Rev. Jeffrey Pehl joined the North Texas Conference in 2018 as a provisional elder appointed to First UMC Iowa Park. Rev. Pehl was ordained elder at the 2022 Annual Conference. As senior pastor, he presided over the final stages of a major remodeling project of the church sanctuary. He worked with church leaders to expand Wednesday after-school programs, emphasizing attracting middle school students. Rev. Pehl also worked with church leaders in securing a grant covering 46% of the estimated cost of remodeling the Food Pantry serving the Iowa Park CISD. During COVID, Rev. Pehl worked to keep his congregation safe and continued Sunday worship services through a Facebook Livestream. As the conference began to allow churches to restart in-person worship services, Rev. Pehl created Iowa Park's protocol checklist to ensure the safety of congregants in the sanctuary. This checklist was shared and used by several churches in their repoening.

 

Before entering ministry full-time, Rev. Pehl worked for 14 years for the Federal Government at the Department of Defense (Vietnam War Commemoration) and the Defense Intelligence Agency. Before becoming a federal employee, he worked at IBM for 14 years and at local accounting firms for five years.

 

Rev. Pehl holds an undergraduate degree in accounting from the University of Richmond and a Masters of Business Administration from George Washington University. He graduated from Wesley Theological Seminary in Washington, D.C. in 2015 with a Master of Divinity. He has been married to Rev. Silvia Wang for 14 years, and they are hoping to adopt their foster child later this year.