Team

As the Chair of the Board, Joseph is responsible for governance and financial oversight for Ministries of Hope. Joseph is the Founder and Pastor of HOPE Church, and nondenominational church he planted in 2015. Joseph has been served as a minister in the United Methodist Church for over 40 years. During his time pastoring in Boston, he served as the Senior Adviser to the Mayor of Boston, the Chairman and CEO of the Organization for a New Equality, a non-profit agency that promotes economic opportunity for women, people of color and economically distressed communities. After moving to Myrtle Beach, Joseph started SharedCare, a health care collaborative that addresses the needs of low-income, uninsured Horry County residents. He started a local chapter of The First Tee and established a mentoring program, which later became the mentoring program for students at Coastal Carolina University. In 2011, Joseph founded the Academy of Hope, a year-round public charter school (grades K-8) focused on developing international business acumen. Most recently, he served as Executive Secretary for Africa for the Board of Global Ministries of the United Methodist Church. In every new venture he takes up, Rev. Washington strives to do God ’s work through promoting justice and equality. Whether it is providing public education and health care for the under-served, promoting economic opportunity for individuals and women- and minority-owned businesses, or preaching the acceptable year of the Lord, he does everything in his power to ensure that the Kingdom of God is realized here on Earth as it is in heaven. Rev. Washington received his B.A. in Political Science from the University of Arkansas at Pine Bluff and his Master of Divinity from the Interdenominational Theological Center in Atlanta.