Igniting Imagination

What if the word unfinished is not a verdict on the church, but an invitation to it? The Unfinished Church begins with a simple conviction. The church is unfinished, not because it is failing and not because God has abandoned it, but because every generation is invited to discern again what faithfulness looks like. In this first conversation, Rev. Dr. Blair Thompson welcomes Bishop Gregory Vaughn...

What happens when the promises we make at the baptismal font stop being liturgy and start being a way of life? This episode of The Unfinished Church brings host Bishop Gregory Vaughn Palmer together with Bishop LaTrelle M. Easterling, Resident Bishop of the Baltimore-Washington and Peninsula-Delaware Conferences of the United Methodist Church. Bishop Easterling is one of the original architects of...

What if the most hopeful thing about the church is the work it has not finished yet? The Unfinished Church is a new podcast series from Wesleyan Impact Partners and Texas Methodist Foundation, hosted by Bishop Gregory Vaughn Palmer. It is a conversation for people willing to hold the questions that do not resolve neatly, and who believe the church still has real work to do in the world. This seaso...

What does faithful leadership look like when the landscape is shifting faster than anyone can teach us to keep up? In this season finale of the Igniting Imagination® podcast, host Rev. Lisa Greenwood sets aside the usual interview format for a genuine conversation with her colleague, Rev. Dr. Blair Thompson, chief learning and innovation officer at Wesleyan Impact Partners and Texas Methodist Foun...

What if the way we invest our resources could become an expression of our faith? Most of us think carefully about where we give, yet we spend far less time considering where our money is invested and what it is doing while it rests there. And those investments have the power to shape companies, communities, and the future we are helping to build. This week on the Igniting Imagination® podcast, Rev...

What if the buildings and land your congregation has stewarded for generations are an asset waiting to serve God's mission in a changing world? This week on the Igniting Imagination® podcast, Rev. Lisa Greenwood is joined by Rev. Dr. Mark Holland, project manager for church property development with Wesleyan Impact Partners and Texas Methodist Foundation, alongside Chris Miller, chief financial, i...

When most people hear the word "grant," they think of applications, deadlines, and dollars. But behind every funding decision sit far deeper questions: What assets is this organization stewarding, and to what end? What makes a church or nonprofit ready, not just for money, but for lasting impact? This week on the Igniting Imagination® podcast, Rev. Lisa Greenwood pulls back the curtain on grantmak...

What if the most meaningful conversations about charitable giving were never really about money at all, but about the story we hope our lives will tell? This episode of the Igniting Imagination® podcast takes listeners behind the scenes of Texas Methodist Foundation and Wesleyan Impact Partners, where host Rev. Lisa Greenwood sits down with two colleagues to explore how generosity becomes part of...

What if the church isn't broken so much as being reshaped, quietly, from the inside out, into something older and truer than the buildings we've come to call home? This week on the Igniting Imagination ® podcast, Rev. Lisa Greenwood sits down with Rev. Dr. Kenda Creasy Dean, Professor at Princeton Theological Seminary, for a conversation about the tectonic shifts moving beneath the church today. A...

What does it look like when worship and justice are no longer separate categories, but the same lived reality? This week on the Igniting Imagination® podcast, Rev. Lisa Greenwood and Dr. Aaron Kuecker welcome Rev. Sandra Maria Van Opstal, co-founder and executive director of Chasing Justice, a movement mobilizing young leaders at the intersection of faith and justice. Sandra is a global speaker, p...

What if faith communities saw themselves not as distant helpers, but as neighbors, woven into the lives, struggles, and dreams of the people around them? This week on the Igniting Imagination® podcast, Rev. Lisa Greenwood and Dr. Aaron Kuecker are joined by Rev. Matt St. Pierre, Executive Director and Co-Founder, Restore Merced, to explore beyond economics into something more sacred, the restorati...

Faith communities everywhere are asking: How do we take responsibility for justice in today’s world? This week on the Igniting Imagination® podcast, Rev. Lisa Greenwood and Dr. Aaron Kuecker explore this question with Rev. Dr. Nikia Smith Robert, founder and executive director of Abolitionist Sanctuary. Rev. Dr. Nikia is a respected theologian and activist who challenges the church to move beyond...

Welcome to the Season 18 premiere of the Igniting Imagination® podcast with host Rev. Lisa Greenwood and this season’s co-host Dr. Aaron Kuecker. In this opening conversation, Lisa and Aaron sit down with Rev. Lea Matthews, Associate Pastor at St. Paul & St. Andrew United Methodist Church in New York City, for a thoughtful exploration of the ways our words, and the spaces between them, shape o...

This week on the season finale of the Igniting Imagination® podcast, Rev. Lisa Greenwood, Rev. Sue Phillips, and Rev. Dr. Blair Thompson reflect on the insights shared by guests throughout this season as they explore the intersection of technology and the church. Together, they unpack the ethical challenges posed by emerging technologies and explore the crucial importance of engaging with technolo...

This week on the Igniting Imagination® podcast, Rev. Lisa Greenwood and Rev. Sue Phillips welcome Bishop Cedrick Bridgeforth, Residential Bishop of the Greater Northwest Episcopal Area, to explore the vital call to faithful leadership in times of uncertainty and rapid change. Cedrick shares a vision for leadership that goes beyond administration, rooted in relationships, spiritual formation, and t...

This week on the Igniting Imagination® podcast, Rev. Lisa Greenwood and Rev. Sue Phillips sit down with TeRay Esquibel, Executive Director at Purpose Commons and a visionary social entrepreneur dedicated to reimagining education and community life through the lens of human flourishing. TeRay shares how lived experience is a powerful, and often overlooked, form of expertise. Rather than relying sol...

This week on the Igniting Imagination® podcast, we explore the powerful crossroads of technology and spirituality, reimagining religious leaders as some of our most important, and often overlooked, technological innovators. Rev. Lisa Greenwood and Rev. Sue Phillips welcome Tiffani Jones Brown, Founder, Advisor, and Editorial and Creative Director, to discuss how spiritual leaders can design meanin...

This week on the Igniting Imagination® podcast, we explore the delicate interplay between faith and technology, asking how innovation can illuminate, not replace, the human spirit. Joined by Rev. Canon Lorenzo Lebrija, Executive Director for TryTank Research Institute, Rev. Lisa Greenwood, and Rev. Sue Phillips reflect on Lebrija’s groundbreaking work with AI tools like Episcopot, and the ways the...

What does it mean to cultivate spiritual presence in a world increasingly connected by screens? This week on the Igniting Imagination® podcast, Rev. Lisa Greenwood and Rev. Sue Phillips explore this question with James Kang, Chief Product Officer and Co-founder of PASTORIA, and Rev. Nathan Webb, Pastor at Checkpoint Church, both Phygital Fellows at Wesleyan Impact Partners. Together, they examine...

What if ministry could be understood as a form of technology? On the Season 17 premiere of the Igniting Imagination® podcast, Rev. Lisa Greenwood, Rev. Sue Phillips, and Rev. Dr. Blair Thompson explore this provocative question. This change in mindset could open the door to understanding how ancient spiritual practices can be renewed to meet the deep longings and challenges of our modern world. Th...

This week on the Igniting Imagination® podcast, Rev. Lisa Greenwood steps into the fault lines shaping the future of faith with Anna Del Castillo, co-founder of Our Own Deep Wells, and Dr. Josh Packard, co-founder of Future of Faith. Together they interrogate the disruptive trends already redefining church life, inspired by Carey Nieuwhof’s 2026 forecasts . Why is Generation Z returning to church,...

In the season sixteen finale of the Igniting Imagination® podcast, Rev. Lisa Greenwood and Rev. Dr. Gil Rendle reflect on the cultural shifts that are reshaping the ways people search for meaning, community, and belonging. This season, Lisa, Gil, and guests have confronted a growing reality: the structures we inherited may no longer be capable of holding the spiritual longings of today, especially...

In this episode of the Igniting Imagination® podcast, Rev. Lisa Greenwood and Rev. Dr. Gil Rendle explore the powerful intersection of faith, justice, and public life with the Rev. William "Bill" H. Lamar IV, Pastor of Metropolitan AME Church in Washington, D.C. The historic congregation recently gained national attention after winning a landmark lawsuit against the Proud Boys, a far-right extremi...

Faith is evolving, and so must the ways we understand and engage with it.  In this episode of the Igniting Imagination® podcast, Rev. Lisa Greenwood and Rev. Dr. Gil Rendle sit down with Dr. Josh Packard, Co-Founder of Future of Faith, and Kris Jordan, Ministry Practitioner at Future of Faith. Together, they examine how younger generations navigate faith in a world where trust in institutions...

What if the future of faith communities isn’t about holding on tighter, but about opening our hands? In this episode, Rev. Tim Shapiro, President of Indianapolis Center for Congregations, joins Rev. Lisa Greenwood and Rev. Dr. Gil Rendle in exploring Gil’s recent monograph, Reimagining and Remapping the Religious Landscape . Together, they explore a gentle, brave question: How do we create congreg...