Links: 

• Watermark Community Church

• Real Truth Real Quick

FOUNDER | WATERMARK COMMUNITY CHURCH 

Todd Wagner and a small group of friends established Watermark Community Church in Dallas, Texas in November 1999. Watermark was born out of a desire to connect people with the richness, adventure, and fullness of life that comes through Christ alone and to reach the unchurched, de-churched, dead-churched, and unmoved. Todd serves as Senior Pastor and Elder at Watermark, which has become one of the largest and fastest-growing churches in the United States. Watermark is also home to The Porch, one of the largest ministries to young adults in the country, as well as the Church Leaders Conference, which exists to encourage and challenge other leaders and faith communities with God’s vision for His Church.

Under Todd’s leadership, Watermark was recognized as the “Best Places to Work” in Dallas-Fort Worth by The Dallas Morning News in 2019. Out of conviction, Watermark has operated debt free since its inception.

Todd is the author of Come and See: Everything You Ever Wanted in the One Place You Would Never Look. He has been a keynote speaker at national and international leadership conferences and a guest contributor to The Dallas Morning News and other media outlets. His weekly video podcast, “Real Truth Real Quick” reaches tens of thousands of people each month.

Todd and his wife, Alex, alongside their six children and grandchildren, love to live, laugh, and serve together in Dallas, Texas.

CONTRIBUTIONS TO FAITH DRIVEN INVESTOR

 Links:

• LinkedIn

Founder and CEO | Cherokee Fund

Bio:

Tom Darden is founder and CEO of Cherokee and its predecessors. Cherokee has raised over $2.2 billion in five institutional private equity funds, and invested this capital in the acquisition, cleanup, development, and sale of approximately 550 environmentally contaminated real estate assets in the US, Europe and Canada.

Tom began investing personal capital in environmental companies before raising institutional private equity funds, and approximately 25% of his early stage investments have been founded or co-founded by him. Since the 1980’s he has invested in over 100 companies including Cherokee Environmental Risk Management (environmental insurance), Brownfield Revitalization (new markets tax credits for brownfield redevelopment), Tethis (biological superabsorbent), Living Homes (green buildings), Cherokee Biotechnology (biological remediation), Cherokee Solar (solar energy), Eco-Site (cell towers), Consert (demand-side energy management), PGSI (supply-side energy management), and Industrial Heat (energy).

Tom began his career with Bain & Company in Boston, working with Bain from 1981 to 1984. Beginning in 1984, he served for 16 years as the Chairman of Cherokee Sanford Group, the largest private brick manufacturing company in the United States and previously the Southeast’s largest soil remediation company.

Tom has served or continues to serve on numerous boards, including the Boards of Shaw University, Environmental Defense Action Fund, Research Triangle Institute, the University of North Carolina’s environmental department, Winston Hotels, Waste Industries, Gentra Systems, Consert, Inc., Evofem, The Prince of Wales Trust, WakeMed Hospital, and Helping Hand Mission. He was Chairman of the Research Triangle Transit Authority and served two terms on the N.C. Board of Transportation, through appointments by the Governor and the Speaker of the House.

Tom earned a Master in Regional Planning from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, a JD from Yale Law School and a BA from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, where he was a Morehead Scholar. His 1976 undergraduate thesis analyzed the environmental impact of third world development and his 1981 Yale thesis addressed interstate acid rain air pollution.

CONTRIBUTIONS TO FAITH DRIVEN INVESTOR

Certified Public Auditor

Thomas Kern was reborn in 1974 at the age of 11. He began preaching in his school class the same way he did in the parish/YMCA. After school and military service, Thomas became a banker, studied MBA at University of Mannheim/ Germany and started his international career with KPMG as a German CPA. He received additional education in New York and Budapest. 

Together with his lovely wife Beatrix, Thomas has three children, the two girls Victoria and Elisabeth are already married whilst Constantin is at secondary school.
For 10 years, Thomas was the treasurer of YMCA Germany and today he am on the board of his local church (free evangelical church). He loves preaching and being a teacher for young people. At the moment he is running another Alpha Youth Course in his parish. In his free time, Thomas loves hiking, bicycling and swimming or cooking a good dinner together with his wife.

CONTRIBUTIONS TO FAITH DRIVEN INVESTOR

Bio:

Tiger Dawson is Chief Executive Officer and Co-founder of Edify, after transitioning from President on October 1, 2017. Tiger served from 2005-2009 as the managing director of the Halftime Organization, which helps high capacity, marketplace leaders move from success to significance. Prior to his role at Halftime, Tiger served for 22 years with Young Life, a non-denominational Christian ministry targeting disinterested youth around the globe. During his time at Young Life, Tiger served in various roles from Area Director to Divisional Director of Strategic Growth where he coordinated the growth in 22 states and Latin America. Since 1997, Tiger has been very involved with the Young Presidents’ Organization (YPO). He has designed and run the youth, teen and young adult education tracts at 10 international family universities.

Life:

Tiger earned his undergraduate degree at Baylor University and pursued a master’s degree at Dallas Theological Seminary and Fuller Seminary. Tiger is married to Leslie and they have two wonderful daughters and a son-in-law, Anna, Kimberly and Hunter. He enjoys spending time with his family horseback riding, snow skiing, and playing sand volleyball.

CONTRIBUTIONS TO FAITH DRIVEN INVESTOR

Links: 

• LinkedIn

• Personal Website

Founding pastor | Redeemer Presbyterian Church in Manhattan

Timothy Keller is the founding pastor of Redeemer Presbyterian Church in Manhattan, which he started in 1989 with his wife, Kathy, and three young sons.  For 28 years he led a diverse congregation of young professionals that grew to a weekly attendance of over 5,000.

He is also the Chairman & Co-Founder of Redeemer City to City (CTC), which starts new churches in New York and other global cities, and publishes books and resources for ministry in an urban environment. In 2017 Dr. Keller transitioned to CTC full time to teach and mentor church planters and seminary students through a joint venture with Reformed Theological Seminary’s (RTS), the City Ministry Program. He also works with CTC’s global affiliates to launch church planting movements.

Dr. Keller’s books, including the New York Times bestselling The Reason for God and The Prodigal God, have sold over 2 million copies and been translated into 25 languages.

Christianity Today has said, “Fifty years from now, if evangelical Christians are widely known for their love of cities, their commitment to mercy and justice, and their love of their neighbors, Tim Keller will be remembered as a pioneer of the new urban Christians.”

Dr. Keller was born and raised in Pennsylvania, and educated at Bucknell University, Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary, and Westminster Theological Seminary. He previously served as the pastor of West Hopewell Presbyterian Church in Hopewell, Virginia, Associate Professor of Practical Theology at Westminster Theological Seminary, and Director of Mercy Ministries for the Presbyterian Church in America.

CONTRIBUTIONS TO FAITH DRIVEN INVESTOR

Links: 

• LinkedIn

• Christian Super

CIO | Brightlight

Bio:

Tim Macready is Chief Investment Officer of Brightlight, leading all aspects of Brightlight’s impact investment strategy across multi-manager and single sector portfolios and working with investors to help them allocate capital into impact and faith-driven investing.  Tim led the formation of Brightlight as it spun out from Christian Super, an Australian Pension Fund, having joined Christian Super in 2005 and been responsible for managing the internal investment team and working with the Investment Committee and external specialists to oversee Investment Strategy.

Prior to working at Christian Super, Tim was an Actuarial Analyst at Aon Consulting.  He holds a B Com (Actuarial Studies) from Macquarie University and a Masters of Divinity from the Australian College of Theology, and is a Certified Investment Management Analyst (CIMA).

CONTRIBUTIONS TO FAITH DRIVEN INVESTOR