About Grace

We gather on Sunday mornings at 9:30 at 63945 Old Bend Redmond Highway. We lift our voices to sing praise to God, and we open our Bibles to listen to his Word preached.

We offer Kid’s Ministry from birth through 5th grade during our Sunday gathering, and our 6th-12th grade Youth Group meets Wednesday nights from 6:30 to 8:30 pm.

Community groups are a vital part of living as a family and Body of Christ. It is in a community group that we can be known and cared for. In a community group, you can expect to share a meal together, share the word together, and share life together.

I am blessed to be the husband of one wife, Lisa, since 1984 and father to three adult children, Julie, Amy, and Jason. Both Lisa and I, as well as our children, were saved in our childhood. The Lord has consistently been gracious as he has led us and kept us. As I mature in faith, I can say along with Paul, “I am chief among sinners,” as I realize my utter dependency on my mighty Savior. We have been a part of Grace Bible since Easter 2013, when Crossroads Community Church joined with Grace. I served as a bi-vocational pastor/elder at Crossroads for four years, and prior to that was part of pastoral preaching teams for seven years. Lisa and I have been involved in church ministry and leadership from the early years of our marriage, serving and teaching in children’s classes, home fellowship groups, and now as community group leaders. We are so thankful to be part of the body at Grace Bible.

I spent most of my childhood growing up in Papua New Guinea as a missionary kid. Seeing the gospel go forth and witnessing churches being planted in remote tribal regions had a profound and lasting impact on my life. At an early age, I repented of my sin and placed my faith in Jesus. After graduating high school, I moved back to the U.S. and pursued a B.A. in Music Ministry from Simpson University. During my time at college I met my best friend Cassidy, who would later become my wife. Upon graduating, I moved to Portland, Oregon, where Cassidy and I got married, worked, and joined a healthy church where we grew further in our faith and served. In 2012, we moved to Bend for me to join the staff here at Grace Bible. We consider it a blessing to be part of this local church and to witness God’s transforming work in people’s lives. We have two daughters, Clara and Audrey. Currently, I am pursuing an M.Div. at Western Seminary in Portland. In my spare time I enjoy snowboarding, fly fishing, and hiking.

I am the lead pastor and primary teaching elder of Grace Bible Church. I have been married to my wonderful wife Heidi since 1997, and we have three beautiful children together, Elizabeth, Rachel, and Benjamin. I served in various student ministries beginning in 1996, and graduated from The Master’s Seminary in 2003 with a Masters of Divinity. I am currently working on a Doctorate of Ministry at Western Seminary in Portland. Previous to planting Grace Bible Church of Bend, I was the Student Ministry Pastor at Independent Bible Church in Port Angeles from June of 2003 - June of 2011. The desire of my heart is to glorify God by using my life and gifts to help people follow the Lord Jesus Christ. I am committed to preaching the eternal truths of God’s Holy Word and calling people to live as the body of Christ in community with one another.

I grew up in Boise, Idaho as the youngest of three children. My parents were faithful Christians who raised my siblings and me in the discipline and instruction of the Lord. I came to faith at an early age, and the Lord matured that faith as a young adult through time studying at Prairie Bible College. It was at Prairie that I met my best friend and beautiful wife LaDessa. We have three children, Abbie, Luke, and Sam. I have worked at Bend Memorial Clinic for the last nine years as a Nurse Practitioner in the specialty of Pulmonary, Sleep, and Critical Care. We have been at Grace since 2015 and are so thankful to the Lord for this church family. We have had the joy of serving in the children's ministry, biblical counseling, and as community group leaders. I enjoy studying the Word of God and have a heart for missions and the local church. In my spare time I like to read, hike, camp, mountain bike, play basketball, garden, and spend time with my family.

I was 17 years old when I attended church for the first time in my life. I soon got  plugged into a college group, and started growing as a Christian after hearing the gospel and giving my life to Jesus Christ. It was during this time that I met my wife Amy. We began to grow in the Lord together and were married in the summer of 1992. God has blessed us with three beautiful children, Hannah, Jeremy, and Megan. I have worked in sales management and business development for a title company for approximately twenty years. We moved to Bend and began attending Grace Bible in early 2016, and this church has been a huge blessing in our lives. I love that GBC is gospel-centered and completely devoted to the Lord and His Word. I am thankful for the opportunity to serve at the information booth, on the offering team, and as a co-community group leader in addition to my role as an elder. In my spare time I enjoy fly fishing, time outdoors, spending time with my family, and studying the Word.

Director of Worship & Operations

Teaching Pastor

Director of Counseling & Discipleship 

Director of Children's & Youth Ministries

Children's & Youth Ministry Assistant

Administrative Assistant

Assistant Jr. High Director & Custodian

Finance Assistant

Facilitators Administrator

Jesus is our Savior, Master, and lead Shepherd. It is for His Glory that we exist and it is for His glory that the Church Exists. We desire to make HIS name famous and to proclaim the glorious gospel that reveals HIS truth

It seems like the trend these days is to be a “Mega Church.” Somehow churches have adopted the idea that “bigger is better.” Our desire is that no matter how “big” we get, people would not get lost in the crowd, and that we would always feel small because people would be living in community where they would be known, cared for, and encouraged in their faith.

Church today sometimes feels more like a theatrical production then the family of God gathered to encourage each other to “Fight the good Fight” We understand that the Christian life is a battle where we fight against an enemy that hates to lose. We gather together as the Body of Christ to encourage each other in the battle, to pray for each other in the battle, and to help rescue people from the enemies of sin, Satan, and death. We gather to celebrate the ultimate victor in the Battle: our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ.

We desire to be a church where our activities do not determine our priorities, but rather our priorities determine our activities. Loving and discipling our families, reaching the lost, maturing in Christ… These things rarely occur during activities at a church and more often happen when the Body of Christ is “being the church.” We desire our calendar to reflect that.

God’s Word is the ultimate authority in our lives and completely sufficient for all matters of faith and practice, Scripture (and Scripture alone) is to dictate how we live our lives and guide our ministry (2 Pet. 1:3; 2 Tim. 3:16-17). In our current culture that exists without absolutes, the church and its leaders must have the bedrock of Scripture as their one and only measuring device for all things. That is why we are committed to expository preaching and the proclamation of the full counsel of God’s Word to mankind.

The gospel is the glorious story of God redeeming mankind through the sacrifice of his beloved Son, Jesus Christ. The gospel is the focus of all of Scripture and must be the center of all teaching of Scripture. The wondrous balance of grace and truth demonstrated by Jesus Christ and found in the gospel must be the goal of a church desiring to stay gospel centered. The gospel is best demonstrated to the world around us as we love and serve people through the Spirit of God.

The focus of the church is “Him we proclaim, warning everyone and teaching everyone with all wisdom, that we may present everyone mature in Christ,” (Col. 1:28). Maturity comes through repentance and discipleship, and is never easy.

The church is not a building you sit in, but a family you belong to if God is your heavenly Father. Eph. 2:19 says, "So now you Gentiles are no longer strangers and foreigners. You are citizens along with all of God’s holy people. You are members of God’s family. Together, we are his house, built on the foundation of the apostles and the prophets. And the cornerstone is Christ Jesus himself." For us to be the church that God designed, we must realize that we are a covenant family committed to each other through good and bad and not consumers looking for a spiritual product. As a family, we serve one another as Christ has served us.

The church is not a just a building, it is a body of believers in the Lord Jesus Christ. 1 Cor. 12:27 says, “Now you are the body of Christ and individually members of it.” As the Body of Christ we are all of equal value and importance and are interconnected through the work of Jesus Christ. We live in community as the Body and when one member suffers, we all suffer. And when one member is honored, we all are honored (1 Cor. 12:12-26). As a Body we use the gifts that God has given us to benefit the whole body, serving one another.

Many people are looking for a church that will be able to meet their needs. We desire to be a church that helps people ask, “How can I serve the body of Christ with the gifts I have been given?” We believe each person has been given special gifts and that those gifts are intended for the building up of God’s church (1 Cor. 12).