Candidate 26 Profile

Section A. Background Information

10. Year of Ordination

2007

11. Denomination of Ordination

RCA

12. If not RCA, what classes or supervising body from the ordaining denomination recognizes your ordination?

13. Present denomination

RCA

14. Present classis or judicatory

Delaware-Raritan

15. If you are not now a member of the Reformed Church in America, can you, in good conscience, agree with the doctrine, discipline and government of the RCA?

16. Do you support the mission and division of the Reformed Church in America?

Yes

17. Citizen of what country? If not USA, do you have permit to live and work in the USA?

USA

18. Previous Experience

19. Formal Education

20. Continuing Education

21. Languages (list any languages, other than English, in which you can preach or converse fluently)

Section B. Reflection

1. Describe your strengths, the best of who you are, and what you bring in service to the church.

I believe the most important strength that I bring in service to the church is a deep love of God and love for people of all ages. Additionally, I am a good communicator in small or larger settings, am responsible, and organized. I believe effective administration is important in the church, and I am attentive to making sure that we are all on the same page. I seek to be relatable and serve as an example to others in my relationship with and service to God. I enjoy helping people connect to God through preaching and teaching the bible at a children's level or deeper adult engagement. I am a non-anxious presence who is a good listener and gets along well with others, but I'm not afraid to express my own honest opinion. I enjoy getting to know others, especially their names, and connecting with the wider community as a means of serving and witnessing to the Good News of Jesus Christ. This may happen at the food bank, around a dinner table, at a coffee shop, in the crowd at a youth activity, or at the bedside of someone in the hospital.

2. Name two or three mentors who have significantly contributed to your ministry, and explain why these people are important to you.

One mentor who has significantly contributed to my ministry is Rev. Andres Fierro. Andres (Andy) was the Pastor of Crossroad Chapel where I interned during seminary and is important to me for the example he set. What I found most profound about Andy and the ministry of Crossroad was the sincerity and intentionality of the church. Crossroad Chapel was a bilingual English/Spanish RCA church. My estimate is that half of the congregation only spoke English, a quarter of the congregation only spoke Spanish, and a quarter of the congregation was bilingual. Yet, given that breakdown, there was a firm conviction among the congregation to be a multilingual/multi-ethnic congregation. They had patience and grace with one another amid the language challenges that Andy encouraged and promoted. Crossroad Chapel was also a "Mission Church" of the Holland Classis which meant the classis financially supported this ministry. Maybe expectedly, this was a middle to lower economic church with really no frills. To me, that, too, was a witness of the community of Christ who worked hard to maintain their facility, their community, and to support one another, all with Andy right there in the thick of things with everyone.

A second mentor who has significantly contributed to my ministry is Rev. Kirsty DePree. Kirsty was the Coordinator of Discipleship for the RCA when I first entered ministry. She provided me the opportunity io serve as a regional representative on the Denominational Youth Team. While I was initially hesitant, thinking that I had my hands full enough with my own, new, local responsibilities, she came back to me after my feet were a little more on solid ground at North Branch. Kirsty invited me into the bigger picture of the RCA network and how we might seek God together to serve more effectively. She has continued to be important to me as a colleague, friend, and encourager as we each navigate ministry and who God is calling us to be as the Church.

A third mentor who has significantly contributed to my ministry is Rev. Todd Buurstra. Todd was the lead Pastor at North Branch Reformed Church for nearly all of my first 14 years at North Branch. He preceded me at North Branch by 8 years. Todd is important to me for what I took away from his ministry. Specifically, he continually pursued what new things God might be calling North Branch to, and he was willing to initiate hard conversations these new things might lead to. I, also, was very impressed by the interfaith partnerships he was able to develop.

3. What caused you to enter ministry, and what are the core values that define your vision for ministry?

Christian faith has always been a foundational piece of who I am. Having been raised Catholic, I didn't have any interest in becoming a priest, so I thought I would serve God as a schoolteacher. While in college, I made the intentional decision to become involved with the Christian community on campus. My college was not heavily Christian, and this was clearly a Spirit-led conviction to not just follow whatever was popular and to own this faith for myself that my parents had raised me in. I am also thankful for good friends who spurred me on in this direction. As I became involved with other Christian ministries, since I'm not a wallflower, I, rather quickly, found myself in leadership roles in bible study, leading worship, and preaching. This is where God planted the seed for full-time local church ministry. After college, I served for a year as the Jr High Intern for Hope Chapel in Maui. That experience convinced me this was really what God was calling me to.

A couple of the core values that define my vision for ministry are:

• The priesthood of all believers - I believe that God has gifted every member of the church for a role and to serve

• The church does not exist for itself - I believe the church exists to serve and bless its local community

4. Explain the strategies or ideas that most excite you for helping a church to become and remain missional.

I believe the root of this question is found in Emil Brunner's quote, "A church exists by mission as a fire exists by burning" or, more recently, that "the Mission of God has a Church rather than the Church has a mission," espoused by individuals such as Lesslie Newbigin and Darrell Guder. In other words, our focus should always be on God, what God is doing in our world and community, and how we might participate. This emphasis might stem from a fair criticism that our churches have become institutionalized and focused inwardly on the interests of the believing community rather than always seeing our purpose as being sent to serve and witness to the world around us of the saving love Jesus offers.

There are many strategies such as a congregational self study, local community assessment, book studies, sermon series', training in evangelism, engaging congregational champions, partnering with other local groups, and highlighting stories of mission, that could all be approaches for making a church more missional or remain that way. Ultimately, it comes down to whether a church sees this as their purpose or not, whether or not they are convinced that the saving love of Jesus makes a difference in their lives, and whether or not they are willing to share about this saving love of Jesus through their every day actions and words.

5. Name three of your most passionate hopes for the Church at large, and why they are significant to you.

My three most passionate hopes for the Church at large are:

• That the Church would be less focused on the differences among us and more focused on our witness for Jesus to the world

• That the Church can overcome the tribalism that exists in our world from politics to economics to ethnicity to sexual orientation, etc.

• That there is a deeper understanding and daily recognition for Christians of who God is and what God does for us.

These hopes are significant to me because I think they are answers to what ails this world that God so loves. So many people are confused or hurting or lost and a relationship with God through Jesus Christ and his family of faith should offer and animate something different than can be found anywhere else.

6. Give an example of how you would theologically address an issue facing your contemporary world. Please be thorough enough to help the reader to understand your thought processes and your life commitments.

I believe one of the biggest issues facing our contemporary world is the polarization between people. Whether we quote Jesus in the gospels or Abraham Lincoln in his "House Divided" speech, "a house (or kingdom) divided against itself cannot stand." Each man is making a slightly different point: Jesus with respect to who he is in relation to Satan's kingdom and Abraham Lincoln in relation to the issue of slavery and how the United States should move forward. For me, scripture should always be our "sole rule for faith and life" which we should focus on when addressing issues. For people who do not hold this belief, I believe that God uses other sources or historic examples to inform a way forward. While citing these can frame the issue of polarization, and we could do a deep study of each, in order to address this issue, we must acknowledge that there could be differing views of righteousness at play that may lend themselves to polarization. (From a biblical sense, this is where the conversation of how we interpret the bible comes into play.) In that case, is polarization really a bad thing? The issue to me is not so much that there is polarization but what that polarization breeds. We read in Ephesians 2:14 that Christ has broken down the walls of hostility between people groups; in Galatians 3:28-9, we are reminded that, in Christ, there is no longer Jew or Greek, slave or free, male and female. 2 Corinthians 5:19 reminds us that "in Christ, God was reconciling the world to himself... and entrusting the message of reconciliation to us." Facing this issue of polarization, do we, as Christians, just jump right in and engage in the same sort of verbal barbs and scathing correspondences, or do we model a different way? Rather than giving in to the click bait and hot takes that our media and social media use, do we call one another to rise above that? Is it possible that person who talks differently and believes differently from me actually isn't terrible, horrible, and the scum of the earth? So, how would I theologically address this issue of polarization in our contemporary world? Having some healthy conversation and study, biblical and otherwise, would be good steps. A calling to accountability for one another when we speak or act in such a way that is degrading to others is a good step. I believe the biggest, and possibly hardest, way to address this issue is to cross the aisle, cross the street, and build relationships with people who look and think differently from us. It still may be hard to work through the areas where we disagree, but that doesn't mean we can't work together for good.

7. What theologians, pastors, authors or other leaders have had the greatest influence upon your life and thought? (List up to 4 and explain.)

I could list here numerous historic theologians (Calvin, Barth, Augustine, etc.) or other historic or more recent pastors and authors (Bonhoeffer, Merton, CS Lewis, Heschel, Nouwen, Wright, Keller, Bolsinger, Mancini, etc.) but, to be fair, the ones that I've spent time with have had the greatest influence upon my life and thought. No doubt, each of the individuals listed above have influenced my life and thought at different points in time and many continue to do so as do new authors and theologians.

The three theologians, pastors, and leaders that have had the greatest influence upon my life and thought are three of my seminary professors each for different reasons.

1. George Hunsberger - George was the professor of Missiology during my time in seminary who helped develop my ecclesiology and exposed me to authors like Brunner, Newbigin, Guder, and Frost and Hirsch that helped me put words around my understanding of church as found especially in answers to questions 3 & 4 of this profile. George is a deep thinker and pastor.

2. Vern Sterk - Vern was the professor of Cross-cultural Mission during my time in seminary who had served as a long-time missionary in Chiapas, Mexico. In Vern, I learned and saw how every day relationships and interactions were opportunities to share the love of Jesus explicitly or implicitly. In particular, Vern and I shared a love of basketball that actually was a big piece of his community ministry in Chiapas which I had the opportunity to visit with him.

3. Dennis Voskuil - Dennis was the President of the seminary when I attended, and, Dennis, to me, modeled faithful leadership in a challenging context. Dennis cared about community and relationships and made time for people of all different strata. He was very intelligent, cared deeply about people, and was able to bring people together around the core mission of the gospel.

8. How do you hope someone influenced by your ministry would describe what s/he considers to be most important?

I would hope that someone influenced by my ministry would describe loving God and loving others as most important. I would hope that I have modeled and articulated the irreplaceability of a personal, daily relationship with God lived out in community where we engage and interact with others around us as a witness to that relationship with God.

9. Name at least one challenge for a pastor who accepts a Call to lead a church whose culture is other than his/her own.

I think there are many challenges for a pastor who accepts a Call to lead a church whose culture is other than his/her own. And, most likely, this will be the case for any pastor. I'm not sure if this question intends to imply racial culture, economic culture, geographic culture, social culture or what. However, for any new pastor, it's likely that any and all of these types of culture that make up a church will be different for him or her. To me, the biggest challenge is for the pastor first to learn the culture and, correspondingly, make sure the church is aware of their culture. From there, the challenge is whether the culture should be changed or not and how the Holy Spirit might be leading the new pastor and the church to serve together.

10. Describe your vision and hopes for the Church over the next 5-10 years.

My vision and hopes for the Church over the next 5-10 years is that the Church focuses on its core mission to share the Good News of Jesus Christ with all who we encounter. Similar to question 5 on this profile, I would like to see the Church get past focusing on all its differences and, instead, focus on the communities around us that need the love of God. To me, this means all of the (c)hurches, knowing who they are and where they are called to serve, working together so that the (C)hurch's purpose might be fulfilled.

11. If there is anything else you would like to add about yourself that you think would help a search team to better understand and consider you as their next pastor, please elaborate here.

In addition to the information requested here, my resume includes a more extensive employment history and professional engagements in the RCA or elsewhere.

Lastly, I am a candidate for the Lead Pastor position at North Branch Reformed Church and, together with the church, am discerning concurrent to their search whether God may be calling me to remain there or to serve another church.