The woman appointed as the first person to manage the Church of Scotland's 2,500 staff has announced she will retire next year.
Pauline Weibye, 62, will leave her post as general secretary of the Church at next May's General Assembly.
She will have spent six years in the role which has seen her coordinate the affairs of the Church, Scotland's largest membership organisation and one of the country's largest charities with an annual budget of £110 million.
The post was effectively the Kirk's first "chief executive".
Rev Dr Grant Barclay, who is convener of the Church's Council of Assembly, said Mrs Weibye has been instrumental in shaping the national Church into a smoother running and more coherent organisation.
He said: "Given the Church's Presbyterian nature it was a bold step to create a senior coordinating role. The impact Pauline has had in helping people work together has vindicated the decision.
"She has overseen the Church's move towards a balanced budget, achieved much needed pensions reform and enabled a more strategic focus for the Church's central work.
"Since the earliest days of the church, Christians have found that working together is challenging but, at its best, it enables God's purposes to be worked out in real life.
"Pauline has exemplified leadership which is filled with faith and a deep desire to serve other people.
"Her contribution in this pioneering role has been immensely appreciated."
Mrs Weibye said she is looking forward to retirement, but still has a great deal of work to do in the next nine months before handing over to her successor.
She said: "This has been so much more than a job, it's been a huge privilege to serve the Church in this way.
"I've had a unique insight into the lives of Christian folks up and down the land, doing their best in difficult times to live out the Gospel message.
"Challenging? Yes, sometimes, but all big organisations have their difficult moments.
"We manage to make a difference to people's lives and that's what keeps me and all of my colleagues going.
"I shall be retiring from the day job but fully expect to keep serving the Church at a local level."
Mrs Weibye has helped steer the Kirk through the issue of the the ordination of ministers in same-sex relationships which has divided the Church since traditionalist members attempted to block the appointment of Rev Scott Rennie - who is in a civil partnership - in Aberdeen in 2009.
A total of 21 out of 806 ministers subsequently quit the Kirk over the issue.
The Church's Council of Assembly is currently drawing up plans to "build on the success of the general secretary role".
The recruitment process will start in the autumn.
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules here