Verlon Fosner
Dr. Verlon Fosner has lead an innovative congregation in Seattle Washington since 1999. In the last decade the congregation transitioned from a traditional proclamation church into a multi-site Dinner Church called Community Dinners (www.CommunityDinners.com). In this decade when more US churches are declining than thriving, Verlon sensed that a different way of doing church was needed for their 97-year old Seattle congregation. After a long season of trial and error (and mostly error), their hearts became stirred by the manner of church that was practiced during the Apostolic Era.
In 2008, they opened up their first Dinner Church in a sore neighborhood some blocks south of their church campus, and immediately the room began to fill up with more never-been-churched people than they had seen in years. Soon they were opening up one after another throughout Seattle neighborhoods on different nights of the week, and the results were the same as the first one. They now pour into numerous neighborhoods throughout their city each week with a simple idea – that Jesus still wants to have dinner with sinners and wants his church to set the table.
It soon became obvious that they were not the only ones who needed a new way of doing church. So in 2014, so they founded coaching network centered on Jesus’ dinner table theology (www.DinnerChurch.Com). Presently, Verlon offers more than half of his time to help leaders throughout the country look at their cities and neighborhoods with new eyes.
In 2016, Verlon joined the Fresh Expression US leadership team and began offering sequential day-conferences (Encounters, Pre-Launches, and Post-Launches), and started hosting ‘Immersions’ and ‘Multipliers Immersions’ in Seattle and at their home, which enables several leaders at a time to observe Dinner Churches in action commingled with training conversations over a three-day period.
In 2019 Verlon founded the Dinner Church School of Leadership in Seattle which offers online Graduate-Level education for those pursuing a deep understanding of the Table Theology and Ecclesiology.
Verlon holds a Doctorate of Ministry degree from Assemblies of God Theological Seminary, and has written several books: “Dinner Church”, “Dinner Church Handbook”, “Welcome to Dinner, Church” (which has a nine-week companion video series to be used as a discussion guide), and “Trowel & Sword” (which reveals prayer-practices needed for the frontlines of evangelism). All of these resources are to help leaders and congregations learn how to work with Jesus at one of His dinner tables.
Verlon has been married to Melodee for 40 years, and together they have three adult children, seven grandchildren, a variant collection of grand-foster-kids, and two grand-dogs.