Over a third of GACX’s 86 current member organizations have joined the alliance in the last two years — 23 of them in just 2019 alone. While this growth increases the potential for members to create strategic partnerships, it’s also creating new challenges for GACX’s leadership in serving each member. To help address this need, the GACX board of directors has appointed Rick Fiechter as Vice President for Membership and Engagement
In this newly created role, Rick will help build a shared understanding of how each member is called and equipped to multiply disciples and churches — and apply that knowledge for identifying and facilitating opportunities for collaboration. He will also help lead GACX’s efforts to increase membership while ensuring current ones are well served by their involvement.
For Rick and his wife Deb, their first full exposure to GACX was at the 2019 forum in Dallas. They immediately felt a connection with the alliance’s scope and purpose and realized that the Lord had been preparing them to serve in such a context. GACX President Bekele Shanko shared, “Rick brings a clear calling with a powerful vision and a heart prepared for strategic collaboration in the body of Christ.”
“Rick is passionate about the Church, and has a contagious heart for reaching the lost,” adds Nate Vander Stelt, GACX’s Executive Vice President. “Over the last few weeks, spending time in calls with some of our members and others, I’m confident his commitment and insights are going to make a big contribution to GACX.” Rick is financially self-supported and will continue serving part-time as lead pastor for a church he and Deb helped plant in St Cloud, Florida.
Rick and Deb grew up in an Indiana farming community, and he worked in the business world before being called to start a church. He went on to college and seminary and earned a Ph.D. in Leadership Studies. He and Deb have five adult children and seven grandchildren.