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Mike Slaughter, lead pastor at Ginghamsburg Church, is the three-decade dreamer of Ginghamsburg and the spiritual entrepreneur of ministry marketplace innovations. His life-long passion to reach the lost and set the oppressed free has now made him a tireless and leading advocate for the children, women and men of Darfur, Sudan, named by the U.N. as the worst humanitarian crisis in the world today. Mike's call to afflict the comfortable and comfort the afflicted will challenge attendees to wrestle with God and their God-destinies.

When Mike arrived at Ginghamsburg Church in 1979, worship attendance hovered at 90 with 118 members and an annual budget of $27,000. Now, 4000 attendees on average worship 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 has become known as an early innovator of small group ministry, the Church “media reformation” and cyberministry, with the Ginghamsburg web site averaging 50,000 visits monthly from around the world. Since initiating The Sudan Project in January 2005, Ginghamsburg has invested $3.7 million into humanitarian relief in Darfur. The resultant agricultural project, child development program and safe water initiative are expanding to reach a quarter of a million Sudanese refugees and villagers. Mike has twice visited 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. Locally, the New Path outreach arm of Ginghamsburg Church annually serves more than 40,000 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 top 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 with the most recent being MONEY MATTERS: financial freedom for all God’s churches (Abingdon Press) and MONEY MATTERS: financial freedom for all God’s children (Abingdon Press).

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 lives in Tipp City, 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 Caroline also have a first granddaughter named Ellie. For more information or to catch up with Mike, check out his weekly blog.