David Burdette – President

     After graduating from Gordon Conwell Theological Seminary Dave served as a missionary in Mexico with Converge Worldwide for 30 years, first as a church planter in Mexico City and Tijuana, then as a mobilizer and mentor. Dave founded Mexico Caravan Ministries, has been the Baja California regional director for Comimex and frequently speaks at Perspectives classes and missions conferences.

Brad Buser – Founding Board member

     Brad and Beth Buser (and two young boys) left San Diego in January of 1979, heading to Papua New Guinea to work among an unreached people group there.  While learning Melanesian Pidgin in the coastal town of Wewak they heard of the Iteri people who were asking for missionaries.
     They began working with the Iteri later that year building a house an airstrip and beginning language study of the Iteri language, which had never been written down before. In 1980 their daughter Natalie was born in PNG, Beth home schooled the kids in their younger years even as she did medical and literacy work among the Iteris.  By 1985 they were fluent in their language and culture and began sharing the message of Christ with the Iteri people.  The church was born in 1986 and discipling of that church commenced, in 1987 they started into Bible translation.  In 1990 their 3rd son (4th child) was also born in PNG.  By 1995 the church was completely under local leadership and in mid-1999 the translation was completed, at that time they left the Iteri church to function fully on its own. They return every couple years to spend time with the church there, the gospel message that God planted among the Iteri people has continued to grow in numbers and depth.
     Since coming back to San Diego Brad is the Missions Pastor at his home church in San Diego, teaches ‘Cross Cultural Church Planting’ at Eternity Bible College and  also teaches the book of Acts yearly at the Ecola Bible Institute in Cannon Beach OR.  Brad is a National Representative for New Tribes Mission and teaches Perspectives courses all over the USA.

Joel Heppner – Founding Board Member

     Joel Heppner was an associate pastor for 18 years at RiverLakes Community Church (formerly Fruitvale Community Church) in Bakersfield, CA.  Although originally leading in the area of worship, his final focus became missions.  Currently, Joel is the Program Officer for The Bolthouse Foundation and continues as the Coordinator for the Perspectives on the World Mission course in Bakersfield.  Joel was on the Advisory Board to the Sovereign Grace Church of Bakersfield church plant where he and his wife Tammy and their 10 children are now active.

Spencer MacCuish – Founding Board Member

     Spencer MacCuish served on staff (summers) at Hume Lake Christian Camps from 1991-98. During that time (1995-99), he also worked in the public school system where he taught English / History and coached volleyball. While teaching, he also served in the College Ministry at Grace Baptist Church in Santa Clarita. In 1999, he left teaching to lead the High School Ministry at the same church. He shepherded this ministry for three years before coming to Cornerstone. He is currently serving as Academic Dean at Eternity Bible College.

Chad Vegas – Founding Board Member

Chad Vegas is the founding pastor of Sovereign Grace Church. After completing his MA in Theology at Talbot, and being the high school pastor at RiverLakes Community Church, Chad was called to plant a church in Bakersfield. His passion is to know Christ and to make him known.  He has been married to Teresa since 1994, and they have 2 children.

Josh Walker – Founding Board Member

     Joshua Walker, a graduate of Caltech and UCLA, was a Mechanical Engineer working in the aerospace industry  from 1995-2003. During that time he served at Rolling Hills Covenant Church in Rolling Hills, California in many leadership roles (deacon, elder, committee chairman, Bible instructor). With a desire to serve Christ more, he entered The Master’s Seminary in 2001 and began to pursue fulltime ministry.

     Joshua Walker is part of the founding team of Eternity Bible College in Simi Valley, CA.  He currently serves as the President of the college and is an elder at Cornerstone Community Church in Simi Valley, CA.  His passions include seeing the local church mature and display Christ better, reforming Christian Higher Education, and training/sending disciples to sacrificially bring the message of Jesus to all peoples.

Zac Shira - Board Treasurer

Zac Shira has worshipped and served at Clairemont Emmanuel Baptist Church in San Diego since 1997.  During that time he has served in a variety of positions including Overseer, Deacon, Men’s Ministry, Missions Committee and Adult Sunday School teacher.  As a member of CEBC, he’s had the opportunity to visit church-planting efforts in various tribes around the world.  These experiences have been influential in molding and reprioritizing his life.  He and his wife Shelbi (along with their 3 kids) are devoted to seeing every tribe, tongue and nation reached with the Good News of Jesus Christ. 

Francis Chan – Advisory Board

     Francis is the founding pastor of Cornerstone Community Church (1994 to present) and author of Crazy Love and Forgotten God: Reversing Our Tragic Neglect of the Holy Spirit. He is also featured in the BASIC video series. He travels throughout the world challenging Christians to a higher commitment to Christ.

Brian Murphy - Advisory Board

Brian Murphy currently serves as the Lead Pastor for Living Grace Community Church, a church plant in Bakersfield, CA.  He has been in fulltime ministry for 27 years, serving both as a youth pastor and a Lead Pastor. He has a heart for people, a desire to preach the Word, and a passion to see the church mobilized in missions both in his own community and around the world.    

Tim & Sharon Simmonds – Instructors

Tim Simmonds served as a missionary in Papua New Guinea along with his wife, Sharon, for 14 years. He was involved in pioneer tribal church planting, culture and language consulting, and leadership and oversight of missionaries. For the last 9 years, since 2002, he has been involved in training and equipping missionary candidates for cross-cultural church planting ministries, at the NTM USA Missionary Training Center, by teaching the Culture and Language Acquisition Courses.

Tim is originally from England and Sharon grew up as an MK (missionary kid) in Papua New Guinea. They have two adult children, Jason (26) and Sarah (23).

Dave Brunn – Adjunct Faculty

     Dave Brunn served as a church planter and Bible translator in Papua New Guinea from 1980 to 2001. He facilitated the translation of the New Testament into the Lamogai language, published 1996. Dave is now the Director of Education at the NTM Missionary Training Center in Camdenton, MO, where he teaches courses on Bible translation. He also makes regular trips overseas to do Bible translation consulting and to train future translation consultants.

George Walker – Adjunct Faculty

     For 18 years in Papua New Guinea (PNG) George Walker, serving with New Tribes Mission (NTM), was a cross-cultural church planter among the unreached Bisorio people. George had an intimate part in the church planting ministry that included: evangelism, discipleship, Bible translation, and the development of Bible commentaries. He also served other NTM ministries as a language and church planting consultant.     After his time in PNG, George helped coordinate the training program of NTM.

     In 2002 he co-founded Worldview Resource Group. WRG’s mission is to provide training in cross-cultural church planting methodologies that emphasize a worldview approach to ministry. While with WRG, George worked as a church planting consultant for ministries working in the Balkans, Asia, South America, and among First Nations peoples. In 2009, George (while remaining of the board of WRG) returned to NTM so that he, and his wife Harriett, could work together in NTM’s residential training program. George teaches the subjects of Worldview, Animism and Cross-cultural Church Planting.

Ryan and Stephanie Sorensen – On-site Mentors

     Ryan and Stephanie met at Ecola Bible School in 1999. Ryan served with Caravan Ministries from 2001-2003 and returned to Tijuana in 2005.  He and Steph married that year and have been living there since.

Joseph and Jessica Bonura - On-site Mentors

Joseph and Jessica both graduated from Taylor University and were married in 1999. Joseph served as a youth pastor in Bakersfield, CA until moving in 2006 to Louisville, KY where he recently received his Masters of Divinity from the Southern Baptist Theological Seminary. God has blessed the Bonuras with four precious children (Daniel, David, Joshua, and Joy).

Shelly Anderson – Administrative Assistant

     Shelly and her husband, Jim, moved from Wyoming to San Diego in 1983 where they enjoyed raising their three children. Over the years, Shelly has kept busy as a homeschool teacher, an AWANA leader,  an adult literacy volunteer with READ San Diego and with various ministries at their missions minded home church, Clairemont Emmanuel Baptist. She recently welcomed the newest joy in her life, her first grandchild, Isaac.