About us.
Open Church is made possible by a fast-growing number of volunteers. We've assembled a smaller team of talent to support these volunteers.
Kent Shaffer
Visionary
Kent holistically oversees Open Church and guides its vision. He is a ministry organizational strategist who has spent the past few years working on tech startups and consulting for groups such as LifeChurch.tv, Saddleback Church, and Catalyst Conference. He blogs about ministry at ChurchRelevance.com. While known most for his thoughts on design, marketing, and technology, Kent's ministry roots began as a missionary's kid in Peru and evolved into 10+ years of youth and children's ministry at Church on the Move and LifeChurch.tv.
Craig Van Korlaar
Chief Operating Officer
Craig implements strategy and develops teams. His proactive leadership skills were honed as a decorated sergeant and enlisted aerial navigator for the U.S. Marine Corps and nurtured through his work at public schools, the YMCA, and Food for the Hungry. Most recently, Craig has served as operations director at Phoenix's New City Church and as co-founder of SoChurch communications software. Craig spent much of his formative years as a missionary's kid in Kenya and civil war-torn Zaire.
Matt Guevara
Kidmin Ambassador
Matt coordinates how Open Church can best serve, partner, and collaborate with children's ministry leaders. Children's Ministry magazine calls him one of 20 leaders to watch for the next 20 years of children's ministry. He blogs at CoryCenter.org and leads progressive kidmin discussions through cmWhatMattersNow.com. Matt currently serves as the Bartlett campus pastor for Chicago's Christ Community Church.
Christopher Benek
Science & Academia Ambassador
Chris builds relationships with scientists, professors, and universities and bridges the gap between theology and academia. As a doctoral student of theology and science at Pittsburgh Seminary with an MDIV and THM in Christian ethics from Princeton, Chris enjoys weaving the intellectual with the spiritual and exploring how it pragmatically and conceptually affects the global Church. Currently, he serves as associate pastor of Providence Presbyterian Church (Hilton Head, SC).
Evie Shaffer
UI Designer
Evie designs online aesthetics and user interfaces for Open Church. As co-founder of Create Etc (formerly Bombay Creative), she has spent over a decade designing brands and Web presences for ministries and tech startups.
Jimmy Lee
Donor Development Advisor
Jimmy offers counsel on how to best serve Open Church's financial supporters. Having served the White House and Illinois Governor Office, Jimmy now helps nonprofits rethink their operational and creative strategies. His company CreatePossible has helped Lausanne Congress and many others achieve their goals.
Antoine RJ Wright
Mobile Ministry Advisor
Antoine assists Open Church in mobile device strategy. As founder of Mobile Ministry Magazine, Antoine has been exploring ministry via mobile devices since 2003. His insights into the benefits, challenges, and trends of mobile technology are crucial to Open Church's initiatives.
Charles Lee
Nonprofit Advisor
Charles serves Open Church as a nonprofit operations advisor. As founder of the Idea Camp, Ideation Conference, and Ideation Consultancy, Charles has developed a reputation for his creative thinking and operational excellence with nonprofits.
Informal Advisors
In addition to countless volunteers, Open Church has a growing number of informal advisors who offer cultural, practitioner, and spiritual perspective. These advisors include Kent Humphreys, Skye Jethani, Bianca Olthoff, Frank Turk, Landon Whitsitt, and many more.
Board Members
Open Church is governed by a board of leaders specializing in technology, open source resources, and translation projects.
OPERATING COSTS
Open Church is intentional about being thrifty. We've already trimmed costs by over $9,000. Here is how we spend the rest of our monthly budget:
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We only need $31 monthly from 500 partners to make Open Church possible.