I grew up in the Protestant Church in the Netherlands. Reformed League department, in the city Rijssen. A large church, at the time 10,000 members, spread over 6 neighborhood municipalities. A Bible-believing church, where many things were arranged well and professionally. For years I attended catechesis classes, attended youth groups, took courses and went to church twice every Sunday. I was baptized and made confession in this church. I gained an enormous amount of Biblical and theological knowledge during this period, I am still grateful for this. With six pastors and regularly also guest pastors, there was sufficient variety, within the context of the Reformed tradition.
As I grew older, I quickly became a manager in youth work, where we were given space and were able to develop many (new) initiatives. My personal faith became more and more alive in the desire to be a follower of Jesus Christ. We attended youth days and national and regional meetings, we organized things ourselves and were extremely active. Later I joined the church council and became an elder.
At that time I was working in the supermarket industry, I had completed my management training and I was in the process as a crisis manager at supermarkets. Then a vacancy arose at a missionary organization in the Netherlands, I applied and was accepted. This was precisely at the time that we, within this organization, decided to import the well-known Alpha course from England and also 'market' it in the Netherlands. This completely changed my faith perspective.
Through this work I suddenly found myself in Evangelical churches, Baptist churches, Pentecostal churches and so on. I came into contact with other religious experiences and different ways of being church than I was used to. I gave training on working with Alpha in different types of churches, during instruction days and at conferences and all this also gave my personal faith a huge boost. I started to delve into the differences in theology, different forms of church, the work and signs of the Holy Spirit and all this broadened my view enormously. We were also starting an Alpha course in our own church and we have organized and led this for years, each course was completely full, especially with people from our own congregation. Later we started working on various follow-up courses and the Premarriage and the Marriage Course. To this day, I am very enthusiastic about these courses and still work with them regularly.
When I started working at a Bible school about 10 years later, I was increasingly asked to preach and lead in different types of churches. Regular church services, youth services and special services. From Protestant to Evangelical and from Baptist to Pentecostal. During this time, we developed training and teaching programs at the Bible School for young people who were interns for a year, but also shorter courses in the field of discipleship, youth work, theology, being a missionary, etc. To keep up, I took courses and training myself and read a lot about theology, missiology, discipleship and so on.
At a certain point, the number of sermons and speaking engagements increased to such an extent that I made this independent, also because after Bible School I worked for a number of years for Christian/missionary organizations for vulnerable people on the margins of society and for organizations that rescue women from prostitution in Amsterdam and The Hague. Intensive, but very educational years.
In 2015 we came into contact with some evangelical churches in Italy. Warm friendships and intensive involvement grew from this. We went to Italy to preach, train and support in the facets of being a church and we received Italian (young) people in the Netherlands for exchange weeks. To this day, we are closely involved in this way with a number of evangelical churches and missionary organizations and we have also been able to place various people to support these projects.
Since 2021 I have been working for the Dutch branch of CAMA, the Christian And Missionary Alliance. As a preacher and speaker, as a mission mobilizer and as a coach and responsible for short-term broadcasts and youth groups. My wife Leida and I travel a lot, part of the year we work in Italy, but also in countries such as Germany, the Czech Republic, France and Spain where we work together with our international colleagues, churches and various missionary organizations such as a homeless shelter, a shelter for women who are victims of sexual abuse, organizations that focus on refugee work, church planting projects, etc.
I have preached in more than 170 churches, in the Netherlands and abroad – Reformed churches, Evangelical churches, Pentecostal churches, churches that do not belong to a specific denomination, Baptist churches, CAMA churches. I regularly return to lead in many of these churches and we have built up a warm relationship with some of them. I usually preach at least once every Sunday, sometimes more than once. I did a church program with a number of churches, and with others I provided some form of guidance or training on topics such as mission, contemporary church life and involving young people.
I am used to working interculturally and have extensive experience in this. I also took courses in this area. Although I do not have a specific, completely theological study, I do have broad theological knowledge and experience and I have studied a lot of theology, taken courses and training, studied and read a lot. I feel at home across the breadth of the church, I recognize the similarities and differences and I know my way around. I experience it as a blessing to be able to move in so many different churches and denominations, I love connecting people with each other.
All these years we have known ourselves to be guided by the Lord our God. We are not perfect, but He is. Because we have discovered the love of Jesus, we want to pass this on to people in all segments of society. In all this we have a deep love for His church and people.
I sincerely wish you the blessing of our God, in the Name of His Son, our Savior, Jesus Christ, through His Holy Spirit.
