Leadership

Scroll down to read about our district leadership team and the work that they do. To e-mail one of our leadership team please go to the contact page.

Revd Pete Pillinger Chairman of the District

Pete was born in Sussex and raised in Kent. Following jobs in the pharmaceutical industry he trained at Cliff College and Queens College, Birmingham. He married Helen in 1980 and they moved to the Truro circuit where his eldest son was born. The family then moved to Sri Lanka where Pete was Superintendent minister of the Hatton circuit, a fast growing group of Methodist churches in the central mountains. Most of the circuit's members worked in the tea industry. In Sri Lanka Pete helped to develop a new order of evangelists for the Sri Lankan Methodist Church.

In 1990 the family, now including a daughter, returned to Britain. Pete was minister of Brixton Hill Methodist Church in south London. After four years there they moved to the Lincoln (north) circuit. In that circuit Pete helped a church to develop a structure of small groups.

In 2002 Pete became District Mission Enabler for the Lincoln & Grimsby District and was also a minister in the Lincoln (south) circuit. In 2005 Pete was appointed as the first Methodist 'Fresh Expressions Missioner' and became part of the new ecumenical 'Fresh Expressions' initiative.

And so back to the South West of England - in 2009 Pete became our Chair of District. "It's great to be back in the south-west" Pete says, " I feel very much at home in Exeter and am feeling really blessed to be living in such a wonderful area."

Chrissie Slaney Safeguarding Officer 

What I do offer? Support, advise and promoting the districts concepts of safeguarding. This does sometime mean challenging some concepts. That said when I think of safeguarding I am often draw to Nehemiah. Why? He was a man of action he saw his calling from God and acted on it. He knew that well-built walls with good firm, healthy foundations can protect people. He knew that those with devious and evil intensions can be prevented from entering in.  Nehemiah didn’t let opposition stop him and he used his skills to inspect, supervise and rebuild the wall around Jerusalem in order to protect and safeguard Gods people.

A little about me, married to Mark with two great children. I have worked both as a practitioner and a manager within a variety of children’s services for nearly 30 years. This included registering inspecting and investigating under eights provision.

Finally I was recently part of a team of women who went out to India to provide pamper sessions and put on a conference for some of India’s widows. These women often face a daily struggle for survival through poverty, abuse and exploitation situations. The project was set up to help women understand their value and to provide them with opportunities to thrive within their own culture.

Revd Dave Martin Mission and Development Enabler

Dave Martin joined the leadership team in September 2006. His main role is to encourage churches to tackle evangelism - helpfully defined as "making more disciples of Jesus Christ".

Dave preaches regularly, leads church and circuit weekends and days on mission and he is really enthusiastic about the way in which God is at work in the churches across the District.

Revd Mark Gilborson Mission and Development Enabler

If I was restricted to only one word to describe myself it would be 'enthusiastic '.

I am enthusiastic about life, I am enthusiastic about my faith, I am enthusiastic about the Bible, music, food... actually just about everything. John's gospel reminds us that the life Jesus offers is one of 'abundance', it is this abundance of God's provision that enthuses me and excites me. As a member of the District team I would hope to have opportunities to share that enthusiasm wherever I am invited. So if you want to talk about mission, discipleship, reviewing your church or indeed anything that you are enthusiastic about then please get in touch so that we can enthused each other about what God is doing and wants to do.

 Steve Jones Regional Training Officer and Pioneer Mission Leader

"As the training officer I try to help equip the Methodist movement with the things they need to do mission and ministry in today's world. I'm immensely excited about what God is doing through Methodism - we have great roots, roots that can still produce great shoots and great fruits!".

Steve is also a Pioneer Mission Leader working across the region with VentureFX in partnership with 'Pioneer', developing lots of small 'Christ-following hubs' committed to transforming their communities, it's called Simply...

Steve Jones in (about) 50 words: 4 kids, 1 wife, blogger, 'triathlon - aspirational??!!', Facebook, making friends, telling & gathering stories, remixing Methodist DNA, Simply, 'small is beautiful', 'loving the whole church', eco?, sailing, simplicity, Coldplay, 'ancient/future eclectic Christ-centred spirituality', films, loves SW, Twitter, camping, exponential happenings, follower of Christ, VentureFX, movements, 'simple, relational, holistic missional, exponential and organic church', Pioneer, geek, iphone, catalyst, U2, road-builder, equipper, coffee, Mac, leadership nurturing, Inspire network