ECO National Gathering
Breakout Session #1
Breakout Session #2
Breakout Session #3
Breakout Session #4
Breakout Session #1

Breakout Session #1

Children/Family/Youth

The One Conversation Model - How Axis can support your church in equipping and inspiring parents and grandparents to disciple tweens and teens. 

David Eaton, Axis CEO and Cofounder

Children/Family/Youth

Young Adult Ministry Now: What young adults want, what churches have, and what it takes to meet young adults where they need you the most. 

Rev. Dr. Steven Argue, Associate Professor of Youth, Family and Culture - Fuller Seminary and Applied Research Strategist, Fuller Youth Institute

Discipleship & Evangelism

Seven Roots Needed to cultivate a Disciple-Making Culture: Partnering with God, starting small, going slow, and establishing deep roots. 

Lisa Johnson, Executive Director of Leadership Formation, ECO

Discipleship & Evangelism

Tending Your Inner Life: Flourishing on the Inside for Ministry on the Outside

Tim Fearer / Transitional Pastor / Community Presbyterian Church of Ventura, CA

Healthy Teams

Functioning as a Healthy Staff: Learn how to assess the health of your team and how to make necessary improvements. for effective ministry.

Dana Allin, Synod Executive, ECO 

Healthy Teams

Pastoral Transitions: How to Flourish in A Transition Season

Andrea Messinger, Ecclesiastical Support Coordinator, ECO 

Leadership Development

Unlocking the Third Third Potential of Your Church: How to get started helping those age 55 and over live full and fruitful lives as disciples of Jesus.  

Mark Roberts

Church Business and Finances

The Power of Endowments - Endowments and legacy funds can mean the difference between sustainability and collapse for many churches and institutions. Join this session to learn how these carefully stewarded and professionally managed assets can leave a lasting legacy of generosity and support for generations to come.

John Furlow, Executive Vice President and Jake Wilson, Relationship Manager, Texas Presbyterian Foundation

Mission

Highlights and Challenges of Discipleship in the Global Church from a panel of Global Guests

Moderated by Jen Haddox, Director of Global Engagement

Small Church

Crafting a Big Vision for the Small Church: Answer the five essential questions of leadership to discern and discover the flourishing future of ministry in your specific context.

Curtis Bronzan, Pastor of Preaching and Vision, Good Shepherd

Theology

Theology of Life: Introducing ECO's new Resource including Q&A and Discussion

Greg Wagenfuhr, Theology Coordinator, ECO 

Breakout Session #2

Breakout Session #2

Children/Family/Youth

Making it Personal: We are seeing an epidemic rise in bullying, emotional abuse, depression, self-harm, and suicide among kids and teenagers. Too many kids are feeling invisible or ignored. This breakout will help leaders connect more deeply and individually with the kids and teens in our lives—to really get personal.

Charlie Conder

Discipleship & Evangelism

Hearing the Voice of God - The Foundational Step of Discipleship

Alex & Hannah Absalom, DandelionResourcing.com

Discipleship & Evangelism

Flexible Tools for Discipleship: How to do Bible Studies, Small Groups, and Theological Training in Your Church 

Rev. Dr. Clay Brown, Adult Discipleship Pastor, and Laurien Hook, MAT, Adult Studies Director, Memorial Drive Presbyterian Church, Houston, TX

Discipleship & Evangelism

Coaching and its Impact on Discipleship Culture

John Terech, Executive Director of Operations, ECO 

Engaging Cultural Issues

Offering Grace and Truth: The Transgender Experience

Scott Kingry, Where Grace Abounds

Healthy Teams

Developing A Healthy Volunteer Culture in the Small Church 

Dale Sellers

Healthy Teams

What We've Learned About Church Staffing Since March of 2020

Matt Steen, Co-Founder, Chemistry Staffing 

Leadership Development

Introducing our Own Seminary - The Flourish Institute of Theology: An an in-depth presentation about our own seminary and the plans for its continued development over the next few years. 

Mark Patterson, President, Flourish Institute of Theology

Mission

Kingdom Collaboration: An interactive workshop for mission pastors and leaders to collaborate on how to set up and maintain healthy ministry partnerships, mobilize congregants to engage in missions, and share best practices.

Julie Wood, Minister of SERVE, St Andrew's Presbyterian Church, Newport Beach, CA

Leadership Development

The Upside - and Inside - of Anger and How to use it for Good

Andrea Gurney, Psychologist, Author, Professor

Breakout Session #3

Breakout Session #3

Children/Family/Youth

Youth Alpha: Reviving Evangelism in the Next Generation

Jordan Biere, National Director, Alpha Youth, Alpha USA

Church Planting

Become a Church Planting Church

Luke Parker, Director of Church Planting, ECO and Nate Dreesmann, Executive Director of Ecclesiastical Support

Engaging Cultural Issues

Racial Reconciliation with Undivided

Troy Jackson, Co-founder and Courtney Walton, Chief Learning Officer, LivingUndivided 

Healthy Teams

Practical Egalitarianism: Ideas for Embodying ECO’s Egalitarian Conviction in Your Local Congregation

Dr. Rob Dixon, InterVarsity Institute and author of Together in Ministry 

Leadership Development

Pathway to Peace – An Action Plan to Manage Conflict: Learn how to deal with difficult people, assess a conflict, choose an appropriate response, target interests, identify stakeholders, communicate more clearly, and negotiate a resolution.

Dr. Daniel Bord, Regional Director, PIR Ministries

Leadership Development

Developing a Pipeline of Church Officers: How to train your whole congregation to be potential leaders so that you have officers who are trained and qualified even before they are nominated.

Dana Allin, Synod Executive, ECO

Leadership Development

Practicing the Way 

John Mark Comer, Founder of Practicing the Way and author of The Ruthless Elimination of Hurry 

Leadership Development

God is Calling, Let your Journey Begin: Understanding both the ECO Ordination and Commissioned Lay Pastor process from beginning to end.

ECO's Ordination Team: Lisa Johnson, Kendra Norton, Bertram Wang, Taylor Woods

Small Church

Celebrating Small Church Stories: Join us for a panel discussion that highlights discipleship pathways, community impact, creativity, planting and more wins specific to the smaller church context. 

Kaitlyn Wood, Pastor, United Church of Cohoes, NY 

Theology

What is the relationship of Jesus to Caesar? ECO's Standing Theology Committee will release a new theological resource, and will discuss what we in ECO might think and do in our own contexts.

Standing Theology Committee, ECO 

Breakout Session #4

Breakout Session #4

Church Planting

Do you feel called to be a church planter? Come hear more about ECO’s church planting process, and why you should plant with ECO.

Luke Parker, Director of Church Planting, ECO and Nate Stratman, Pastor, Hope Community, Wilmington, NC

Discipleship & Evangelism

Leading in Step with the Holy Spirit: Join us as we slowly walk toward a more RELAXED life. What do you have to lose? You’ll find out, it’s everything you’ve been hoping to lose all along.

Megan Marshman, Pastor/Speaker/Author

Discipleship & Evangelism

Laying New Foundations: Cultural Pillars for Mission & Evangelism

Jad Levi, Senior Director of Network Advancement, Alpha 

Discipleship & Evangelism

Non-hierarchical Discipleship: Changing the paradigm from "top down" discipleship to mutual encouragement for more mature believers to invest in each other. Come learn about how to disciple and be discipled from a one-size-does-not fit all perspective.

Dana Allin, Synod Executive, ECO

Healthy Teams

Biblical, Christ-Centered Conflict: Working through Conflict in a Biblically Christ centered way is essential in building a flourishing church.

Nate Dreesmann, Executive Director of Ecclesiastical Support, ECO

Leadership Development

Mentored Ministry: Learn all about the nuts and bolts of the exciting journey to becoming a mentoring pastor and church for candidates and FIT students - no matter the size or location of your congregation!

Lisa Johnson, Executive Director of Leadership Developments, ECO

Church Business and Finances

The Changing Landscape of Church Economics: What can the church do to create additional streams of income?

John Terech, Executive Director of Ecclesiastical Support

Mission

Getting People out of the Pews and into Mission: Re-energizing mission service in your local church. 

Phil Smart - ECO Church Relations & Chris Gibson - Groups Program Manager, World Renew 

Theology

ECO's New Theology Document on Sabbath: Deep yet Simple

Greg Wagenfuhr, Theology Coordinator, ECO