June 27, 2023
Pastor Jenkins serves as Senior Pastor of Southwest Church.
The Wheaton College Board of Trustees has appointed Pastor Ricky Jenkins to serve as its newest member beginning in summer 2023. The Board made the appointment at its June retreat. Pastor Jenkins serves in Indian Wells, California as the senior pastor of Southwest Church.
“We are delighted that Ricky Jenkins is joining the Board of Trustees,” Wheaton President Philip Ryken said. “His many years of dynamic, faithful ministry and his passion for the gospel will be both valuable and relevant to the stewardship of Wheaton College.”
Southwest Church is a gospel-centered, multiethnic, intergenerational church with more than 4,000 members. Jenkins and his wife, April, have served in California’s Coachella Valley since 2018, but his life of ministry and preaching spans 25 years across Mississippi, California, Tennessee, and Illinois, where he has spoken at Special Services for Wheaton College.
Jenkins has also experienced long-standing mentoring relationships with Wheaton Trustees Emery Lindsay, Presiding Bishop of the Church of Christ (Holiness) Western Diocese, and Greg Waybright, past president of Trinity International University for 12 years, who has also held multiple pastorates across the United States, most recently at Lake Avenue Church in Pasadena, California.
“Ricky Jenkins has unique gifts as a cross-cultural communicator and meets the challenges of effective leadership,” said Wheaton Trustee Emeritus Emery Lindsay. “The Wheaton community will have another very insightful and able contributor to the mission of Wheaton College.”
Jenkins earned his B.A. in political science and business administration from Mississippi College and his M.Div. from Mid-America Baptist Theological Seminary. He is currently pursuing a DMin in Pastoral Ministry at Trinity Evangelical Divinity School. His research interests include pastoral leadership, pastoral training, and racial reconciliation.
“I have walked with Ricky for almost 20 years, and he is a man whose life, family, faith, and ministry are directed by the Scriptures,” Trustee Greg Waybright said. “He has a deep love of students. At the same time, he is a powerful resource during discussions about ‘how to do what God would have us do’ within the context of institutional culture and fiscal realities.”
The Board of Trustees is the governing body that stewards the mission of Wheaton College, which is led operationally by the President and Senior Administrative Cabinet.