This morning, the Rev. Dan Hallgrimson will stand in the rainbow-tinted sanctuary of Grace Lutheran Church and deliver his final Christmas sermon.

Hallgrimson plans to speak from the Book of John about the word of God becoming flesh.

"See, I'm ready," Hallgrimson said last Friday, as he pulled his prepared sermon from a stack of papers on his desk.

After more than 13 years with the Corvallis congregation, and more than three decades as a pastor, Hallgrimson is retiring next Sunday, with some sadness but a lot of optimism.

"You have to make room for the next generation," he said.

Although he was raised Lutheran, Hallgrimson did not originally feel called to become a pastor. After graduating from Western Washington University in 1964 with a degree in science education, he joined the Peace Corps and taught in Malaysia. After he returned, he taught in inner city Seattle and then Hawaii.

He was part of a very tiny Lutheran congregation in the town of Maluhia, which met each Sunday in a quonset hut. There were so few people in attendance that each member had to fulfill many roles in the church and Hallgrimson started to think more deeply about his involvement in his faith.

He decided to attend seminary and enrolled at Pacific Lutheran Theological Seminary in Berkeley, Calif.

"What I liked most was the ecumenical nature of the seminary," he said.

He learned not only from Lutherans, but from Jesuits, Benedictines, Franciscans, Presbyterians, Episcopalians and Methodists as well.

"That tends to make you a bit more ecumenical and more broadly accepting of others," he said, a viewpoint that has remained through his years as a pastor.

Hallgrimson spent seven years as a pastor in Gresham, and then 11 years in Eugene before coming to Corvallis. In those years, he's seen a lot of changes, from the technological advances that now allow him to write his sermons on a computer and project digital slideshows on a big screen during his sermons to the changing attitudes of his congregation.

"The old style of 'the pastor is in charge' is long gone," Hallgrimson said, and he's glad to see the congregation take a more active role in leadership, putting the hierarchical structure of the past aside. He tells members of his congregation that rather than asking his permission to do things they should look to the congregation's mission and vision statements and how their plans fit within church goals.

The church's annual "Christmas Sweaters and Carols" service takes place this Sunday. Church attendees are encouraged to wear their favorite holiday sweaters to round out the Christmas season. It will also include a special retirement rite for Hallgrimson, who will officially release back to the church the responsibilities he assumed as pastor, from baptism to confirmation.

Hallgrimson, who presided over funerals ranging from Nils Hult, the namesake of the Hult Center, to Enrique "Junior" Sanchez, a homeless man murdered in Corvallis in 1999, said his job has given him the opportunity to work with a broad social spectrum of people.

He recommends the ministry, but only for certain people.

"Do it only if you can't stay away from it," he said. "Try a lot of other things first. A second career is not a bad way to go."