Pastor Jon

Yesterday, George McFarland, Andrew Fletcher, and I visited Tenth's daughter church, Grace and Peace, so that we could present a resolution on behalf of Session giving thanks for Jonathan Olsen's ministry to Tenth. We had a wonderful experience of worship and fellowship. Here is the resolution presented, as well as the Tenth Press article about him in Sunday's bulletin.


Resolution for Rev. Jonathan David Olsen

Whereas Jonathan Olsen is well-known for his charming, engaging, friendly, personable character reflective of his relationship with Christ, and

Whereas Jonathan in his youth and enthusiasm came to Tenth as a young intern engaging college and graduate students through Tenth College Union, developing that further into City College and Career, and

Whereas Jonathan ministered to our city through City Outreach, training and engaging hearts for evangelism, and

Whereas, Jonathan participated in Tenth’s global outreach through partnerships in Colombia and T***, and

Whereas Jonathan’s passion for grace to permeate the lives of individuals hungry and needing to know the Savior led to personal discipleship of many individuals, used by God to populate leaders in churches across the country, and

Whereas Jonathan’s wisdom to marry Rachel echoes Christ’s love for the Church as well as the family they are rearing embraces those who are yet to know of this love, and

Whereas this family-engaging, Gospel-focus fervor and zeal has flooded over into the Olsens’ neighborhood, and

Whereas, God has led the Olsen family, together with other Tenth members to establish a unique Christian fellowship at Grace and Peace Community Church,

Therefore, let it be resolved this Thirty-First day of July 2011 that the Session of Tenth Presbyterian Church, offers great praise to our Sovereign God for Jonathan and Rachel Olsen’s faithful ministry in the name of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, and ask for his rich blessing to pursue them in their lives.

Tenth Press article:

Jonathan Olsen: Everyone’s Pastor
By Marion Clark, Executive Minister

If you want to know what distinguishes Jonathan Olsen, take a walk in his neighborhood with him. Your conversation will be interrupted by a neighbor walking by across the street and shouting, “Hey, Pastor Jon!” Or a driver of a truck at the traffic light honking his horn to catch Jonathan’s attention and wave to him. And Jonathan yells back, calling each person by name with true Philly responses: “Hey, what’s up, dude!” “How you doin’!” Every comment ends with an exclamation point, because Jonathan is never blasé about greeting anyone. Every individual is an “awesome” person to meet; every neighbor a great face to see! And they call him Pastor Jon because they regard him as their pastor. Whether or not they attend his church, or any church, is irrelevant. He is their pastor! What does Jonathan think? He couldn’t agree more! And he couldn’t be happier!

Tenth Church “sent” Jonathan out to South Philadelphia to plant a church. But then how does a church send a person to where he already lives? It was more of a releasing him to his true love. But maybe that is not the right phrase. It is hard to nail down Jonathan’s “true love” because everything he engages in is at that moment his passion.

Those who received his ministry as college students in the old Tenth College Union that Jonathan directed in the first half of his ministry (2001–2006) will attest that college students were his true love. Jonathan did not “direct” ministry; he loved his students, and he loved them by spending time with them. He invested himself in them. He was their pastor!

But those who knew Jonathan in the years of City College and Career will say that his true love was for their community. It was so obvious by how excited he was to spend time with them and to be involved in their lives and gatherings. He was their pastor!

But wait! Anyone who went with Jonathan on a mission trip overseas will tell you that Jonathan’s heart was with the people of the other country. If you had only seen the way he interacted with them and immediately became their friend. It was like he belonged to their culture! He was their pastor!

There is one group that has the rightful claim to “he loves us best.” It is his family— Rachel, his wife, and his five children: Annamaria, Gabriel, Christabella, Angelina, and Elianna. Everyone sees them with him. No one gets just Jonathan. They get Jonathan and the family. I’m not sure which is more accurate—to say that you are made part of the family or the family is made part of you. Other ministers wrestle with dividing time between ministry and the family; Jonathan throws them in together!

Indeed, Jonathan doesn’t try to stretch himself to reach out to everybody. He doesn’t run from one person or group to another. He doesn’t go from one love to the next. He just throws them all into the great big JOY bowl—Jonathan Olsen and You, as the popular blue t-shirts said a few years ago.

Not a bad legacy for a former gang member, but that is what happens when someone like Jonathan encounters his truly true love—his Savior Jesus Christ. Jonathan’s passion and love are generated from his passion for his Lord. Pastor Jon loves, well, just about everybody, because of the love he found in Jesus Christ. We are thankful for the pastoral care and friendship Jonathan showed us here at Tenth for over ten years, and pray for God’s rich blessings to be poured out upon him and his family and his church and his neighborhood and…well, upon everybody who claims Jonathan as their pastor.