William (Bill) Beckham
Bill Beckham served as a Southern Baptist Missionary to Thailand for a number of years, where he met and worked with Ralph Neighbour. In his missionary work, he planted cell groups in the slums of Bangkok as well as the inner city. When he returned to the US in the early 1990's, he was instrumental in communicating the vision, theology, and methodology of the cell group church model, taking Ralph Neighbour's first writings to a whole new level. His books include The Second Reformation and Redefining Revival, two excellent resources that have been translated into other languages and used around the world by pastors and transitioning churches. While these two books are not new releases, you should read them if you are embarking on the journey into biblical community and group-based church life. Bill lives and works from his home in Houston, Texas.
M. Scott Boren
Scott is a staff pastor at Woodland Hills Church in St. Paul, Minnesota. For many years, Scott was on staff at TOUCH and spearheaded the development and publishing of most of the resources our ministry released from 1995 through 2003. Among other works published by Allelon and Baker Books on missional church life, Scott is the author of four powerful TOUCH titles: The Relational Way, How Do We Get There From Here?, The Navigation Guide for Making Cell Groups Work, and Cell Group Leader Training. As you read Scott's books and interact with him via his blog (The Relational Mission), you will quickly learn he has the wisdom of someone twice his age. Visit his blog, The Relational Mission.
Joel Comiskey
Joel Comiskey served as a Christian & Missionary Alliance missionary with his wife in Ecuador for years and developed a growing cell-based church while there. In the early 1990s Joel researched eight of the world's largest churches to find out how they became successful through the cell group model, and wrote his first book for TOUCH, entitled Home Cell Group Explosion. This book explains the practical lifestyle issues that make the cell group leaders in these churches so successful. Soon after this book was released, he wrote Reap The Harvest and Leadership Explosion, both of which shed light on how to implement holistic small group successfully in a Western culture. Moving back to the US, Joel and his family settled in Moreno Valley, California where he planted a cell-based church called Wellspring. Since that time, Joel has written a number of books for TOUCH surrounding the G-12 model. The first was Groups of 12, followed by an adaptation of the G-12 model called From 12 to 3. Between these releases, Joel published two excellent resources on cell leadership. One of our best-selling books is How to Lead a Great Cell Group Meeting. The other is How to be a Great Cell Group Coach. Joel has a wonderful blog where he interacts with pastors directly and he also invites other cell church pastors to blog. You'll learn a lot by reading these books and visiting his blog.
Mark Collins
Mark Collins is easily one of the most creative and high-energy small group pastors in ministry today. Mark designed on of TOUCH's out-of-the-box curriculum guides entitled Connecting Inward. If you've not used our curriculum for groups, you'll love the way it moves a group into ministry to one another and then into planning how to live out their faith between meetings. Only one book per group is required too, so it's economical. Check it out!
Rod Dempsey
Dr. Rod Dempsey is the Chairman of Discipleship Ministries at Liberty Theological Seminary in Lynchburg, Virginia. He is also the Discipleship Pastor at the historic Thomas Road Baptist Church. Rod has over 20 years of church experience as a church planter, Christian Education Pastor, Membership Pastor, Small Group Pastor, consultant and Elder. Rod co-wrote The Pocket Guide to Leading a Small Group, which provides a practical nut of small group truth to chew on for every week of a calendar year.
Dave Earley
Dr. Dave Earley is Chairman of the Department of Pastoral Ministries and Church Expansion at Liberty Theological Seminary. He also serves as Director of the Center for Ministry Training at Liberty Theological Seminary, and the Director of the Center for Church Planting of Liberty University. Dave is the founding Senior Pastor of the New Life Church of Gahanna, Ohio, a church started in his basement with 12 people. Today, the church has grown to nearly 2,000 in weekly attendance and over 100 small groups. Dave has written ten books including The Small Group Leader's Toolkit, 8 Habits of Effective Small Group Leaders, Turning Members into Leaders, and The Pocket Guide to Leading a Small Group, If you would like to interact with Dave or invite him to speak to your church or leaders, visit his web site.
Jim Egli
Dr. Jim Egli serves as the Small Groups Pastor at the Vineyard Church of Urbana in Illinois, where he oversees a growing system of over 100 home and specialty groups. Jim has authored fifteen books on discipleship, leadership, evangelism, and spiritual freedom. Jim worked for TOUCH for a number of years, heading up our training in local churches. He is best known for Encounter God, a retreat designed to help small group members break away from spiritual and relational bondage. He also developed Upward, Inward, Outward, Forward, which is a one-day workshop to help small group members make a 4-month calendared plan of action to do more than meet in a home once a week.
David Finnell
Dr. David Finnell has planted churches both in Southeast Asia and America. He taught church planting at Columbia International University for 12 years. David has led numerous international conferences on prayer and church planting. He now writes, consults, and teaching in globally strategic areas as the Lord leads. His wife, Linda, travels with him. David is the author of Life In His Body, a simple primer on the cell church and Looking Upward, a six-week curriculum piece that helps a group focus on prayer.
Paul R. Ford
Dr. Paul Ford is a leadership and teambuilding specialist with Church Resource Ministries. He is the author of numerous resources focusing on spiritual gifts and leadership, including God is Powerful in You, a six-week curriculum piece that helps group members discover where God is using them powerfully through a unique, "ask others" approach. He and his wife reside in Albuquerque, New Mexico and have one college-aged son.
Karen Hurston
Dr. Karen Hurston is an international speaker and consultant on cell groups and prayer. She grew up and now serves on the staff of Dr. Cho's church (Yoido Full Gospel Church) in Seoul, South Korea as the English Pastor's liaison. Karen is the author of numerous books, including a revealing study of Victory Christian Center in Tulsa, Oklahoma called Breakthrough Cell Groups.
Daphne Kirk
Daphne unfolds fresh truths from Scripture in such a way that repentance and vision flow together to bringing about a revolution in homes, churches and nations. Her vision is to see a healing between the generations and a transformation of the church that will birth a generation of young people and children who have an uncompromising passion for Christ, take the gospel into the every nation and are intentionally prepared to live victoriously through the end times of this earth. To this end she challenges this emerging generation to live radically and has developed Fire for the Nations to intentionally equip them "for such a time as this." Daphne works internationally with churches through conferences, consultation, preaching, teaching and training and the author of groundbreaking resources (there's too many to list here, so click this link to see what TOUCH offers).
Ralph W. Neighbour, Jr.
Dr. Ralph W. Neighbour, Jr. is the founder of TOUCH Outreach Ministries and the author of 42 books on cell group life and leadership. His most widely read resources include The Survival Kit for New Christians (Lifeway) and Where Do We Go From Here? His most recent book, Christ's Basic Bodies, delves deep into the centrality of Christ in biblical community. Dr. Neighbour continues to write, speak, travel internationally, and consult churches at 81 years of age, and remains one of the movement's strongest voices. Dr. Neighbour and his wife live in west Houston, Texas.
Randall G. Neighbour
Randall Neighbour is the President of TOUCH Outreach Ministries and the author of numerous resources on holistic small group life and leadership. His most recent book, The Naked Truth About Small Group Ministry: When it won't work and what to do about it is shaking up the American group life movement, providing practical solutions for the pastor and church who desire to equip and release God's people for the work of their ministry through holistic small group life. Randall coaches pastors, consults with churches, trains small group leaders and members, and continues to write from the TOUCH offices in Houston, Texas. He and his wife are planting a cell-based housechurch near downtown Houston for those who refuse to darken the door of a church building.
Michael Mack
Michael C. Mack is Life Groups Minister at Northeast Christian Church in Louisville, Kentucky. He founded smallgroups.com and is the author of several excellent resources for small group leaders and groups, including Leading From The Heart and The Pocket Guide to Burnout-Free Small Group Leadership. He and his wife, Heidi, live in Pewee Valley, Kentucky, with their four school-aged children. His passions include coaching youth sports and mountain biking.
Dennis McCallum
Dennis is founder and lead pastor of the 5,000 member Xenos Christian Fellowship in Columbus, Ohio. Xenos is a non-traditional church based on 250 home churches and 550 cell groups. All the leaders in Xenos are “home grown” based on what he wrote about in his in-depth book entitled Organic Disciplemaking. Dennis holds a B.A. in history from The Ohio State University, and an MA from Ashland Theological Seminary. His other books include Christianity, The Faith that Makes Sense, Spiritual Relationships that Last, Walking in Victory, The Death of Truth, and Satan and His Kingdom . Dennis married his wife, Holly, in 1973. Their three grown children, Jessica, Joe, and Bret, lead home churches at Xenos.