By Elliott Brack
Editor and Publisher, GwinnettForum
NOV. 18, 2025 | For Jolene and Kenneth Hodder, there was one reason to choose Gwinnett as their retirement location: to be near their two grandsons, now ages 5 and 7. Their daughter, Jessica, and her husband, Tyler Fagerstrom, live in Lawrenceville, and the Hodders are now residents of Suwanee.
The couple retired in February, from being the top leaders, the national commissioners, of the Salvation Army in the United States.
Hodder is a sixth generation Salvationist, born in San Francisco. “I never intended to be a Salvation Army officer, but wanted to be a corporate attorney.” However, he planned to be a “soldier” (lay member) of the Army. His father had served as the national commissioner. Kenneth studied history at Harvard, got a law degree there and began a career with a large law firm in Los Angeles, Calif.
Meanwhile, he had married Jolene, herself a fourth generation Salvationist from Fort Collins, Colo. They met at a Salvation Army camp in the state of Washington.
After three years in law, his senior partner, who told him he was doing well, presented him with a bonus check. “I went back to my office and saw all the piles of paper and transactions, and realized it was not what God intended of me. I knelt at my desk and asked the Lord what was his intention, and he told me to become an officer of the Salvation Army.”
The first person he called was his father. He had always told his father that one day he would buy him a new Cadillac. His father said: “I guess this means I’m not getting a Cadillac.”
When he told his wife of his intention, she was not convinced. She was in retail with the Carter Hawley Hale and Broadway stores. Two weeks later, she turned off the radio, turned to him and said that God had also called her.
Hodder remembers: “We announced to our firms we would be leaving, sold our car, paid off student loans, and entered training college in 1985 at Rancho Palos Verdes, Calif. The life God has given us is more exciting and more fulfilling and joyful and meaningful than we ever imagined.”
Their first assignment was to Nairobi, then three years in London, then four years in Kenya, and finally assignments in the USA. “We learned that the Lord never wastes anything. I used my legal training in London as the legal and constitutional adviser for the Commanding General, working with the Democratic Republic of Congo, then in Kuwait, Nepal and other nations. It was so exciting to see how God never wastes anything.”
He served one assignment in Georgia, living in Duluth, between 2017 and 2020. He was attached to the Army’s officer training college, and spent the time making plans for the international millennial Congress in Atlanta. It was the biggest event in its history, bringing 25,000 people to Georgia, with nearly every country where the Salvation Army serves represented.
In 2016, he was appointed as the territorial commander for the Western region, and 2020 was named the national commander. In that role he chaired the commissioner’s conference and set policy nationally; spent a good deal of time on Capitol Hill; represented the Army to the corporate community by working with firms like WalMart, Federal Express, Amway and BNSF, and reported to the general in London.
He says: “We look back as having a career with an enormous blessing. We cannot wait to see what is in store for us now in Gwinnett.”
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