Brooklyn Heights’ Plymouth Church appoints senior minister

The Rev. Dr. Brett Younger Brings Wide Experience As Pastor, Preacher, Educator

April 19, 2016 By Francesca Norsen Tate Brooklyn Daily Eagle

The Rev. Dr. Brett Younger. Photo courtesy of Plymouth Church

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Plymouth Church in Brooklyn Heights has elected and called the Rev. Dr. Brett Younger as the 11th settled senior minister in the landmark church’s 169-year history.

The announcement was made on Sunday, April 17, following the church’s Candidate Weekend during April 15-17. Younger’s election and call is the culmination of a search process that began in June 2014. During that period, two interim senior ministers and an associate interim minister have ably served Plymouth.

The Plymouth search committee had multiple in-depth conversations with Younger, listened to many of his sermons and read his columns, blog and books. The congregation also had many opportunities to meet and have conversations with him and his wife, Carol, during the Candidate Weekend.

“We strongly feel Dr. Younger is a good spiritual and cultural fit with Plymouth,” the search committee said. “We believe he has the strength and skills to take the church to its next level of growth and depth, and we wholeheartedly recommend him.”

Younger, who earned his Ph.D. in 1991, has served as pastor for 22 years at churches in Indiana, Kansas and Texas. He has served as the settled senior minister at four churches, some of them large and urban.

Since 2008, he has been a professor at the McAfee School of Theology at Mercer University in Atlanta, where he teaches preaching, worship and writing.

Younger also brings experience as an interim senior minister and an astute understanding of the process that churches undergo in their own discernment as they call a new minister.

Currently, he is the interim at First Baptist Church in Asheville, North Carolina. He chose to serve as an interim minister so he could continue to preach to congregations.

Younger is the author of six books, two of which he co-authored with his wife. He is a frequent conference speaker and workshop leader. His articles and sermons have appeared in journals, periodicals and websites such as Christian Century, Feasting on the Word, Lectionary Homiletics and Review & Expositor.

Last year, Younger spent his five-month sabbatical in Santiago, Chile, as the full-time minister at a multi-denominational church there. It is this experience in particular that made him discern a call back into full-time ministry.

He and Carol have two sons, Caleb and Graham.

Plymouth Church will soon make available the dates of his official first Sunday and installation.