Weekend Plug-in 🔌

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MALIBU, Calif. — Fun in sunny Southern California.

Pizza and drinks on the beach.

Thirty-one active and aspiring Christian preachers experienced these tangible benefits during a recent three-day gathering organized by Pepperdine University.

But the real goals of the meeting — part of the Compelling Preaching Initiative, a $171 million national endeavor funded by Indianapolis-based Lilly Endowment Inc. — went deeper.

“Ministry is incredibly difficult,” said Kevin Huddleston, lead minister for The Church at 1548 Heights in Houston. “I have had so many friends who have stepped out in recent years due to the political turmoil and the growing move toward Christian nationalism in the church.”

The Texan traveled nearly 1,600 miles for the conference, enjoying how-to sessions on the content, crafting and delivery of sermons as well as one-on-one coaching and fellowship with other men — and women — of God.

“I sometimes ask myself why in the world I would step back into congregational ministry at such a time as this,” said Huddleston, who just returned after seven years with a faith-based nonprofit. “I am hopeful that the Compelling Preaching Initiative will help me be fresh in ministry and faithful to the calling to proclaim God’s word.”

Joshua Jackson left a lead minister role in the Nashville, Tennessee, area in December. 

He echoed Huddleston, saying he hoped to gain tools to preach more effectively.

“Ministry is extremely challenging right now due to sociopolitical issues and isolation,” Jackson said. “The cohort model can be a safe place to help ministers develop and maintain community.”

• • •

LILLY ENDOWMENT INC., a private philanthropic foundation, kicked off the Compelling Preaching Initiative in 2022, citing a desire to help pastors strengthen their abilities to proclaim the Christian gospel. 

The launch came amid the upheaval of the COVID-19 pandemic.

“Since the earliest days of Christianity, preaching has played a key role in communicating the good news of God’s love and nourishing the spiritual lives of Christians and their communities,” Christopher L. Coble, the endowment’s vice president for religion, said in a statement.

“Throughout history, preachers often have needed to adapt their preaching practices to engage new generations of hearers more effectively,” Coble added. “We are pleased that the organizations receiving grants in this initiative will help pastors and others in ministry engage in the kinds of preaching needed today to ensure that the gospel message is heard and accessible for all audiences.”

The initiative has awarded 142 grants ranging from $275,400 to $1.25 million each, said Judith Cebula, Lilly Endowment Inc’s communications director. Additional grants to Calvin University in Grand Rapids, Michigan, support the Calvin Institute of Christian Worship as it facilitates a coordination program for the funded organizations.

Grant recipients include seminaries and theological schools, denomination agencies, synods and dioceses, Christian publishing houses and faith-based universities such as Pepperdine, which has ties to Churches of Christ.

Through workshops, personal mentoring, podcasts, newsletters and training videos, Pepperdine wants to help preachers improve their sermons and messages, said Mike Cope, director of the university’s ministry outreach as well as its $1.25 million Compelling Preaching Initiative.

At the same time, the university in Malibu — a coastal community about 35 miles northwest of Los Angeles — seeks to recruit and train a new generation of ministers through its NextGen Preacher Search program, led by Jeff Walling.

Every preacher probably feels like they could make their sermons better — be it in content, crafting or delivery, said Cope, who spent 35 years in pulpit roles in North Carolina, Arkansas and Texas. 

That’s a major emphasis of Pepperdine’s grant-funded program, which in 2025 matches four groups of eight preachers each with a veteran minister/coach. 

The mentors — Sara Barton from California, Josh Graves from Tennessee and Wade Hodges and Sean Palmer from Texas — lead the cohorts through the calendar year, offering group training and individual sermon feedback alike.

“But the secret sauce, I think,” Cope said, “is the meetings through the year so that you become connected with a handful of ministers under the guidance of one of our coaches.”

• • •

MANY PREACHERS EXPERIENCE a sense of isolation, which a Hartford Institute for Religion Research study highlighted last year. 

Nearly half of clergy claimed frequent or occasional loneliness in Hartford’s survey of more than 1,700 Protestant, Catholic and Orthodox clergy.

“We found that while clergy are generally in good mental health and wellbeing, they are also lonely and stressed at this moment,” said Scott Thumma, the study’s lead researcher. “Many of them had also considered leaving their current church or thought of leaving the ministry profession at some point since the pandemic.”

Preachers apply to participate in Pepperdine’s program. Those selected — the latest cohorts comprise 10 states — pay their own airfare to attend the initial meeting, but the grant covers their meals and hotel expenses. 

The recent conference originally was set to occur in an executive center on the university’s campus, but first responders were staying there after recent wildfires. So the gathering was moved to a hotel in a neighboring community. 

Still, attendees got to enjoy an afternoon and early evening at a beach house owned by Pepperdine.

Leah Redling, director of young adults, new members and engagement for The Springs Church of Christ in Edmond, Oklahoma, relished the experience.

“Even in the best of circumstances, ministry can often feel lonely and isolating,” Redling said. “In addition to helping those who preach to be more effective in their role, (the initiative) offers friendship and camaraderie that is difficult to discover since ministry as a vocation comes with unique challenges that can only be truly understood through direct experience.”

• • •

WOMEN IN LEAD ministry roles remain highly controversial in many Christian groups, including Churches of Christ, Southern Baptist churches and the Catholic Church. 

However, Pepperdine embraces a more progressive stance and has invited women to preach at its annual Bible lectureship for a decade. Roughly one-third of the active and aspiring preachers participating in the 2025 cohorts are women.

“There’s a big gap between the number of women who are training to preach, wanting to preach, and the number of churches … where women are preaching,” Cope said. “But we just determined that we’re going to receive all those who feel called to preach, who want to grow in this.”

Missy Taylor grew up as a preacher’s kid. 

Now she’s an associate minister and administrator for the North Atlanta Church of Christ, a Georgia congregation whose elders believe women should serve in all worship assembly roles.

Taylor said she welcomed the opportunity “to be coached and learn from some of the greats” among ministers.

“My biggest challenge is staying positive in an increasingly divisive and hostile world,” she said. “Many of our members are upset, frightened and concerned about policies, international relations, immigration, public health, etc. Others are also tired and worn out from the fighting and seeming absence of civil discourse. And still others are just struggling to get by with their own daily challenges.”

While Holly Racca serves as the children’s minister for the Southern Hills Church of Christ in Abilene, Texas, she hopes to hone her preaching talents.

“My church is not ready for a woman to be their full-time preacher,” Racca said, “but they love me enough to give me opportunities to grow and let God use me.”

She, too, points to post-COVID ministry challenges.

“I have only been in ministry for 12 years, but these last five years have been really hard,” Racca said. “I don’t speak to my congregation every week as a whole. But in a culture that is expecting to be outraged, it is hard to find the perfect words to walk the line of loving and hoping to influence your congregation and your city while also keeping a job.”

Allison Ford worked in family, youth and children’s ministry before becoming the sole pastor for the West Islip Church of Christ in New York.

“I have been in search of resources to help me grow in my preaching since that is the area in my ministry that I have the least knowledge and experience,” she said of applying to participate in the Compelling Preaching Initiative.

Ford juggles the demands of ministry with parenthood.

“Some weeks my family gets more of me — and some weeks my church gets more of me,” the mother of three said. “It is a delicate dance, and I am happy to have a church that understands and is supportive of me as a person and mother and not just as a pastor.”

• • •

PATRICK ODUM, the English-speaking preacher and an elder for the multilingual Northwest Church of Christ in Chicago, completed Pepperdine’s yearlong program in 2024.

The Compelling Preaching Initiative benefited Odum, he said, as he worked to sharpen his abilities “to speak to younger generations and post-Christian people in ways that will gain a hearing for the gospel.”

“I was feeling the need to stretch my thinking and my communication style,” he said.

Beyond that, the cohort approach blessed him, Odum emphasized.

“In addition to the excellent coaching, it was so encouraging to meet other preachers,” he said. “We were able to share sermons, receive helpful feedback and just interact with others who understand the frustrations and challenges that preachers face.”

Inside The Godbeat

My Christian Chronicle colleague Erik Tryggestad has made multiple reporting trips to Ukraine.

“I think it’s six,” he told me.

Tryggestad’s coverage of the war in Ukraine earned him a first-place prize from the Religion News Association in 2023.

Amid all the headlines about last week’s Oval Office clash between Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy and U.S. President Donald Trump and Vice President J.D. Vance, I found Tryggestad’s related piece of the range of emotions experienced by Ukrainian Christians especially compelling.

But this story — about people of faith who fled in the conflict’s early days but have since returned to Ukraine despite the danger — is the one Tryggestad would prefer you read.

The Final Plug

I’ve read and appreciated Carla Hinton’s stories for many years.

We worked together for nearly a decade at The Oklahoman, and she followed me as religion editor when I left that newspaper in 2002 to join The Associated Press. (And she’s still in that role!)

But I particularly enjoyed a feature by Hinton in Sunday’s newspaper: She wrote an extremely kind profile of my daughter, Kendall, an Oklahoma City fiber artist known for I’d Knit That.

For more insight, I did a 2021 column that explained how Kendall — a Pepperdine history graduate who traveled around the world with the debate team — turned her knitting hobby into an entrepreneurial career.

Happy Friday, everyone! Enjoy the weekend.

Bobby Ross Jr. writes the Weekend Plug-in column for Religion Unplugged and serves as editor-in-chief of The Christian Chronicle. A former religion writer for The Associated Press and The Oklahoman, Ross has reported from all 50 states and 18 nations. He has covered religion since 1999.