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#169: Christian Community in Crisis: How the Church Showed Up When the Twin Cities Needed It Most

Dwight Zscheile and Alicia Granholm bring you inside the last eight months in the Twin Cities of Minnesota.

What does Christian community look like when a city is in crisis? In this first episode of Season 6 of the Pivot Podcast, Faith+Lead scholars Dwight Zscheile and Alicia Granholm go inside the last eight months in the Twin Cities, a period marked by targeted violence, a school shooting, and a large-scale federal immigration enforcement operation that left communities shaken and afraid. The church showed up quietly and persistently across every theological tradition, delivering food, organizing legal assistance, moving worship into living rooms, and rallying around members who were detained and flown out of state without warning.

This episode explores what crisis reveals about the difference between Christian community and mere membership, and why genuine belonging looks nothing like a program. It also launches a season-long conversation about why cultivating Christian community is so hard right now and what a faithful response might look like. If you’ve ever wondered whether the church still has something irreplaceable to offer a fractured world, this episode is your answer.

Hosts

Dwight Zscheile

Professor of Congregational Mission and Leadership, Luther Seminary, St. Paul, Minnesota

Dwight Zscheile is professor of congregational mission and leadership at Luther Seminary. His latest books are The Starter’s Way (with Ed Olsworth-Peter) and Embracing the Mixed Ecology (with Blair Pogue).

Alicia Granholm

Senior Director, Faith+Lead, Luther Seminary, St. Paul, Minnesota

Dr. Alicia Granholm is senior director of Faith+Lead at Luther Seminary and a leadership and church consultant based in Minneapolis, Minnesota. She helps pastors and leaders engage culture to make a lasting impact. For nearly two decades, she has trained, equipped, and empowered followers of Jesus to engage their local communities by contextualizing the Gospel and its application. Alicia compassionately crosses cultural boundaries having lived, studied, traveled, and served in 25 countries on six continents. Alicia has a Doctor of Strategic Leadership, Global Consulting (Regent University), M.Div. (Bethel Seminary), and M.A. in Teaching (University of St. Thomas).

About Pivot Podcast

Join us on Pivot Podcast, where we journey beyond church-as-usual to discover how God is reshaping ministry for today’s world.

Each week, we dive into conversations with innovative leaders and practitioners who are navigating four game-changing pivots: shifting from quick fixes to deep listening, from membership to discipleship, from rigid models to creative ministry ecosystems, and from clergy-centered leadership to unleashing everyone’s gifts.

Whether you’re a member of the clergy seeking fresh inspiration or a volunteer stepping into new leadership territory, Pivot Podcast equips you with the insights and practical wisdom to follow Jesus into a faithful future.

Through their work with diverse cohorts of preachers, they’ve discovered that the most compelling sermons aren’t necessarily the most polished – they’re the ones where preachers have learned to listen deeply to both God and their congregations. Learn practical tools for gathering meaningful feedback, understand why vulnerability matters more than ever in preaching, and discover how shifting from evaluation to understanding can deepen your sermon’s impact. Plus, hear why reimagining God’s agency in preaching might be the key to unlocking more powerful proclamation.

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