Announcing Asbury Church’s Fellowship Program: Raising Up the Next Generation of Leaders

15 Tuesday Apr 2025

Tags

Asbury Church, church leadership, Fellowship Program, Tulsa

I have been waiting to share this with you. I am so pumped!

With the blessing of the leadership at Asbury Church, I am starting a Fellowship Program. We will hire two Fellows, which will be full-time paid positions, with benefits, starting this August.

For years, I have had a growing burden to build something that will help raise up the next generation of leaders for the church. I want to build what I would have wanted when I was just getting started in ministry. I was so hungry for mentors and had the hardest time finding them when I was starting out in ministry.

The Asbury Fellowship Program will be a blessing to the Fellows. The purpose of the Fellowship Program is not to bring people to Asbury Church to serve us. Rather, the purpose is to bring Fellows to Asbury Church so we can serve them.

That does not mean the Fellowship Program will be easy. Growth and development can, at least at times, be painful. The Fellowship Program will be an intentional season of accelerated growth, where Fellows are pushed to grow as followers of Jesus Christ.

I am also excited about this because my time in Tulsa, Oklahoma has been such a blessing to me. I love having a foot in Asbury Theological Seminary’s Tulsa Extension Site and one on the Asbury Church pastoral team. I love being at Asbury Church. My faith has grown here. I have been strengthened and sharpened here. I am grateful for the leadership of Rev. Andrew Forrest, Asbury Church’s Senior Pastor, and Rodney Adams, the Executive Director.

I am best at inviting people to things I enthusiastically believe in and I enthusiastically believe in what Jesus is doing at Asbury Church!

I believe the Fellowship Program is a crucial strategy in a time of uncertainty and significant change in American Christianity. The Fellowship Program is an intentional investment in in-person formation. I am certain the problems facing the church in our day will not be solved by applying more technology. On the contrary! We need to invest more fully in relationships in enfleshed spaces. The people I have seen really grow and thrive in their lives in Christ all have one thing in common: They are anchored within a family of faith that provides care, nurture, and discipline. And so, Asbury Fellows will move to Tulsa to be fully present here for two years.

Ok, that is why I’m so excited. Here are more details to help you decide if this is right for you:

Who is Asbury Church?

Asbury Church is a conservative evangelical church from the Wesleyan theological heritage in Tulsa, Oklahoma. Asbury has more than 2,500 people in-person in worship on average each week. We are passionate about figuring out how to do discipleship and evangelism with excellence in Negative World.^[1] (The “Negative World” framework is integral to the Fellowship Program, so you will want to familiarize yourself with it if you don’t know about it and are trying to discern whether this is right for you.)

Asbury Church has the kinds of ministry opportunities you would expect of a church of this size: a pre-school, weekly small groups, kids and youth ministry, recovery ministry, and more. We lean into big events like Christmas Eve and Easter, as well as our own made-up holiday – Celebration Sunday! We are a Bible reading church, which is expressed through Bible reading guides and all church Bible Studies (which are roughly once a month during the school year). We also host a seminary extension site (Asbury Theological Seminary, a separate institution) on our property, which reflects our commitment to theological education and raising up the next generation of leaders for the church. Our commitment to education and formation is further seen in our launch of a Classical Christian School (Asbury Classical School) that is in its first year. And we are known in our community for our commitment to missions in and beyond our community.

What is the Asbury Fellows Program?

The Asbury’s Fellows program is a two-year fellowship that will raise up the next generation of leaders in the church and empower gifted young people who sense a calling to the work of the church. Fellows will explore their calling and be strengthened and equipped to lead in Negative World.

Fellows will also be pressed to grow through mentoring and discipleship. (I am personally most excited about this aspect, which is where I will spend most of my time with the Fellows.) As the Director of the Fellowship Program, I will meet with Fellows weekly for a Wesleyan class meeting experience, one-on-one check-ins, and a monthly book discussion. I love reading and engaging ideas and I want to introduce Fellows to the best books I’ve read on the Christian life, discipleship, the person and work of the Holy Spirit, big ideas about current issues, personal productivity, leadership, and more. The purpose of all of this will be to grow in Christ, ability to lead and disciple others, and be equipped to lead and minister in our changing cultural moment.

Fellows will have a mentor on the Asbury Church staff. They will also receive exposure to every major ministry area at Asbury Church, including Pastoral Ministry, Kids/Students, College/Young Adult, Business Administration, Outreach/Evangelism, Experience, Worship Arts, Communications, and Asbury Classical School. Based on the gifts of the Fellows and the needs of Asbury Church, Fellows will be given ministry assignments and responsibilities.

Asbury Fellows will be present at all worship services (including Wednesday morning communion and Thursday evening), staff chapel, and Wednesday evening discipleship activities, with a “see a need, meet a need” attitude.

Fellows will also observe leadership meetings, attend the monthly pastor’s Bible Study, assist with pastoral care and visitations, and other experiences that serve the Fellow’s growth and development as a ministry leader.

Who is the Asbury Fellowship Program for?

The Asbury Fellowship Program is ideal for people who have at least one year of full-time seminary experience to recent seminary graduates, who intend to go into local church ministry as their first career. The Fellowship Program is for people who are hungry for more of Jesus, want to grow, desire a deeper understanding and experience of the person and work of the Holy Spirit, and sense a calling to the work of the church.

Asbury Fellows will be people who love being around Jesus’s church, are excited by the prospect of being immersed in the life of a church for a season, and are eager to serve and participate in the full worshipping life of Asbury Church. Fellows will not only be hungry for more of God, but they will come humble, ready to grow and learn, and be led for a season.

The Asbury Fellowship Program will be a season of accelerated growth for Fellows in their preparation for leadership and administration of the local church. This Fellowship is for people who know they are called to the local church in some sense but may not be sure which part of the church they are called to. This is for people who know they don’t know everything and want to learn from a large and growing church that believes God has more for everyone and is passionate about pursuing joy individually and corporately.

Finally, the inaugural class of Asbury Fellows, in particular, will proactively set the culture for the Asbury Fellowship Program by creating a culture of excellence that will benefit all who come after them.

When will it start?

The Asbury Fellows Program will launch in August 2025. To apply email hr@asburytulsa.org by May 14^th. Include with your application a resume and statement of interest that explains why you want to be an Asbury Fellow based on our description of who we are, who this program is for, and what you would most hope to receive from this experience.

^[1] We believe Aaron Renn’s diagnosis is accurate. The church in the United States is not in Positive World or Neutral World anymore. The dominant culture and elite taste makers overwhelmingly view the teachings of Scripture and those who unapologetically hold to them negatively. For more, see Aaron Renn, Life in the Negative World (Zondervan, 2024) https://amzn.to/4i1PSST (Affiliate link) For the article that led to the book, see Aaron Renn, “The Three Worlds of Evangelicalism” in First Things https://firstthings.com/the-three-worlds-of-evangelicalism/

What They Don’t Teach You in Seminary: An Invitation to Underground Seminary

06 Thursday Mar 2025

Posted by Kevin M. Watson in Ministry, Teaching

≈ 3 Comments

Tags

Asbury Church, Asbury Theological Seminary, church leadership, culture, operations, Rodney Adams, strategy

I have really enjoyed having my feet in both the church and the academy in my roles here in Tulsa. I am the Director of Academic Growth and Formation at Asbury Theology Seminary, anchored at our Tulsa, OK Extension Site. I am also the Scholar in Residence at Asbury Church. Though they share a connection to the legacy of Francis Asbury, the father of American Methodism, they are separate institutions.

I believe theological education is ultimately for the local church. A seminary should be evaluated based on its graduate’s ability to lead well in the local church. Other outcomes may be appropriate and valuable, but I cannot imagine anything being more central to the legacy of a seminary than the effectiveness of its alumni within the church.

There are some things that don’t fit in courses I teach, or perhaps even in the seminary curriculum at all, that people preparing to lead in the local church need to wrestle with, think about, or just have someone tell them. There are also conversations that I want to have with people who are preparing to be pastors that I think will be helpful to them and I don’t know where they would fit in specific classes.

In my role for Asbury Church, I’m still interested in shaping pastors. So, I have been working on optional, not-for-credit, opportunities for Asbury Theological Seminary students and others that I’m calling “Underground Seminary.”

Underground Seminary is for people preparing to lead in the church who are hungry to learn and grow. They want to gain everything they can from their seminary experience. Some students want to do the least they can to get the most credit possible. And that’s fine. There are seasons where that is appropriate.

I’m most excited to work with people who know God has more for them and they are going after it. Underground Seminary is for these people.

Our next Underground Seminary meeting is focused on practical details of running a church that they don’t teach you in seminary. It is March 27^th from 12-3pm at Asbury Church in Tulsa, OK.

Pastors often joke about the things they didn’t teach you in seminary. These are often very practical hands-on aspects of running the life of a church. And that is what this Underground Seminary will focus on: what they don’t teach you in seminary.

Rodney Adams, the Executive Director of Asbury Church, will lead this. And it will focus on strategy, culture, and operations in the day to day running of a church. I have had several conversations about this workshop with Rodney and I believe every church leader would benefit from what Rodney has to share.

In case you don’t already know Rodney, here is why you should want to learn from him:

Rodney is a former United States Marine Corps officer.
He worked for a season at a top global investment bank.
He has owned and operated his own business.
And, most importantly for this discussion, he is currently the Executive Director of Asbury Church.

Asbury is a large church that has 2,500 people in person in weekly worship. In his role, Rodney oversees:

80 full time staff and 60+ part time staff
$12.5 million annual budget
$12 million foundation
300,000 square foot facilities

Put simply: Rodney know how to run a large church with excellence.

At a personal level, I have never been around an organizational thinker and leader like Rodney. Working with him is fun because I get to see how ideas are actually brought to life. I have an easier time thinking of a thing that would be fun to do in theory. Rodney has great ideas. And he is the person who can take a dream and figure out the steps to make it reality. And, just as important, he can help you realize that an idea won’t work and save time, energy, and frustration.

The goal of Underground Seminary is to bring people hungry for excellence together for content that will equip and prepare them to lead in the church.

This one is going to be fun!

How to join us:

Lunch will be provided at the beginning of our time together. In order to ensure that there is food and space for everyone, you need to RSVP if you would like to attend. We will send the location for the meeting to you after you RSVP by emailing Laura.Wilkie@asburyseminary.edu. Deadline to RSVP is March 20^th.

Kevin M. Watson is Director of Academic Growth and Formation at Asbury Theological Seminary’s Tulsa, OK Extension Site. He is also Scholar in Residence at Asbury Church. His most recent book, Doctrine, Spirit, and Discipline describes the purpose of the Wesleyan tradition and the struggle to maintain its identity in the United States.