Board of Directors
John Musick, MSW, PhD in Social Work and Sociology
President and Founder
After a forty-year professional career as both a teacher and practitioner of community development, John became involved with a struggling village in South Sudan where he sought ways to apply what he had previously practiced in a community with greater needs and far less resources than any he had encountered. He says, “My experience with these people both in their native village and more recently in the refugee settlements to which they fled, has opened me to intense relationships and powerful spiritual experiences which have profoundly influenced every aspect of my life and taught me much about the power and potential of people even in the most difficult situations imaginable.” John serves as the president of SSLCD since 2004. He lives with his wife, Denise, in Minnesota.
Denise Sheer, MSW, MDiv
Founding Board Member
Denise has a Master of Social Work in community development and organizing. She has over a decade of experience in the field. She also earned a Master of Divinity and has served as a parish pastor for 30 years. She says, "It is difficult many days to find things to be hopeful about in the refugee settlements. But the refugees always inspire hope through their unmatched resilience and through their ability to take our small gifts and create change in their settlements.” Denise is a founding member of SSLCD. She lives in Minnesota with her husband, John.
Rev Dr. Paula V. Mehmel
Board Member
Paula has served SSLCD as a board member since 2016. She is committed to SSLCD because she believes it is the embodiment of what it means to build up the body of Christ in a faithful way. She says, “We seek to be in partnership with the communities we serve and empower them to respond to the needs they identify. Every penny goes directly to support the work in the refugee settlements.” Paula is the Senior Pastor of Emanuel Lutheran Church in Hartford, Connecticut.
Rev. Robert W. Mueller
Treasurer
Bob is a retired pastor of Christ Lutheran Church in Grand Rapids, Michigan. He first became involved in SSLCD in 2005 when he met four Sudanese “Lost Boys” in Grand Rapids. Christ Church responded to their appeal to share their building and allow Bob to help create their own ethnic mission development congregation. His close relationships with the, now, South Sudanese community in Michigan quickly led to creating the SSLCD mission development in South Sudan. Next to his pastoral career, he says “I have done nothing more honorable than to work side by side with these kind, loving brothers and sisters. It has solicited a dedication from me that I could not have envisioned before undertaking it. It has been the kind of dedication that I cannot yet imagine giving up even in retirement.”