Rev. Rachel Gilmore

Rachel most recently served as the Director of Recruiting, Training and Assessing for lay and clergy church planters in the United Methodist Church.  Rachel and her husband, Rev. Brandon Gilmore, are pastors at Central United Methodist Church in Phoenix, Arizona where they are creating a new faith community while revitalizing the existing congregation.  In 2009, Rachel planted a church in Virginia Beach and started two missional preschools.  In 2017 she cultivated fresh expressions in the local jail and in a feeding ministry which provided food to over 40,000 people in 2020. Rachel graduated magna cum laude from Duke Divinity School as a Distinguished Leader after serving for two years in the Peace Corps in Bulgaria.  She is the author of Expanding the Expedition Reach with Missional Communities and a contributor to Launching a New Worship Community: a Practical Guide for the 2020s (Upper Room, 2021).  Her story is also featured in Ready, Set, Plant (Upper Room, 2021) and From Franchise to Local Dive: Multiplying your Church by Developing your Contextual Flavor (Marketsquare, 2020).