Amy Schenkel

When Amy Schenkel bought a house in Grand Rapids, Michigan, she thought she would find community. After all, the block ended in a cul-de-sac and only had 20 homes. But neighbors were not very connected. So she put a table in her front yard.

Sometimes, the table had "kindness rocks” painted with gratitude messages, to be taken and shared. At other times, it held buckets of sidewalk chalk, which magically turned into street art by preschoolers. Sometimes, neighbors found baked goods with a note that said, “take me.” From a front yard table grew a tight neighborhood, where people focused on what they shared, rather than how they differed.

Schenkel honed the art of taking small steps to help people connect deeply while starting and growing Monroe Community Church in Grand Rapids, Michigan, over 15 years. This Christian faith community is centered on loving their neighbors. “When Jesus redefines the law, he says that the two most important commandments are to love God and to love our neighbor.  I think these two commands are intricately connected – you can't do one without the other,” she says.

Schenkel graduated from Calvin Theological Seminary. As a pastor and now as Regional Mission Leader for Resonate Global Mission, she coaches people to help them connect their own communities. She shares sermons with congregations of many backgrounds and gives workshops and presentations on what it means to build trust, like when she spoke to students at Cuyahoga Community College in Ohio at a Weave event.