Mission Igniter is entering a new season of leadership as part of its continued commitment to catalyzing a movement of multiplication across the Free Methodist Church.
This transition reflects growth, clarity, and organizational maturation. Mission Igniter’s vision of catalyzing a movement of multiplication remains unchanged.
Mission Igniter was created to strengthen leaders, plant new churches, and build systems that sustain long-term fruitfulness across the denomination. By God’s grace, that work continues to expand.
Since its launch, Mission Igniter has helped catalyze more than 50 new churches and emerging ministry points across the country — reaching diverse populations and worshiping in multiple languages. More than $1 million annually is now being mobilized toward church planting efforts. Multiple cohorts of existing churches have engaged in revisioning processes to become multiplying churches. Assessors, coaches, and vision strategists are being trained and certified across conferences to expand local capacity for multiplication.
Conferences are engaging Mission Igniter’s services more broadly than ever before, and new churches continue to be planted.
Leadership Transition
As part of this transition, Dustin Weber is concluding his role as Executive Director and stepping into a new role as Director of Development with Free Methodist World Missions.
During his leadership, Mission Igniter helped shape a clear and compelling multiplication vision for conferences, developed pathways for training and certification, strengthened church planting systems, and catalyzed new churches and ministry initiatives across the country. The fruit of that work now provides a strong foundation for this next season.
Moving Forward
Mission Igniter’s leadership oversight will be aligned with the Shoreline Conference, providing a clear executive home while continuing to function as a shared national resource.
Erick Ewaskowitz, Superintendent of the Shoreline Conference, will provide visionary and executive leadership for Mission Igniter. While Erick will give oversight, he will not have any day-to-day responsibilities with Mission Igniter, as his full-time focus and commitment is to establishing and leading the Shoreline Conference.
Derik Heumann, Director of Church Multiplication for Shoreline Conference, will oversee operational delivery of coaching, training, and consulting systems. These services will be integrated into the multiplication support offered by the Shoreline Conference.
Julie Weber will continue coordinating services across conferences — managing assignments, tracking progress, facilitating communication, and ensuring smooth execution.
Jenny Rivera, who leads the FMCUSA Resource Center, will continue overseeing Mission Igniter’s administrative services through a formal partnership between FMCUSA and Mission Igniter. Bonnie Philson and Jill Lane remain integral members of this administrative team, continuing to provide trusted accounting and operational support.
Dwight Weber will continue leading and expanding Assessment Services, serving church planters, Conference MEG Teams, and appointment processes.
Megan Weber will continue serving part-time, providing pastoral care, spiritual direction, and enrichment for church planters through a self-funded role focused on strengthening the spiritual health and resilience of leaders.
This partnership strengthens and expands Mission Igniter’s ability to serve church plants and conferences nationwide while maintaining the systems developed over the past several years.
A Distributed and Sustainable Model
This leadership model allows Shoreline Conference to integrate multiplication systems into its own staffing structure while ensuring that Mission Igniter’s services remain available to conferences and networks across the country.
As conferences across the Free Methodist Church continue to strengthen staffing and regional collaboration, Mission Igniter’s role increasingly functions as catalytic, equipping, and collaborative — supporting multiplication efforts wherever they are emerging.
Mission Igniter remains committed to serving church planters, local churches, and denominational leaders pursuing multiplication in their contexts.