Date of Award

2026

Document Type

Project Portfolio

Degree Name

Doctor of Ministry (DMin)

Department

Seminary

First Advisor

Robin Pyles, DMin

Second Advisor

Darcy Hansen, DMin

Third Advisor

MaryKate Morse, PhD

Abstract

American Individualism is antithetical to the Gospel of Jesus. It is rooted in individual exceptionalism and meritocracy; one succeeds or fails by one’s own strength and will. The need for community and mutuality is minimized or non-existent. The I does not need the we. I pull myself up by my own bootstraps. I am the captain of my ship. I create my own destiny.

American individualism has created a church ill-equipped to encounter the Peaceable Kingdom in daily life. Faith is private. Christian community is relegated to weekly gathered worship. Spiritual friendships have been replaced with personal quiet time. “We and us” has been replaced with “Jesus and me”. The result is a church unable to recognize the now and not-yet, Peaceable Kingdom of God in Isaiah 11:6-9 where the wolf and lamb rest, together. The Peaceable Kingdom is rooted in and dependent on the love of God expressed through love of one another. Jesus’s invitation to repentance in Matthew 4:17 is a call to realignment with the Peaceable Kingdom, together.

My ministry context is a 60-year-old, predominantly white, professional, educated, upper-middle-class, United Methodist Church in suburban Columbus, Ohio. I have served as associate pastor for eleven years along with the lead pastor who has served for over twelve years.

My project offers a way to practice our interconnected faith by marrying a Rule of Life with John Wesley’s Class Meeting model. Class meetings are built on a circle of mutuality where participants give testimony and bear witness to one another’s practices and weekly encounters with The Peaceable Kingdom. By weaving together Intentional faith-forming practices and weekly sharing, congregations have an opportunity to recognize the Peaceable Kingdom as participants move out of American individualism and live more fully as the body of Christ.

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