This week in class we had the
opportunity to hear from Rich Jones from Element Church. Rich started his
ministry in a church in Roxboro, where he was the youth pastor for 5 years.
Eventually that season of his life came to an end and he went to another church
in New Jersey but it would only last 3 months. He didn’t connect with the
pastor very well. A funny story he told us was that he pastor had a problem
with the suits that Rich was wearing so he decided to take things into his own
hands and sent Rich out with a representative who picked his suits out for him.
After his short stint in New Jersey he left and landed a youth pastor position
in Michigan. This would prove to be a rough journey for Rich as well. There was
a time of ministry at this church where Rich lived in his car for two weeks.
Rich would eventually decide he needed to move on from this church as well. One
thing Rich said which I found to be wise was that he went into the church
thinking he could change the culture of the church and found out that was not
that case. He moved back to Pittsburgh with his family.
This is where he began
getting into church planting, which he claimed he would never do. Millvale
Matters (Church) is the church plant he started. He would do such events as the
Great Millvale Egg Hunt, which took place two weeks before they launched the
church. The egg hunt had 2 companies that funded their event. Other event were
the Family BBQ, Parents Night Out this took place around Valentines Day and
gave the parents a night out with the kids being supervised. The structure of
the church is a circle according to Rich, the people he works with work
together as a team, and when there is an event all of the church helps out.
“Understand
where you work well, go somewhere where that you’re wired for”
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