Ministry is about relationships. It is about shared love, shared grief, and shared hope. The church is a community called to a growing life together. As we begin a new church we are committed to approaching this work as a team – a community of leaders that will pray together, suffer and rejoice together, and hope together as friends in the shared task of ministry.

The Bartholomews: Tuck, Stacy, Connor, Tucker & Emalyn
(also see the The Pendletons, the The Hsus, and The Matters below)

Our urban pilgrimage started four years ago with our move to the Upper West Side of Manhattan where I joined the pastoral staff of Redeemer Presbyterian Church. We have been stretched and pulled beyond our dreams, and in the process awakened to the challenge of church planting. The work in New York has kindled a love of city, a commitment to communicating the gospel in secular urban contexts, and instilled deep appreciation for the church as the means by which God sustains his ongoing conversation of hope and grace with his world.

Stacy and I have been married 16 years, and she is a partner in ministry in every way. We met while I was a campus minister at the University of Georgia; we started our married life in Philadelphia. Philadelphia was our first exposure to the beauty, complexity and brokenness of the city. We ate our first “fine” meal here, got to know students and people of other cultures, and saw our first homeless person. We love the city; we love the university and are eager to help plant a church community that embodies the gospel among our neighbors that awakens their curiosity and our own to the hope that God has brought in the world in Jesus.

Our kids, Connor, Tucker and Emalyn love New York. Nevertheless, they are a part of our ongoing discussions of a new work and offer great insight. In both Virginia and New York our children have played a significant role in gathering and creating community. In fact, they may be more suited to church planting than we are! We believe that the move will be a challenge for them, but one we believe they will meet. Connor, our oldest daughter, will enter high school with this move. Tucker, our energetic and dramatic 11 year old, will head into 6th grade and Emalyn, our spunky determined New Yorker will enter 4th grade. Together—we are excited about the opportunity to plant a university church in one of our Nation’s great cities.

Randy & Belinda Pendleton

Randy is City Church’s Director of Worship Arts. Randy hails from Sandusky Ohio, was educated at Bowling Green State University and Bowie State University. Randy’s love for music led to a career as an instructor in the US Navy School of Music, playing in the Naval Academy Band and the NATO Band in Naples, Italy. He performed and taught extensively in Europe and the US as an instrumentalist of tuba, string and electric bass, piano and vocals. He has worked with several churches in worship arts, training, leading and educating children and adults in music, drama, multi-media and visual arts. He and Belinda have been married for 32 years and have two children, Anastasia & Peter. Belinda has worked as a Christian Counselor and recently graduated from Westminster Theological Seminary with a Master of Arts in Biblical Counseling.

Jason & Kristen Hsu

Jason is an assistant pastor with City Church, focusing on the church’s justice and mercy efforts, ministry to college students, and general administration. Jason and Kristen have lived in Philadelphia since their undergraduate studies at the University of Pennsylvania. Following his graduation, Jason worked for The Enterprise Center, a non-profit business incubator in West Philadelphia helping to develop and start small businesses in struggling communities. He has worked with Intervarsity Christian Fellowship at Penn, and completed a Master of Divinity at Westminster Theological Seminary in 2006. Jason and Kristen have been married for almost four years now.

Drew & Susie Matter

Drew coordinates City Church’s Fellowship Group ministry and also serves as a pastoral intern. A native of Chillicothe, Ohio, Drew graduated from Georgia Tech and worked in engineering for several years before leaving to help begin a Christian student organization at the University of Sarajevo in Bosnia-Herzegovina. He came to Philadelphia in 2004 to earn a Master of Divinity degree from Westminster Theological Seminary. He and Susie, a Duke University alumnus, fell in love while she was earning a Master’s degree in Biblical Counseling also at Westminster. They were married in 2006 and moved to University City soon after to join with the work of City Church. Susie currently teaches at a private school in Philadelphia and Drew is finishing his final year in seminary.