{"id":2380,"date":"2024-08-12T12:57:35","date_gmt":"2024-08-12T12:57:35","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.brethren.org\/ac\/?page_id=2380"},"modified":"2026-09-10T18:42:24","modified_gmt":"2026-09-10T18:42:24","slug":"moderator","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/www.brethren.org\/ac\/moderator\/","title":{"rendered":"Moderator"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Dennis may be contacted at moderator@brethren.org<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Theme Statement<\/a> (PDF)<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Daily Scriptural Themes<\/a> (PDF)<\/p>\n\n\n\n

About Dennis Beckner<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

Dennis is an ordained pastor in the Church of the Brethren \u2013 serving in both the Northern Indiana and South\/Central Indiana Districts. He has served as pastor of Columbia City (Ind.) Church of the Brethren in Northern Indiana District since 1999.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Dennis has spent a lot of time serving the youth of the denomination. He has been a Youth Camp counselor and advisor to the Youth Camp Council at Camp Alexander Mack in Indiana, served as advisor to the National Youth Cabinet in 2019 & 2020, has been an advisor and small group leader at every National Youth Conference since 1990, coordinated senior high activities at three Annual Conferences, for six years coordinated the Midwest regional youth conference \u2013 now called Powerhouse, has been keynote speaker at both Powerhouse and Roundtable (an East coast regional youth conference), was one of the speakers at the 2026 National Youth Conference, has attended several Christian Citizenship Seminars, and led many FaithX service trips. He has also served as a local youth advisor in three congregations, leading youth fundraisers, lock-ins, retreats, and coordinated many Youth Sundays.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Dennis grew up in the Church of the Brethren. Originally from Elkhart County, Indiana, he is a graduate of Manchester University and Bethany Theological Seminary. As a student at Manchester, he worked two summers on summer staff at Camp Alexander Mack and was very involved in Brethren student activities. Following graduation from Manchester in 1987, Dennis was employed by the University for ten years working in fundraising, alumni relations, church relations, and admissions. It was during his work at Manchester that he felt a call to ministry. He enrolled as a student at Bethany in the fall of 1995.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

His love for youth ministry widened to include pastoral ministry in 1997. During his time in pastoral ministry Dennis served as a local congregational moderator in two congregations, served as District Moderator in 2022, and on the Northern Indiana District Shalom Team, District Ministry Committee, and served on the Indiana Camp Board. He has been a long-time volunteer at Camp Mack \u2013 receiving the Volunteer of the Year award from Outdoor Ministries Association in 2022. He is a strong advocate for outdoor ministries in the Church of the Brethren, visiting more than half of the Church of the Brethren camps.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Outside ministry, Dennis has coached both a middle school and high school academic Spell Bowl team the past 20 years, taught an 8th<\/sup> grade video production class for 11 years, worked as a substitute teacher for 6 years, served as a community mentor to 9th<\/sup> graders, volunteered as a district judge for DECA (Distributive Educational Clubs of America) in hospitality, and loves to travel. He interned in a travel agency in college and has enjoyed planning travel and seeing the many places God has provided us to enjoy on this Earth.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Dennis\u2019 wife, Beth, is a middle school Family & Consumer Science teacher and is very involved in the Columbia City congregation. She also grew up in the Church of the Brethren both at the Salamonie congregation in South\/Central Indiana and the Mount Morris congregation in Illinois\/Wisconsin District.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Dennis and Beth met at Manchester College, and both worked on summer staff at Camp Mack.  They have two daughters \u2013 Deanna Beckner & Alaina Taylor. Both daughters also graduated from Manchester. Following college, Deanna spent two years in BVS as a Workcamp (now FaithX) coordinator working out of the Elgin offices. She currently lives in Columbia City and is the Director of Advancement at Camp Mack. Alaina is married and has three children. Alaina is the Executive Assistant to the President at ProFed Credit Union in Fort Wayne, Indiana. Dennis & Beth spend much of their free time enjoying building memories with their grandkids.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Dennis may be contacted at moderator@brethren.org Theme Statement (PDF) Daily Scriptural Themes (PDF) About Dennis Beckner Dennis is an ordained pastor in the Church of the Brethren \u2013 serving in both the Northern Indiana and South\/Central Indiana Districts. He has served as pastor of Columbia City (Ind.) Church of the Brethren in Northern Indiana District […]<\/p>\n

Read More…<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"parent":0,"menu_order":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"page-templates\/narrow-blank.php","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"class_list":["post-2380","page","type-page","status-publish","hentry"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.brethren.org\/ac\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/2380","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.brethren.org\/ac\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.brethren.org\/ac\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/page"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.brethren.org\/ac\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.brethren.org\/ac\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2380"}],"version-history":[{"count":15,"href":"https:\/\/www.brethren.org\/ac\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/2380\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2891,"href":"https:\/\/www.brethren.org\/ac\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/2380\/revisions\/2891"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.brethren.org\/ac\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2380"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}