The Rev. John Stewart Ballenger is a lifelong Baptist. Two important sets of letters go with his name that no university can confer: M.K. (missionary kid) and P.K. (preacher's kid). Growing up in Europe, the son of a pastor, is an experience that has shaped who he is and how he sees his world. Because of that experience, family is his dominant metaphor for church, and personal relationships are his understanding of church work.

John's parents, Dr. Isam Ballenger and Katie Ballenger, were commissioned by the Foreign Mission Board in 1965, when John was two. His early years were spent in Germany and his high school years in Switzerland. He graduated from the University of Virginia, magna cum laude, with bachelor's degrees in English language and literature, and German language and literature in 1984; he graduated from the Southern Baptist Theological Seminary, in Louisville, Ky., with a master's of divinity degree in 1988; and he is currently completing a doctorate in ministry from Brite Divinity School in Fort Worth, Texas.

John was associate pastor of Seventh & James Baptist Church, a congregation in Waco, Texas, from 1995 until 2000. He was minister of college students and administration there four years before that. His wife, the Rev. Susan Ballenger, was youth minister at Seventh & James when they met. They married Dec. 27, 1997 and have two daughters.

Congregational worship "is potentially the richest of all worship experiences," John says, and he views the planning for worship as one of joys and challenges. "I appreciate an integrated service – a service with a coherent theme developed over the course of the service," he wrote when asked his thoughts about worship. "I like it when no element is included simply for the sake of being included. I appreciate a service that is thoughtful and creative, that reaches individuals on various levels. I appreciate high expectations, careful preparation -- a service that is respectful but not rigid, relaxed but not disrespectful of people or of God. A service that intentionally uses the spoken word, the written word, and silence -- a service that features visual images, music and space. I value a service that seeks to weave together the transcendent and the immanent elements without sacrificing either. I am intrigued by the interplay of the expected and the unexpected -- the comfort of the familiar and the energy and excitement of the new and surprising."