Join us for our opening session! Featuring 'Stories that Heal' An Evening with Cole Arthur Riley.

Coffee and continental breakfast

Welcome, Announcements, Conference Logistics

Join us for an impactful worship service featuring a sermon by Traci Blackmon.
Q&A to follow.

Q&A session with Traci Blackmon

Sermon Session featuring Anna Carter Florence with "The Preacher Who Wouldn't Leave"

The session will include the sermon, a song, and Q&A.

Choose from one of 8 (rotating) workshop options, including special sessions exclusively for virtual participants. The workshops offer a more intimate setting to dive deeper into a variety of topics.

In-Person Sessions

Shipwrecks and Forest Fires: Honest Metaphors for an Age of Polycrisis
Dr. Tim Eberhart
How do we preach and teach in a time of multiple, overlapping crises in ways that speak truthfully about where we find ourselves while also fostering hope? Along with providing examples from his own preaching and teaching, the facilitator will invite participants to experiment with different metaphors and symbolic arcs based on their particular traditions and contexts.

The Theology of Improv
John Haynes
This workshop takes the concepts of improvisational theater and relates them to preaching focusing on concepts of communication, listening, creative idea generation, collaboration and the idea that church is theater.
***Also available in Workshop Session 3***

Preaching Between Love and Loss
Dr Cody Sanders
Love and loss are inextricably intertwined on personal, communal, and planetary levels. To love the world at this moment means to grieve it, as so many of our ecological co-inhabitants on the planet are being lost to extinction rates far beyond what can be considered "normal." This workshop will explore ministry in times of both death and non-death losses as our congregations and communities face the limits of our own finitude.
***Available Online in Workshop Session 2***

Online Sessions

Not Your Model Minority: Proclamation from an Asian American Lens
Rev. Deanna Kim Bassett and Rev. Jenny Sung
Revs. Bassett & Sung will share the joys and challenges of preaching, teaching, and leading as Asian American women. Come & learn more about what it means to be a great ally and fellow human in the face of model minority culture & Asian hate.
***Available In-Person in Workshop Session 3***

Preaching from a Digital Pulpit
Rev Jim Keat
It’s one thing to step into the physical pulpits of the past but what does it mean to step into the digital pulpits of the present and future? We will explore various digital platforms and what it might look like to reimagine the art of preaching for spaces like YouTube, Instagram, TikTok, and more. Rather than working to bring people to church, what happens when we focus on bringing church to people?
***Also available in Workshop Sessions 2&3***

Sermon Session featuring Cole Arthur Riley.

The session will include the sermon, a song, and Q&A.

This (optional) event will transport attendees via bus from St. Andrew to Minneapolis where we will join with Singing Resistance in learning a new song before walking over to George Floyd Square. We will then travel by foot to the Renee Good Memorial site where the bus will pick you back up.

Should you choose to, you may walk on foot to the Alex Pretti Memorial site (1.5mi).

Dinner on your own.

Coffee and continental breakfast

Sermon Session featuring Zach Lambert with "The Narrow Way - Following Jesus Out Of Empire".

The session will include the sermon, a song, and Q&A.

Choose from one of 8 (rotating) workshop options, including special sessions exclusively for virtual participants. The workshops offer a more intimate setting to dive deeper into a variety of topics.

In-Person

Your Story, My Story, Our Story: Tellin’ the Story We’re In - The Embodied Craft of Preaching
Brian J. Evans
This dreamshop invites us to explore storytelling as an embodied practice of connection, reflection, and transformation. Through conversation, movement, and practical tools, we’ll consider how authenticity, accessibility, historical context, and community can deepen the craft of messages we share
***Available online in Workshop Session 3***

The Preacher as Guest: How We Enter Changes What We Know
Dr. Kelly Sherman-Conroy, Native Theologian
Every story we encounter belongs within a larger life. Behind a headline, a congregational conversation, or a memory of our own are people, places, histories, and relationships. What does it mean to enter that story as a guest before carrying it into a sermon? Drawing on her Lakota theology, Indigenous methodology, and movement chaplaincy, Dr. Kelly Sherman-Conroy explores community as a spiritual practice that shapes how we hear and proclaim.

Oh, Hey, What If Children’s Sermons Didn’t Suck So Much??
Rev. Andrea Roske Metcalfe
From the perspective of the kids, the pastor, and the people in the pews, children’s sermons can be the most awkward and painful part of the worship service. But what if they weren’t?? Join this workshop for a conversation about turning this particular piece from drudgery into a delight for the entire Congregation.
***This session is not an 'online' session but will be live-streamed for virtual participants***

Online Sessions

Preaching Between Love and Loss
Dr Cody Sanders
Love and loss are inextricably intertwined on personal, communal, and planetary levels. To love the world at this moment means to grieve it, as so many of our ecological co-inhabitants on the planet are being lost to extinction rates far beyond what can be considered "normal." This workshop will explore ministry in times of both death and non-death losses as our congregations and communities face the limits of our own finitude.
***Available In-Person in Workshop Session 1***

Preaching from a Digital Pulpit
Rev Jim Keat
It’s one thing to step into the physical pulpits of the past but what does it mean to step into the digital pulpits of the present and future? We will explore various digital platforms and what it might look like to reimagine the art of preaching for spaces like YouTube, Instagram, TikTok, and more. Rather than working to bring people to church, what happens when we focus on bringing church to people?
***Also available in Workshop Sessions 1&3***

Sermon Session featuring Paul Drees with "Making Soil from Stones".

The session will include the sermon, a song, and Q&A

Choose from one of 8 (rotating) workshop options, including special sessions exclusively for virtual participants. The workshops offer a more intimate setting to dive deeper into a variety of topics.

In-Person Sessions

The Theology of Improv
John Haynes
This workshop takes the concepts of improvisational theater and relates them to preaching focusing on concepts of communication, listening, creative idea generation, collaboration and the idea that church is theater.
***Also available in Workshop Session 1***

Oh, Hey, What If Children’s Sermons Didn’t Suck So Much??
Rev. Andrea Roske Metcalfe
From the perspective of the kids, the pastor, and the people in the pews, children’s sermons can be the most awkward and painful part of the worship service. But what if they weren’t?? Join this workshop for a conversation about turning this particular piece from drudgery into a delight for the entire Congregation.
***This session is not an 'online' session but will be live-streamed for virtual participants***

Not Your Model Minority: Proclamation from an Asian American Lens
Rev. Deanna Kim Bassett and Rev. Jenny Sung
Revs. Bassett & Sung will share the joys and challenges of preaching, teaching, and leading as Asian American women. Come & learn more about what it means to be a great ally and fellow human in the face of model minority culture & Asian hate.
***Available Online in Workshop Session 1***

Online Sessions

Your Story, My Story, Our Story: Tellin’ the Story We’re In - The Embodied Craft of Preaching
Brian Evans
This dreamshop invites us to explore storytelling as an embodied practice of connection, reflection, and transformation. Through conversation, movement, and practical tools, we’ll consider how authenticity, accessibility, historical context, and community can deepen the craft of messages we share
***Available In-Person in Workshop Session 2***

Preaching from a Digital Pulpit
Rev Jim Keat
It’s one thing to step into the physical pulpits of the past but what does it mean to step into the digital pulpits of the present and future? We will explore various digital platforms and what it might look like to reimagine the art of preaching for spaces like YouTube, Instagram, TikTok, and more. Rather than working to bring people to church, what happens when we focus on bringing church to people?
***Also available in Workshop Sessions 2&3***

Get prepared for the upcoming Sunday with Drs. Barreto and Chan.

Worship service featuring a sermon by Winnie Varghese with "We Go Together".
Q&A to follow.