We are pleased to announce that Teresa Thornton has accepted the position for TWK Controller. Teresa is a faith-driven finance and administrative leader with more than 15 years of experience serving churches, faith-based organizations, and nonprofits through faithful stewardship and sound financial administration. She brings deep expertise in church finance, fund accounting, internal controls, and governance, supporting ministries in aligning financial practices with mission and connectional priorities.
Throughout her career, Teresa has partnered closely with pastors, finance committees, trustees, and governing boards to manage multi-million-dollar budgets, strengthen financial transparency, and ensure compliance with denominational and nonprofit standards. Her church leadership experience includes serving as Chief Accountant for a large urban congregation and Chief Financial Officer for large A.M.E. Church, where she supported budgeting, forecasting, compensation review, and long-range financial planning during seasons of transition.
Teresa is also a longtime leader in women’s ministry, reflecting her commitment to servant leadership, discipleship, and community engagement. She holds a Master of Divinity from Central Baptist Theological Seminary, where she was part of the Women in Ministry Leadership cohort, along with advanced degrees in accounting and organizational management. Teresa is honored to serve the Tennessee-Western Kentucky Conference and support its clergy, congregations, and ministries through faithful stewardship and strong financial leadership.
Teresa’s first day will be December 29th and her email will be teresa.thornton@twkumc.org. Please offer her a warm welcome to the TWK Conference!
The Process
In September, Melinda Parker retired from her position as Assistant Benefits Officer. The Office of Administrative Services went through a reorganization and Clare Wilson moved from the Controller/Assistant Treasurer position into a newly formed Benefits & Data Management Specialist position. We then formed a hiring team to begin the process to fill a newly modified Controller position. The team, made up of John Pearce, Cary Pappas, Melinda Britt, Toi King, Mark Hagewood, Alice Grunau, Clare Wilson, screened and reviewed many qualified applications, interviewed top candidates on Zoom and in person, and ultimately recommended Teresa for the position.
Thanks are due to Clare Wilson for covering the controller and benefits responsibilities these past three months and to the hiring team for their faithful and prayerful discernment work.
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