When Mike arrived at Ginghamsburg Church in 1979, worship attendance hovered at 90 with 118 members and an annual budget of $27,000. Today 4500 guests on average worship or grow weekly at Ginghamsburg and the multi-million dollar budget helps resource a faith community committed to serving the poor, lost and disenfranchised.

Under Mike’s leadership, Ginghamsburg Church became known as an early innovator of small group ministry, the Church “media reformation” and cyberministry. Since initiating The Sudan Project in January 2005, Ginghamsburg has invested more than $8 million into sustainable humanitarian relief projects in Darfur, Sudan and South Sudan. The resultant agricultural project, child development program, safe water and health care initiatives reach a quarter of a million Sudanese and South Sudanese refugees, returnees and villagers. Mike has visited (three times) the internally displaced persons’ camps and villages in South Darfur served through The Sudan Project to witness firsthand God’s “loaves and fishes” miracle and to reconfirm for the Sudanese people Ginghamsburg’s determined commitment toward completing the mission that has been placed before it. Ginghamsburg has also raised $1 million for Imagine No Malaria. Locally, the New Path outreach arm of Ginghamsburg Church annually serves more than 58,000 people in surrounding communities via its food pantry, car, clothing and furniture ministries. In 2005 and 2006, Ginghamsburg was named as one of the top 50 churches in the U.S. by The Church Report magazine. In 2007, The Church Report listed Mike as one of the 50 most influential Christians in America.

As a mentor, Mike travels globally to speak and uses his “gift of irritation” to equip ministry leaders to minimize brick and maximize mission so that they may fully deploy the mission of Jesus into the world. He is also the author of multiple books including Made for a Miracle (Abingdon Press) Down to Earth (Abingdon Press); The Passionate Church: Ignite Your Church and Change the World (Abingdon Press); The Christian Wallet: Spending, Giving & Living with a Conscience (Westminster John Knox Press); RENEGADE GOSPEL: Rebel Jesus (Abingdon Press); Dare to Dream (Abingdon Press); Shiny Gods (Abingdon Press); Christmas Is Not Your Birthday: Experience the Joy of Living and Giving Like Jesus (Abingdon Press) and Change The World: Recovering The Message and Mission of Jesus (Abingdon Press), among others.

Mike is an ordained Elder within the United Methodist Church (UMC) and holds a Doctorate of Ministry. He was named the Foundation for Evangelism’s “Distinguished Evangelist” in 2003 and has twice received the Denman Evangelism Award from the Foundation in recognition of demonstrated leadership in promoting the United Methodist Church’s historic commitment to evangelism. In 2007, Olivet Nazarene University granted Mike the Reed Institute Lifetime Achievement Award, given in recognition of outstanding leadership. Mike was recognized as the Outstanding Doctor of Ministry Alumnus in October 2014 by United Theological Seminary. In May 2016, United Theological Seminary awarded Mike an honorary Doctor of Divinity degree. In April 2017, Mike received the “Distinguished Alumni Award” from the University of Cincinnati School of Social Work.

Mike lives in Cincinnati, Ohio, with his wife Carolyn. Their children are daughter Kristen (Slaughter) Leavitt with husband Brendan, as well as son Jonathan with wife Stacy. Mike and Carolyn have four granddaughters, Ellie, Addison, Anna and Tessa, and three grandsons, Luke, Caleb and Jack. For more information or to catch up with Mike, check out his blog: http://mikeslaughter.com/blog.

Passionate Churches LLC was founded in 2017 when Pastor Mike Slaughter stepped away after 38 years from serving as lead pastor and chief dreamer of Ginghamsburg Church. Now, with a combined 70-plus years of innovative and effective leadership within small to mega church, Fortune 100 and non-profit organizations, spiritual entrepreneur and ministry practitioner Mike Slaughter and Karen Perry Smith (MBA) of Passionate Churches, LLC are uniquely positioned to equip pastors, church staff and lay leaders to deploy the mission of Christ into the world.

Karen Perry Smith is the lead facilitator for Passionate Churches and also serves with the Ginghamsburg Church Lead Executive Team as that team’s coordinator to ensure strategic goal planning and tracking, appropriate HR/staffing practices and organizational development, and effective workplace processes. Karen also leads the teams responsible for leadership development, adult discipleship and local-to-global missions. Additional responsibilities include oversight of the church’s three affiliated 501c3 non-profit partnerships, global resources and conferences. Before joining the Ginghamsburg staff in 2002, Karen served for 16 years with a large information technology company in training, communications, staff leadership and project management roles. She holds an MBA in Marketing.