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This week's eNote
February 10, 2025 by pastor chip freed
Dear Members and Friends,
Yesterday, the focus of our message was “Being On a Mission Together.” Well, our “together” just got a lot stronger. Pastor Terry McHugh and I are excited to announce that as of July 1, 2025, Pastor Joe Burkhardt (MDiv, DMin.), his wife Jeanette and amazing children, Zach, Matt (and spouse, Jaden), Jason, Micah, Andrew, Titus, Naomi (ages 12-25) will be joining our Garfield Memorial family, as Joe steps in as our Executive & Teaching Pastor following Terry’s upcoming retirement (also effective July 1, 2025).
Like Pastor Scott Blevins, Joe was a young pastor who came in under my watch as a District Superintendent. Joe and Pastor Terry were classmates in seminary, and Joe joined our staff team in 2019 to attend the Mosaix National Conference where he shared that the Revelation 7:9 vision of the church on earth as it is in heaven "changed the entire course of my ministry" (his words).
Joe has served as Lead Pastor of Wedgewood UMC for 10 years, and was also given missional responsibilities for the entire City of Akron for the United Methodist Church. Joe led a declining homogeneous church of 80 at Wedgewood to become a thriving 200 in worship multiethnic church that now includes 50 African immigrants in regular worship. He and his team have organized their technology to include songs and sermons to be shared in various languages via A/V for all of their non-English speaking audience in attendance.
Joe has said that his time with Garfield and our staff in 2019 impacted this entire transformation. He and his family have worshipped at both Heritage & Mosaic here at Garfield when on break the last 4-5 years, and recently worshipped at Dre & Leah's mid-week "Worship in the Chapel" in March 2024. The denomination was concerned about disrupting the ministry at Wedgewood and gave Joe the choice to stay or move. Joe felt that joining our team at Garfield was divinely appointed and his deepest calling. I guess the NBA is not the only entity making big trades in February LOL. We are so excited to welcome Joe, Jeanette, and their family to our team on July 1, 2025. Here is what Joe shared about this new adventure:
God is truly good! I am excited to be joining the pastoral team at Garfield Memorial Church. My family and I have committed ourselves to living out the vision of Jesus' eternal Church as glimpsed in Revelation 7:9, where people of all nations, tribes, ethnicities, and languages gather as one family, walls of division broken down, uniting in worship before God's throne, humanity forever restored in the love of Jesus Christ. I have served as a pastor since 2002, and a youth pastor for a few years before that. I currently co-lead with Pastor Ja'Alycia Richmond the Wedgewood UMC and the First UMC of Akron. We work to organize collaborative, multiethnic church and community ministries that advance Christ's kingdom here on earth with the goal of welcoming all people to new life and universal flourishing, both in greater Akron and throughout the world.
I am deeply appreciative of Pastor Chip Freed, who has been a pastoral mentor and personal friend for many years. I am also grateful for Pastor Terry McHugh, who has labored faithfully in leadership, and who continues to lay the groundwork for the church's mission to move forward. Garfield Memorial Church holds a special place in our hearts already because GMC has graciously modeled multiethnic ministry for our current churches. This began when I traveled with GMC's staff to the Mosaix Conference in Dallas in 2019. We brought Wedgewood UMC church leaders soon thereafter to Garfield for one of the extended learning labs, after which we again attended the Mosaix Conference in 2022. I am looking forward to personally connecting with other staff members of GMC as we together discern God's path forward for the mission to Widen the Circle through living out the core values of safety, authenticity, diversity, transformation, and reconciliation. May God's will be done on earth as it is in heaven.
On a mission together for sure!
WIDENING THE CIRCLE: Connecting diverse people who share a common brokenness, with Jesus
