About Rev. Jen Evans

Jen grew up in Charlotte, North Carolina and served First Presbyterian Church in Charlotte as the Director of Youth and Families before becoming Associate Pastor for Youth, Young Adult, and Families with Young Children at Second Presbyterian Church in Little Rock, Arkansas. Jen now serves a congregation in Kentucky. Her experience and passion offers children, youth, adults, and families space to encounter God’s transformative love through creative and challenging formative opportunities.

Spending her free time with family and friends, laughing, hammocking, and organizing are just a few of her favorite things. Jen attended Elon University, where she double majored in Psychology and Human Services as well as where she met her husband, Rich. Jen and Rich have two sons and two pups that make sure to keep them busy. She earned her Master of Arts in Christian Education and Master of Divinity from Union Presbyterian Seminary.

Jen believes that serving the greater Church is important in the call to ministry and currently serves on the board of Re:Create, an umbrella organization which provides opportunities for intentional leadership development that focuses on connecting recreation, experiential arts, theology, and education. She has served as a workshop leader, keynote speaker and manual writer for various retreats and trainings, as well as recreation leader for Presbyterian Youth Triennium and Montreat Youth Conference.

About Parents Take Five

The podcast Parents Take Five was a long time calling that took shape and dropped in February of 2019. This venture came from a deep need Jen saw in the busy parents and families who struggled to keep laundry done, meals cooked, and still insisted that their family’s faithfulness needed to be tended to even with little available time.

As a parent herself, Jen knew that while there were great faith-focused resources available for parenting in general, there wasn’t much available for busy parents. She loves resources and knows of some amazing faithful parenting books and faith-focused parenting podcasts, but she was finding that parents were still not feeling an overwhelming sense of support. These resources weren’t meeting the needs of many parents. As Jen dug deeper, she found that parents felt guilty when they didn’t have time to read these books or listen to the lengthier podcasts. They were frustrated when they were part of a book club that read one chapter at a time only to still feel like they could never attain what the author was suggesting.

After a lot of prayer, discernment, and talking with family and friends, and finding a producer...Jen was ready after having a few Moses and Jonah moments. Her producer and husband gave her the final vote of confidence that she needed to be brave and vulnerable as she began this adventure. Parents Take Five was launched on a trial basis. Jen's commitment is that she will continue with Parents Take Five as long as the need continues to be there because she absolutely loves planning, creating, and hosting. She started this podcast because God called her to fill a need and she is excited to see how God will continue to use Parents Take Five.

"I have learned so much from listeners, guests, and the many parents and church workers that I’ve met as a result. It offers a place to be authentic by sharing my own parenting struggles as we attempt to model faithful discipleship." -Rev. Jen Evans