CHICAGO, IL

Pastor Jessy Padilla

October 21

Keynote Speaker: Pastor Jeff Frazier

Jeff Frazier

Jeff Frazier is the Lead Pastor at Chapelstreet Church in Geneva, IL. Before transitioning into this role, Jeff was the Teaching Pastor at Chapelstreet Church, and prior to that he spent the previous 15 years in youth ministry: 9 years at Chapelstreet Church and 6 years on staff at Willow Creek Community Church. Jeff’s primary passion in life is to see the gospel of Jesus Christ transforming human hearts. Jeff loves the process of studying, discovering, and communicating God’s Word and desires to encourage others to share this passion. Jeff is also passionate about his wife and kids, the writing of C.S. Lewis, the sport of football, strong coffee, and old books. Jeff has an MA in theology from Wheaton College Graduate School with a focus in evangelism & spiritual formation and a BA from Wheaton College. He lives in Batavia, IL with his wife, Erin, and has three young adult children: Noah, Hannah, and Benjamin.

Theological Forum -
Gospel Partners

Few leaders would be so foolish and presumptuous as to say they don’t need anyone to accomplish the Kingdom mission to which God has called them. And yet, many of us behave as if we can do it all on our own.

Paul gives us a powerful picture of what he calls “partners in the gospel” in the intro to his letter to the Philippians. We will walk through Philippians 1:3-11 together and examine what it looks like to be gospel partners in God’s Kingdom today.

Featured Presenters

Chris and Schlonda Dodd

Chris and Schlonda Dodd have been married for 22 years. Both are graduates of NIU and Northern Theological Seminar. Schlonda has a Master of Divinity and Chris a Doctorate. They serve New Community Church in Dolton, IL. Chris is on the Board of Converge MidAmerica. Schlonda is a teacher. They have three daughers Kennedi, Raygan, and Madison. The newest addition to the family is Carter the family dog.

Jeff Dryden

With a background in youth ministry, missions & church planting, Jeff has pastored for 33 years in Southwest MI. He currently trains preachers from Islamic countries of Central Asia.

Danny Flores

Danny Flores is the lead pastor of R church in the city of Elgin, IL. Church planting, connecting people to Jesus, their purpose and community are his passions. He has been in ministry for over 20 years. Loves spending time with his family and enjoys a good time at the golf course. He’s “half hood, half good”. That means pray for him, don’t play with him.

Ibeth Flores

Ibeth Flores resides in Elgin, Illinois, a suburb of Chicago. Daughter of church planters herself she grew up working in various capacities of ministry from a young age. In June of 2008 she married her husband, Danny Flores and together they have 3 kids. In 2017 R Church in the city Elgin was launched, where she currently serves as lead pastor alongside her husband.

Gregg Heinsch

Gregg has been married to Heidi for 40 years. They have three children and eight grandchildren. Together, they planted Faith Community of Hudson, WI which Gregg served for twenty years. In 2006, they relaunched Celebration Community Church in Celebration, FL where he has served as Lead Pastor ever since. He has also taught preaching at seminary, coached church planters, and completed 11 marathons.

Register Now
Where?

Chapelstreet Church

3435 Keslinger Road

Geneva, IL 60134

Schedule

Chicago, IL


Registration  / 
8:00am – 1:30 pm

Prayer First  /  9:00 – 9:45am

Workshops / Session I  /  10:00 – 11:15 am

Networking Lunch  /  11:45am – 1:15 pm

Workshops / Session II  /  1:45 – 3:00 pm

Break  /  3:00 – 3:30 pm

Vision/Business Meeting   /  3:30 – 5:30pm

Workshops

Session 1

Presented by: Gregg Heinsch

Title: Pastoring from the Pastorals: The High Priority of Sound Doctrine & Love

C.S. Lewis urged, “You can’t go back and change the beginning, but you can start where you are and change the ending.” Crafted on the assumption that faithfulness matters more than perceived success, this session examines key directives from Paul as a standard by which to assess our own priorities in personal and congregational leadership.

Presented by: Eric Moore

Title: Preaching Narrative Texts

The goal of this workshop is to help the preacher bring narrative passages of the bible “to life” for his audience. The ability to preach a narrative sermon is both a skill and an art form. In this workshop we will highlight and discuss the key elements to a successful narrative sermon; which include the Verbal, the Visual & the Virtual (imagination).

Presented by: Chris and Schlonda Dodd

Title: Partnering for Progress

The goal of this session is to provide practical strategies for implementation using principles of Christian Community Development and church revitalization.

Presented by: Jessy Padilla

Title: Forming Trustworthy Leaders

Analyze the problem of the lack of trustworthy leaders in the church and present a process for solving this problem.

Presented by: Michelle Obleton

Title: Pastor’s Wives Made to Last

-Regularly scheduling balance is very important. 

-Being held accountable for the unique balances in your life. 

-Reaching for the future with great anticipation. 

These principles are what allows us to stay the course and ultimately made to last.

Presented by: Warren Jee

Title: Part 1 – What You Measure You Produce

We will take time looking at Jesus as our model for measurement and production in ministry. How He made disciples and how we can too.

Session 2

Presented by: Gregg Heinsch

Title: Pastoring from the Pastorals: The High Priority of Sound Doctrine & Love

C.S. Lewis urged, “You can’t go back and change the beginning, but you can start where you are and change the ending.” Crafted on the assumption that faithfulness matters more than perceived success, this session examines key directives from Paul as a standard by which to assess our own priorities in personal and congregational leadership.

Presented by: Jeff Dryden

Title: Preaching for the Transformation that God Intends

True change comes from God.  All our people need that. While we may believe that, how do we really function in our preparation and preaching?!? This workshop will encourage you with specific help.

Presented by: Kody Woodard and Danny Flores

Title: Evangelism and Outreach

This evangelism/creative outreach session will be filled with dynamic ways and tools to reach your city.

Presented by: Paul Urban

Title: The Key to Leadership Development

The Key to Leadership Development is both harder and easier than you might think. Ask almost any pastor and they will say one of their biggest challenges in ministry is leadership development. Why is that and what will it take to turn this challenge into a victory for you, your church and your community? We’ll explore these issues in this session.

Presented by: Ibeth Flores

Title: Work With What You Have

Ever felt like you’re not good enough? You struggle with comparison and have an inner struggle with yourself? This session will focus on how to allow God to work with what we have.

Presented by: Warren Jee

Title: Part 2 – What You Measure You Produce

We will take time looking at Jesus as our model for measurement and production in ministry. How He made disciples and how we can too.

Workshop Leaders

Click on a leader’s name to read their bio.

Chris and Schlonda Dodd

Chris and Schlonda Dodd have been married for 22 years. Both are graduates of NIU and Northern Theological Seminary. Schlonda has a Master of Divinity and Chris a Doctorate. They serve New Community Church in Dolton, IL. Chris is on the Board of Converge MidAmerica. Schlonda is a teacher. They have three daughers Kennedi, Raygan, and Madison. The newest addition to the family is Carter the family dog.

Jeff Dryden

With a background in youth ministry, missions & church planting, Jeff has pastored for 33 years in Southwest MI. He currently trains preachers from Islamic countries of Central Asia.

Danny Flores

Danny Flores is the lead pastor of R church in the city of Elgin, IL. Church planting, connecting people to Jesus, their purpose and community are his passions. He has been in ministry for over 20 years. Loves spending time with his family and enjoys a good time at the golf course. He’s “half hood, half good”. That means pray for him, don’t play with him.

Ibeth Flores

Ibeth Flores resides in Elgin, Illinois, a suburb of Chicago. Daughter of church planters herself she grew up working in various capacities of ministry from a young age. In June of 2008, she married her husband Danny Flores and together they have 3 kids. In 2017, R Church in the city Elgin was launched, where she currently serves as lead pastor alongside her husband.

Gregg Heinsch

Gregg has been married to Heidi for 40 years. They have three children and eight grandchildren. Together, they planted Faith Community of Hudson, WI which Gregg served for twenty years. In 2006, they relaunched Celebration Community Church in Celebration, FL where he has served as Lead Pastor ever since. He has also taught preaching at seminary, coached church planters, and completed 11 marathons.

Warren Jee

Warren and his wife Lynette serve with J-Life Africa, who serve the church in Africa with disciple making strategies. They have served in ministry for the past 27 years in youth ministry, sports ministry, music and worship ministry and see the need for disciple making.

Eric Moore

Eric Moore is the pastor and cofounder of Tree of Life Bible Fellowship church in Royal Oak, Michigan (just outside Detroit). He has led Tree of Life for the past 21 years. In addition, he is the Chair of Applied Theology at Moody Theological Seminary (Chicago, IL & Plymouth, MI) where he teaches homiletics. He is married to Marilyn and has 3 children, Chanel, Samuel and Christina.

Michelle Obleton

Michelle serves as Executive Director of Ministries at WCC where she started a woman’s ministry 30 years ago, called WINGS (women in godly services) designed to encourage, inspire, and empower the lives of women on every level of life. Michelle is the devoted wife of Dr. Winfred Obleton the Senior Pastor of Waukegan Community Church for over 40 years in which God has blessed them with two adult children a son, Shelby, and a daughter, Andrea and one grandson, Jelani. Michelle’s Life verse is; 2 Timothy 1:12 For I know whom I have believed and am persuaded that He is able to keep that which I’ve committed unto Him against that day.

Jessy Padilla

Happily married to my only wife Lulu for over twenty-eight years, I have two wonderful children; I am the first Christian from my family, more than thirty three years being a Christian and serving as a pastor in the Emanuel Church for the last twenty-three years.

Paul Urban

Paul Urban is a founding Pastor of The Journey Church in Muskegon, MI, a multi-site congregation made up of 65% previously unchurched people and planted in 2003, and has been in ministry for 25 years. He’s married to Jennifer and they have three sons, 24, 22, and 19. Paul also serves on the Converge MidAmerica Board.

Kody Woodard

Pastor Kody Woodard is the Lead Pastor of Renovation Church, located about 25 minutes from Nashville, in Gallatin, TN. Renovation Church launched on October 20th, 2019. Since launching they have seen over 100 people decide to follow Jesus and have celebrated over 60 baptisms. Pastor Kody is passionate about helping people follow Jesus, find community, discover their purpose, so that together we can make a difference. He has been married to his wife Jessica for 8 years and has two boys, Tatum and Jett.

Chicago Hotels

Comfort Inn & Suites

1555 E. Fabyan Parkway,
Geneva, IL, US, 60134

(630) 208-881

1 King Bed – $110/night
2 Queen Beds – $100/night
Breakfast is included
Book by October 8th

Group code: UN29X2

Hotel Baker

100 W. Main Street, St.
Charles, IL 60174
630-584-2100

Room Rate – $172/night
Breakfast is included
Book by October 8th

Group code: NA

**Must call to make reservation

Hampton Inn

2875 Foxfield Road,
St. Charles, IL 60174
630-584-0215

1 King Bed – $89/night
2 Queen Beds – $89/night
1 King Bed w/sofa bed – $99/night
Breakfast is included
Book by October 8th

Group code: CMA

Fairfield Inn & Suites

2096 Bricher Road
St. Charles, Illinois 60174

630-845-5500

Room Rate – $103-$111/night
Breakfast is included
Book by October 8th

Group code: NA