In All Things

EPISODE 93: EPC author and former Mormon Lisa Brockman, Part 2 (encore presentation)

Dean Weaver, EPC Stated Clerk, continues a conversation with Lisa Brockman, Ruling Elder for First Presbyterian Church in Orlando, Florida. In the conclusion of a two-week dialogue, the two discuss how her path from a devout Mormon childhood to accepting Christ affected her relationships with Mormon family members—especially after she wrote her book, Out of Zion: Meeting Jesus in the Shadow of the Mormon Temple.

Episode 92: Devout Mormon to Evangelical Christian with Lisa Brockman, Part 1 (encore presentation)

Dean Weaver, EPC Stated Clerk, welcomes Lisa Brockman, Ruling Elder for First Presbyterian Church in Orlando, Florida, and author of Out of Zion: Meeting Jesus in the Shadow of the Mormon Temple. In part one of a two-week conversation, the two discuss her path as a sixth-generation Mormon—including her childhood dream of a temple marriage—to accepting Christ as a student at the University of Utah. She recounts how her spiritual journey was influenced by Josh McDowell, Larry Crabb, and James Spencer. She also describes coming to the realization that the biblical God is the only God who will not abuse His authority.

Episode 91: “Purposeful Pain: What Your Troubles Achieve” with Bryn MacPhail (encore presentation)

Dean Weaver, EPC Stated Clerk, welcomes Bryn MacPhail, Senior Pastor of St. Andrew’s Presbyterian Kirk in Nassau, Bahamas, and author of Purposeful Pain: What Your Troubles Achieve. The two discuss how God uses suffering to make believers more like Jesus, and how repeated pain and suffering—unlike manual labor that develops strength and durability—results in a heavy burden that only being yoked to Christ can relieve.

Episode 90: “The Apostate: My Search for Truth” with Mark Christian (encore presentation)

Dean Weaver, EPC Stated Clerk, welcomes Mark Christian, member of the EPC’s Covenant Presbyterian Church in Omaha, Nebraska, and author of The Apostate: My Search for Truth. The two discuss Christian’s upbringing in Egypt in a family of the Muslim Brotherhood, becoming an imam at age 12, and how a journey of questioning the claims of Mohamed for a deeper understanding of Islam resulted in a failed attempt on his life and ultimately to faith in Christ.

Episode 89: EduNations and the EPC of Sierra Leone with Samuel Sesay (encore presentation)

Dean Weaver, EPC Stated Clerk, welcomes Samul Sesay, missionary evangelist with the Evangelical Presbyterian Church of Sierra Leone and President of EduNations. The two discuss Sesay’s journey to faith from a Muslim background within the syncretic religious environment of Sierra Leone. Sesay also describes the mission and vision of EduNations, which operates 15 Christian schools with more than 3,500 students in predominantly Muslim villages in the West African country, as well as how the Evangelical Presbyterian Church of Sierra Leone—which has witnessed more than 1,000 baptisms in the past eight years—was birthed from the ministry of EduNations.

Episode 88: Tragedy, suffering, grief with Jennifer Prechter (encore presentation)

Dean Weaver, EPC Stated Clerk, welcomes Jennifer Prechter, EPC Teaching Elder who serves as a palliative care chaplain at Arnold Palmer Hospital for Children and in the Neonatal Intensive Care Unit (NICU) at Winnie Palmer Hospital for Women and Babies in Orlando, Fla. The two discuss her journey to hospital chaplaincy, and how her ministry provides opportunity for addressing deep questions of life with unchurched people across a wide spectrum of life experience. Prechter also discusses how “longing and lament” can help people process tragedies such as a child with a terminal illness, or the May 24, 2022, shooting at Robb Elementary School in Uvalde, Texas.

Episode 87: Podcasting as evangelism

Dean Weaver, EPC Stated Clerk, welcomes Brandon Queen, Ruling Elder for First Presbyterian Church of Thibodaux, Louisiana, and host of the podcast “E.A.R.: Evangelical and Reformed.” The two discuss Brandon’s involvement in the EPC’s Westminster Society, how he launched his podcast as a tool for evangelism as well as his desire to use the podcast as a means of racial reconciliation.

Episode 86: Ministry to abused and trafficked women

Dean Weaver, EPC Stated Clerk, welcomes Bonnie Gatchell, Teaching Elder in the Presbytery of the East and Executive Director of Route One Ministry in Boston, Massachusetts. The two discuss how God led her to begin a ministry to strip club dancers in Boston, and Route One Ministry’s efforts to train church leaders on how to minister to victims of trafficking, trauma, and abuse. Gatchell also describes the qualities of a “safe church” and some of the resources on trauma and abuse that Route One Ministry provides.

Episode 85: Rural ministry and local history

Dean Weaver, EPC Stated Clerk, welcomes Stephen Morefield, Pastor of Christ Covenant Church in Leoti, Kansas. Morefield discusses his spiritual path as a covenant child of the EPC to urban church planting to rural church ministry. He also describes some of the joys and challenges of serving as an introverted solo pastor in a rural setting, how “falling in love with the community” is essential to rural outreach, and how writing the historical novel But the Blood: A Novel Based on the True Story of America’s Bloodiest County Seat Battle based on events in the town in the 1880s has built bridges for ministry in the community.

Episode 84: The EPC in the American Presbyterian story

Dean Weaver, EPC Stated Clerk, welcomes Don Fortson, Professor of Church History and Pastoral Theology at the Charlotte, N.C., campus of Reformed Theological Seminary. The two discuss how Fortson’s most recent book, Reformed and Evangelical, fills a need for a comprehensive, current Presbyterian history, as well as how it traces the symbiotic relationship between Presbyterians and evangelicals. In addition, Fortson describes the Presbyterian heritage of evangelistic renewal, and how the EPC may be uniquely positioned to respond to revivals, such as what occurred in early 2023 at Asbury University in Kentucky. Fortson also describes how gifts of the Spirit and the ordination of women are examples of how the EPC lives out its motto of “In Essentials, Unity; In Non-Essentials, Liberty.”

Fortson is the author of numerous books on Presbyterian history, including Reformed and Evangelical Across Four Centuries: The Presbyterian Story in America, and Liberty in Non-Essentials: The Story of the Evangelical Presbyterian Church.