The Reverend Doctor Theodore William Johnson is a congregation developer who has specialized as an interim priest for congregations in transition in the Episcopal Church. He is also a consultant and coach strengthening leaders and congregations.

SPIRITUALITY

Ted’s spirituality combines being a faith-filled disciple and a bold apostle of Jesus Christ. Through baptism, he is a member of the body of Christ, an agent of the risen Lord, making Christ present to others in word and action wherever he is and whatever he is doing. He is cheerful, energetic, and outgoing with a positive, enthusiastic presence and a playful sense of humor.

BONDED TO CHURCH

The son of an Episcopal priest, he has been bonded to the life of the church and its congregations from birth. For example, he continued to worship with a local congregation every Sunday while in college when most students drifted away from church activity. Participation in the liturgy, music, spiritual formation, fellowship, community service, and leadership of congregations has been the keystone of his life.

In fact, his intentional ministry as a baptized person in his political career and in the church at the congregational and diocesan levels produced his call to ordination at the mid-point in his life. He came to realize that his personal experience would inform his ministry as a priest helping people live more completely into their ministries as baptized persons in all aspects of their daily lives as well as in their congregations.

Ted is proud to be an Episcopalian at this moment in the church’s history. He takes very seriously the vows he made when he was ordained a deacon and repeated when he was ordained a priest. He is knowledgeable about the Episcopal Church, its governance, and the issues currently confronting it.

COMMUNICATION SKILLS

Communication skills have been the foundation for Ted’s work before and after ordination. He has the ability to explain issues and concepts in ways that people readily understand. He has used this skill as a spokesperson for politicians and activist organizations, in preaching and teaching in the church, as a change agent, in writing and producing political campaign advertising, as a Washington representative for corporations and associations, in grass-roots organizing, as a trainer and facilitator of group processes, in directing conferences and events, as a speech-writer and public speaker, as a leadership coach, in media and public relations, as an advocate lobbying the Congress and state legislatures, as a political and congregational consultant, and in writing a wide variety of published materials.

LEADER

His communications skills enhance his leadership ability. Ted defines a leader as one who initiates and sustains movement for change through transformation and innovation. A crucial task of a leader is to facilitate consensus in a congregation about the change it desires or requires in order to move into its future.

His Myers-Briggs Temperament Inventory type, ENTJ, is sometimes described as “one of life’s natural leaders.” His preferred leadership style is collaborative. He is purposeful and visionary, seeking to equip and build up a congregation so it can fulfill its mission and accomplish its vision for the future guided by its core values. He is entrepreneurial and decisive. He makes things happen.

MANAGER

He is also an effective manager of tasks, people, and resources, one who enables effective and efficient functioning. He provides direction to others by giving them a sense of common purpose and of mutual responsibility for achieving goals, seeking to have the people he manages function as a team. He organizes, delegates, and handles administrative details and financial matters in a collaborative and empowering manner, with a high level of attention to clarity, accuracy, and quality. He keeps things running.

ANALYST

He is curious, inquisitive, and analytical. When a congregation and its leaders are not functioning optimally, he seeks to diagnose the problems and identify possible solutions. He figures things out.

He is honest, direct, and sometimes blunt in reporting his findings, occasionally confronting congregation leaders with realities they would rather ignore and courses of action they would rather avoid.

THE BIBLE

He believes that the Hebrew and Christian Scriptures must be interpreted in order to find their relevance for life today. This requires a historical-critical approach to the Bible (not a literalist one) that seeks to understand what the original writers intended to communicate to their audiences and then making appropriate connections to current situations that are vastly different. This process of interpretation is guided by the Holy Spirit and informed by church tradition, human experience, and intellectual reason.

ETHICS

Ted believes that ethical decisions are made in the contexts of life (not according to absolute rules) by faithfully seeking courses of action that in their concrete situations are intended to advance God’s purposes and to show Christ’s reconciling and redeeming love to others.

With many issues of our day, ambiguity is greater than certainty and conflict greater than unanimity. Ted believes that the ability to accept ambiguity and doubt, as well as to stay in relationship with people in spite of disagreements, are signs for emotional and spiritual maturity.

INCLUSION VERSUS EXCLUSION

Ted recognizes that the dialectic between inclusion and exclusion has occupied the attention of the church since the years following Easter and Pentecost as it addressed and continues to deal with issues of membership, its requirements, and its privileges; eligibility for the sacraments and rites of the church; recipients of the salvation obtained by the crucifixion and resurrection of Jesus Christ; and target audiences for the church’s ministries of compassion and evangelism. Ted is on the inclusive side of this continuum. He embraces Saint Paul’s declaration that nothing “else in all creation will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord.” (Romans 8:39b) and the statement of the late Archbishop of Canterbury, William Temple: “The church is the only organization in the world that exists primarily for the sake of people who are not its members.”

CHURCH AS PROPHET

Ted also believes that the church is the agent of Christ in the world, not the government, a political party, or an ideology. This means that the church is often called, like Amos and Jeremiah, to take prophetic stands against governmental policies that do not advance peace, justice, social well-being, and human dignity.

DIVERSE VIEWS

While Ted holds strongly to these beliefs, he worships and works within the church with people who have different beliefs and dissimilar opinions. Such diversity of views is necessary for the church to be the body of Christ in the world; divergent opinions do not disqualify baptized members from common ministry with one another.

10/8/2007