Edwin Barry Young

Ed Young (Edwin Barry Young, born 16 March 1961) is the founding and senior pastor of Fellowship Church. With four campuses in the Dallas/Fort Worth area and one in Miami, Florida, Fellowship is one of the most attended churches in North America and was listed as the 3rd Most Influential Church in America according to a 2007 survey.

Young is the oldest son of Homer Edwin Young, senior pastor of Second Baptist Church Houston in Houston, Texas. He played basketball at Florida State University in Tallahassee, Florida before receiving his bachelor’s degree from Houston Baptist University and his Masters of Divinity from Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary in Fort Worth, Texas.

Pastor

Young attended Florida State University on a basketball scholarship. Upon graduating college, he worked as an associate pastor at Second Baptist Church in Houston, Texas – at the time one of the largest churches in America.

In February 1990, Young began a new church in the Dallas/Fort Worth area with a core group of 150 members. Since that time, Fellowship Church has grown to an average weekly attendance of over 20,000 people.

In 2003, the church began expanding beyond its central campus. Today, there are five Fellowship Church locations throughout the Dallas/Fort Worth metroplex and one in Miami, Florida.

Fellowship Church

Fellowship has grown exponentially since its inception in 1990. After starting out in a rented office complex, moving to an arts center and then meeting in a public high school in Irving, Texas, Fellowship Church moved to its current 141-acre (0.57 km²) campus in Grapevine, Texas in the heart of the Dallas/Fort Worth area.
In 2003 Fellowship Church opened two satellite locations in the Plano and Fort Worth areas, with a third satellite opening in downtown Dallas just two years later. Fellowship Church’s latest satellite campus in Miami opened in May 2006.

Television

Young hosts a weekly television program shown on networks including Daystar and ABC Family. The television program was also the first religious program of its kind ever aired on the E! Channel in 2010.

Media

Young and Fellowship Church have attracted a large amount of media attention—from local newspapers to internationally televised news programs.

Throughout his 20 years as pastor of Fellowship Church, Young has been featured in the major newspapers, magazines and television programs, including:

• ABC: Good Morning America
• ABC: Nightline
• NBC: The Today Show
• Comedy Central: The Colbert Report
• The Wall Street Journal
• The New York Times
• USA Today
• CNN.com

Young regularly contributes to Outreach Magazine and is occasionally featured in pulbications such as Relevant Magazine and Rev! Magazine as well.

In 2008, Young’s “7 Days of Sex Challenge,” which he issued to the married couples of Fellowship, attracted the attention of the worldwide media. He also made appearances on:

• CNN Headline News, November 12, 2008
• CBS: The Early Show, November 13, 2008
• ABC: Good Morning America, November 16, 2008
• Inside Edition, November 19, 2008
• The Insider, November 19, 2008
• Fox: The Morning Show with Mike and Juliet, November 20, 2008
• ABC: Good Morning America (follow up), November 21, 2008
• ABC: The View, November 24, 2008
• The Glenn Beck Radio Show, November 24, 2008
• Fox News: Your World with Neil Cavuto, November 25, 2008
• Comedy Central: The Colbert Report, January 26, 2009

In 2009, Young attracted national media attention on ABC’s Nightline (September 24, 2009) when he debated the topic of adultery with AshleyMadison.com founder Noel Biderman on the ABC special, "Born to Cheat?"

Sexperiment

In January 2012, Ed and his wife Lisa released their newest book Sexperiment: 7 Days to Lasting Intimacy with Your Spouse. The book, which promotes intimacy and sex between married couples, spent two weeks on the New York Times best sellers list.

Sexperiment Bed-In

To promote the new book and share the message beyond the walls of the church, Ed and Lisa Young also took part in a 24 hour "bed-in" on the roof of Fellowship Church. The bed-in, which included Skype interviews with several of the Young's friends and leaders around the world, attracted local, national, and international print and television media, including:

• Fort Worth Star Telegram
• KXAS-TV
• WBAP (AM) 820AM
• Dr. Drew
• Stephen Colbert
• The Christian Post
• Daily Mail (UK)

Additional Media Attention

In February 2010, a story aired by WFAA-TV reported that Young lives a "lavish" lifestyle, in Flower Mound, Texas. The story was refuted by Young the next weekend before the church. Each claim in the report was systematically denied. Since that story, Fellowship Church has continued to attract media attention for a variety of events, services, and missions opportunities through its many ministries, including a weekend with Bethany Hamilton and most recently welcoming Rev Run to share his story.

Bibliography

• Sexperiment ISBN 978-0-446-58272-8
• Beauty Full ISBN 978-1-934146-46-0
• The Marriage Mirror ISBN 978-1-934-14683-5
• Outrageous, Contagious Joy ISBN 978-0-425-21185-4
• The Creative Leader ISBN 978-0-8054-3177-3
• The Creative Marriage ISBN 978-0-9725813-0-1
• You! ISBN 978-1-58229-446-9
• Kid CEO ISBN 978-0-446-69177-2
• In the Zone ISBN 978-0-9725813-8-7
• Know Fear ISBN 978-0-8054-2572-7
• Rating Your Dating While Waiting For Mating ISBN 978-0972-581318
• High Definition Living ISBN 978-1-58229-290-8
• Can We Do That? ISBN 978-1-58229-238-0

External links

• Ed Young Ministries
• Ed Young on Twitter