‘My church means everything to me:’ Agawam’s Vivian Roberts surprised by pastor on 103rd birthday
Updated 5:15 AM;
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To nurture his small but sturdy congregation of fewer than 100 over the past year of COVID has not been without its challenges for the Rev. J. Willard Cofield.
Each and every member of the First Baptist Church of Agawam, though, provides him inspiration, none more so perhaps than Vivian E. Roberts.
Roberts turned 103 on Friday, and Cofield, with help from the entire congregation and the Agawam community, delivered birthday greetings by the hundreds. Literally.
It was the first time Cofield had been able to visit Roberts in person since she moved last September from the home where she’d lived alone since the death of her husband, Norman, in 2006 to Heritage Woods assisted living. For a man of the cloth who thrives on in-person ministry, not having the personal contact has been his greatest challenge of the pandemic, Cofield says.