Author

Jasmine Smothers serves as lead pastor for the historic Atlanta First United Methodist Church. Previously, she served as Associate Director for Congregational Vitality through the Office of Connectional Ministries in the North Georgia Conference. She is co-author of Not Safe for Church: Ten Commandments for Reaching New Generations (Abingdon Press, 2015). Her book with coauthors Lia McIntosh and Rodney Smothers, Blank Slate: Write Your Own Rules for a 22nd-Century Church Movement (Abingdon Press, 2019), is available at Cokesbury and Amazon.

Rev. Dr. F. Douglas Powe, Jr.

F. Douglas Powe, Jr., is director of the Lewis Center for Church Leadership and holds the James C. Logan Chair in Evangelism (an E. Stanley Jones Professorship) at Wesley Theological Seminary in Washington, DC. He is also co-editor with Jessica Anschutz of Healing Fractured Communities (Palmetto, 2024) and coauthor with Lovett H. Weems Jr. of Sustaining While Disrupting: The Challenge of Congregational Innovation (Fortress, 2022). His previous books include The Adept Church: Navigating Between a Rock and a Hard Place (Abingdon Press, 2020); Not Safe for Church: Ten Commandments for Reaching New Generations; New Wine, New Wineskins: How African American Congregations Can Reach New Generations; Transforming Evangelism: The Wesleyan Way of Sharing Faith; and Transforming Community: The Wesleyan Way to Missional Congregations.

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Lewis Center Director F. Douglas Powe suggests strategies that can make it possible for those with significant time constraints to serve as church leaders —…

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Congregations often struggle to fill vital ministry roles because new leaders are reluctant to step forward. Lewis Center director Doug Powe names three critical factors…

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Incoming Lewis Center Director Doug Powe says that demographic shifts will bring increased diversity to the neighborhoods around most churches in the coming decades. Rather…

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Hal Knight and Doug Powe discuss nine characteristics of transformative Christian communities that allow them to nurture spiritual growth while also remaining open to others…

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Churches have long assumed that new people would engage their congregations by first attending worship. When they are not growing and attracting new people, people…