Coaching new church planters
Disciple-making
Youth ministry
Rob is a church starter (Lightshine Church) in the suburban Los Angeles community of Thousand Oaks, California. Rob holds an MA in Theology from Fuller seminary and serves as a church planting coach for Cyclical LA, Cyclical Inc. and 1001 New Worshipping Communities of the PC(usa). Rob also works as a Developer for Cyclical Inc. serving two regions: Seattle and Spokane Washington.
Developing church infrastructure
Supporting new worshipping communities
PCUSA
Vera White is a ruling elder at Hiland Presbyterian Church in Pittsburgh Presbytery. She is retired from the position of National Coordinator for 1001 New Worshiping Communities with the Presbyterian Church, USA. Vera enjoys coaching new worshiping community leaders. Her area of specialty is helping presbyteries develop the infrastructure for providing oversight for new worshiping communities. She believes that starting new worshiping communities is the most exciting thing going on in God’s church today. In her spare time Vera enjoys making pottery, working in her garden, cooking, and reading.
Missional leadership in worship
Vision casting
Strategy
Organization and teaching
B.J. Woodworth was the founding pastor of the Open Door, an urban Presbyterian Church (USA) missional community in Pittsburgh, PA. Now he's attempting to slow down to invest in the interior lives of Christian leaders. He is a spiritual director, coach and retreat leader and serves part time at East Liberty Presbyterian Church, as Director of Spiritual Life Ministries and Taize Minister. He loves to create space for people to attend to their interior lives, helping them awaken to their true self and inner wisdom in order to bear fruit in their lives and work. He has a particular interest in accompanying people in professional ministry, entrepreneurs, and those in service and justice work helping them establish sacred patterns of rest, renewal and reflection. He enjoys companioning those in vocational discernment and the journey of de/reconstructing faith.
His spiritual direction training is from the Hesychia School of Spiritual Direction, which focuses on “the ancient art of Christian spiritual direction in a multi-faith context.” B.J. has coached church planters across a variety of denominations and contexts, he has taught at Pittsburgh Theological Seminary in the Spiritual Formation Certificate Program and is the Missional Leadership DMin cohort facilitator. He has a certificate in Spiritual Transformation from the Transforming Center, where he currently serves on the board and as community pastor in Transforming Community #15. Currently he lives in Pittsburgh with his wife Katrina, who is a hatha yoga instructor, yoga therapist and retreat leader. They have 4 children in their late teens and early twenties, Kyra, Elena, Alex and Zach.
First-time church starters
Vision casting
Leadership development
Nicholas Warnes (Masters of Divinity, Fuller Theological Seminary, Emphasis in Worship Theology and Art) is the Founder and Executive Director of Cyclical. He enjoys the regular pattern and rhythm of being both the Executive Director of Cyclical Inc. and Director of Cyclical LA in Los Angeles. Nick is also a recognized speaker on church planting, coach for New Worshiping Communities with the Presbyterian Church USA, on the advisory board for the Brehm Center and the Church Planting Program at Fuller Theological Seminary, and an adjunct professor at Fuller Theological Seminary (church planting certificate). Nick finished his first book in 2014 with Dr. Mark Lau Branson called Starting Missional Churches: Life With God in the Neighborhood. Nick is lives with his wife, Whitney, and son, Lee, in Los Angeles, CA.
Certified Strengths Finder coach
Personal development
Career development and advising
Entrepreneurship
Len Tiso has spent the majority of his career advising executives of major corporations on strategic and financial initiatives. In 2014, as a continuation of this work, he founded an independent consultancy. He also coaches entrepreneurs and start-ups. Len holds an MDiv from Fuller Theological Seminary, an MBA from UCLA, and is a CFA charterholder (Chartered Financial Analyst). As an elder in the PC (USA), Len served as Treasurer of Bel Air Presbyterian Church and was involved in the leadership team of a church plant in Downtown LA. In 2016, he completed an internship with Northland Village Church in Northeast Los Angeles and also participated in the PC (USA) 1001 New Worshiping Communities summer cohort. He is currently exploring ways in which the church can engage in the practice of ethics and reconciliation at the intersection of faith, economics, and vocation.
ACC credentialing under the International Coach Federation (ICF)
Missional discipleship and church starting
20 years of work as an overseas missionary and church starter
Runs a leadership development and coaching organization, Artesia Resourcing, with his wife, Ann.
I help pioneering leaders and pastors engage fresh ways to lead and multiply mission-shaped communities while tending to their holistic formation along the way. Having worked for 30+ years in cross-cultural missions, church planting and pastoring, I know personally how hard and soul-depleting ministry can become. I can identify with the challenges that grate on the souls of shepherd-teacher leaders, and I’m equally familiar with the stresses that plague apostolic-prophetic-evangelistic leaders. My heart goes out to both those in nurturing roles and those in advancement roles. I want to help these leaders - women and men alike - lead well and in ways that promote their growth in faith, hope and love.
Some wells from which I draw: I hold a DMIN in Leadership in the Emerging Culture from Portland Seminary. My coach training is through Creative Results Management, and I have ACC credentialing under the International Coach Federation (ICF). As an outflow of my love for writing, I have authored several practical books (Amazon) around which I coach, train and teach: Dynamic Adventure: A Guide to Starting and Shaping Missional Churches (2017); Growing Local Missionaries: Equipping Churches to Sow Shalom in Their Own Cultural Backyard (2014); and Grow Where You’re Planted: Collected Stories on the Hallmarks of Maturing Church (2013).
Professional coaching
Calling and vocation development
Cyclical Director of Operations
Developer for multiple Cyclical networks
Justin has a Masters of Theology from Fuller Theological Seminary. During his time at Fuller, Justin assisted in starting Northland Village Church (NVC) in Northeast Los Angeles. The NVC church plant helped Justin discover a passion for coaching people as they begin their ministries. Over the last 10 years, Justin has offered coaching to adults and college students in a variety of settings as they discovered God's calling in their lives. Justin also works with under-resourced community college students around the greater Los Angeles area, and is a Developer with Cyclical Los Ranchos and Cyclical Canada. Justin lives in Pasadena with his wife, Dawn, and two kids, Declan and Avery. The Beck family enjoys exploring all the beautiful things Southern California has to offer.
Without leadership, all Cyclical networks would cease to exist. In Luke 10:1-2, Jesus reminds us to pray for leadership for the harvest of the Kingdom of God.
"After this the Lord appointed seventy others and sent them on ahead of him in pairs to every town and place where he himself intended to go. He said to them, “The harvest is plentiful, but the laborers are few; therefore ask the Lord of the harvest to send out laborers into his harvest."