The Kashtan's are active members of the Grace & Truth Christian Congregation near Tel Aviv. They are involved in outreach and discipleship opportunities in their areas and run the HaChotam Christian Publishing house.

In 1992, we sent Eitan & Orit Kashtan back to Israel for gospel ministry. They have been active in the leadership and ministry at the Grace & Truth Congregation near Tel Aviv. The church has about 260 attendees on the Sabbath service.

Orit is involved in preparing material and leading the children’s ministry. Eitan serves in the youth ministry and is an elder at the church. Community work is coordinated by Eitan which consists of helping with a school for children with autism and those who have been abandoned and work among the deaf in the community.

The Kashtan’s primary ministry is the HaChotam Christian publishing house which produces separate periodicals geared towards adults, youth and children, as well as publication of many Christian resources into Hebrew. Through this ministry the Kashtans are able to instruct Israeli Christians in sound doctrine and practice. They also sponsor Christian conferences and festivals in Israel.

Grace Church began supporting Dave & Connie Patty in the Czech Republic in 1993 to help churches establish strong youth ministries. Dave is the Founder and Executive Director of Josiah Venture, a ministry that is now flourishing in 14 countries, primarily in Central and Eastern Europe.

Josiah Venture (JV) exists to establish a movement of God among the youth of Central and Eastern Europe that finds its home in the local church and transforms society. The focus of JV has been to train up youth ministry leaders and to evangelize the youth.

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SERMONS BY DAVE AT GRACE CHURCH OF DUPAGE ➝

READ CONNIE'S BLOG ➝

Claire grew up the daughter of Josiah Venture leaders Dave & Connie Patty. Through her experience as an MK and during training at Moody Bible Institute, she developed a heart to equip and support JV kids and their families in the challenges they face as "third-culture" kids. Grace Church of DuPage is Claire's sending church. Claire is based out of the Czech Republic, but serves JV kids and their families all across Central and Eastern Europe.

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In 1997, Tim & Linda Kelly were sent out to plant a church in Germany. In 2011, the church completed building its current location of worship and registered as Freie Evangelische Bibelgemeinde Meine (Free Evangelical Bible Church in Meine).

The church has trained pastors in Kazakhstan, continued to reach out to their own community with the gospel, and been a light to other regions of Germany by posting Tim’s sermons online. Additionally, Grace Church of DuPage has conducted marriage conferences and a Biblical Counseling conference at Freie Evangelische Bibelgemeinde Meine.

Tim is currently teaching Hermeneutics and the Pastoral Epistles at the European Bible Training Center in Berlin and Zurich. These bible training centers are associated with The Master’s Academy, a ministry of the Master’s Seminary located in Sun Valley, California. Tim has also taught these subjects at the Baptist Theological Seminary in Armenia.

Don and Dana Larimer have been a part of the Grace Church family since June of 2005. They have served together in Marriage Builders small groups, men’s and women’s discipleship groups, special needs events, fellowship committee, and Dana served on the women’s leadership team and Don served as an elder. A strong call for discipling young adults grew during their time at Grace and as they served with Ron Hutchcraft Ministries’ On Eagles’ Wings teams every summer.

On November 2 of 2020 Don and Dana were led to full-time ministry with Ron Hutchcraft Ministries’ On Eagles’ Wings and moved to Arkansas to serve as the administrator and dean of students for the new On Eagles’ Wings Discipleship Center. The mission of the residential center is to provide discipleship and training to committed Native leaders equipping them to be lifetime Jesus-followers, prepared with the skills and strategies needed for Native ministry and assistance in placement for a lifetime career in ministry.

Please pray with them that the Lord will raise up the first Jesus-Generation of Native America led by fully equipped Native leaders, transforming Native communities through the power of Christ’s Gospel and their Christlike lives.

LEARN MORE ABOUT ON EAGLES WINGS→

Contact Dana. Contact Don.

Ray & Bobbi have been members of Grace Church for 25 years, with Ray serving on the Elder Board and on staff as the Pastor of Outreach and Shepherding for over 21 years. They also served together in our Biblical Counseling, Special Needs & FLOCK ministries. Together they served in Iraqi Kurdistan for six months reaching out to the Kurdish people.

As Global Outreach Pastor, Ray was involved in equipping & sending Global Workers. His position on staff also afforded Ray (and Bobbi) the opportunity to lead evangelistic teams to serve alongside our workers in several countries. Ray taught systematic theology in Armenia twice per year for 20 years.

Ray retired from Grace Church in April 2020, but through an old friend, the Lord called Ray to serve again in Global Outreach. In October, Ray began serving as the Vice President for Church Planting with the To Every Tribe missions agency, located in Los Fresnos, Texas. Ray will be working with current field staff and new trainees to plant churches among unreached peoples.

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Grace Church has had a longstanding relationship with Steve and Heather Lestonwhich began in 1989 when Steve began attending. At Grace Church, Steve served as the Youth Pastor, College Pastor, director of the training program called Ministry Preparation Course (MPC) and Local Outreach Coordinator. He met his wife Heather in 1991 when they served together in the youth ministry. They were married at Grace in 1994. In 1997 Grace Church sent Steve, Heather and their daughter Anna to Alaska to work in a church in the Southeast panhandle. From 2003 to 2016, Steve left Alaska and became the teaching pastor at our sister church, Kishwaukee Bible Church (KBC - a church he helped plant in the early 90's). Out of KBC, a mission to the First Nations peoples in Northwest Ontario began. This is what led Steve to develop a relationship with To Every Tribe.

In the summer of 2016, Steve Leston responded to God's call to take a new role: Director of the Center for Pioneer Church Planting (CPCP). The CPCP is To Every Tribe’s training center through which missionaries are trained to do pioneering work–to take the Good News of Jesus to places without a gospel presence. In 2018 Steve became president/ CEO of the ministry. Steve’s life and ministry are driven by a desire to help people understand the Scriptures and experience the deep and life-changing transformation that comes from the Word of God so that they would participate in the mission of extending the church to the ends of the earth. Grace Church became Steve's sending church in the Spring 2021. Steve and Heather have four adult children, Anna, Amber, Alyssa and Anderw.

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We are blessed to have Theresa Kerns serving with us from the states as she supports the work God is doing through Josiah Venture from their home office in Wheaton, IL. Theresa began serving full-time with Josiah Venture as Human Resource Director in 2002. Theresa builds relationships with Josiah Venture team members by providing admin assistance to those on the field and by preparing new workers for the field. She also spends time visiting the JV women overseas, encouraging and helping the women better serve the Lord, their families, and the nationals.

In addition to her work in Eastern Europe, Theresa has also conducted women’s seminars in Israel in conjunction with the Kashtan Family.

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In October of 2019, the Lord laid on the hearts of Pastor Charles Butler, his wife Donna, and Pastor Steve Mason and his wife Kerri, to begin a congregation in the city center of Chicago. Both the Masons and the Butlers made Chicago their home for well over 30 years and have a deep love for this city. While the Masons have now gone on to pastor at a church in Winnetka, the Butlers continue to serve and lead Hope Church. Hope Church is in the Tri-Taylor neighborhood, a few blocks south and west of the Medical District, and minutes from I-290 and I-94. This is a burgeoning area comprising multiethnic, socioeconomic, and generational diversity.

Their goal is to develop a church where God’s people are nourished and equipped by in-depth preaching of God’s Word and engaging worship, and then are faithful witnesses of Christ as they move through the city.

FIND OUT MORE ABOUT HOPE CHURCH CHICAGO →

It was in 2000 that our former Global Outreach Pastor Ray Glinski first traveled to the Armenia to explore opportunities for Grace Church to join the mission work taking place in what used to be the USSR. It was on this trip that they were introduced to Asatur Nahapetyan. Asatur is the Executive Director of the Armenian Baptist Union as well as its Seminary. Asatur has since been our primary contact in Armenia, and has connected us with local church planters in the region.

We partner with Lito & Juliet Manguera and Divine Grace Bible Church as they faithfully advance the gospel in Tarlac City, Philippines. In March 2021, they celebrate the thirtieth anniversary of DGBC.

FIND OUT MORE ABOUT DIVINE GRACE BIBLE CHURCH →

Names, specific location, and involvement cannot be disclosed for safety purposes. We invite you to be in prayer for this family's involvement in ministry to this region. Their main ministry is theological training for pastors and Christian leaders with an institution in the area. If you are a member or regular attendee at Grace Church of DuPage, you can contact the main office for more information on how to support this family in their ministry.

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In addition to church planting, Grace Church of DuPage has sponsored a dozen annual Pastors Conferences hosting over 100 pastors, and providing teachers for seminary instruction. Grace Church of DuPage staff regularly travels to Armenia to be a part of these vital ministries. The seminary, operating since 2000, has graduated about 75 men.

Short-term global outreach teams have four subordinate aims in light of gathering Christ-worshippers. Short-termers go 1) to support, encourage, and edify Grace Church global outreach partners, 2) to prepare the ground for the potential establishment of a career global outreach team, or church partnership, 3) in response to a discernible leading in their lives in pursuing a potential career ministry in global outreach, and 4) to become vibrant, passionate world-Christians who feel the urgency of the spread of the gospel.

Our goal in short-term outreach is not to take the place of long-term outreach, but rather assist bridging the gap between the nation and the local church through this ministry partnership with our global outreach partners. Our short-term teams must have a strategic evangelistic outreach to the nations. Our passion is to see all peoples shout to God with loud songs of joy (Psalms 47:1)! We seek and desire to be used by God to bring people to repentance, and a saving knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ. We pray that through these global outreach projects you would personally experience, even for a brief time, what world-outreach really means, and as a result, that it might spark a fire for you to see the importance of global outreach, and possibly be used of God to direct you towards being a career global outreach partner.

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