The Movement 2024

BEN EATH THE WATER LI N E • page 8

IN TIMACY, AU T H E N T I C I T Y, SIMPLI C I T Y • page 32

M A KI N G D I S C I PLE S T H AT L IGH T U P T H E WO R LD • page 40

the Stories of God at work in the Evangelical Free Church of America

COV ER PHOTO:

Contents

Taken by Mark Winterlin, husband of ReachGlobal missionary Tara (Sharp) Winterlin, on a recent trip to Israel alongside several other EFCA leaders.

Mark's photos of Israel were also used throughout Challenge 2024 in Kansas City and are available for download at helps.efca.org.

A Message From Carlton Harris

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UNDERSTANDIN G SCR IP T U R E A Critical Way to Foster Doctrinal Fidelity and Moral Faithfulness

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How the Gospel Reconciled a Pastoral Feud

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MAKING DISC IP L ES I Remember That Conversation

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Come and See the Next Generation Lit Up by God

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EXT ENDING MIN IST R IES Don’t Give Up on the Great Commission

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Celebrating New Missionaries

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Open to God’s Agenda

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REMEMBERING OU R H ISTORY I Can’t Tell My Story Without the Free Church

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Deepening Our Longstanding Partnership

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L EADING C HURC H ES American Church Meets Scottish Pastor

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Intimacy, Authenticity, Simplicity

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ENGAG ING C ULTU R E A Call for Bold Clarity

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Local Churches Are Key in Crisis

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PL ANT ING C HURCH ES Celebrating New EFCA Churches

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Making Disciples That Light Up the World

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I’m Excited About the Future of the EFCA

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REAC HING ALL P EOP L E Beneath the Water Line

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Q & A with Prepared Graduates

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Why We Serve: Faces of the EFCA National Office

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Staff Acknowledgement

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The articles and stories in this magazine were originally published on the EFCA Blog between 2023 and 2024, with several pieces being published for the first time in print. You can find more EFCA stories at blogs.efca.org.

Support the EFCA National Office ADVANCE the mission of our movement SUPPORT your family of churches E XPAND your church’s impact PARTICIPATE in God’s work through your generosity

Individuals can support national and global ministries through the EFCA Fund: give.efca.org Churches can support the Partnership Fund to equip and expand the work of the national office: efca.org/partnership-fund

Greetings, EFCA family. Welcome to the second edition

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As you read the following stories and articles from various EFCA leaders, churches and ministries, I pray you catch a glimpse of that deep relational unity.

of The Movement, our annual publication highlighting stories of God at work within the Evangelical Free Church of America.

Since I still may be an unfamiliar face to many of you, I want to briefly introduce myself. In March 2024, when the EFCA Board of Directors asked me to consider leaving my role of Executive Vice President of National Ministries to serve as Acting EFCA President, two primary emotions struck me: first fear, then gladness. The fear reminded me of my deep dependence on God and need for His help. The gladness reminded me of how much I love the Free Church – more specifically, the people of the Free Church.

As you’ll read in “Beneath the Water Line” (page 8), my wife Carol and I have a deep history with the EFCA. Although I was never a senior pastor at an EFCA church during my 40-plus years of pastoral ministry, the Free Church has held a unique place in my heart since 1981, when Pastor Mike Andrus hired me as a pastoral intern at First Free Wichita (EFCA). In the last few months serving as Acting President, my appreciation has only grown.

Since stepping into this role in April 2024, I’ve traveled to several districts and local churches and connected with many of you. In April, I spoke at the EFCA Western District Conference in Vacaville, California.

In May, I joined 150 EFCA leaders at New Life Community Church (EFCA) in Aurora, Colorado, to address issues of diversity and justice. And in July, Carol and I made three stops: 1) Kansas City, to worship alongside 3,500 EFCA students and youth leaders at Challenge Conference, 2) Charlotte, to visit with EFCA Clause B district leaders, and 3) again in Charlotte to accept Pastor Chris Payne’s invitation to preach on Romans 15 at New City Church (EFCA).

In short, I’ve already had many wonderful opportunities to step into deeper relationship with many of you – EFCA pastors, ministry leaders, missionaries, students and many more.

As my predecessor Kevin Kompelien – who you’ll also hear from in this publication – often said during his time as EFCA President, we are better together. Whatever your role, it is a privilege for all of us to do ministry together, as “one EFCA.” As we move into this next season of ministry, let’s ground ourselves in that same interdependence that has existed in the Free Church from the beginning. In conjunction with the EFCA’s historical values – the inerrancy of Scripture, centricity of the gospel and emphasis on the Great Commission – I hope to anchor the EFCA in the sweet relational unity that defines who we are as a movement.

Majoring on the majors. Unity amid disagreement. Working together as one EFCA. As you read the following stories and articles from various EFCA leaders, churches and ministries, I pray you catch a glimpse of that deep relational unity. I also pray, as Kevin said last year, that you see a bit of yourself and your congregation in these stories – and that you feel a deep sense of pride and appreciation for your connection to the Free Church, like I do.

Thank you for being a part of this wonderful movement that I am humbled and honored to serve. May God bless you and your ministry in the days ahead.

With joyful hope,

CARLTON P. HARRIS

Acting EFCA President

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JOIN US AT THE EFCA'S BIENNIAL NATIONAL CONFERENCE Registration opens January 2025 | events.efca.org/efca-one

REMEMBERING OUR HISTORY

ANNA BELLUM: I Can’t Tell My Story Without the Free Church A member of the EFCA Board of Directors shares about her roots with the EFCA – and why she stuck around.

I first got involved with the EFCA in utero. My parents

met at an EFCA church in Gainsville, Florida, as students at the University of Florida. When they moved to Albuquerque before I was born, they immediately got involved with Hope Church (EFCA) and haven’t looked back. My mom jokes that she doesn’t remember potty-training me – she’s pretty sure the women who worked in the nursery took care of that (I don’t actually think it’s a joke!). But that is indicative of my story. From the beginning, Hope – and, by extension, the EFCA – has been the backdrop against which almost every significant moment in my life has taken place.

My first impressions of the EFCA are really best described as my “all-along-the-way” impressions. I came to know Christ in a Free Church. I was baptized here. When I was a child, and my dad lost his job for an extended period of time, our church community rallied around us with support: meals, parts of paychecks, mystery Christmas gifts on the front porch (I still don’t know who gave me that stuffed soccer ball), benevolence gifts, mortgage payments, you name it – over the course of years!

When I wanted to take athletics more seriously, it was my youth pastor who paid for a gym membership for me. I discovered my passion for missions, other cultures, languages and travel through Hope and our partnerships all around the world, many of whom are Free Church partners.

In college, I majored in Spanish. Why? Because Hope took a short-term trip to a Spanish-speaking community when I was eleven, and God radically changed my life. I ended up pursuing a PhD in Latin American Literature, and when the time came for me to put my nose to the grindstone and finish my dissertation, it was Hope who helped make it happen. The elders gave me part of my sabbatical three years early in order for me to have time and space to do the necessary writing. The Free Church and I are woven together, I can’t actually tell my life story without it.

In the midst of all of those life events, I was more and more convinced that God was calling me to full-time missions – until He wasn’t. All of a sudden, in my late twenties, God started calling me back to my roots, deeper and deeper into Hope in different areas of leadership. I started to learn the church in which I had grown up in new and exciting ways.

I never imagined I would work for a church. I was quite content with the thought of ministry as a lay leader that wouldn’t be full-time, but would be full-life. However, in 2015 our lead and

executive pastors invited me to consider joining Hope’s staff as the outreach director. It wasn’t what I had expected, but it was what God was doing, so I said yes.

Being in this role has allowed me to gain more and more friendships throughout the broader EFCA through conferences, meetings, joint missional efforts and the like. I don’t actually know who recommended I be considered for the EFCA Board of Directors, but I’m grateful for their vote of confidence and for seeing something I didn’t see myself. In June 2021, I was voted in at the virtual EFCA One conference and began my tenure as a board member that September.

Our movement is full of people who pursue God above all else, hold each other accountable and live our life in such a way that we believe is glorifying to God. By far, what I value most about the EFCA on a philosophical level is our ethos of majoring on the majors and minoring on the minors. In a cultural climate where people want to parse words, define lines and have the exact right interpretation on a particular topic or situation so as to prove others wrong, our ethos leads us to insist on what is essential, and then to leave room for dialogue and discipleship in all other things.

Even on secondary topics where we all agree, our primary unity is in agreeing that they are secondary. As such, we preserve, honor and lift high those ten points that we hold firmly to as our essentials – the same basic tenets the historical church has held to for millennia.

As a result of that ethos, our movement is full of people who pursue God above all else, hold each other accountable and live our life in such a way that we believe is glorifying to God. Wonderfully, even emphatically, we are people who disagree, save for our Statement of Faith; save for the only true tie that binds us. We have agreed to that. And that stands out to me about our movement.

The humble orthodoxy that is so deeply rooted in the EFCA can sway this way and that, but it will not be blown over. That is what makes me want to be a part of the EFCA; that and the people who have said “yes and amen” to it.

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I L LU STR ATIO N BY K E NDA L L SO D E RSTRO M

Beneath the Water Line The future of the EFCA is rooted in trusting relationships.

CAR LTO N P. HA RRIS

Carlton started ministry in 1981 as a pastoral intern at First Evangelical Free Church in Wichita, Kansas, and has spent 40 years in church leadership. He began his role at the EFCA national office leading the ReachNational division in September 2021 and was named acting president of the EFCA in April 2024. He and his wife, Carol, are members at New Hope Church in New Hope, Minnesota.

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THE MOVEMENT 2024

REACHING ALL PEOPLE

In the summer of 2021, I received a call at my home in San Diego, California. It was a search consultant with NL

Moore and Associates. She was recruiting for an open position at the EFCA, Executive Vice President of National Ministries.

“I don’t know who this person is or why they’re bothering me,” I told my wife, Carol, after the call. “I’m sure I’m not what they’re looking for.”

For 30 years, I’d been a pastor – 14 years in Cleveland Heights, 16 more in San Diego, neither an EFCA church – I didn’t know much else. I certainly felt I knew little about being a national leader for an entire movement of churches.

But at Nancy Moore’s persistence, I agreed to pray about the opportunity with Carol for the next two weeks. Four months later, I accepted the job and packed my bags for Minneapolis.

F REE C HURC H RO OTS My introduction to the Evangelical Free Church of America came the summer of 1981 in Wichita, Kansas. A Free Church pastor by the name of Mike Andrus hired me as a pastoral intern at First Free in Wichita. Mike took a chance on me – with my big afro, mutton-chop sideburns and blonde-haired bride – and people left his church because of it.

Mike had a profound influence on my life. Beyond his belief in me and Carol, Mike was a brilliant preacher, committed to the Word of God and had a deep heart for church planting. When I accepted my first senior pastor position in 1992 – a struggling multiethnic congregation in Cleveland Heights, Ohio – Mike and several other members of First Free continued to pray for and encourage me. When Carol and I moved to San Diego 14 years later, Mike preached my installation service.

I accepted the position with the EFCA in the summer of 2021 for multiple reasons, but at the core of it was the people.

Everything Mike did was rooted in preaching the Bible and loving people. That was it. It was simple, but it stuck with me.

I want to be around people like him, I remember thinking.

And I want to be around churches like this.

Although God’s path led me away from the EFCA for most of my pastoral ministry, my time in Wichita gave me a sweet tooth

CAR LTO N AT DAL L AS T HE O LO GI CAL S E M I NA RY.

for the Free Church. Even as I pastored non-EFCA churches, I kept my eye on the movement. I subscribed to the Evangelical Beacon and Pursuit Magazine (the EFCA’s two major publications at the time). I read that stuff constantly. I had my heart toward the EFCA, but a door never opened for me.

That is, until Nancy Moore called, exactly 40 years after Mike hired me in Wichita.

I accepted the position with the EFCA in the summer of 2021 for multiple reasons, but at the core of it was the people. People like Mike Andrus, who had hearts for God’s Word and the Great Commission. Free Church people.

For years, I’d been asking God to help me finish well in life.

Now, I was asking Him to multiply my impact and make the final season of my life more fruitful than all the others combined – and He led me back to where it all began.

G O I N G B E N E AT H T H E WAT E R LI N E Christianity is about relationship. It’s a relational religion. When the Pharisees asked Jesus about the greatest commandment in the Law, He said: “‘Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.’ This is the first and greatest commandment. And the second is like it: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’ All the Law and the Prophets hang on these two commandments.” (Matthew 22:37-40) In my experience, people are transformed in three primary ways: the Word of God, the Spirit of God and the people of God (Articles 2, 6–8 of the EFCA Statement of Faith). As evangelicals, we are people of the Book. Everything we do is deeply rooted in Scripture – and I love that about our movement – but I want to make sure we’re not missing the other two.

I’m all for the study of Scripture. I love the left-brained, intellectual side of evangelicalism. In seminary, I hosted a Q&A radio show where I explained all sorts of theological topics

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We learned from people. We walked with people – in seasons where it felt like God was smiling on our ministry, and in seasons of spiritual, emotional and physical struggle.

Through all of it, we saw how the people of God can impact one another as vehicles of God’s healing love. That was at the core of our ministry, beneath the water line. Or, in the words of my good friend Kevin Kompelien: CARLTON AND CAROL IN T HE E ARLY 1 9 8 0s.

through debate with callers and co-hosts. I had an answer for everything – divorce and remarriage, tongues and spiritual gifts, you name it. I had my views packaged up with bows, but that wasn’t what changed me – at least, that wasn’t all of it.

Everything in the depth of people’s hearts – emotions and motives – is below the water line. That’s where true change happens.

In my late 20s, I started to loosen my uncharitable grip on some of those views. In his book Inside Out, Dr. Larry Crabb introduced me to the illustration of people as icebergs. Above the “water line” of our hearts is seen and conscious behavior. Below the water line is unseen and often unconscious.

Everything in the depth of people’s hearts – emotions and motives – is below the water line. That’s where true change happens, and it happens in the context of safe relationship.

Reading Dr. Crabb’s book prompted a season of great change for me. At one point, Carol looked at me with tears in her eyes and said, “I don’t know you anymore.” I agreed.

When we began our ministry in Cleveland Heights, God began a work in my heart. I felt (what I hoped was) a holy discontent. As a new pastor, I saw how easy it would be to isolate, to be the “lonely pastor,” to only allow people to see the tip of the iceberg. But God called me in a different direction, to relationship, and my life changed because of it.

In trusting relationships with a community of believers, Carol and I navigated the deep waters of pastoral life. We did life together with our church community. We unpacked personal issues. We raised a family. We married and buried people.

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“I firmly believe that all ministry is based in relationships, all relationships are based on trust, and trust grows as we minister together in meaningful ways” (Partners with the President, February 2016).

“H E ’S F O R R E A L.” When I first met Kevin, we did the typical, “professional” dance when you’re a candidate for a job. I wore a suit and tie. We exchanged small talk. Tip of the iceberg stuff. After the interview, when I still wasn’t sure about the position, my good friend Mike Andrus reassured me: “Kevin’s a good brother,” he said.

Near the end of the process, Kevin and his wife Becky flew to San Diego to visit me and Carol, and we spent the day together at one of our favorite restaurants. After we dropped the Kompeliens back at the airport, I turned to Carol and asked, “So, what do you think about Kevin?”

Without missing a beat, she said, “He’s for real. I trust him.” I couldn’t have agreed more.

When I started with ReachNational in September 2021, Kevin onboarded me with wisdom, skill and care. He gave me freedom to lead. He trusted me. He walked with me and supported me as we navigated a new direction for national ministries. He did everything in his power to help me as a leader.

As a man and as a leader, Kevin Kompelien models loving, trusting relationships, and I hope to carry on his legacy.

For the last two-plus years, I’ve watched Kevin live the leadership principle that “more is caught than taught.” I’ve had a front-row seat watching him love the people of the EFCA. Kevin

REACHING ALL PEOPLE

just emotes love and relationship. He cares for people with grace and patience. He loves his family – his wife, his kids, his kids-inlaw, his grandkids. As a man and as a leader, Kevin models loving, trusting relationships, and I hope to carry on his legacy as I step into the role of Acting President of the EFCA. CON TIN UI N G TOWARD “ON E E FCA” Looking forward, I know the next three years (until the presidential term ends in June 2027) will go by quickly. In my experience, it takes about five to seven years to impact a local church, and about seven to 10 to have an impact on a regional level. As I step into this new role, I’m not fooling myself. My aim isn’t to enact great, foundational change in our movement.

Instead, I want to build on the Foundation Stones1 that are already here.

During the next three years, I want to continue what trusted EFCA leaders have started. I want to foster the sweet relational unity and fellowship among district leaders (which, in my view, is one of Kevin’s greatest legacies). I want to reinforce our deep commitment to the Great Commission – in local churches, districts, national ministries and around the globe.

In everything, I hope to love first, lead second, but always do both.

I’m asking God to use the EFCA to raise up the next wave of leaders to lead churches that transform lives and, in turn, communities. I’m asking God to deepen our sense of “all people,” to use churches and global workers to populate the great heavenly scene of “every tribe and language and people and nation” (Revelation 5:9). I’m asking God to empower us to “keep the unity of the Spirit through the bond of peace” (Ephesians 4:3), to keep us grounded in our ethos and values, and to give us a courageous, humble and joyful spirit.

I pray that, as I step into these uncharted waters, I will lead out of my personal and relational wealth – rooted in the Word of God, the Spirit of God and the people of God. I will not be a lone ranger or the “lonely president.” In everything, I hope to love first, lead second, but always do both.

In closing, I want to turn us back toward Kevin’s beautiful vision of “one EFCA,” rooted in trusting relationships:

CAR LTO N AN D CAR O L W I T H T HE I R SE VE N GR AN D C H I L D R E N.

“The mission and vision of the EFCA are dynamic and powerful statements of what we believe the Lord wants to do in and through our churches. Yet, unless we are clear in how we are working together, we won’t see the depth and breadth of gospel transformation. I believe we are most effective when local churches and districts, along with the national and international ministries of the EFCA, work closely together to see ministry advance. This happens best when based on shared biblical and ministry values, trusting relationships, and commonly identified areas of ministry focus” (Partners with the President, October 2015).

I joined the EFCA movement because of the theology, the vision and the people – people like Mike Andrus, and Kevin and Becky Kompelien. And because of the people – those of you I know already and those I’ve still yet to meet – I trust that God will guide the EFCA into a future of joy that is rooted in relationship.

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To read more about the EFCA Foundation Stones (from EFCA President Emeritus Kevin Kompelien), visit efca.org/foundation-stones THE MOVEMENT 2024

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DEEPENING OUR Longstanding Partnership Anchored in our shared values, TEDS and the EFCA are stronger together.

K E VI N KOM P E L I E N

When I attended Trinity Evangelical Divinity School (TEDS) in the early 1980s, I witnessed something that has stayed with me even today.

Around my second year at TEDS, the EFCA was wrestling through a question: could a pastor be credentialed in the EFCA if he didn’t hold to a pretribulation view of the rapture?

In their search for unity and insight, the EFCA Ministerial Association asked three TEDS professors – Paul Feinberg, Gleason Archer and Douglas Moo – to each write a paper defending one of the three main interpretations of the rapture.

After they finished, each presented his view on the TEDS campus at the Ministerial Association’s 1981 Mid-Winter Institute (the precursor to the EFCA Theology Conference).

Sitting in the Arnold T. Olson Chapel as a young seminarian, I watched with genuine amazement as these brilliant, godly men engaged in a lively dialogue on a significant theological topic that mattered to the Free Church – as friends.

As Dr. Moo put it in his presentation on post-tribulationalism, “I cannot, indeed must not, allow this conviction to represent any kind of barrier to full relationships with brothers who hold different convictions.”

Although the professors genuinely disagreed, they did so respectfully. Despite their differences in beliefs, they all anchored themselves in the Word of God, their love for each other and their love for the church.

“This is incredible,” I remember thinking. “I want to be a part of something like this.”

So much of my life as a young pastor—and eventual leadership in the EFCA – was built on what I learned and experienced at TEDS. And all of it – the unwavering commitment to Scripture and deep love for the church, majoring on the majors and minoring on the minors – reflected the DNA of the EFCA. It’s who the Free Church has been since the beginning.

Earlier this year, when the Trinity International University (TIU) Board of Regents approached me about becoming TIU’s next president, I thought back to my years at TEDS. I thought back to that robust discussion between those professors, to the gospel-centric focus surrounded by a spirit of deep love and unity.

And I thought, “If we lose that, we lose something that can really help the EFCA to be who God called us to be as a movement of churches.” If Trinity and the EFCA lose that longstanding partnership – based on the historic values we share – we both lose an opportunity to grow in our shared mission to effectively train pastors, missionaries and leaders for the church.

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THE MOVEMENT 2024

P RE SI DE N T KO MP E L IE N DE L IV E RS T RI N IT Y ' S CO MMEN C E M E N T A DDRE SS I N A RN O L D T. O L SO N CHA P E L IN M AY 20 24 .

EFCA family – pastors and church leaders, national and district staff, missionaries, lay leaders and members – this is what EFCA churches need today. This is what Trinity needs today.

I love Trinity, I love the Free Church, and we’re better when we’re together.

R E T U R N I N G TO O U R R O OTS The Free Church started for three primary reasons: 1) to send missionaries, 2) to plant churches, and 3) to train and affirm pastors. Trinity finds its roots in that third goal.

In 1897, in the basement of a Swedish Evangelical Free Church in Chicago, that congregation started a 10-week Bible course. They wanted their church leaders to be trained in the ethos of the EFCA: tethered to the Text, grounded in the gospel, majoring on the majors as they followed Jesus’ Great Commission to the ends of the earth.

In the early 1960s, after several decades and iterations of the school, Trinity Dean Kenneth Kantzer cast a new vision for the seminary that combined robust biblical orthodoxy with evangelistic zeal and cultural engagement. The “Kantzer vision” centered on academic excellence and pastoral proficiency.

Understanding God’s Word and living it out. Deep theological study and practical application in the local church.

More than half a century later and following several years of declining enrollment, now is the time to reaffirm TEDS’ longstanding relationship with the EFCA. How can TEDS better reflect the heart and ethos of the EFCA, and more effectively serve local Free Churches? And beyond that, how can we, in the words of Ken Kantzer, be “a love gift from the EFCA to the entire church of Jesus Christ”?

It starts with a healthy partnership between TEDS and the EFCA. H O N O R I N G T H E E T H O S O F T H E E F CA Following my leadership transition and subsequent emphasis on TEDS returning to its roots, one of the TIU Board members – and longtime Free Church member – asked me: “Kevin, what’s your elevator speech? If you had one paragraph to describe what it means that TEDS is returning to its roots, what would you say?”

REMEMBERING OUR HISTORY

In other words, what does all of this actually mean?

For TEDS, while we still train students from a variety of evangelical streams, it starts with joyfully honoring the distinctives and ethos of the EFCA. The EFCA has always been people of the Book. This movement was built on our shared Statement of Faith, our unwavering commitment to the inerrant Word of God as the foundation for life and ministry, and our stewardship of the lifechanging gospel that challenges the mind, engages the heart and encourages action. That theological core, which Trinity fully embraces, is essential, but it’s not the whole picture.

As Bill Kynes wrote about in The Gospel Coalition, “the central EFCA distinctive is that it ‘majors on the majors.’” Yes, we anchor ourselves in the truth of Scripture, but we also do that in a way that reflects the heart of Jesus. The EFCA is about pursuing truth with a sense of winsome graciousness to say, “We’re in this together, and we keep our eyes on Jesus and His mission while grounding everything we do in the inerrant Word.” That’s what I witnessed back in the early ‘80s with those three professors.

That’s what enables Trinity to educate those from a variety of evangelical backgrounds, and it’s what has inspired so much of my ministry vision, even today.

The EFCA and Trinity exist at an important juncture in our world today. In a moment so polarized and tribalized – where, in anger and fear, we dismiss people by putting them in boxes – our culture needs a counter-cultural picture of unity. EFCA churches need to provide a refuge in the chaos. Our church leaders need training in the distinctives and ethos of the EFCA, because this is who we are.

TRAINING THE NEXT GENERATION OF EFCA LEADERS When I think about the people who I know influenced my life, three people come to my mind. I think of my dad. I think of one of my uncles, Art Ramsland, who was also a Free Church pastor.

And I think of Wes Johnson, my pastor growing up who eventually became superintendent of the EFCA Great Lakes District.

As a young pastor, when I thought about who I wanted to become, these three men were right there – and all of them studied at Trinity (my dad studied at the college, not the seminary). Trinity shaped who they became, and in turn, it shaped me as well.

Directly and indirectly, TEDS taught me to think biblically and theologically. Professors like Don Carson, John Woodbridge and Walter Kaiser (among many others) taught me the ethos of the EFCA: we agree on gospel essentials, and we charitably disagree about non-essentials. We can still love each other and not divide.

Since I stepped into this new role, I’ve had several people tell me that this transition feels like the next logical step toward “one EFCA,” the vision I cast back in 2015 to see local, regional, national and international ministries working together toward common ministry objectives with shared values and trusting relationships. I have to say, I agree.

Part of my role as EFCA President was to guard the theological and biblical integrity of the movement, and I believe a healthy, vibrant TEDS helps the EFCA do that. After all, TEDS is the only seminary to share the EFCA Statement of Faith. As TEDS helps to raise up the next generation of church leaders—and come alongside existing leaders—EFCA churches will be better equipped to effectively address the issues of our day while still maintaining a counter-cultural unity.

If we do this well, the EFCA and TEDS can deepen a longstanding partnership of biblical-theological study and practical application in the context of the local church.

Because, at the end of the day, TEDS is about the church.

BY T H E C H U R C H , F O R T H E C H U R C H To once again quote my friend Bill Kynes, Trinity was started by the church, for the church. At the core of the school’s foundation are questions like, “How do we support the church?” and “How do we resource the church?”

We’re not just writing papers. We’re equipping real leaders for real ministry. It’s head, heart and hands. Yes, we’re molding minds with great theological content. Yes, we’re shaping hearts in the life-changing power of the gospel. And we’re also equipping hands to do the work of ministry.

If we do this well, the EFCA and TEDS can deepen a longstanding partnership of biblical-theological study and practical application in the context of the local church.

I think about North Suburban Church (EFCA), just down the road from campus, where senior pastor Tim Higgins (MDiv ‘16) credits Trinity for jarring him “out of the realm of the theoretical and…into the realm of devotion.”

I think about First Free Wichita (EFCA), where pastor Josh Black (MDiv ‘11) partners with TEDS to lead a residency program focused on multiethnic ministry, and Jane Schaible (MA Theological Studies, ‘22) leads women to practice faithful hermeneutics in their local congregations as the director of women’s leadership and discipleship for the EFCA Midwest District.

I think about The Compass Church (EFCA) in Naperville, Illinois, who recently partnered with Trinity to launch a certificate program to train church staff and leaders. I think about Brian Farone (MDiv ’07) – member of the Trinity Board of Directors and superintendent of the EFCA North Central District (NCD) – who, along with TEDS professor Dr. Scott Manetsch, led a group of NCD pastors through the Alps to learn about church history and wrestle through their own pastoral practices.

I’m not a scholar, by any means. The closest I’ve come to an academic is the honorary doctorate Trinity so graciously gave to me. But I do have the heart of a pastor who loves the church.

I love the EFCA, and I believe TEDS is here for the church. And if what we’re doing isn’t serving the church, we need to rethink what we’re doing.

TEDS and the Free Church are better together. Together, we can effectively serve the church by training men and women to engage in God’s redemptive work in the world. And we do this by returning to the roots of who we are, all for the glory of God and the advancement of His gospel.

Kevin Kompelien served as the president of the Evangelical Free Church of America from June 2015 until April 2024, and currently serves as the president of Trinity International University. He previously served more than 20 years as a local pastor in the EFCA and then nine years as international leader of the Africa division with EFCA ReachGlobal. He and his wife, Becky, are members of Hillside EFC in San Jose, California.

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Credentialing:

A Critical Way to Foster Doctrinal Fidelity and Moral Faithfulness The history, policy, processes and benefits of pursuing credentialing in the EFCA. G R E G ST RAN D

Two men were visiting a cemetery and as they slowly walked through, they paused to read the epitaphs on the tombstones. As they approached one of the graves, one

of the men surprisingly exclaimed, “Look, two people buried in this grave. It says, ‘Here lies a pastor and a theologian.’”

We smile, knowing that truly there was only one individual buried in this grave, one who was a pastor-theologian. Yet, the fact remains that some consider that one is either a pastor serving in a local church, or one is a theologian serving in a Bible college or seminary. But surely, those serving in the local church are to serve as pastor-theologians.

Let’s continue the anecdotal story. There are two individuals talking about an EFCA church with congregational polity, i.e., a church comprised of professing believers under the Lord and Head Jesus Christ. One turns to another and says, “Look, here are two churches, an independent church and an interdependent church.” The thought is that a church is either independent or inter-dependent. However, in the EFCA, local churches are both independent and inter-dependent. (The EFCA Articles of Incorporation refer to the EFCA as “an association and fellowship of autonomous but interdependent congregations of like faith and congregational government.” Emphasis mine.)

This means that in the EFCA, we are committed to the model of pastor-theologians serving in churches that are autonomous and interdependent. The church affirms the EFCA Statement of Faith, reflecting the autonomous and interdependent polity, and the pastor(s) and other minister(s) pursue credentialing, reflecting the commitment to the model of pastor-theologian.

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PASTO R AU ST I N SHAW ( L E FT ) RE CE IV E S H I S E F CA CE RT IFICAT E O F O RDIN AT IO N FRO M A L L E GHE N Y D I ST R I C T SU P E RIN T E N DE N T K E RRY DOYA L ( RI GHT ) AT P ROV I D E N C E CHU RCH ( E FCA ) IN AVO N , O HIO IN A PR I L 20 24 .

U N D E R STA N D I N G S C R I P T U R E

Furthermore, in today’s culture, with doctrinal aberrations and immoral behavior which have dishonored the Lord and caused harm to God’s people, it is wise for pastors and other ministers to submit themselves to doctrinal fidelity and moral purity, and it is wise for churches to require this of their pastors and ministers.

Although there is no absolute guarantee, this is one means of safeguarding the doctrinal and moral health of pastors and other ministers, and thus the EFCA, both now and for the future.

With this article, my hope is to encourage and exhort pastors, other ministers and missionaries to be credentialed, and to encourage and exhort elders, leaders and church members to require their pastors, other ministers and missionaries to be credentialed.

HISTORY A N D POL ICY OF CRE D E N TIAL IN G There was one key reason for the Spirit-prompted origin of the EFCA in 1884, along with two accompanying convictions.

The reason: missions – evangelism, church planting and global outreach. The two accompanying convictions: education – training of pastors and missionaries – and credentialing – testing (doctrinal and moral) of pastors and missionaries. With traveling pastors, credentialing was a way to ensure that the pastor had been vetted so they knew he could be trusted.

In our EFCA Articles of Incorporation, as “an association and fellowship of autonomous but interdependent congregations of like faith and congregational government,” one of our objectives is “to credential and help to place pastors, missionaries and other Christian workers and to hold them accountable for personal life and ministry.” This is done through the ministry of the Board of Ministerial Standing (BOMS), a board affirmed by and accountable to the EFCA Conference.

As articulated in the EFCA Bylaws, BOMS, in conjunction with districts, is responsible to carry out all matters related to credentialing. Specifically, in matters related to doctrine, BOMS “shall seek to preserve the doctrinal integrity of the EFCA, and shall adjudicate all charges brought to it of doctrinal error among ministers.” In matters related to moral purity, BOMS “shall hear, investigate and adjudicate all charges brought to it of moral error among ministers.” Additionally, BOMS “shall prescribe appropriate discipline for any minister found to have committed doctrinal or moral error and shall prescribe times and means of restoration where possible and in accordance with the policies and rules established by the Board of Ministerial Standing.”

Although there is no absolute guarantee, [credentialing] is one means of safeguarding the doctrinal and moral health of pastors and other ministers, and thus the EFCA, both now and for the future.

In sum, BOMS’ task is to “carry out the policies of the EFCA in all matters related to credentialing,” with the primary responsibility to “preserve the doctrinal integrity of the EFCA,” and to preserve moral purity among pastors, other ministers and missionaries. This is one of the important ways of ensuring the EFCA remains a denomination that does not deviate doctrinally and which takes seriously the moral purity of pastors, other ministers and missionaries as a reflection of the gospel and for the glory of God.

Because credentialing plays an important role in the EFCA, it is important to be informed.

What follows is a series of questions and answers that explain several benefits of credentialing.

1

What types of credentials are offered?

One must be in a qualifying ministry which consists of a ministry of the Word of God primarily in the context of a local church. One begins with a Ministry License, required of all (expedited, five-year nonrenewable, three-year renewable), and for those who desire a permanent credential, they have the option of pursuing a Certificate of Christian Ministry (for both men and women) or the Certificate of Ordination (for men only), which reflects our complementarian convictions, consistent with our policy and our history. Additionally, all candidates must complete the Policy on Spiritual and Character Qualifications.

2

Why should the local church encourage or require their vocational ministry staff to be credentialed?

Because this is a national credential, it provides consistency and uniformity of standards and expectations for all those being credentialed. When a local church has a pastoral staff person credentialed in the EFCA, they can be reassured of the calling, character, and biblical and theological competency of this person. This is true of their pastoral staff who have been credentialed while in ministry with them, and it is also true of those they may call at some point in the future. This is an important way the EFCA national office serves local churches.

Moreover, this is a very important step to ensure doctrinal fidelity and moral purity in the lives of those who serve as pastoral staff. If there is doctrinal compromise or moral failure with an uncredentialed pastoral staff person, the local church often must address it alone. If a person is credentialed, it provides a national resource to the local church to address these matters intentionally, purposefully and redemptively. This is also an important way in which the autonomous local church communicates their interdependency with other local EFCA churches together known as the EFCA. (There is a difference between being a pastor of an EFCA church and being an EFCA pastor.)

3

What are the benefits to the local church?

The local church leaders and membership will be assured that their pastoral staff is aligned with the EFCA and is committed to serve within the EFCA. As members in a local church are under authority (of Christ, the elders and other members), so is the pastoral staff under the same authority, and also the authority of the EFCA, both in doctrinal and moral matters. The pastoral staff is saying to the local church that we, too, are under authority, and we are fully committed to the EFCA.

4

What does the process of credentialing and the subsequent three-year reaffirmation of all credentialed individuals mean for the EFCA? These help to ensure doctrinal fidelity. What one affirms doctrinally at some point in the past is important, but over time there may be changes in doctrinal positions or perspectives. Some of those changes are minor, simply shifts within acceptable biblical and theological parameters. Others are more substantive and compromise or undermine biblical truth through a move towards heterodoxy or heresy. The fact that all those credentialed in the EFCA are asked to affirm initially their commitment to the biblical and theological truths of the Scriptures and our evangelical convictions as articulated in our Statement of Faith, and then subsequently every three years to reaffirm one’s commitment to “subscribe to and affirm without mental reservation each article of the EFCA Statement of Faith” helps to ensure those credentialed in the EFCA remain committed to doctrinal truth both in the present and in the future. This is a means of ensuring the present and future doctrinal fidelity and moral purity of credentialed pastors, other ministers and missionaries, and also the EFCA as a denomination.

5

What are the benefits for the candidate of the credentialing process?

The candidate will be affirmed beyond the local church regarding a calling to and gifting for ministry. Through this process, the candidate will have structure to guide the study and processing of truths and the pastoral applications of those truths in the lives of God’s people. It will also provide accountability, both doctrinally and morally.

Read more at credentialing.efca.org.

C O N C LU S I O N Returning to the model of pastor-theologians serving in EFCA churches that are autonomous and interdependent, I reiterate what I stated at the beginning: The goal of this article is to encourage and to exhort pastors, other ministers and missionaries to be credentialed, and to encourage and to exhort elders, leaders and church members to require their pastors, other ministers and missionaries to be credentialed.

I asked several credentialed EFCA pastors the question, “Why be credentialed?,” and requested they comment on the benefits personally, to the church and to the EFCA. These affirming responses could be multiplied:

Personal • It is good for the pastor (and other ministers and missionaries) to be formally examined and approved relative to gifting, skills, character and ability to teach the Bible soundly. There is much learning that takes place through the credentialing process.

• It is good for the pastor to align formally with and to be accountable to the EFCA family of churches, similar to how he challenges his congregants to become church members.

• A credential is somewhat like board certification for many other vocations – you may not absolutely need it to practice that vocation, but you must meet specified, external standards to get it. This credential – whether license or ordination – reminds us that one is not one’s own Pope, i.e., I do not get to set the standards for my calling. God Himself does that, which is recognized, affirmed and approved by others, and in the EFCA that consists of the local church, the district and the national office (i.e., the three-legged stool).

Church • The church can learn along with the pastor and other ministers when integrating the process with his ministry.

• It is good for the church to know that the EFCA affirms their pastor officially – both character and doctrine – and by rigorous standards (“Watch your life and doctrine closely” (1 Tim 4:16)).

• The pastor owes it to the church served and any served in the future to pursue pastoral ministry with doctrinal and ethical integrity. A credential beyond what a local church offers says to the wider church, “Our pastor is recognized as fit for ministry by biblical standards, which has been affirmed by others. And since we are an EFCA church, we gladly follow their guidelines and requirements.” Although there is no guarantee, doctrinal and moral requirements, grounded in Scripture, are confirmed through credentialing, which ensures and fosters fidelity and faithfulness through accountability.

Some sort of recognition or certification is required for those serving in most every other vocational profession.

EFCA • It helps safeguard our present and future doctrinal integrity and moral purity as a family of churches.

• It safeguards our commitment to apostolic doctrine and holiness by seeing to it that future pastoral leaders are held to the same high standards in both realms, which we believe should be required of all ministers of the gospel.

• Being credentialed grants one the privilege of serving in some district and national ministries and serving as a member on a district credentialing council. Ordination enables one to serve on a council for a Certificate of Christian Ministry, Certificate of Ordination and a Transfer of Ordination, and it also opens a door for one to be considered for the ministry of BOMS. Credentialing plays a critical role in preserving the doctrinal integrity and moral purity of our pastors and other ministers personally, and also directly the local church where they serve, and finally, the EFCA more broadly. It is a wonderful joy and privilege to be able to study doctrinal truths expounded in our Statement of Faith, to write about them and then to be asked to articulate those beliefs before others. It is also important that one reaffirms those beliefs and be asked about moral purity every three years.

It is a wonderful joy and privilege to be able to study doctrinal truths expounded in our Statement of Faith, to write about them and then to be asked to articulate those beliefs before others.

EFCA

Statement of Faith Video Series and Study Guide

Led by Greg Strand and professors from TEDS, dive deeper into each article of the EFCA Statement of Faith and equip your congregation on the theological convictions that unite our movement.

Since we care about and are committed to doctrinal integrity and moral purity, and because we care about the spiritual health and well-being of the church and the EFCA now and for the future, and because we are engaged in a life of worship, if you are a pastor, or a minister in some other capacity, or a missionary, I encourage you to be credentialed. If you are an elder, leader or church member, I exhort you to require your pastor(s), other minister(s) and missionaries to be credentialed.

As I often say, the appropriate context in which credentialing is approached is worship. Theology is the ground of doxology (worship), and doxology is the fruit of theology (truth and doctrine). EFCA credentialing consists of both, so join in the doxological study of theology through credentialing.

Greg Strand is EFCA executive director of theology and credentialing, and he serves on the Board of Ministerial Standing as well as the Spiritual Heritage Committee. He and his wife, Karen, are members of Northfield (Minnesota) EFC.

Learn more and download the resources

Q &

Three years ago, the EFCA launched a theological training

cohort called Prepared. The vision was to provide an affordable, accessible and systematic program for women in ministry

leadership, equipping and preparing them to face their unique

challenges in ministry. With several of Prepared’s first students

having graduated (or soon graduating), we checked in with three of them to see how Prepared has impacted their lives and ministries.

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KAT E SE NYS HY N

Worship Leader & EquipU Director, Fox Valley Church (Dundee, IL)

E MILY R .

Missionary in South Asia

ASHLE Y HAF E R M A N

Credentialing and Multiplication Catalyst, EFCA Forest Lakes District

REACHING ALL PEOPLE

Where were you before Prepared and why did you apply for the program?

K ATE : When I applied for Prepared, I was working part-time at Fox Valley Church (EFCA) as a worship leader while going to school full-time to finish my undergraduate degree. I’d started my undergrad journey as an education major, but through a string of events, people and time with the Lord, I felt a strong redirection into ministry. Working in ministry was – and still is – new to me, and I struggled with my role and what God was asking of me. I was also wrestling with bigger questions like, “What is a woman’s role in ministry leadership?” and “What did God have in mind with the roles He gave men and women?” I was in a place of curiosity, but it provoked a lot of anxiety and fear.

Did I make the right choice? Is this what God was asking of me?

In the summer, my senior pastor told me about Prepared. I was having so many doubts and concerns, and it felt like the Lord’s perfect timing. I applied days before the application closed and was given one of the final slots.

E MILY: Around the time I was considering Prepared, I had been on the field as a missionary in Southeast Asia for six years. My husband and I moved here in 2016 and now have two small kids. I grew up in church – with many wonderful discipleship opportunities, mentors and experiences with missions – but I never had any formal ministry training. When I heard about Prepared, my husband had just started seminary, but I knew that would never be an option for me, considering the expense, workload and length of time. Around this time, my friend Julie Triplett was finishing up with the Prepared pilot group, and she let me know they started allowing non-EFCA women to join if the classes weren’t full. I jumped at the opportunity! I had seen my best friend go through this course in the throes of a job, small babies and lots of ministry, so I had confidence this was doable in my context. My cohort was the first Friday morning group, which was the only way it could work for me. God clearly wanted me in this program.

ASHL E Y: After a challenging season in ministry, I confessed to my husband that I was done. It was too hard. I wanted to just "live life" without all the hard stuff. When I learned of Prepared, I was working in public education. I really liked my job. It was a perfect blend of serving teachers, students and administrators. But when you sense a call on your life, anything you do outside of that can be fine for a while, but you know you're missing out on God's best. My church graciously offered to sponsor a few of the courses for me. The more I prayed about it, the more excited I became, and I stepped out in obedience.

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What impacted you most during your training?

K ATE : I left the first Prepared session with tears in my eyes. To be surrounded by women, young and old, from all ministry areas, all to receive encouragement and training for our work in ministry was so exciting! I was also immediately reassured that I was not alone in my doubts, fears and struggles. While I was not encouraged to continue living into those doubts and fears, I was assured other women had been there, too. They encouraged me to turn to the Lord.

Prepared gives you deep, Word-rooted teaching on many different topics that are organized to build on one another. It was amazing to dig deeper and deeper as we went through the courses.

E MILY: The Biblical Spiritual Formation courses were the most impactful.

My husband and I had just started walking through a difficult situation with a young adult we had known for years. She was unexpectedly pregnant with twins and abandoned by her boyfriend. She was in and out of the emotional rollercoaster of deciding between abortion, adoption and keeping the babies.

In that season, God graciously introduced me to a deeper level of soul care, which helped carry me through this difficult and emotionally volatile relationship.

I was able to care for my soul and stay rooted in the peace of Jesus, while walking in one of the most stormy and unknown situations of my life.

ASHL E Y: God unearthed so much of my story. For the first time, I saw how God could use the ugly and painful parts of my story in the most beautiful of ways to help me grow in His likeness, deepen my intimacy with Him and relate to others in new ways.

In our third course, Biblical Spiritual Formation, we chose one spiritual discipline to practice for the entire course. I thought: Prayer. I need to grow in my prayer life.

No, wait. Silence and solitude. What's that with these two monsters (kids) I have running around here all the time? Fasting was at the very bottom of the list. I like food too much, and with my low blood sugar, I wasn’t sure it was possible. But the more I prayed, studied and contemplated it, I knew that for six weeks, I would experience God in a whole new way through the discipline of fasting. How God drew me deeper and deeper into that discipline through the duration of our course was life-changing! In my six-week experience, God was like a balm to my soul.

He fit the broken pieces of my heart back together. For the first time – maybe ever – I was able to see myself through God’s eyes.

The relationships that were formed in Prepared surprised me. Some of my best friends on earth are now my Prepared sisters. My journey was their journey, and their journey was mine. The program’s design allows for a tremendous amount of deep, meaningful connection, fruitful conversations, and opportunities for us to minister to one another.

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REACHING ALL PEOPLE

How has Prepared impacted your current life and ministry?

K ATE : I will be graduating in May 2025, but I am using the things I’m learning daily in my ministry work. I’m a worship leader and teacher at my church, and I’m building classes around one of the Prepared classes. I am always reminded by analogies and teachings from our introductory courses, and I've shared tips and wisdom from that class with many with whom I work. I have brought in the tactics of the Narrative Overview of the Bible course to share the story of Jesus and better weave it into the fabric of the worship sets on Sunday.

E MILY: Every class project is so intentionally tailored to application that I'm putting each class to use already! I call myself the Prepared cheerleader; I will continue to point people to this course. I know I’ll continue to reference back and implement all the different things I have learned, and I hope to have a small-scale version of these teachings and classes with some local women here in Southeast Asia, who are hungry for more!

ASHL E Y: After the first few courses, I sensed a call back into full-time ministry.

God used Prepared to redeem parts of my story and also further equip me for what was to come. I now serve on staff with the EFCA Forest Lakes District as the credentialing and church multiplication catalyst.

Prepared deepened my love and appreciation for the EFCA, and I feel incredibly blessed to serve. Furthermore, the practice of hermeneutics and homiletics, coupled with my experience and gifts, has afforded me multiple opportunities to share what God has been teaching me at retreats and conferences within our district. I’m still amazed by God’s grace, His gentle nudge towards Prepared and what He has done in my life during the past two years. If you had told me where I would be today, doing what I’m doing, I wouldn’t have believed you. But God is good and faithful, and with Him, all things are possible.

Are you interested in developing your gifts as a female leader? Prepared is now accepting applications for the January 2025 cohort. Apply today at efca.org/prepared.

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How the GOSPEL Reconciled a Pastoral Feud Two EFCA pastors clashed over theology. What came next surprised them.

EFCA C OM M U N I CAT I O N S

In 2015, a seemingly straightforward EFCA ministry license meeting grew tense when EFCA pastor Andrew Woods questioned Benjamin Vrbicek’s commitment to premillennialism. Now, nearly a decade later, the two EFCA pastors sat down – as friends – to revisit that conflict and the fruit the Lord grew from it. The following conversation has been edited for clarity and brevity.

Benjamin Vrbicek: I would describe you, Andrew, as ambushing me during my licensing meeting. You asked me a series of questions that were totally appropriate but the sequence and what you were collecting was not opaque to me: my view of creation, Israel in the church and other things like that, leading to historic premillennialism, which I was saying I held and you were saying I didn’t. As a tense argument broke out back and forth, Peter Johnson, leading the meeting, said, “Andrew, he’s saying he’s historic premillennial. He’s written it.

We have to take him at his word.” So, I leave the room, and you talk about me. After 30 minutes, I come back, and the council tells me, “We’re going to approve you for licensure. But you got one ‘no’ vote.” It wasn’t a mystery to me who voted “no.” I assumed it was you. And it was. I remember it significantly because for five years I had to think, “What do I believe?”

Andrew Woods: To me, the Free Church had taken a stand that we are premillennial, so I couldn’t understand why we would come off that stand. You know, why would we? Why would we invite people who we disagree with after we’ve taken a stand for generations on it? I felt like we’re going to see people slipping into our denomination who have a bent towards non-premillennialism. They’re going to vote against what I think is right and what traditionally the Free Church has been.

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Benjamin: What did you think about the logic going around at the time – that we’re big on the gospel, evangelical theology and majoring on the majors, but premillennialism is the one inconsistency? Was that compelling to you at all?

Andrew: It’s compelling to me now. Because it’s been recognized as a minor, not a major. But by virtue of it being in the Free Church Statement of Faith, the Free Church says this is a major.

My whole life premillennialism has been a major. Now people are coming along and saying it’s a minor, and I’m going, “Well, it was major to the people in 1950. Why is it not a major to us now?”

So, through my own reading and study, it took a little while to move this from a major category to a secondary category.

Benjamin: And that’s what we voted to do [in 2019].

Andrew: Yeah. It was a big paradigm shift.

The 2019 EFCA national conference voted to change “premillennial” to “glorious” in Article 9 of the Statement of Faith. In this Article we affirm the following: “We believe in the personal, bodily and glorious return of our Lord Jesus Christ. The coming of Christ, at a time known only to God, demands constant expectancy and, as our blessed hope, motivates the believer to godly living, sacrificial service and energetic mission.”

Benjamin: Do you remember anything about my licensure?

Andrew: I do. I remember when Peter said, “He’s historic premillennial. He’s written that he’s historic premillennial.” If I didn’t say it out loud, I’m sure in my mind I said, “Yeah, but he’s not going to be for long.”

[Laughs]

U N D E R STA N D I N G S C R I P T U R E

Benjamin: That’s what you said! So, I took four and a half years doing local church ministry to prepare for ordination. When I heard the 2019 vote to change the Statement of Faith was coming, I thought maybe I should delay my ordination.

Andrew: At that point did you think you were not premillennial?

Benjamin: I was starting to own it. I was conflicted at first but then I became convinced. When it came time for our October Eastern District conference – and there were a lot of jokes made about this – they added my ordination council as the preconference event. It felt like a gladiatorial ordination in a Roman Colosseum.

I was fine with that and appreciated the compliment buried within their choice to highlight my ordination, but it did not have the obscure ordination in some church basement that most of these have. So, I gave my defense of amillennialism, and there were people in the room that clearly disagreed with me, but it wasn’t adversarial.

Andrew: In the summer of 2019, our church was considering leaving [the EFCA]. We took the EFCA Statement of Faith change seriously. So, I was in the process of asking the question, “What other denomination would we go to?”

Benjamin: That’s a heavy question.

It felt like a gladiatorial ordination in a Roman Colosseum. I was fine with that and appreciated the compliment buried within their choice to highlight my ordination, but it did not have the obscure ordination in some church basement that most of these have.

Andrew: If you had asked me June of 2019, I would have said, “We’re leaving.” But when we got your paper, I read it, and I’m like, “Well, this guy is getting ordained.” It was a good paper.

So, I didn’t want to ordain someone who’s amillennial, but that wasn’t up to me. The Free Church said we must ordain someone who’s amillennial if they’re qualified. I felt like I would have to vote for you, and I didn’t want to vote for you. Because you’re amillennial. But as a member of the committee, I felt like I couldn’t vote against you. That didn’t seem fair to me. The only thing I could come up with was to not go, and that way I wouldn’t hurt my conscience. But, shortly after your ordination council, I concluded that [premillennialism] was a secondary issue. And my church should not be leaving the denomination over this. I remember later wishing I was at your ordination.

Benjamin: You were on a trajectory, even as I was.

Benjamin: When we came to Article 9 of the Statement of Faith, you’re to my left, and we have to lean forward to look at each other. The ordination candidate is in the middle. Somewhere during the interview, I interject. He has the 2008 Statement of Faith, the pre-2019 version. I want to ask the question, “Why did you do that?” I hear my words are coming out very charged as I’m talking. I want to sound neutral, because we’re just here to serve, to ordain people and ask thoughtful questions. I’m essentially saying, though, “Why did you choose the old Statement of Faith?

Why are you trying to offend me?” I think everyone in the room heard the frustration in my voice. Immediately, they said, “I don’t even think we knew that was in there. I’m so sorry.”

Andrew: None of us in the room realized it was the wrong Statement of Faith in his paper.

Benjamin: I didn’t realize I was still amped about feeling excluded and wanting to belong. And then Andrew leans forward and says, “Hey, let’s just pause for a minute. Benjamin. I’m glad you’re here. I’m sorry. Even if I’ve excluded you. I’m sorry I didn’t come to your ordination. I want you to feel like you belong, and I’ve played a part in not helping you feel included. I know you belong, because you take things seriously. You’re a gospel pastor, and I’m thankful you’re in our denomination. Please forgive me.” I was blown away, because I had experienced you as the guy who didn’t vote for me and didn’t come to my ordination. I felt received by the denomination. I felt loved by you. I hope I just said, “I receive your forgiveness, and I’m sorry for whatever part I played in being adversarial as well. Please forgive me, too.”

Andrew: I didn’t go to your ordination and always felt bad about that. I had seen you four to six times, and I was like, “This guy’s great. I wish I could be his friend.” But there was still an unspoken tension between us. I just felt compelled in that moment to fix what was broken. We all heard the hurt in your voice, that you were being excluded. Later on in the hallway, I sought you out and said, “Seriously, that wasn’t just for the lights and the recording.” I don’t know if you remember this, but I gave you a hug. I rarely hug people. It was probably a weird scene. But I said, “You’re a part of the Free Church and an important part of this district. And I want to be your friend.”

Benjamin: I felt that, and it’s been fun just going forward. At the Theology Refresher [a conference in EFCA East], I walked into the room and was like, ‘Oh, where should I sit? There’s 50 pastors,’ and then I think, ‘Oh, there’s my friend Andrew. I’m going to go find Andrew and sit with him.’

Andrew: There was a break between us. That moment in the council fixed it. I was not an adversary to you anymore.

Benjamin: The Lord pushed us to a place that He wanted us to go. We both just struggled to know how to get there. And I’m so glad He did. The Lord certainly loves to use the gospel to not only bring us to Him but also to each other.

Andrew: Yeah, in October, I thought I made the right decision not to go. But by winter, when my understanding had changed, I was disappointed that I missed it.

Benjamin: I hear you trying to be as faithful at every step as you could with your church and with your history. I don’t begrudge that at all.

Later, Benjamin and Andrew sat together with other pastors to review the ordination paper of a potential candidate.

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theo conf ad

2025 EF C A TH EO LOGY CO N FER EN C E

TH EO LOG I C A L A NTH RO P O LOGY: “God created man in his own image, in the image of God he created him; male and female he created them.”

February 5-7, 2025 | Chicago, Illinois Registration open at efca.org/theologyconference

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E N G A G I N G C U LT U R E

a call for bold clarity

Whether we admit it or not, our lives are deeply influenced by the relationships and experiences of our past. If you reflect for a moment, I’m sure you can name

a family member, church leader or specific ministry that has significantly influenced – and continues to influence – your life.

While looking back might stir difficult memories, it also reminds us how God works in our circumstances to shape us for our role in the kingdom.

For me, I trace a thread of influence back to the early 1980s, when God’s work through faithful EFCA believers gave me a vision for a life transformed by the gospel and prepared for mission and service.

M Y D I S C I PLE S H I P J O U R N E Y

Amid a post-Christian cultural moment, ReachNational is anchoring in the reasons we exist.

SCOT T ST E RN E R

My EFCA story began in middle school, after my brother came to faith through the youth ministry at Kearney Evangelical Free Church (EFCA) in Kearney, Nebraska. His transformation led me to join a Bible study, and on November 11, 1985, I prayed to accept Christ as my Savior, a milestone recorded in my first Bible.

From there, God blessed me with numerous mentors and friends who taught me how to both know the fullness of God through Christ (Eph 3:19) and respond by offering my life to Him as a living sacrifice (Rom 12:1). Before my junior year of college, even after getting married and transferring to study engineering, I couldn’t shake the sense of a deeper calling.

After much prayer and counsel, I switched my major to music and spent the next 16 years in worship ministry – 12 of them at Parkview EFC in Iowa City – before joining several friends to plant EFCA churches in Madison, Wisconsin.

From there, I added roles with the Forest Lakes District and ReachNetwork (the EFCA’s church planting ministry), and in June 2024, God led me to my new role as the EFCA executive vice president of national ministries.

While my discipleship journey is unique, it is but one drop in the vast ocean of stories that begin with Jesus and His disciples and spread, by the power of the Holy Spirit, from Jerusalem to the ends of the earth (Acts 1:8). Your journey to faith in Jesus, investment in the local church and unique role in God’s kingdom are all tied back to faithful people who lived out the Great Commission. These are the stories we live out together as “one EFCA.” B AC K TO O U R F O U N DAT I O N

In June 2024, Scott Sterner assumed the role of executive vice president of national ministries for the EFCA. Scott has more than 20 years of pastoral experience within two EFCA churches, as well more than a decade of service in church planting and leadership roles with the EFCA Forest Lakes District and ReachNetwork, the collaborative, district-based church planting effort of the EFCA. Scott holds a master’s degree in theological studies from Trinity Evangelical Divinity School and attends Door Creek Church (EFCA) in Madison, Wisconsin.

Scott and his wife, Carrie, have five children and four grandchildren.

As I consider my next step in ministry, I am struck by the tension of our post-Christian culture. The days of “just add water” church growth strategies and overflowing Bible colleges are behind us.

While some church leaders might be tempted to address today’s challenges with new campaigns or strategies, I am reminded of both my own faith journey and the story of the EFCA. Though there’s value in systems, our cultural moment calls us back to a stronger foundation, to the reasons we exist, to the stories that shaped us.

When the EFCA was founded in 1950, the Swedish and Norwegian-Danish Free Churches came together with two overarching goals: 1) to unite around a shared Statement of

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Faith and 2) to partner to bring the gospel to the ends of the earth. While I grieve with you over the current divisions in our culture, I also believe the EFCA is uniquely positioned to showcase a counter-cultural picture of love and unity.

Those two original goals of the movement will continue to guide ReachNational as we seek to serve EFCA districts, churches and leaders toward glorifying God by multiplying transformational churches among all people.

1. Guarding the essentials. ReachNational is committed to discipleship around the gospel essentials. Like the faithful people before us, we are devoted to the inerrancy of Scripture, the centrality of the gospel and creating pathways for multiplying both across the movement.

Through the EFCA’s renewed partnership with Trinity International University, we celebrate the emergence of churchbased residencies and internships that utilize TIU’s 14 certificate programs, covering everything from theological studies to bioethics. Similarly, EFCA GATEWAY provides accessible theological training for all people through multilingual cohorts built around the EFCA Statement of Faith. These and other courses equip church leaders for ministry and strengthen credentialing pathways.

At EFCA One 2023 in Fullerton, California, we also celebrated the first graduating class of Prepared, the EFCA’s two-year, gospel-centered equipping program for women. By God’s grace, we’re seeing more female leaders equipped to fulfill their ministry calling and support the work of the Church.

2. Prioritizing mission. The good news of Jesus not only gives us a new identity as ambassadors, but also a new calling to spread His ministry of reconciliation to our neighbors and the ends of the earth (2 Cor 5:16-21). In ReachNational, we are committed to advancing this same pattern of gospel multiplication.

One example of this is found in ReachStudents through Apex Missions, who are “helping students take the next step in God’s call to advance the gospel from here to everywhere.” Through short-term mission trips and training, Apex challenges students to embrace their calling to make disciples among all people.

ReachNetwork is also multiplying gospel pathways through quality systems of assessment, training, coaching and care for church planters. Our goal is not only to plant new churches, but to also plant planters (couples and teams) who are trained, loved and supported in establishing transformational congregations that continue to multiply disciples, leaders and churches.

More recently, the ReachNetwork team has been developing clearer pathways to help existing churches increase their participation in this vital work of church planting, and we’re excited to share more soon about how every EFCA church can partner in these efforts.

3. Upholding the “one EFCA” vision. From the earliest chapters of the EFCA story, an overarching theme has been unity: identity in the gospel, partnership around the Statement of Faith and collaboration in a shared mission. Under Kevin Kompelien and now Acting President Carlton Harris, the vision of “one EFCA” – local, regional, national and international ministries working

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together toward common ministry objectives with shared values and trusting relationships – continues to bind us together.

In recent years, ReachGlobal staff have partnered with ReachNational, EFCA districts and local churches toward missionary mobilization and all-nations ministry opportunities within the United States. For example, multiple ReachNational and ReachGlobal ministries – Crisis Response, Immigrant Hope, the All People Initiative and others – are working with Refuge Church (EFCA) in Houston, Texas, to share the love of Jesus with Afghan refugees and other displaced immigrants in one of the most diverse cities in the country.

From the earliest chapters of the EFCA story, an overarching theme has been unity: identity in the gospel, partnership around the Statement of Faith and collaboration in a shared mission.

Also in the All People Initiative, Disability and Special Needs Ministry leaders are working with districts and churches to integrate people with disabilities and special needs into every aspect of the local church, both here in the U.S. and around the globe. Immigrant Hope also continues to help EFCA churches reach growing immigrant populations with the gospel through low-cost immigration legal services. Gospel unity shines when congregations make space for people on the margins, to “speak out on behalf of the voiceless, and for the rights of all who are vulnerable” (Prov 31:8 CEB).

A CA LL F O R B O LD C LA R I T Y EFCA Family: In light of our current cultural moment, let’s look back to our roots. Amid a world rife with division and controversy, let’s reflect on the convictions that have united us from the beginning. As cultural norms and beliefs grow increasingly at odds with biblical truth, let’s remember the people and relationships God used to transform us for His kingdom. While our current reality may lead some to despair, I believe it is a powerful opportunity for the light of Christ to shine even more brightly in the darkness (John 1:5) – and to anchor the next generation of disciples and disciplemakers in gospel unity and mission.

The challenges of our time call for bold clarity. They urge us to embrace gospel essentials with renewed fervor, leading to mission multiplication and counter-cultural unity. As we do this, we pray others would see our good works – which flow from our common salvation and faith (Jude 3) – and give glory to God (Matt 5:16).

Let us seize this moment with hope and courage, trusting that God is at work in and through us to make His glory known.

Together, we can be a beacon of His love and truth in a world that desperately needs both. *All biblical references are ESV unless noted otherwise.

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I Remember That Conversation The story of why I became a youth pastor – and how it's still shaping me today.

PAU L M I L L E R

I met Jesus when I was six years old. Our family was

driving home from church one Sunday, and I was sitting in the rear-facing back seat of our old Caprice Classic station wagon.

We called it the “way-back seat.” I didn’t mind sitting back there because it gave me the opportunity to make faces at the driver of the car behind us.

On that Sunday, I was too busy thinking about what I’d heard in church to bother with the car behind me. I had this sense that Jesus was talking to me, and I was listening. I remember that conversation, and I responded with a six-year-old’s understanding of the gospel. I told Jesus I wanted to give my life to Him. I wanted Him to always be with me, like I knew He was on that morning in the way-back seat on the drive home from church.

MY FI RST DI SC I P L E SHIP E X P E RIE N CE S I grew up in an EFCA church in the northwest suburbs of Chicago.

I loved our church. It was there I learned to love the “big C” Church. My earliest memories of church include my dad serving as an elder—in fact, he was chairman of the elder board for years.

I grew up watching my dad serve faithfully—he was constantly involved in important “church conversations”—but I didn’t have the greatest relationship with him. We were never that close. He was closed-off and distant, and I was happy on my own, personally as well as spiritually.

And then I entered high school. The summer before my freshman year, our church welcomed a new student pastor. Brent showed up at our house on his first Sunday on the job to shoot hoops with me in our driveway. I didn’t realize it at the time, but that was my first experience of discipleship.

Discipleship happens best in the context of relationships.

One could argue that discipleship only happens in the context of relationships.

Throughout my high school years, Jesus used Brent to teach me many life lessons. When I was a sophomore, he drove me to downtown Chicago one morning. He dropped me off in Daley Plaza and told me he'd pick me up after I shared the gospel with three people (not necessarily a strategy I would recommend to

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student pastors today, but…). It took me all morning to get up the courage to talk to three people, and I remember the conversation with Brent at lunch afterwards: How was that? It took you a while to have three conversations.

I hated it. I didn’t know any of those people, and they had no reason to listen to me.

So I guess it’s easy for you to share your faith with your friends then? People who know you and trust you.

I see your point…

Jesus, through Brent, helped me understand I did not need to be ashamed of the gospel (Rom 1:16).

When I was a junior, we had a weeklong lock-in at our church. The problem was I had tickets to go to a rock concert in Chicago that Wednesday night, so a friend and I snuck out of the church (without permission) and went to the concert (which was awesome). We got back after midnight, and Brent was waiting up for us. He let my friend go to bed and took me aside for a conversation about leadership and influence. That was years ago, and I still remember that conversation.

Jesus, through Brent, showed me the importance of stewarding my influence to lead others toward Him (1 Tim 4:12).

My senior year, Brent took me to Moody Bible Institute in Chicago. On the drive, he explained there was a conference for student pastors happening, and he wanted me to talk to the group about what teenagers needed from their pastors. I don’t remember what I said in that talk, but I do remember going out to lunch afterwards with Brent and Dann Spader from Sonlife Ministries. I remember our conversation about calling, about how to discern if I should pursue a career in vocational ministry.

Jesus, through Brent, confirmed in me a calling to a career in ministry (2 Tim 2:2).

E Q U I PPI N G ST U DE N T LE A DE R S T H R O U G H C O N V E R SAT I O N I decided to become a student pastor for one primary reason.

I wanted to do for one other person what Brent did for me.

What Jesus, through Brent, did in me. I've had the privilege of serving as a student pastor for several years, and for even more years as an executive pastor, in several different church settings. I've had the privilege of creating moments and having conversations with students, volunteers and especially youth pastors. Conversations I hope they will remember. Conversations I hope Jesus could use to form Himself in them.

And now years later, I have the privilege of serving with ReachStudents and the EFCA national office. As a team, we get to help EFCA churches become transformational ministries.

We get to help student pastors lead their students toward fullness of life in Jesus. Students are not the “future” of the church; they’re the church right now. They’re ready to be discipled, and our focus is on equipping student leaders for those disciplemaking relationships.

MAKING DISCIPLES

“

Discipleship happens best in the context of relationships.

One could argue that discipleship only happens in the context of relationships.

At ReachStudents, we’re committed to an ongoing conversation about who we want to see our students become by the time they graduate from high school.

Here are six statements that reflect our prayers for discipled EFCA students: 1. Discipled students are lifelong learners. They realize the importance of having a “church home” and give priority to participating in weekend services to receive and grow from biblical teaching. They also seek to grow through personal spiritual practices like prayer and Bible reading. They have a basic understanding of the gospel and know what they believe.

Romans 12:1, 2 Peter 3:18 2. Discipled students engage in a lifestyle of worship.

They give God honor in all things and humbly connect their hearts to his. They can discern and surrender to the Holy Spirit’s voice and leadership in their lives. Colossians 3:16, 1 Corinthians 10:31 3. Discipled students connect in community with other Christians. They understand we all need encouragement, support and accountability. They are intentional about finding and developing these relationships, often in small groups offered through the church. John 17, Romans 15:5-7 4. Discipled students invite people to Jesus. They invest in relationships with people who do not yet know Him. They are motivated by how their own lives have been personally transformed. They look for opportunities to develop friendships, hear stories and someday introduce their friends to Jesus.

Matthew 28:18-20, Acts 1:8 5. Discipled students serve in the church. They are committed to discovering, developing and deploying their spiritual gifts. Service is not seen as an “obligation” but rather as an opportunity for Jesus to work through them to make a difference. 1 Peter 4:10, 1 Corinthians 12:1-31 6. Discipled students grow their hearts for the world around them. They think beyond themselves. They prioritize living and displaying the gospel, pursuing justice and mercy both here and around the world. Acts 4:32-25, Micah 6:8

Paul Miller serves as the director of student ministries for the EFCA. Paul most recently served as executive pastor at Hopevale Church (Saginaw, Michigan) and before that, spent 12 years in various ministry roles in Western Michigan and the Dallas-Fort Worth metroplex. Paul grew up attending Crystal Lake Evangelical Free Church (Crystal Lake, Illinois) and studied at Trinity Evangelical Divinity School. Paul and his wife, Bobbi, have been married for 30 years and have five kids.

Looking at that list, you might think, “That’s not just a discipled student. That’s a mature disciple.” And you'd be right.

Graduating from high school is a step into “adulthood,” but it’s also just another mile marker on our journey with Jesus.

Now, let me encourage you to have a conversation. Take those six statements and have a private, honest conversation with Jesus. How are you doing on your journey? Where are things going great? Where might you feel a little stuck? And what would be a great next step for you to take?

It just might be a conversation you remember for the rest of your life.

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TODD GROAT: Come and See the Next Generation Lit Up by God EFCA pastor and Challenge security team lead shares how he has a front-row seat to life transformation.

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MAKING DISCIPLES

I grew up in the southeastern Ozarks of Missouri. When

I was 17 years old in high school, I felt like God was calling me in the ministry.

I connected to the EFCA through Reeve Evangelical Free Church. When I was coming into my last year of seminary, I made a shortlist of denominations that I felt would fit my heartbeat.

Before I went through the placement program, Reeve hired me as their youth pastor. I love the simple ethos of the EFCA: we major on the majors and minor on the minors. The tradition that I came from really wasn’t like that.

In 2000, I was only in the role as a youth pastor a short time before I came to my first Challenge conference at Purdue [University]. I had no idea what was going on. I was brand new to the Free Church and relied on the lay youth leaders. I had been to other youth conferences before but something about Challenge grabbed my heart. It was unlike anything I had experienced before. Grace was in the air. It was obvious how much all the staff at Challenge cared about young people, and how much they cared about youth pastors and youth leaders.

In 2002, I changed roles at my church. I was now the senior pastor. I sort of didn’t have a natural reason to come back to Challenge, and I was bummed about that. A guy from our church was the Director of Housing at Challenge, and I told him how sad I was to miss it. He knew I did professional security work and training before ministry, and he said, “You should be on the security team at Challenge.”

In 2004, it was my first time to be on staff at Challenge, but because of my experience, the security director appointed me to lead the team near the stage. In Salt Lake City, anybody that

came on the stage had to go through the crowd. So, we had to move the students back to make space for the act to get on.

I was moving students toward the door and out of the corner of my eye, I saw someone standing there, and I said, “You need to move out of the way because the band is coming out,” and they didn’t move. And I looked up and I was looking at Chris Tomlin. And I was like, “Oh, sorry about that. Right this way.”

He just smiled and laughed, and up on the stage he went.

I apologized later.

I still have the privilege of leading the stage security team at Challenge. I stand in front of the stage but I’m looking toward the students, instead of looking the other way. It’s probably my favorite thing to do at Challenge. I love the energy. I love how the students passionately worship and celebrate, and I like to be in the middle of it.

Some of the most powerful moments of worship I’ve ever had in my whole life is up by that stage, looking out at the sea of students, jumping and dancing, raising their hands, praising God and singing at the top of their lungs. I tell people all the time, if they feel a little discouraged about the younger generation, maybe they should come check out Challenge and see all these young people absolutely lit up for God.

Scan to watch all the speaker messages from Challenge 2024 on EFCA Helps

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I L LUSTRATI O N S BY N ATAL I E K UHL

INTIMACY, AUTHENTICITY, SIMPLICITY On sabbatical, I asked God what He wanted from me. He asked me the same question back.

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In May 2021, I sat alone in my favorite place on earth: a hermitage crafted for spiritual refuge on a lake in the Minnesota northwoods. I’d just kicked off a three-month

sabbatical – my first since planting CityVision Church (now Park Community Church, EFCA) in St. Louis Park, Minnesota in 2012 – and this seemed like a good enough place to start.

I had a problem, and sabbatical gave me a chance to fix it – or, for God to fix me – before it was too late.

Alright God, I prayed from the dock of the lake. It’s time to get serious. I’m going to do this holy, silent retreat for three days. I’ll fast, read, journal and pray. You can deal with all my sin patterns, and I’ll come back a holy, better man.

For an hour, I sat on the dock and waited. Surrounded by the fragrance of the Minnesota pines, serenaded by the gentle ripples of the water, I felt…nothing.

God, I ’m here to give myself to you.

I ’m here to do what You want me to do.

Fix me, so I can continue to serve You. As I tried to will myself to holiness, all I felt was restlessness.

No transformative realizations, no spiritual breakthroughs, just the fruit of all the sin patterns I carried with me. My mind drifted to the water.

I wonder if the crappies are biting, I thought. I haven’t caught crappies here for years.

As a kid, I’d come to this same spot—the hermitage shared a property with a camp I grew up attending—and on multiple occasions, my dad and I had caught a ton of crappies. Those were some of my best childhood memories. As an adult, I’d tried to recreate those early fishing experiences, but I always came too late into the season. The crappies were never biting.

Man, I want to go fishing.

But I hadn’t come to the lake to fish. Sure, I’d packed my pole, but that was only as a (potential) reward after all the fasting and praying. After God had fixed me. Gritting my teeth, I shoved aside the nostalgia and walked back to the hermitage to start a fire. As I aimlessly prodded at the logs, I turned my mind back to prayer.

Alright God, now what ? What do you want from me?

Expecting to hear more of what I’d been telling myself – ”pray, fast, read, repent, journal” – the answer that came back surprised me.

“What do you want, Andrew?”

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BURN IN G OUT I was supposed to go on sabbatical in Summer 2020, but it seemed like the wrong time.

Beyond the pandemic – and all the complex church decisions that came with it – unrest dominated our city following the death of George Floyd just six miles from our church building.

Unanswered questions filled my inbox as I attempted to balance the church’s expectations (“Where do we stand on this? What are we going to do about this?”) with my own inadequacies.

I grew up as a baseball-loving pastor’s kid in Grand Marais, Minnesota. I didn’t know the first thing about wrestling through my own racial biases or navigating a pandemic in a local church – but I couldn’t say that from the pulpit. I had to be better than that.

To add to the stress, my father-in-law – who was also a personal hero and pastoral mentor to me – had just passed away following an out-of-the-blue cancer diagnosis. In a span of four months, he’d gone from “perfectly healthy” to just…gone. I officiated his funeral the day before COVID lockdowns started.

I tried to stay positive as I pastored through the pandemic, but my heart was consumed with personal grief and the weight of trying to support my wife and three kids. I postponed my sabbatical until 2021.

A year later, it still felt like the wrong time. Our church was still trying to figure out our identity post-pandemic. On top of that, we were in the middle of sending out one of our pastors to revitalize a dying congregation in northern Minnesota, and we needed to backfill his position. I couldn’t leave for three months.

In between services on a Sunday morning in March 2021, I ran into Linda Gunderson, one of our members, long-time ReachGlobal missionary, and – unfortunately for me – one of the most genuine people I’ve ever met.

“Hey Andrew,” she said. “How are you?”

Dang it, I thought.

For anyone that knows her, you know that lying to Linda Gunderson is like trying to outsmart Tim Keller. I couldn’t fake it with someone so genuine.

“Honestly,” I said. “I just feel really apathetic.”

Linda’s eyes lit up. “I just attended a seminar on burnout, and apathy was one of the key giveaways. Can I send you the PowerPoint?”

“Sure,” I said.

“You know, if you’re feeling apathetic, there’s probably a level of burnout,” Linda said. “I think you might need to take your sabbatical.”

After reading through Linda’s PowerPoint (“Oh my word, I feel all of that”), I reluctantly passed it along to the elders of the church, still wrestling through the guilt of asking for time away.

“Linda thinks I should take my sabbatical,” I told them. “What do you think?”

After scanning the PowerPoint, the elders came to a quick consensus.

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B AC K TO T H E LA KE Back at my “holy campfire” in the northwoods, I struggled to understand what I’d just heard from God – or, at least, what I thought I’d heard.

That can’t be Your question, God, I prayed. “What do I want?”

It doesn’t matter what I want!

Again, I sensed a response from God – not an audible voice, per se, but a distinct impression.

“Don’t you care what your kids want?” He said. “Wouldn’t you be a bad father if you never considered their desires? I’m your dad, Andrew. Don’t you think that I care?”

I hesitated. I reached for the “Sunday school answer,” then stopped myself.

No, I prayed honestly. I don’t think You care. I think this is a one-sided relationship where I’m here to serve You, period, and You couldn’t care less about what makes me happy.

The words almost felt wrong as they flooded my mind.

“So, what do you want, Andrew?”

Well, if I’m honest with You, I don’t want to fast and pray. I want to fish and eat.

“OK then,” I sensed God saying. “Go get some brats. Hop in the canoe with your fishing rod and go see what happens.”

So, that’s what I did. I drove to town, bought some brats, loaded up the canoe and caught some crappies. They were

U N D E R STA N D I N G S C R I P T U R E

biting! It was awesome. Sitting in the middle of the lake, I could tangibly feel God’s presence with me. I could see Jesus sitting in the front of my canoe – smiling at me, catching crappies with me, enjoying the moment with me. Like a friend.

After paddling back to shore, I started another fire and sunk my teeth into a juicy brat – and Jesus stayed with me. Sitting there, instead of feeling a need to “bow down in worship,” the Holy Spirit reminded of Jesus’ words in John 15: “I no longer call you servants, because a servant does not know his master’s business. Instead, I have called you friends.” (John 15:15a) Jesus is my Friend, I thought. I can be real with Him. I can be “normal” with Him. God is my Father. He delights in me. He enjoys spending time with me. The Holy Spirit is my companion.

He’s not just there to convict me of sin. He has my back. And all of them are here with me, enjoying this moment, having fun.

For three days, I enjoyed God as Father in the same way I enjoy time with my kids. I still read and prayed like I’d planned, but it was so much more than that. It was intimate. It was relational. My “holy, silent retreat” transformed from a spiritual discipline into a relational experience. Or maybe, relational awareness was the discipline.

Instead of fasting like I’d planned, I feasted on the presence and pleasure of God, in a spirit of authentic friendship and intimacy. I read when I wanted to read. I ate when I wanted to eat.

I fished when I wanted to fish. And it all felt…good. For the first time in what seemed like years, I felt free.

God loves me. He enjoys being with me.

In this newfound freedom, I felt my guilt wash away along with the pressure to perform. I opened my journal and wrote, more authentically this time: Will I discover that I actually love God – His Word, His ways, His people – while I’m on sabbatical? I know I used to, but I’m not sure anymore. I’ve neglected my spiritual life and substituted it for church work. With church work now on pause for three months, will I discover I still believe this stuff, or has it just become a job to provide a living?

Have I used God? Have I used the Bible and Jesus ’ people to achieve a new American dream that I abandoned when I first felt called into ministry?

If God has become a means to an end – if I’m using Him, His Word and His people to get a paycheck or feed my ego, or as a platform for attention or perceived importance – I must quit.

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F E A RFULLY A N D WON D E RFUL LY MAD E ?

Before I’d left for my retreat in the northwoods, I met with a pastoral counselor. After he spent (more than) a few minutes listening to me share my soul – my comparison to other pastors, the weight of expectations, my sense of shortcoming – he had a suggestion.

“I want you to read Psalm 139,” he said.

Well, that’s lame, I thought.

I grew up in the church. I already knew Psalm 139. It was the passage used for women’s ministry, children’s ministry and the Pro-Life Movement. I didn’t have a problem with any of that, except that none of it applied to my current situation.

I’m not a woman. I’m not a kid anymore. I don’t need a refresher on the sanctity of human life. Why should I read this passage?

“I want you to make a list of all the ways God has made you uniquely you,” the counselor said. “And then think about the ways you’ve been violating that by trying to be someone you’re not.”

Reluctantly, I’d agreed to the assignment (“I’ll do it, but it won’t mean anything to me”), and then forgot about it – that is, until I was sitting around the campfire, belly full of brat, feasting on relational intimacy with Jesus.

As the sun set and stars filled the clear spring sky, I pulled out my headlamp and opened my Bible to Psalm 139: “O Lord, you have searched me and known me! You know when I sit down and when I rise up; you discern my thoughts from afar. You search out my path and my lying down and are acquainted with all my ways. Even before a word is on my tongue, behold, O Lord, you know it altogether” (Psalm 139:1-6, ESV).

Reading that passage at the campfire, immersed in the presence of God, a new thought hit me: I’ve never actually read this passage for myself. For decades, I’d heard that passage read over and over, taking it for granted, but not once did I ever apply it to my own life.

“For you formed my inward parts; you knitted me together in my mother’s womb. I praise you, for I am fearfully and wonderfully made. Wonderful are your works; my soul knows it very well.” (Psalm 139:13-14, ESV, emphasis mine).

Do I actually believe that? Do I actually think I am “fearfully and wonderfully made ”? Could God truly love me as I am?

Does He love the person He created?

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At the time, I didn’t think so. I thought God loved the holy, cleaned-up version of Pastor Andrew I was trying to be – for Him and others – not the broken, burnt-out person I actually was.

Maybe I am violating myself, I thought.

As I reflected more on the psalm, God made it clear He actually liked me. He loved me as I was. He created me the way He did for a specific reason, for His glory. I didn’t need to be like other pastors. I didn’t need to keep believing I’d be a better person if I was more like John Piper or Matt Chandler or John Mark Comer. Because in doing that, I was telling God that His creation wasn’t good.

INTI MACY, AUTHE N TICITY, SIMP L ICITY I left my retreat in the northwoods with three words (well, technically four, but I narrowed it down because it was easier to remember): intimacy, authenticity and simplicity.

INTIMAC Y: For so long, I viewed God not as my Father or Friend, but as my employer – and who wants to spend time with their boss when they’re off the clock? I wanted to take vacation from God, not with Him. Thankfully, He wanted something more. He wanted to spend time in intimate relationship with me, experiencing joy, freedom and presence together as Father and son. He wanted to fish and eat with me, as my Friend – and it’s exactly what my soul needed.

AUTHENTICITY: Intimacy with God, self and others released me to be my authentic self – to live and pastor as the “Andrew” that God fearfully and wonderfully made. I began asking questions like, “What is unique about me? How did God design me? What does it look like to be a sanctified version of myself?” and through that, began to embrace who I am: Adventure over study. Questions over answers. Curiosity over conviction. Journey over destination.

SIMPLICITY: It took authenticity to ask, “Who am I?” and simplicity to say, “No, I can’t do that. That’s not how God has wired me.” Life is so complex. I don’t have the capacity to take an informed stance on every debate, and that’s OK. If my authentic self, my God-given wiring, is not to be the most intellectual or convicted person, I probably shouldn’t be writing statements about our church’s stance on “x, y and z.” Someone should – there’s certainly a time and place for that – but it probably shouldn’t be me. I tried, and it wasn’t pretty.

I wasn’t doing myself any favors by trying to be John Mark Comer or Tim Keller. I was violating God’s creation! I needed to simply – in the freedom of relational intimacy – accept and embrace who God created me to be.

B AC K TO T H E PU LPI T When I returned from my sabbatical in August 2021, I stood in front of our congregation and read Psalm 139. By the grace of God, I shared about the burnout I’d felt and how it pushed me away from God. I told the “brat story” and the freedom I found in God’s presence and love. In Fall 2022, I led our church through a series called, “Soul Work: Moving towards greater intimacy, authenticity and simplicity with God, self and others.”

Today, our church is a lot more hungry and honest than we used to be. We’re also a lot messier – but I think the mess is allowing us to actually be seen, known and loved by God, ourselves and others. There’s a lot less “faking it” and a lot more authentic hunger for the righteousness of Jesus rather than the false righteousness of religion.

Although I’m far from perfect – and still regularly affected by comparison and expectations – I pastor with much more joy and freedom. I operate more from a place of deep confidence in God’s love. I’m more ready to give grace to myself and others on the messy, non-linear journey of following Jesus.

God wants His sons and His daughters to live with security.

Eternal security, yes, but also to know that we are in His presence, in His arms – that we have His love and don’t earn it by what we do or lose it by what we don’t do.

To live securely in an age of insecurity – created by a culture of soul-sucking comparison, expectation, deconstruction and accusation – we must embrace who God created us to be, and resist violating ourselves and God by trying to be someone we’re not.

My appeal to you, fellow brothers and sisters in Christ, fellow pastors and ministry leaders, is this: Trust God’s unique and personal love for you. He cares about you. He delights in you.

He enjoys just being with you, regardless of what you’re doing – or not doing – for Him. As you pursue deeper intimacy with Him, you might just hear Him say, “My son, my daughter, my friend, what do you want?”

Andrew Peterson serves as the lead pastor of Park Community Church (EFCA) in St. Louis Park, Minnesota. He is married to Brittany, and they met at Crown College, where he received a B.S. in youth ministry and an M.A. in Christian studies while serving on the pastoral staff of an EFCA church. Andrew and Brittany and their children (Avery, Judah and Oakley) live in St. Louis Park, where they love spending time with their family, friends and neighbors, seeing God’s kingdom advanced through the local church.

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36 Celebrating New EFCA Churches

EFCA churches planted with ReachNetwork in partnership with districts from 2023-2024.

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PLANTING CHURCHES

THE C OMPAS S CHURCH, Hinsdale, Illinois • N E W B R E AT H - OA K LA KE C H U R C H , Lincoln, Nebraska RI SEN

HOPE

HISPA N I C ,

CHURCH,

Anamosa, Iowa •

H A RV E ST

Orange City, Iowa • G RE ATL IGH T

Albia, Iowa • N E W

F E LLOW S H I P,

DI S C I PLE

CHURCH,

H O PE

EF C

Gaithersburg, Maryland • B R A NC H

EVA N GELI CA L CHURCH, Medford, New Jersey • M I DTOW N C O M M U N I T Y C H U R C H , Harrisburg, Pennsylvania GRAC E

FREE

CHURCH,

Tremont, Pennsylvania • ZO I

E VA N G E LI CA L

FREE

CHURCH

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A M E R I CA ,

Hendersonville, Tennessee • OL IVE IRA VE RDA DE I R A C H U R C H , Ocala, Florida • R I V E R OA KS C LOV E R H IL L , Maryville, Tennessee • IG L E SIA LUGAR D E É L, Fort Worth, Texas • PR OV I DE N C E C H U R C H , Katy, Texas LI V I N G

WORD

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E SPAÑ OL , Pharr, Texas • I G LE S I A

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V I DA , San

Bernardino, California • IG L E SIA RE FUG IO DE G R AC I A , Riverside, California • I G LE S I A PA LA B R A V IVA , Rio Rancho, New Mexico • FAITH CHURCH E S PA N O L, Rio Rancho, New Mexico • F U LLE RTO N F R E E - E N ESPA Ñ OL, Fullerton, California • E MMAN UE L C H U R C H , Madison, Wisconsin • T H E G R OV E C H U R C H , Union Grove, Wisconsin • G E N E RATION S CHURCH , Milwaukee, Wisconsin • E DG E WO O D C O M M U N I T Y C H U R C H , Sheboygan, Wisconsin • LORAIN E CHURCH H E N RY C O U N T Y, Prophetstown, Illinois • T H E TA B E R N AC L E , Cadillac, Michigan • THE TAB E RN ACL E , Manistee, Michigan • T H E C O M PAS S C H U R C H - C O M PAS S E S PA NOL , Naperville, Illinois • CAMIN O

DE

VIDA

EFC,

Lexington, Nebraska

•

NEW

H O PE

CHURCH,

Ogallala,

Nebraska • C EN TE R CHURCH, W IN CHE STE R , New Hampshire • G R AC E C H U R C H - LAT I N O, Longmont, Colorado PETRA C HURCH, San Francisco, California • GA R D E N C I T Y C H U R C H , Sacramento, California • V I N TAGE GRAC E PLAC E RVIL L E , El Dorado Hills, California • C O M U N I DA D B I B LI CA H I S PA N A , Walnut Creek, California

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making disciples that light up the world The story of how God is raising disciplemakers and multiplying churches in West Palm Beach.

EFCA C OM M U N I CAT I O N S

ON JULY 5, 2024, Pastor Jeremy Barahona walked onto an arena stage in Kansas City on the final day of Challenge 2024 – the EFCA’s biennial youth conference – along with his wife (Angelica) and their daughter (Junia). After spending a week among 3,500 EFCA students and youth leaders – sharing music, filming videos, participating in the Gatherings and leading Equipping Labs – Jeremy and Angelica were about to learn how much the Challenge offering had raised for their church plant, The Light West Palm Beach (EFCA).

After a brief drumroll from the crowd, a number flashed on the screen: $30,000 – enough to cover the remainder of The Light WPB’s annual budget.

“We want to see disciples making disciples,” Jeremy said. “We want to see Bible studies and community groups continue to be multiplied. And ultimately, we want to see churches planting churches. Because that’s what happened with us, right?

“It just starts with one person.”

Scan to watch the full story of Pastor Jeremy and The Light WPB.

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IN FEBRUARY 2023 – before they officially launched – The Light WPB hosted a baptism in the Latin Quarter of West Palm Beach, Florida. More than 50 people from the community sat on folding chairs in a local park as a local teen – and member of The Light’s church planting team – was baptized by Pastor Jeremy and Angelica.

That girl’s name was Beberlin González. “[Beberlin] brought all her friends and people connected to her family,” Jeremy said. “It was crazy. It ended up being this baptism ceremony and worship preview service.”

Seven months later, on September 24, 2023, The Light WPB officially launched – Beberlin and her family all in attendance – with one common mission: “to make disciples of Jesus that light up the world.”

PLANTING CHURCHES

Our ministry was that of presence. We were just trying to be the light of Christ in the regular rhythms of our community.

IN MAY 2022, Beberlin asked God for a sign. She was at the end of her rope, depressed and lost. She wanted a church to call home, a community to help her grow – so, she prayed. Later that week, Beberlin saw a video from Pastor Jeremy and Angelica on her mom’s Facebook account, talking about a church they were planting in WPB: The Light.

To Beberlin, it was a sign from God – but she still had her doubts.

That same week, Jeremy and The Light's pastoral resident, Mario, showed up in Beberlin’s neighborhood to promote that same Bible study. The next week, Beberlin brought her entire family.

“I joke around with Beberlin,” Jeremy said. “I tell her, ‘Girl, you are planting this church. I’m just facilitating it.’”

IN AUGUST 2021, Jeremy and Angelica arrived in the southside of West Palm Beach, essentially alone. After sensing a call from God in 2018 to return to his hometown to plant a church, Jeremy and the team at The Brook Church (EFCA) in Chicago had spent the last three years preparing for this move – praying, training, building a core team. Except, of the five families who’d committed to join the church plant, only one person made the trip south.

“I remember one night, I just began to cry,” Jeremy said. “I was like, ‘We’re alone. I don’t even know what we’re doing here now.’ Nobody came with us. Everything I’d been trained to do, that I thought I was equipped to do, completely flopped.”

His plans falling flat, Jeremy sensed another call from God, through Scripture: You’ve got to dig into the mud. Before you can plant this church, you've got to get your hands dirty and really get to know some people in the community. Then watch me work from there.

Inspired by this new vision, Jeremy and the team did anything and everything to build connections in their neighborhood: job fairs, street evangelism, Bible studies, grill-outs. Albeit imperfect (i.e., burning hotdogs and burgers), it was a ministry fueled by genuine love for their community.

“At first, my strategy was, ‘I need to recruit other solid believers in order to start this church,’” Jeremy said, “That just didn’t happen. Our ministry was that of presence. We were just trying to be the light of Christ in the regular rhythms of our community.”

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THE MOVEMENT 2024

www.fcmmbenefits.org

LEADING CHURCHES

American Church Meets Scottish Pastor Robbie Brown felt called to serve in the Midwest. He just had to get there first.

E FCA C O M M UN ICATIO N S

Robbie Brown’s heart sank when he heard the news – his flight from London to Dallas was canceled. To make

matters worse, the next flight wasn’t until the next day, and it was filling up fast. He and his wife, Michelle, planned to fly to Fargo, North Dakota, to candidate for a lead pastor role at Cornerstone Community Church (EFCA), but those plans were collapsing before their eyes.

As they spoke to the airline’s customer service, they had two options: wait until tomorrow and hope to get on the next flight or fly to Charlotte and take a connecting flight to Dallas. They chose Charlotte.

When they landed, they prayed the worst was behind them.

They walked to the other end of the airport and waited to board their next plane to Dallas. Except, 23 minutes before boarding, the flight was canceled.

Distraught, the Brown family raced back through the airport to find another route to Fargo. The front desk greeted them with a four-hour wait in line. It was midnight. They were tired, hungry and just needed a break. They just needed to make it to the church on time.

A LOCA L C HURC H LOOK S FOR A PASTOR Cornerstone Community Church is roughly 3,800 miles away from northeast Scotland, as the crow flies. It sits at the center of Cooperstown, North Dakota, a humble town with a population of a little less than a thousand. The winters are cold and snowy, the summers hot and humid. Manufacturing and agriculture keep the town humming and offer jobs to the next generation. And it’s full of people in desperate need of the gospel.

For more than a century, Cornerstone has shared the gospel with the community. After seeing steady growth in the early 2000s, they purchased the old elementary school and converted it into their new church building. Several years ago, however, they

found themselves without a pastor, so they started their search for new leadership.

With the help of Brian Wright, superintendent of the EFCA Northern Plains District, the Cornerstone elders connected with eligible candidates through EFCA Jobs and EFCA Pastor Search, two online tools that connect EFCA churches to pastors and ministry leaders. In the process, they came across Robbie’s profile, but they quickly moved past him.

“We weren’t interested in somebody from Scotland,” Wade Faul, the chairman of the church elder board, said. “We thought the process and cost would be unbelievable.”

So, they hired another pastor instead. But before the week was over, that candidate changed his mind. Starting the process over, Robbie’s name re-emerged, but again, the elders dismissed it.

M I DW E ST DR E A M S Since he was 12 years old, Robbie Brown had an interest in the Midwest. Posters of the old Metrodome stadium in Minneapolis and Minnesota Vikings pennants lined his wall, and he carried this love for the Heartland with him into adulthood.

Robbie grew up in a Christian home. His father was a pastor, and Robbie made a commitment to the Lord as a child. He wandered away from God as a young adult.

“My parents were always praying for me,” Robbie said.

“The truth hadn’t left me, even though I was going nowhere.”

In his 30s, Robbie worked as an archivist in Edinburgh, Scotland, and met a few Christians who encouraged him back to the faith. He attended church again but felt isolated with his group of friends who were non-believers. He returned to his hometown, where his father was a minister, and attended their church. In 2004, his father baptized him, and he felt a call to ministry.

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PASTOR ROBBIE BROWN, M ICHE LLE AND T HE IR FOU R CHIL DRE N .

After receiving his Master’s in Theology at a Bible college in Northern Ireland and his Master’s of Philosophy at a seminary in Manchester, Robbie started his pastoral ministry, which eventually led him to a church in a small fishing community in northeast Scotland.

When he sensed God’s call to serve elsewhere, he considered applying to churches in America, but Michelle wasn’t persuaded – the significant cost to move their young family and two dogs seemed impossible. He put it aside until the Holy Spirit prompted him to talk to her again. When they spoke, Michelle changed her mind and encouraged him to try it.

For a year, nothing happened. Robbie heard from a church in Ohio, but when he made plans to come over to preach, COVID hit, and the church moved on to another candidate. Another church in North Dakota also considered Robbie, but he didn’t feel right about it. After months and months of searching, he was almost ready to give up – that is, until Cornerstone contacted him.

After several conversations with the Cornerstone’s search committee, Robbie received a text from the elders. It was time to come and preach.

STUC K IN A TERMIN AL Robbie and Michelle stood in line at the Charlotte Douglas International Airport for two hours. The woman working at the counter was serving a couple in front of them, but after a minute, she stopped and looked right at Robbie and Michelle. “You two,” she said. “Go around the corner, and someone will serve you there.”

Confused, Robbie thought she was closing her desk and redirecting the line to a new agent. “I’m really sorry,” Robbie said, “but we’ve been standing in line for two hours. Can we not just wait and get served with you?”

“No, you don’t understand,” she said. “Just you two. Go around the corner.”

Robbie felt uneasy, but as instructed, he and Michelle walked around the corner and met another female airline customer service agent. She said they’d have to stay overnight, and she couldn’t get them a flight to Chicago or Dallas the next day either.

That wouldn’t work – they needed to get to North Dakota earlier than that. “Could you fly us to Minneapolis?” Robbie asked.

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Three seats were open on a flight to Minneapolis. Robbie didn’t know how he was going to get from Minneapolis to Fargo, especially since a bad storm was plowing through the area. He called a woman from Mayville, North Dakota to see if they could get a ride. She didn’t think it was possible, but she encouraged Robbie to book the flight anyway.

After a two hour and 45-minute flight to Minneapolis, a four-hour bus ride to Fargo and another 88-minute car ride to Cooperstown, they arrived at the church.

On the morning of Sunday, April 23, 2023, Robbie and Michelle met the people of Cornerstone Community Church; Robbie delivered his sermon; and a few days later, he and Michelle hopped on their long flight back to Scotland without another delay or cancelation. Still, the trip proved enough: Cornerstone found their pastor and Robbie found his church.

Now they faced the next hurdle – applying for an R1 visa.

I M M I G R A N T H O PE After researching the process, paperwork and knowledge required to successfully attain an R1 visa for Robbie, Cornerstone realized they needed help. Brian Wright recommended Immigrant Hope.

“That was probably one of the best things we have ever done,” Wade said.

Rooted in the EFCA Statement of Faith, Immigrant Hope helps the local church to share the hope of the gospel by providing low-cost immigration legal services for immigrants coming to the United States. Cornerstone contacted Immigrant Hope Santa Barbara and worked with Litzy Castro Moran and Diane Martinez.

After several meetings and plenty of paperwork, they filed with immigration and waited for two months.

When a letter came in the mail, Litzy broke the bad news – they had to wait another four years to receive approval. When word reached Robbie, he couldn’t believe it.

“We couldn’t wait that long,” Robbie said, “and we couldn’t ask the church to wait that long.”

Still, Cornerstone remained unshaken. “We’re not giving up,” they told Robbie. “You are our pastor. You’re coming.”

Everyone prayed – Cornerstone, Robbie and his family and the team at Immigrant Hope Santa Barbara. Robbie said even people who weren’t thrilled about him leaving Scotland joined in the effort.

After 10 days, Immigrant Hope received another notice from Homeland Security. They’d approved Robbie’s application.

T H E I N T E RV I E W The next step for Robbie and his family was to travel to the U.S. Embassy in London for the visa interview. When Robbie asked

LEADING CHURCHES

the embassy how long it would take to get an interview, they said, “Well, how long is a piece of string?”

Soon after, though, Immigrant Hope told Robbie they could book him an appointment with the embassy on September 1.

It was bittersweet – the opening appeared faster than expected, but it didn’t work for his family, plus the cost to travel that day was $8,000.

“We didn’t have the money,” Robbie said.

Robbie felt broken and discouraged. They had come so far only to be set back again. He didn’t know when they would have another chance. Two days later, Michelle saw an opening for October 3. The cost was significantly less, so they booked it.

Before the interview, Immigrant Hope helped the Browns prepare and advised on the appropriate documents and appointments, but they couldn’t help with the questions.

They didn’t know what the agents would ask.

“That’s why prayer is so important in cases like this,” Litzy said.

On June 2, 2024, Cornerstone held a baptism for four people who had given their lives to Christ. They met at Lake Ashtabula in Sibley, North Dakota, and Robbie brought each of them into the waters of baptism. Several months later, he baptized three more.

They found a more affordable option and thought it was settled.

Two weeks later, an elder from the church called with news: the church raised money to help purchase the house the Browns couldn’t afford and turned it into a parsonage. The congregation fully furnished the house and purchased two cars for the family.

“I was nearly in tears,” Robbie said.

When he arrived, Robbie didn’t waste any time getting started in ministry, which blunted any potential culture shock. From his vantage point, North Dakota wasn’t too different from Scotland, though he admitted the winters were much colder. The biggest difference was the warm welcome.

“At the fishing port I served at in Scotland, you were an outsider until you were there for about 20 years,” Robbie said.

“In North Dakota, it’s the opposite. Because you’re an outsider, we’re going to make you welcome as soon as you get here.”

On June 2, 2024, Cornerstone held a baptism for four people who had given their lives to Christ. They met at Lake Ashtabula in Sibley, North Dakota, and Robbie brought each of them into the waters of baptism. Several months later, he baptized three more.

“A real blessing,” Robbie said. “The Spirit is doing a work at Cornerstone.”

Robbie and his family are allowed to stay in the United States until April 2025 with their visa. To stay longer, they will work with Immigrant Hope to apply for an extension and then a green card.

Despite the challenges, Robbie’s faith has been strengthened, and he has seen God’s hand at work through it all.

In the interview, the agents didn’t talk to Robbie’s family at all, even though they required them to be present. They only asked Robbie three questions: “What denomination are you? Where’s the church? How long are you staying for?”

It took five minutes, and they approved his visa.

F IN A L STEPS The move to North Dakota presented its own challenges. As Michelle suspected, the cost to move a large family with two dogs from Scotland to North Dakota was significant. They didn’t know how they could afford it.

It cost $10,000 just to move their two labrador retrievers across the ocean. The Browns initially considered keeping the dogs in Scotland and giving them to someone else, but they couldn’t find anyone. They had no idea what to do until the Cornerstone congregation surprised them with a gift to help pay for it.

Meanwhile, as Robbie and Michelle browsed for houses in North Dakota, they found one they liked, but it was too expensive.

HELP YOU CAN TRUST. Equipping local churches to share the hope of the gospel by providing low-cost immigration legal services for immigrants coming to the United States.

Learn how your church can get involved at immigranthope.org.

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Don’t Give Up on the Great Commission Amid our ever-changing world, God still calls His disciples to the ends of the earth.

BR I AN DU GGAN

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EXTENDING MINISTRIES

Inside small cafés that sit beneath the shadows of quiet church steeples, new partnerships are forming to establish the church where the gospel isn’t known.

Sweden was once a country that sent missionaries to the ends of the earth. After revivals sparked in Sweden in the late 1800s, a contingent of Swedish immigrants to the United States formed what would eventually become the Evangelical Free Church of America.

Though our Scandinavian forebearers would establish a gospel-centered movement of churches in America, the health of the Church in their homeland would eventually fade. Today, this influential Scandinavian country is considered the most secular nation in Europe.

It is also here, in the capital of Stockholm, that ReachGlobal missionary Tonya Dove works alongside several pastors to reach the Swedish people with the good news of Jesus Christ. Her effort to launch a new City Team in Stockholm is answering the call of the Great Commission in a land familiar to our movement of churches.

Before you are tempted with fear and anxiety over the state of the global Church, be encouraged! God is faithful to His Bride, and the Church is moving forward with its mission. Not only that, the Church – through individuals and local congregations – still answers Jesus’ call to go and make disciples of all nations.

But the story of what God is restoring in Sweden leads us to an important question: As the demographics of our world shift and change, are we prepared to answer the Great Commission no matter where it takes us?

A R E M I N D E R TO G O Our world is more connected than ever. Technology continues to make every corner of the globe increasingly accessible. The benefits are clear on a variety of levels – economically, socially, culturally – but this newfound connectedness can tempt us to stray from Jesus’ command to “go.”

It might surprise you to learn I’ve had to defend the effectiveness of sending missionaries into the field. I’ve also been questioned on the use of resources to maintain a ministry presence in multiple countries. And, perhaps, if we’re honest with ourselves, we’ve asked some of the same questions. Is the effort and approach effective for the gospel? Could God make better use of the resources we use to support global ministry workers?

Let’s revisit Jesus’ words to the disciples just before his ascension.

“Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you.

And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age.”

Matt. 28:19-20

Photo of Stockholm, Sweden, taken by ReachGlobal missionaries John and Kate Rechin.

It should stand out that the first thing Jesus commands his disciples to do is “go.” To go requires effort and action. It also indicates the importance of presence. I believe this matters in our day as much as it did 2000 years ago. Though our world is increasingly connected by technology, most developed societies indicate an epidemic of loneliness. Not only that, but many cultures deeply value physical presence. Let’s not lose sight of the importance of the embodied Church of which we are members and to which we call the lost.

Let’s go back to the text. To “go” is not an option, it is commanded by our Savior, the one who has all authority both in heaven and on earth. The Church, by sending and supporting missionaries, is obeying God’s command, even if it may not be

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SUBSCRIBE TO THE

LINK Stay connected to stories, resources and missions opportunities around EFCA ReachGlobal. Sign up today.

make disciples, make disciples. As disciplemaking multiplies local churches blossom.

I hope you’re starting to see it. By investing in disciplemakers we are establishing the Church. As disciples gather for the purpose of learning, worship, fellowship and collectively carrying out Jesus’ commands, the Holy Spirit equips these churches to be beacons to of hope in our lost world. Let’s not lose sight of the connection between disciplemaking and Christ’s Church.

Wherever you are in your life with Christ, you are equipped to make disciples! Be the disciplemaker Jesus has called you to be. In doing so, you answer the Great Commission and build the Church.

A R E M I N D E R TO A N S W E R

seen as wisdom to our world. ReachGlobal is the primary means for EFCA churches to send and support missionaries through our movement.

We all have a responsibility to go. Some will go across the street and others will go across oceans. I encourage you, ask God where he is calling you to “go.”

Whether near or far, your neighborhood to Stockholm, God commands us to respond to the gospel need everywhere – even if the society is “post Christian” or in places where the good news has yet to be heard. In fact, that’s what ReachGlobal is all about – we exist to invest in disciplemakers to establish the Church where the gospel isn’t known.

A REMI N DER TO M AK E D ISCIP L E S But Jesus’ command calls us to do more than simply “go.” We are to “make disciples.” For ReachGlobal, we define a disciple as someone becoming more like Jesus and doing the things Jesus did. This requires two things of the believer. First, they are becoming more like Jesus in character. Second, they are growing in their competence to do the things Jesus did.

Though the term isn’t regularly used, our world is full of disciples. Consider the role of social media “influencers” to better understand what discipleship looks like in our day. People emulate in character and competency the influences who’ve won our attention. How much more should those of us who claim to follow Jesus emulate the character and competency of the King of kings?

We all have a responsibility to go. Some will go across the street and others will go across oceans. I encourage you, ask God where he is calling you to “go.”

But this kind of transformation requires help – from the Holy Spirit and from trusted believers who are fulfilling the Great Commission. We call these people disciplemakers. A disciplemaker is becoming more like Jesus and brings others with them. It’s not enough to learn about Jesus. We must become like him and make more disciples. This is core to the Great Commission. It is not optional for any of us who call Jesus our Lord. Our personal spiritual growth is dependent on our obedience to God’s commands. The Great Commission is for every believer to obey.

An interesting aspect of the Great Commission is that Jesus’ command is self-propagating. New disciples learn to obey His commands, one of which is to make disciples. Disciples who

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There is a theme in Scripture: God’s commands aren’t always answered with an emphatic “yes.” Like Gideon (Judges 6) you may feel weak. Like Moses (Exodus 4) you may feel unprepared.

Like Jonah (Jonah 1) you may want to flee. Look to Jesus’ closing words in the Great Commission: “And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age.” Matt. 28:20b Be encouraged. It’s evident that Jesus anticipates our hesitancy, our fears, even our resistance when responding to His command, so He offers His presence as we obey.

What’s keeping you from answering the Great Commission?

Fears of failure, shame, physical harm, financial hardship?

In answering the Great Commission we take Jesus up on the promise of His presence.

It is our responsibility as individuals, in our families, small groups and local churches, to ensure that our lives are oriented toward the lost. Through ReachGlobal, pathways for individuals and local churches to participate in the Great Commission make it easy to join the mission. From child sponsorship and ministries to communities in crisis, to short term and career ministry opportunities around the world, we help EFCA churches identify, mobilize and support gospel workers.

Why? Because our Lord commands it. Because He loves His Church. Because He loves the lost. Because He loves us and desires to use us to share His love.

Tonya is an example to us. Her work with disciplemakers, pastors and ministry leaders in Stockholm, is establishing the Church where the gospel isn’t known. You can join this work too.

Whether small or large, at home or abroad, you can contribute to God’s redemptive work in the world by answering the call to go and making disciples among all nations.

Brian Duggan began his career as a church planting pastor, then moved into a variety of experiences in nursing, humanitarian work near the Afghanistan border, healthcare information technology and consulting in the healthcare industry. He has served with ReachGlobal since 2007, beginning in Latin America before returning to the U.S. in 2017. In 2019, he became the executive vice president of EFCA international ministries. Brian and his wife Cathi have four grown children and two grandchildren.

Mobilizing the next generation of GOSPEL INFLUENCERS

PROVIDING THE CLEAR NEXT STEP toward answering God’s call to a lifetime of ministry.

OPPORTUNITIES FOR: • National youth missions • International youth missions • Collage-age missions

Register online at apexmissions.org apex@efca.org

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celebrating New Missionaries A FR I CA

EUROPE

ELISA GEORGE

L AW S O N S H AY SANDY LEXI J O S H UA MERRY MICHAEL LEVI D AV I D KARLA K AY L A ZACH M I K AY L A DANIEL HANNAH DOUG KRISTIE M AT T KRISTINA ANGELA BEKAH

G LO BAL FIN G ER PR I N TS GRACE H E AT H E R K AT I E BRIAN

APEX MACKENZIE

ASI A COLIN MEGAN C H R I S TA AARON LY D I A JENNY E L I S H E VA JANE KASSY

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LATIN AMERICA and the CARIB B EAN BETSY

MIDDLE EAST and NORTH AF RICA CAROLINE BEN B R I T TA N Y ANNE

G LOB AL EQU IPPING J AY D AV I D

CRISIS RESPONSE DALE KIM R O B E RT GAIL STEVEN SUZANNE TODD SAMUEL ERIC AMY

EXTENDING MINISTRIES

Photos taken by ReachGlobal missionaries John and Kate Rechin.

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DAN HOLMAN: Local Churches Are Key in Crisis How one ReachGlobal missionary followed the call to serve in the unique mission field that follows crisis.

Back in 2017, after seeing news coverage on the devastating impact of Hurricane Harvey just three hours from where I lived, I hopped in my truck to search for ways to help. I’d heard through the grapevine that an EFCA

church in Houston was helping to “muck and gut” flooded homes around their church, so I joined in for a week and a half.

I knew the devastation of Hurricane Harvey went well beyond this one neighborhood, and I wondered: were any other churches reaching out to their community?

As I traveled other areas of Texas, I discovered most churches were overwhelmed, shocked and just trying to survive.

Beyond that, I saw mountains of items donated that no one needed, while people were in desperate need for other basic items. I met with a pastor who admitted he was barely functioning and at a total loss for what to do to help the people calling him.

He couldn’t see a path forward, much less how to plug in other people to help.

After serving, I had even more questions. What would happen in Houston when the church “mucking and gutting” needed to get back to normal life? What would happen in the areas where the churches had no idea where to even begin?

How could churches reach out in a way that had long-term and eternal impact?

Driving back, I called someone serving in the EFCA to ask if she knew of any ministries that specialized in major disasters.

She told me about ReachGlobal Crisis Response.

Next thing I knew, I was sitting down with the Crisis Response directors in Houston. They told me about the unique mission field that follows crisis. Normally, people live their lives closed off to people around them and the gospel. But after a crisis, literal and figurative doors come down, opening an opportunity for holistic gospel outreach—if a church has a vision to engage.

The key to long-term and eternal impact after crisis is to empower local churches. As I’d seen firsthand, most churches don’t know what to do after a hurricane, flood, tornado or fire hits their community.

ReachGlobal Crisis Response is set up to help local churches assess the resources available, the gifts and passion of the church body, and the needs of the situation. From this initial assessment, they help churches develop a unique outreach ministry with the goal of sharing the love of Christ with their communities in crises for years to come.

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In that meeting, the directors encouraged me to apply to join Crisis Response. Amazingly, two years before Hurricane Harvey, my wife and I had felt led by the Lord to downsize into an RV with our three kids. We went through the application process and before we knew it, we were serving full-time with Crisis Response in Texas.

Since that introduction, my family and I have been serving with Crisis Response for seven years. Having a knack for adaptability and thriving in hard situations, I joined the frontend response team and traveled into disaster areas while my family hosted volunteer teams in Houston. From Texas, my family moved to Paradise, California, where we oversaw the Paradise Fire Response until Fall 2023.

Currently, I serve as the domestic response director, overseeing our North American operations. Our home-base is still in Paradise, but I have the honor of coming alongside my fellow teammates all across the U.S. to help them get the support they need to serve well with joy and strength in difficult environments.

One of the misconceptions about Crisis Response is that it’s a “construction ministry.” But our focus is always intentional disciplemaking, church strengthening and church planting.

Rebuilding homes is one of the easiest access ministries when you have a lot of volunteers willing to serve, but not every church is led to rebuild homes.

In Crisis Response we say, “When you have been to one disaster, you have been to one disaster.” Every situation is unique, with endless possibilities of how the Lord can work. Not only is every disaster different, but the type of disaster changes the type of response. With a hurricane, volunteers can pour in immediately to gut homes. Fire is completely different.

Paradise was a slow and difficult response, to say the least.

Since the fire survivors weren’t allowed to go back to what was left of their homes for up to a year, the main issues we faced were not only displacement, paperwork and immediate needs for goods, but also helping with emotional, relational and spiritual loss. Given that, we carried out the response in three phases.

Phase 1 was immediate relief, which involved finding survivors a place to live, making sure they had what they needed and assessing their emotional and spiritual state. Phase 2 involved helping Chico Evangelical Free Church (EFCA) rally a group of 40 volunteers to adopt five to 10 survivors each. Phase 3

E N G A G I N G C U LT U R E

“

The key to long-term and eternal impact after crisis is to empower local churches.

As I’d seen firsthand, most churches don’t know what to do after a hurricane, flood, tornado or fire hits their community.

involved setting up a community rebuilding effort with Paradise Evangelical Free Church (EFCA) that involved regular volunteer teams coming for two and a half years to help rebuild both the community and the church.

Five years later, the town is about 25 percent rebuilt, and the church is thriving. Altogether, more than 620 survivors were supported through this outreach ministry.

The Maui Fire Response had some of the same patterns as Paradise but was very different because of the Hawaiian culture.

With the guidance of Matt Dirks, superintendent of the EFCA Hawaii District, we came in with a foreign missions mindset. We set out to connect with partner churches, learn the culture and see how the Lord wanted us to effectively minister on the island.

We’ve partnered with multiple churches on the island and strategically used our resources to support local outreach.

In Kula, we’ve provided trauma care training and support so churches there could start cleaning up and connecting with their community. On Oahu, we are partnering with multiple churches to help them send inter-island volunteer teams. In Wailuku, we are partnering with a church to provide food to the hubs on the island so survivors struggling with meals can get the food they need. We have witnessed these churches not only giving food, but also praying for people, connecting relationally and spiritually, and doing life with those just trying to hang on after this disaster.

After one year, the Maui Response is coming to the end of Phase 1 as most of the homes have been cleared from Lahaina and Kula. The local churches are looking at how to continue to reach out as people still struggle with a lack of resources and clear path forward. Our hope is to provide support to the churches on the island as long as necessary and see Jesus glorified while they love their community in this time of need.

To learn more about how and your church can support the Maui Wildfire Response – and all other current responses – visit efca.org/crisis-response.

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Open to God’s Agenda How an innovative internship changed a missionary’s trajectory – and a church’s heart for missions.

AM Y M E DI N A

It was a shot in the dark, but that was all Angela had left. In May 2022, Angela showed up at First Free in St.

Louis, Missouri, on a Sunday morning straight from the airport, luggage in tow. She wasn’t expecting much to come from it.

Visiting a church cold turkey usually doesn’t.

But desperation makes you willing to try anything.

In 2019, Angela had returned home to Ohio after spending two fruitful, energizing years with ReachGlobal in Athens, Greece. Less than half a percent of Greece’s population is evangelical Christian, and God gave Angela a deep love for Greek people and culture.

She knew God was calling her to return for long-term ministry, helping to revitalize and strengthen the local church. So, she went through the long-term application process with ReachGlobal and made the transition to become a career missionary. With it, the budget she needed to raise nearly doubled.

Angela was just starting to raise additional support when the pandemic hit. Months of lockdowns, personal illness, and turmoil in her home church brought her support-raising process to a grinding halt. And she just couldn’t get it going again. After almost three years, she was defeated and demoralized and questioned whether she would ever get back to Greece.

During that time, Angela tried just about everything. She had contacted everyone she knew. She had offered to speak at any possible venue that would host her. Once, she even set up a table outside of a car show! She reached out to hundreds of EFCA churches. Yet she’d hardly received any response at all.

A RA N DOM C ON NE CTION When a conference took Angela to Missouri in May 2022, and she realized she would be arriving on a Sunday morning, she looked up nearby EFCA churches she had previously contacted. She randomly chose First Free and visited that Sunday morning – luggage and all – hoping for a connection that might lead to a partnership. But by this point, she didn’t have much hope.

Angela managed to connect with John Richardson, First Free’s executive pastor of discipleship, who oversees the missions program. “I shared with her what I always do – that we weren’t looking to support any new missionaries,” John said.

First Free already had 30 missionaries on their roster, including many sent from their own congregation. Regardless, John said, “I never say no to the meeting. I never want to play God. I wanted to be an encouragement to her, and I wanted to be open to God’s agenda.”

That attitude changed everything.

John agreed to meet with Angela. As she shared about the need in Athens and her desire to build partnerships in the U.S. with churches that could send teams to help, it sounded like something First Free wanted to pursue. The church had recently ended partnerships with three international locations because

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they no longer needed American teams. “The more we talked, the more I realized that this could be an attractive partnership for us,” John said. Angela connected him with her team leader in Greece, and John learned more about the ministry there. It was a great fit.

That summer, First Free agreed to support Angela, and John and the senior pastor planned a vision trip to Athens. But that was just the beginning.

N E W O PPO RT U N I T I E S Meanwhile, ReachGlobal staff were brainstorming how to help Angela become fully funded. Deciding that she needed a fresh start in a new community, her team leader approached First Free with an idea: Would the church be willing to take Angela on as an intern?

John instantly liked the idea and took it to church leadership.

“Our whole team was enthusiastic about it,” he said. Plans came together rapidly: Angela was already receiving a small stipend from her mission support, so the church didn’t need to pay her.

Two First Free families offered to host her.

Angela developed a program and then visited home groups, Bible studies and Sunday School classes to promote it. “I shared what it’s like to be a missionary and how much you miss when you are away from your family and friends. I helped people realize what helps them feel encouraged and not forgotten. It was cool to go to each group and see that kind of awakening,” Angela said.

Now, all 30 missionaries supported by First Free have their own care group.

Angela dove quickly into life at First Free, volunteering in Awana and homeschool groups. Leadership assigned her several missions-related projects, such as creating a pathway for groups to “adopt” one of their supported missionaries.

First Free wasn’t the only one to benefit from this arrangement.

John and other First Free staff began investing in Angela. They included her in staff meetings, giving her valuable discipleship amid healthy church leadership. And knowing the ultimate goal was to send her to Greece, they did everything they could to

EXTENDING MINISTRIES

advocate for financial partnerships. They invited her to briefly share in a Sunday service. They introduced her to scores of people. They put on a “Greek Night” to promote her ministry.

When a church missionary retired, John asked their financial partners to consider supporting Angela.

It worked. While it had taken Angela several years to raise 10 percent of what she needed, it took just several months to raise the remaining amount. The momentum was contagious. Excited by her progress, friends back in Ohio supported her, too.

May 2023 was the end of Angela’s internship. First Free put on a commissioning service for her and invited anyone touched

by Angela’s service to come up and pray for her. John said, “There was this huge throng of people who came up and surrounded her.”

Shortly after that service, Angela hit 100 percent of her budget.

For three years, Angela wondered if she would ever get back to Greece. In a matter of seven months, everything changed.

By mid-July, she was on a plane to fulfill God’s call on her life.

MA K IN G A DI FFERE N CE The positive ripple effects of Angela’s time at First Free continue. Not only did Angela’s internship help to strengthen First Free’s mission program, but it tangibly helped to connect the congregation to God’s work in the world. Last Christmas, First Free sent a sizable donation to help the church in Athens with their building fund. This coming summer, First Free will send its first team to assist ReachGlobal’s ministry in Athens – hopefully the first of many.

It worked. While it had taken Angela several years to raise 10 percent of what she needed, it took just several months to raise the remaining amount. “[Angela’s internship] was a real, tangible way to assist a missionary candidate in fundraising. It was also a boost for both our staff and our church. It gave visibility to our global ministry and helped everyone see the importance of relationships with missionaries,” John said. The positive impact on First Free has encouraged church leadership to invite another support-raising missionary to do the same thing.

Some missionaries come from rural areas or low-resourced churches where it’s extremely difficult to raise support. Developing an additional community network at a different church can give them the support they need to broaden opportunities for partnerships while developing their ministry gifts – and spark deeper passion for missions in that church. If a dozen EFCA churches contacted ReachGlobal and said, “We’d love a

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missionary intern for a few months!” more missionaries might have the opportunity to live out their calling, and more local churches might see radical transformation.

Support-raising missionaries need advocates: a person or a group of people who will come alongside them and say, “Let’s work together to get you into the ministry where God has called you!” Missionaries need someone to give them a platform, bring groups of people together to hear their story and enthusiastically cheerlead them in their journey. If more EFCA churches worked together to advocate for the ReachGlobal missionaries from their district, I’m convinced God would work in the missionaries, church leadership and the local church as a whole to send many more workers to build God’s kingdom. And isn’t that what all of us long for?

First Free taking a step of faith to advocate for Angela made all the difference for her. And when we’re considering how to fulfill the Great Commission, that makes all the difference in the world.

If you would like to connect with missionaries raising support in your district or are interested in hosting a missionary intern, please contact reachglobal@efca.org.

Amy Medina spent almost half her life on the continent of Africa, first as an MK in Liberia and then sixteen years in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania as a ReachGlobal missionary. Amy (and family) relocated to Southern California in 2020, and she now serves with the ReachGlobal Engage team as a pre-deployed missionary coach and placement specialist. Amy blogs at Not Home Yet.

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EFCA Foundation Godly living, joyful giving.

The EFCA Foundation exists to provide trusted charitable and estate planning services to help meet personal planning goals while furthering the Lord’s work. We offer donor-advised funds, charitable gift annuities, a Christian guide to wills and trusts, and more.

Visit efcafoundation.org or email foundation@efca.org to learn more about our offerings.

PLANTING CHURCHES

GLEN SCHRIEBER: I’m Excited About the Future of the EFCA The former district superintendent of EFCA Southeast shared in 2023 how he came to Christ, what led him to the EFCA and his next chapter of ministry.

I’m the district superintendent of EFCA Southeast.1 I do

a lot of traveling. I think I will have driven 1.1 million miles in these 20-21 years. I bought a brand-new Toyota Camry and it finally died at 397,000 miles. I rent now.

I came to Christ through a free church, in Columbus, Nebraska. And it was local members of that free church that led me to the Lord and then discipled me after. They encouraged me to go into full-time Christian work; they encouraged me to go to a Christian bible school. I went to Moody Bible Institute.

They supported me through that, and I went on staff at Campus Crusade for Christ, they supported myself and my wife through that. And then when I wanted to do church ministry, beyond the parachurch church, I went to TEDS (Trinity Evangelical Divinity School) and then I’ve been church planting, or some sort of ministry with the church ever since. So I came to Christ in 1971 and started church planting for the free church after seminary in 1985.

We were part of a team that planted two churches in the Louisville, Kentucky area. Then I went to New Orleans and planted Urban Impact and a couple of churches there. We were in New Orleans from 1988 to 2003.

When we moved to Louisville, the district just included four states; the deep south wasn’t even on the map of the Free Church. So when we moved with that team to Kentucky, we added Kentucky to the map, and then Tennessee and called it the East Central District. And then they were looking for someone to follow up some potential church interests further south, and they said, “Glen, you like this kind of thing. Would you be interested in going south to plant a district? And I said, “Sure, if I can move anywhere I want.” And they said, “What do we care? It’s not even on the map yet.”

So we moved to New Orleans because it was kind of the biggest, baddest place, and I had an urban ministry desire. It’s probably one of the best things that we’ve ever done in ministry and in marriage and family life, just enjoying those years in New Orleans.

When I think of the future of the EFCA, and I think of the district, we’re in good hands. I love how God has brought these guys to these churches for this time.

The opportunities are immense in the southeast. People are moving there all the time. It’s a fluid situation. The thing that I’m most excited about, as I think of just all the years in the district, is just the health, vitality and health of the pastors; we’ve got a number of young pastors I’m extremely thrilled about. When I think of the future of the EFCA, and I think of the district, we’re in good hands. I love how God has brought these guys to these churches for this time.

With my impending retirement or reassignment, I would like to continue to invest in the Free Church that I love and to continue to play a part but just a different part. I’m quite excited to see what’s ahead.

1

Following the publication of this article, Glen Schrieber retired as district superintendent of EFCA Southeast.

The current district superintendent is Marc Ramirez.

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why we serve: Faces of the EFCA National Office

“

I’ve always had a heart to serve others no matter the capacity. Working at the national office was a prayer answered. I’ve always wanted to work at a Christian organization where I could somehow impact and further God’s kingdom, even in a small way.

When I hear comments like, ‘Connie, thank you so much for praying with me during the application process’ or ‘Connie, thank you so much for your servant heart’ or ‘Connie, thank you so much for making us feel so welcome here at the national office,’ my purpose is confirmed. I love using the gifts God gave me – empathy, compassion for others and a heart to serve – to love on God’s people.

CONNIE WINSTON

“

RE ACH G LO BA L A D M I NI STR AT I V E ASSI STA N T

I coordinate EFCA GATEWAY at the EFCA national office. GATEWAY is a cohortbased program that facilitates in-depth study of the EFCA Statement of Faith. I love working with GATEWAY because of its mission to offer transformational training for all acting and emerging ministry leaders, especially those who wouldn’t otherwise pursue formal training. Personally, I had career aspirations that gave me specific reasons to pursue formal training and enough resources to do it. It was a worthwhile investment, and I know my glorious God better because of it. Many people leading EFCA churches can’t commit to a traditional educational experience because 1) they’re already leading a congregation, 2) they’re vocational call is something else (like finance, plumbing or raising kids) or 3) they can’t afford it. While traditional education paths are great for some, GATEWAY offers an affordable opportunity for spiritual growth that’s approachable for anyone worshiping with us on Sunday mornings. This is a mission worth working for.

ALEX RAUCH

“

E FCA GAT E WAY M I NI ST RY C OOR D I N ATOR

I serve the EFCA as event director, strategically and intentionally leading national and international gatherings. My calling is to cultivate experiences; creating spaces for encouraging and equipping so leaders can maximize their impact for Christ. The best part of my job is collaborating with and providing opportunities for our awesome constituents – students, pastors, leaders, missionaries, and others. It is truly a privilege to serve this movement.

LAURIE SEAY

E FCA E V E N T D I R E C TOR

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From all of us at the EFCA national office, we are grateful and honored to serve you and your church – with projects like The Movement – as we all seek to glorify God by multiplying transformational churches among all people.

O FFIC E OF THE PRESIDENT

M INIST RY ADVANC E M E NT

Carlton Harris, Acting President

Lanny Harris, Associate Executive Director of the EFCA Foundation

Carole Lehn, Executive Vice President of Operations

Denise Heskin, Development Administration Manager

Brian Duggan, Executive Vice President of International Ministries Scott Sterner, Executive Vice President of National Ministries Rae Phillips, Director of Organizational Relations and Strategic Projects Kate Downs, Executive Assistant to the President

NATION AL MIN ISTRIES

DO NO R SE RVIC E S Nyng Yang, Director of Donor Services Mai Yang, Donor Services Associate II Kimiko Huber, Development Operations Assistant Cara Weier, Donor Services Associate III

Grace Gould, National Ministries and ReachNetwork Manager and Executive Assistant Paul Miller, ReachStudents Director David Boerema, Apex Missions Director April Warfield, Multicultural Ministry Director Ben Johnson, Immigrant Hope Director

T HE O LO GY AND C RE DE NT IAL ING Greg Strand, Executive Director of Biblical Theology and Credentialing Dani Richards, Administrative Assistant

Alex Rauch, GATEWAY Ministry Coordinator Molly Brant, ReachStudents Administrative Associate Claudia Ruiz Gutierrez, Executive Administrative Assistant

EVENTS Laurie Seay, Events Director Tracy Maas, Events Coordinator

F I NANCE, HU MAN R ESOU R C ES, A D MI NI STRATION AND BU ILDIN G SERVIC E S Courtney Blesi, Director of Accounting Becky Dahlen, Purchase Card Administrator Becky Anderson, Financial Operations Accountant Kayla Carter, Trust and Payables Supervisor Heide Becker, Accounting Assistant Curt Swanson, Accounting Assistant, Trust and Payroll Angel Bird, Manager of Financial Planning and Analysis Kari Berglund, Manager of Finance Emily Moak, Director of Human Resources Rochelle Bendell, Human Resources Administrator Anita Olson, Payroll Manager Randy Smith, Building Maintenance Coordinator John Caflisch, Mail Center Coordinator Terry Smith, Copy Center Coordinator Terry LaPlante, Copy and Graphics Coordinator

ARC HIVE S Tom Cairns, Archivist

M ISSIO NARY P E RSO NNE L James Petersen, Executive Director of IMA Personnel Drew Pederson, Director of Next Steps Mike Davis, Director of Mobilization James Lauderdale, Director of Member Care Mandi Rodger, Associate Director of Ministry Effectiveness Stewart Humphry, Director of Connect Harold Golden, Director of Transitions Amy Medina, Associate Director of Engage Mark Long, Associate Director of Engage Liz Blancke, Associate Director of IMA Support Services and Transitions Marilynn Plucar, Director of Alumni Sandy Sindelar, Candidate Advisor Rick Stigen, Associate Finance Director Emily Schomers, ReachGlobal Explore Supervisor Judy Westrum, Resource Specialist John Westrum, Personnel Projects Connie Winston, Administrative Assistant Deonna Mitchem, Administrative Assistant Allina Shvedchikov, Administrative Assistant Leslie Burford, Mobilization Team and Administrative Assistant

Talis Rudzitis, Manager of Administrative Services Magna McSpedon, Administrative Assistant Sarah St. Julien, Receptionist

I NFORMATION TEC HN OLOGY Jason Blanchard, Director of Information Technology Peter Olson, Technical Support Analyst

C O M M U NICAT IO NS Nate Thompson, Director of Communications Jason Ingolfsland, Staff Writer Kevin Horner, Content Strategist Natalie Kuhl, Senior Graphic Designer Kendall Soderstrom, Graphic Designer Josiah Barrett, Video Producer

May God bless the work you are doing in your local congregation and around the EFCA. If you or your church has a story to share with the movement, let us know at communications@efca.org.

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