Timothy Project
Ponce pastoral residency program
Ponce Presbyterian Church is excited to announce, in partnership with Made to Flourish, a pastoral resident position for our center city church. This position is a two-year role that will serve as preparation for becoming either a parish pastor or a church planter. The candidate will have the opportunity to minister in various contexts that are consistent with a diverse metropolitan city, serving a community shaped by Tier 1 Research universities, homelessness, international immigrants, business professionals, the LGBTQ+ community, and industry leaders in medicine, technology, media, and the arts. Our church ranges in size from 175-225 men, women, and children.
Qualified candidates for this two-year residency should be actively exploring a calling to either church planting or church revitalization. Candidates must have completed a Master of Divinity (or equivalent degree) or be able to complete the degree from Atlanta during the first year of employment while pursuing ordination. Beyond expectations of godly character and spiritual maturity, ideal candidates will have experience ministering in cross-cultural contexts and a desire to grow in cross-cultural adaptability and competency. Further, candidates must desire to develop gifts particularly required of church planters and lead pastors.
Ponce Church has a longstanding commitment to leadership development. Despite a limited pastoral staff, Ponce has been consistently developing pastoral leaders for varying ministry contexts, including church planting, church revitalization, and campus ministry. This commitment is shared by the pastoral staff, the session, and other lay leaders in the congregation. And yet, because of limited resources, Ponce Church’s staff and elders have recognized untapped avenues for further investment in leadership development. With more resources dedicated to leadership development and an increased emphasis on full-time residents instead of pastoral interns, the full flourishing of Ponce’s passion to train church leaders can now be realized. Thankfully, due to the generous partnership of Made To Flourish, this residency does not require fundraising and is commensurate with full-time pastoral positions for candidates of similar experience.
If you would like to get more information about this opportunity, please contact Hace (hace@poncechurch.org). Currently accepting applicants for position beginning Summer 2024.
Ponce Pastoral Internship
Ponce Presbyterian Church strives to be a gospel-centered and missional presence in Atlanta’s Midtown context. We hold to the classic Christian faith as expressed both communally and sacramentally in hopes of being Christ-centered in our relationships and worship. And of course, it is our particular calling to bring the gospel to the greater Atlanta area, and the special training opportunities that we have toward sending men and women into the entire world for the sake of the kingdom of God in all spheres of life. In short, one of our goals as a church is to train and equip men and women for service in Christ's church so as to build Godly leadership for the Kingdom of God into the 21st century.
And what you have heard from me through many witnesses, entrust to faithful people who will be able to teach others as well... 2 Tim. 2:2
Toward this mission, we have developed a rather extensive undergraduate and pastoral internship program that seeks to take advantage of our urban and ecclesial context. In the pastoral track, there are two focuses to the program—a learning focus that integrates theology with pastoral ministry, and a mentoring/practical focus that seeks to integrate the intern into a holistic pastoral experience that is especially suited to sending pastors into other missional contexts.
The internship is predicated upon the belief that the church is where God’s Kingdom activity is hopping. The church is an essential element of the gospel, even the mediated presence of Christ for our salvation. The church as such, is but a Christology Applied! This translates into a training and mentoring philosophy that wants to integrate both “high church” (not to be confused with high culture necessarily) with “high gospel.”
The central method of our intern program is an integration of study, mentoring, and practical ministry, all within a post-modern context of 21st-century urban church ministry.
If you would like to get more information about this opportunity, please contact Hace (hace@poncechurch.org).