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5 Questions with Deborah Wright and Jim Kitchens

This series highlights participants at the national gathering in Minneapolis on March 31st – April 2nd, 2014. Presenters, preachers, teachers, and leaders were asked the same five questions and their thoughtful responses may be found here every week. The goal is to introduce you to people you’ll hear from in Minneapolis and prime the pump for our time together. Hopefully, something here will spark an idea, thought, or question for you. We encourage you to reach out and initiate conversations that you can later continue in person. 

Deborah Wright and Jim Kitchens are partners in PneuMatrix, a consulting group working with churches and presbyteries implementing adaptive change and supporting pastors developing innovative forms of Christian community. 

Together, they are offering a thought-piece at the Next Gathering on adaptive change and leadership.

5 questions1. Tell us about your ministry context.

Deborah: Following 8 years in the pastorate, a return to the PhD program at the GTU (Historical Theology), and serving as Development Director under Randy Taylor at SFTS, I launched a practice in Corporate Chaplaincy and Strategic Leadership Development.  Clients have included Kaiser Permanente, LucasFilm, and Google.  Launched PneuMatrix , a not-for-profit consulting practice for Adaptive Change, with Jim Kitchens in Jan. 2012.

Jim: I serve as interim director of the progressive ecumenical campus ministry at the University of California at Davis and as a consultant with PneuMatrix.  I also help oversee the Company of New Pastors, our denomination’s first call program.

2. Where have you seen glimpses of “the church that is becoming”?

Deborah: Since launching PneuMatrix, I’ve seen signs of ‘the church that is becoming’ across the country – through NEXT, through UNCO, through 1001 NWCs, through Fresh Expressions (U.K.), through following some of the brightest and most creative imaginations of newly discovered colleagues on Facebook.  PneuMatrix’ beta study in San Francisco Presbytery in 2012 allowed us to celebrate profound ‘deaths’ and ‘resurrections’ of a variety of ministries.  As a partner with NEXT in the Paracletos engagement, Jim and I are working closely with a congregation in transition in SoCal.

Jim: In people who are willing to take “holy risks” and begin new ministries that respond to the unique needs of their neighborhood.  I’m especially drawn to new ministries that are willing to risk even failure for the sake of learning about what the Spirit is doing among us.

3. What are your passions in ministry? (And/or what keeps you up at night?)

Jim: I’m passionate about mentoring and encouraging younger church leaders and also about working with congregations approaching the end of their life to help them leave a legacy of mission for the church’s future.  What keeps me up at night is that whether we Boomers might run the church into the ground before younger generations of church leaders have the opportunity to renew it.

Deborah: I have always been attracted to change.  Since my undergrad years, I have studied the sociology of change in the church.  Having been born/raised/baptized/confirmed in a large congregation in South Florida that became a founding congregation of the PCA, I have lived the stuff of dramatic church change to the bone.  This current tsunami of change in Christendom jazzes me.  Where many see loss and challenge, I see fresh winds of the Spirit and vast opportunity for Kingdom work.  My work as a Corporate Chaplain has been all about being a midwife of deep change.  It doesn’t keep me up at night – I eagerly dive into the dreamworld waiting on God’s unveilings.  I’m an off-the-chart intuitive on  the MBTI.

4. What is one thing you are looking forward to at the NEXT Gathering?

Deborah: I’m looking forward to all the workshops and speaking engagements I’m NOT a part of!  I’m looking forward to the IGNITE segments, and to meeting new companions along the way to the Becoming Church!  And I just may make a side trip  to the Mall Of America, because, honestly, what a crazy concept!

Jim: I love the enthusiasm and hope that pervades the room as people who trust the Spirit is equipping us for and leading us into the future build off of one another’s insights, ideas, and energy.

5. Describe NEXT Church in seven words or less.

Jim: Isaiah’s “new thing” bursting into flower.

Deborah: Church Becoming: Diving into the Deep Unknown!

5 Questions with Gary Swaim

This series highlights participants at the national gathering in Minneapolis on March 31st – April 2nd, 2014. Presenters, preachers, teachers, and leaders were asked the same five questions and their thoughtful responses may be found here every week. The goal is to introduce you to people you’ll hear from in Minneapolis and prime the pump for our time together. Hopefully, something here will spark an idea, thought, or question for you. We encourage you to reach out and initiate conversations that you can later continue in person. 

Gary D. Swaim, Ph.D. lives in Irving, TX.  He is a produced playwright in California and Texas (including a drama portraying the last years in the life of Dietrich Bonhoeffer) and a widely-published poet and writer of short fiction, in addition to anthologized poetry and fiction.  Currently, Dr. Swaim teaches in the Masters of Liberal Studies Program for S.M.U and serves as Faculty Advisor for Creative Writing.  He was selected as the 2011 Texas Senior Poet Laureate and was awarded the honor of Minnie Stevens Piper Professor of Excellence for the state of Texas. Swaim is a member of the Woodhaven Presbyterian Church of Irving, Texas and a ruling elder. Gary will be leading a workshop, Creating the Poetry of the Spirit.

5 questions1. Tell us about your ministry context.

I grew up in a conservative denomination and served as a minister (pastor) in that denomination (fulltime and supply) for approximately fifteen years.  With that same group, I later served as an elder for thirteen years.  Through it all, I began drifting (deliciously and painfully) from the literalism I had been part to.  Fresh air fell on me when my wife and I associated with the Presbyterian Church.  I continued my spiritual search and have served as a ruling elder (and lay minister) there.  I have, for as long as I can remember, regarded myself a deeply spiritual person who makes essentially no distinction between the world of the spirit and material.  Each of my life acts is, I believe, of the (S)spirit.

2. Where have you seen glimpses of “the church that is becoming”?

I have seen the “church that is becoming” in the specific acts of persons inside as well as outside the nominal church.  I have seen it among those who say they do not believe as well as in those who believe deeply.  I have seen it in the person of advanced age and of youth.  It is most in individuals (and my thoughts go to one so aptly named Gloria) more than in collected gatherings of Christians.  I have seen the church becoming most with the marriage of the arts to the gathered body of persons. . .when individuals become co-creators with God.

3. What are your passions in ministry? (And/or what keeps you up at night?)

The so-called “high church” among most Presbyterians speaks to me most and impassions me.  Perhaps because I am a Professor of Arts and Humanities, symbology/imagery/depth of analysis speak to me most clearly, and I fear for its demise, its being overrun by bubblegum theology and practice.  No, I know.  This meets the needs of many and has every right to its existence.  It is, perhaps, only I whose need cannot be met by what APPEARS to be surface in nature.  And, then, I cry (worshipfully) at the excellence in a performance of “Sing, Sing, Sing” by Benny Goodman’s recording.  I have not said, you will have noticed, that I’m always consistent.

4. What is one thing you are looking forward to at the NEXT Gathering?

I will be enjoying (I know this is so, by faith) my first visit with Next Church.  I have long been involved in a quest for truths of all types and sorts, the very nature of my profession and temperament.  A quest, as concept, automatically involves “quest-ions.” I am rife with questions, short on permanent answers.  I expect that will be so for most attending Next Church.  What other reason than the search for answers would bring into existence a gathering like this?  I look forward to interacting with “questers.”  Nothing gives me greater anticipation.

5. Describe NEXT Church in seven words or less.

Believing, hopeful, questers in search of answers. . . .

5 Questions with Bill Golderer

This series highlights participants at the national gathering in Charlotte, North Carolina on March 4 – 5th, 2013. Presenters, preachers, teachers, and leaders were asked the same five questions and their thoughtful responses may be found here every week. The goal is to introduce you to people you’ll hear from in Charlotte and prime the pump for our time together. Hopefully, something here will spark an idea, thought, or question for you. We encourage you to reach out and initiate conversations that you can later continue in person. 

Bill Golderer and his partner in crime, Julie.

1. Tell us about your ministry context. 

In 2005, I responded to a call from a group of (mostly) suburban mainline protestant clergy from the Philadelphia region to breathe new life into a dormant landmark church in Center City that in the last century was an important part of a vibrant urban landscape. That response led to my founding of the Broad Street Ministry (BSM) in Philadelphia in what was once the historic Chambers-Wylie Memorial Presbyterian Church along Center City’s Avenue of the Arts. BSM is an innovative Christian faith community that emphasizes the Gospel imperatives of extending generous hospitality, demonstrating justice and compassion, and providing a ground for artistic expression. Beginning with less than $8,000 in seed capital and no existing congregation, BSM has grown into one of Center City Philadelphia’s most dynamic and largest worshipping congregations. It is diverse in every way, and has worked aggressively in its common life to be hands-on in addressing issues that detract from people’s ability to experience the abundant life that God intends.

In 2008, I extended my pastoral ministry in Philadelphia when he became the Pastor of Arch Street Presbyterian Church (ASPC).  Since 1851, Arch Street Presbyterian has been a worshipping congregation in the heart of Center City Philadelphia. When I arrived, this congregation was on life-support.  But after assembling a dynamic team of lay and professional leadership, ASPC has undergone a rapid and dramatic revitalization. Collectively, this community has taken up its mat and is walking boldly into the future that God has prepared for it.  The congregation is now a dynamic Sunday morning worshipping community, a church that welcomes children and families of every configuration, and a church that struggles alongside the people who work in the skyscrapers around it (and those who wish they were employed there) who aim to integrate their faith and work.

2. Where have you seen glimpses of “the church that is becoming”?

It is a core conviction of mine that God is already dynamically at work in the world and the priorities of the Kingdom are on view everywhere.  I like to think that when we are at our best, Presbyterian leaders are like archeologists who are uncovering in the most unlikely places where God is up to something exciting and challenging.  Specifically I have seen this wherever the church is taking risks that are real and scary.  When we are not at our best, we tend to be the kind of people who want to know our ministry experiments will work without the risk of failure.  Two women who are forging ahead with an attempt to be the church in a new way–who are sort of “alumnae” of BSM’s pastoral leadership program–are doing something that is really exciting (and fraught with risks).  Rev. Karen Rohrer and Becca Blake are a couple of committed and talented seminary grads who have tried to be the church in a neighborhood that is rife with tension between those who have lived in the neighborhood for decades and a recent influx of hipsters and other young people whose presence is gentrifying the neighborhood.  Through creative worship and a commitment to be the church that brings these divergent populations together, they are up to something really powerful but also very fragile.  God is unmistakably present when those two elements are in place.  Check them out!  https://www.facebook.com/thewordatbeacon

3. What are your passions in ministry? (And/or what keeps you up at night?)

My passion in ministry is connecting the core commitments of the congregations I serve with the concerns and dreams of people whose work and lives are in deep alignment with the Kingdom of God but who have–for whatever reason–been disaffected or disappointed by the church.  I love to mix it up with “lowbrow” artists and the societal shot-callers who are often surprised by the passion and conviction of the people who call BSM or ASPC their church home.  I love challenging the assumptions held by some that the church is limp, inert and overly concerned with comfort, safety and institutional survival.  I like to get into the deep end with people who are trying to make a splash in society that could result in a more just Philadelphia.

4. What is one thing you are looking forward to at the NEXT Gathering?

I relish conversation with people who are looking for the courage and the company to be the church in a more generous and bold fashion.  I met quite a few folks like that at NEXT last year.  I tend to shy away from conferences but this feels fresh to me.

5. Describe NEXT in seven words or less.

I have high hopes for NEXT but I am not sure we know yet what it will be.  If I were to sum up my hopes for what NEXT will be is:Community for those who believe restlessness, courage, and relentlessness are spiritual qualities worth cultivating. (That’s more than 7 but that’s what I’ve got.)