I could probably give you an overview of myself in a few simple phrases: I love my family, I’m called to lead and I love all things creative.
I Love My Family
I am blessed to have an amazing wife and four wonderful children. You may have heard of my wife, she runs an awesome blog Chasing Supermom. If you want to know more about my family and what our life looks like, you should check out Chasing Supermom.
I Am Called to Lead
For a decade now, I have been leading worship ministries as well as leading worship. For the last 5 years I have been blogging and podcasting, primarily through the blog and podcast I run for Worship leaders, Worship Ministry Catalyst.
As I enter this second decade of ministry, I am excited about what God has for me as a leader. I am available for speaking to your church or worship ministry. If you need someone, get in touch with me and I’d love to talk to you about the possibilities!
I’m also now the Lead Pastor of SixEight Church in Vancouver, WA. We are a small church with a big mission – we want to literally change the world. Want to know more about us? Especially if you’re in the Vancouver/Portland area and are looking for a church that’s on mission, we would love to have you check us out!
I Love All Things Creative
I have been doing music pretty much my whole life. My Dad was the music pastor at our church growing up, & my Mom played the piano for the church, and also teaches piano lessons. I started learning to play piano when I was in the second grade. I don’t know how far I got in the book my Mom was using to teach me…all I know is that I wasn’t interested in learning how to read music as much as I was interested in learning to play the piano like my Dad. Mom taught me enough to know how to read music, fingerings, etc., but I didn’t follow through with all the formal piano lessons like others have. In fact, I didn’t really play much piano until high school. I played the few songs that I knew, and every once in a while, I’d learn something new, but it wasn’t until I started playing with some guys in a “band” that I actually got really interested in playing piano. It was then that I started playing by ear and started down the path of songwriting.
Songwriting is probably my single greatest passion in music. I love singing and I love playing the piano, but I have always loved composing music of different kinds and writing lyrics.
I went in to college and began a double major in Church Music and in Music Theory & Composition for three years at Indiana Wesleyan University before transferring to Multnomah Bible College (now Multnomah University) to finish my music degree and get a degree in Bible & Theology as well. As you have probably guessed, it took me a while to finish.
It was after I moved out to the Northwest United States to go to Multnomah that I met my lovely and wonderful wife Bekki. We met in a driveway and fell in love at first sight. We got married in May of 2003, had our first child in March of 2006 and our second in April of 2008. We have been blessed beyond measure with our children.
I did a lot of writing in high school. In college at Indiana Wesleyan, my songwriting became more focused on instrumental and other non-mainstream forms of writing. Once I started leading worship in local churches, I started writing songs for our congregations to sing. However, I stopped writing for a while when life got busy, and it has been in the last year or so that I have been given a second-life in the realm of songwriting. Honestly, it was because of a strong conviction I started writing again. I really began to feel convicted that I wasn’t writing because it truly is a gift that God has given only a select group of people. He trusted me with it, and wants me to use it for Him.
Looking back, I can see all the things that God has led me through to be able to write the songs that I am writing. It’s my pleasure to be able to bring them to you, and I trust that God will use them in your life as He has used them in my life and the lives of others.