Reverend Dr. Steve VanOstran

Executive Minister

svanostran@abcrm.org

303-988-3900

Steve comes to us after 18 years in pastoral ministry serving congregations both in rural and urban settings. For the last 5 years he has been the Associate Executive Minister for ABC of the Central Region (primarily Kansas). He is married to Debbie, an interior architect, and they have three children. Their oldest, R.C. is a senior math major at Kansas University. Peter, their second, is a senior at Washburn Rural High School and plans to remain in Kansas for college, possibly Washburn University. Their youngest is their daughter, Paige.

Van Ostran received his Master of Divinity from Southern Baptist Theological Seminary in Louisville, Kentucky in 1987. His Doctor of Ministry degree was conferred by Northern Baptist Seminary in Lombard, Illinois. Rev. Dr. Van Ostran stated in his application that, “I was raised, licensed, and ordained as a Southern Baptist. This has given me a unique understanding of church growth, theology and holistic worship. I have chosen to be a part of and to serve American Baptist Congregations because I am better able to live out my faith here.” His entire ministry has been in the American Baptist family.

Steve was called to ministry out of a study beginning with Ephesians 4:11 which emphasized the equipping and preparation of fellow Believers for Christian service. When called to Regional work five years ago he believed he was able to live out that passion and purpose more fully by working with multiple congregations. Further, he stated, “My call to regional work has grown out of the calling and practice of being a local church pastor.” He has shared that his vision for the local church is to reclaim the “incarnational” nature that is described by the Apostle Paul by depicting the church as “The Body of Christ” (1 Cor. 12:27). It is his desire to help local churches reconnect with their community and to discover new avenues of ministry within those communities. In so doing, Van Ostran believes that the church’s ongoing witness to Christ will once again become effective, even in our postmodern world.

During the time that Van Ostran was the Associate Executive Minister he served two terms as the Acting Executive Minister due to the sabbatical and subsequent disability and retirement of their Executive Minister. In his capacities in the Central Region he was responsible for directing the Interim Ministry Program of the Region, consulting with congregations on a variety of issues including pastoral placement, conflict transformation processes, Natural Church Development, Appreciative Inquiry processes and financial concerns. He also worked with a regional task force looking at structure and redesign for the region.

Additional Staff (in alphabethical order)

Jessica Fischer

Communication Specialist

jfischer@abcrm.org

303-988-3900

Jessica Fischer has been an ABCRM constituent since she was born. Born and raised in Gillette, WY, her home church was First Baptist Church of Gillette. She attended Camp Wyoba from 3rd grade to 12th grade as a camper. During her high school years, she was also a camp counselor and co-director of Primary camp.

In 2001, Jessica was selected as one of 3 youth delegates from ABCRM to attend the ABC Bienniel in Providence, RI. There she met many friends, but she also met her future husband James. He was a youth delegate from the ABC Dakotas. Jessica attended the University of Sioux Falls, where she was a member of the choral department, and a memeber of the women's soccer team. She graduated with a BA in History in 2005.

Jessica and James married in 2005 and moved to Denver. They found Calvary Baptist Church in Denver to be their new church home. Jessica is deeply involved in Calvary's music program. She sings in the choir, plays in the bell choir, sings a solo once in a while.

In 2009, Jessica had her triplets, Alexander, Grant, and Ethan. They were born very premature and spent 3 months at a NICU in Denver. They are all healthy, happy, energetic little boys now. They keep Jessica on her toes. The boys are little miracles to Jessica and James.

Jessica travels a lot to see her family in Wyoming and just for pleasure. She also loves to sing, play piano, sew, read, write, and play with her black labrador, Jet.

Alyce Keys

Bookkeeper/Secretary

akeys@abcrm.org

303-988-3900

When you call the Region office, you might hear the friendly voice of Alyce Keys. Alyce is the Bookkeeper and the Secretary for the Region. She supports Steve Van Ostran, Executive Minister, the 2 Minister and Missionary Coaches, and all the various committees including the MLC (Minister Leadership Committee), Board of Directors, Executive Committee, and Executive Minister Search Committee to name a few.

As Bookkeeper for the Region, Alyce is responsible for the daily tracking of our finances. This includes tracking Mission giving, inputting the mission support information into the American Baptist Churches Information System (abcis.org), sending monthly reports back to the churches, and distributing the checks that the Region distributes to the various organizations. She is quickly learning QuickBooks, our accounting software, and is inputting approved invoices and printing the checks which require a Board Members signature.

With over 25 years in the workforce, Alyce has developed critical skills necessary for working in fast paced, detail oriented and customer-driven environments. Timeliness, proficiency and strong work ethics are 3 areas that Alyce states are at the top of her core values. Alyce spent the last 17 years as Rev. Golson’s, Senior Pastor True Light Baptist Church, Administrative Assistant and Bookkeeper for the church. This experience has been a tremendous resource to the Region office, because she understands how things affect the churches. Rev. Golson recommends Alyce whole heartedly for her new position. He stated, “Alyce is conscientious, a person of great integrity and a hard worker”.

Dr. William G. Mankin

Interim Ministry and Mission Coach

Wyoming
bmankin@abcrm.org

Bill Mankin is a member of the First Baptist Church of Laramie WY, where his wife, Mary Beth, is the pastor.  Bill was raised near Memphis TN and educated at Rhodes College and the Johns Hopkins University where he received a Ph.D. in Physics in 1969.  He spent his entire career at the National Center for Atmospheric Research in Boulder CO, where he made ground-based, airborne, and satellite measurements of the chemistry of the upper atmosphere, primarily for understanding the ozone layer.  He retired in 2003 to move to Kansas City KS, where Mary Beth was a student at Central Baptist Theological Seminary.  He is a Senior Scientist Emeritus at NCAR.  While at Central Seminary, he audited a number of classes and helped teach Environmental Ethics.

He has been an active American Baptist layman all his adult life.  In the First Baptist Church of Boulder, he held numerous offices and taught an adult Sunday School class for 25 years.  He has participated in a number of ways in the American Baptist Churches of the Rocky Mountains, including seven years as Treasurer.  He has been on the Board of Directors of Central Seminary for 16 years, six as chair.  He has served as the receiving treasurer in Laramie and has taught Sunday School.

His outdoor passion is white water rafting.  In his spare time, he enjoys woodworking, reading, and cross country skiing.  He is happy in his role as a pastoral spouse.  He and Mary Beth have two children, David, a software engineer for Google in Mountain View CA, and Emily, a graduate student in neuroscience at the University of California in San Diego. 

He is looking forward with anticipation and a bit of nervousness to his new role, serving the pastors and churches of the Wyoming Cluster as a representative of the Region.

Reverend Mike Oldham

Ministry and Mission Coach

Southeast Colorado, New Mexico, and Western Slope
moldham@abcrm.org

Rev. Mike Oldham has been in the Rocky Mountain Region since September 2001. Mike received a B.A. from Eastern New Mexico University in 1985 with a major in Religious Studies. He then received his M. Div. from the Southern Baptist Theological eminary in 1990. While in seminary, Mike served as Associate Pastor at the First

Christian Church (Disciples) of Jeffersonville, IN.

After seminary, Mike served a yoked ministry, FBC of Pt. Marion and Oak Hill Baptist Church of Smithfield, PA for five years. Mike continued to serve as pastor of Oak Hill Baptist Church until August of 2001. In September 2001, Mike began his ministry in our Region as a church planter. Then he served as the Manager for Black Forest Camp and Conference Center.

Mike began as a Ministry and Mission Coach on September 1, 2005. He works with two of our Ministry and Mission Clusters, the churches on the Western Slope of Colorado and Moab, Utah and the churches of Southeastern Colorado and New Mexico. Mike is married to Chris Oldham.

Rev. Daniel and

Mrs. Estela Schweissing
Region Missionaries

dan@abcrm.org and estela@abcrm.org

Dan and Estela currently serve the American Baptist Churches of the Rocky Mountains as region missionaries, providing pastoral ministry and educational opportunities to the growing refugee community from Burma (Myanmar). Prior to joining the ABCRM staff, the Schweissings served for ten years as American Baptist missionaries in the Bahamas, where Estela ministered to at-risk women and children in the Haitian immigrant community and Dan trained church leaders through a local Bible institute. Previously, Estela worked as a bilingual educator for Denver Public Schools and Dan was the assistant director for the GED Program at Curtis Park Community Center.

The daughter of Haitian immigrants, Estela was born in La Romana, Dominican Republic where she was raised in the First Haitian Missionary Baptist Church and accepted the Lord at twelve years of age. The following year, the deacons of Estela's church invited her to go with them to the bateyes (migrant villages for Haitian sugarcane cutters). There, she saw for the first time the impoverished conditions of the Haitian migrant workers who cut sugarcane in the Dominican Republic. She was especially concerned about the children of the workers and, in each place she went with the deacons, she taught Sunday school classes for the children. Estela's love for children led her to pursue a career in education while improving her ministry skills through courses at the local Bible institute. While employed as a teacher, Estela was also active as a lay missionary to Haitian migrant workers in the nearby bateyes. Following her marriage with Dan, she acquired additional teaching, ministry, and cross-cultural experience in Puerto Rico and Denver.

Estela earned her B.A. in Early Childhood Education from the InterAmerican University of Puerto Rico. She also completed three years of theological studies at the Center for Biblical and Pastoral Studies in Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic.

Dan, a fifth-generation Coloradan, traces his American Baptist roots back to the early 1870s when his great-great grandparents joined a Baptist church shortly after homesteading in the Colorado Territory. Born and raised in the Denver area, Dan committed his life to Christ at Crossroads American Baptist Church at a young age. At fifteen, he became interested in missions work through a series of Bible studies led by his youth pastor. During the remainder of his high school and college years, short-term missions trips to Mexico and San Francisco, active involvement in campus ministry, and volunteer tutoring served to confirm his call to teaching and missions work. Following his graduation from college, Dan served for two years with American Baptist International Ministries as a volunteer ESL instructor in the Dominican Republic. It was during those years that he met and married Estela Luisima, an active leader in the congregation where he volunteered. Subsequently, Dan continued his teaching career while completing graduate studies in Puerto Rico and Denver.

Dan holds M.A. degrees in Teaching English as a Second Language from the InterAmerican University of Puerto Rico and Urban and Intercultural Ministries from Denver Seminary. He completed his undergraduate degree in humanities at Fort Lewis College in Durango, Colorado.

Reverend Mary Tellis

Ministry and Mission Coach

Metro Denver

mtellis@abcrm.org

Rev. Mary Tellis says her passion is “to be in ministry one hundred percent.” Her primary tasks are to determine the needs of churches in the Metro Denver area and to build relationships.

Mary, the youngest child of Henry and Ruby Rhodes, is a native of Louisiana. After living in Louisiana, Texas and Ohio, her family settled in Denver, CO. Mary completed her public education in Louisiana and also her higher education at Louisiana Tech University and Grambling State University, where she received a BA degree in Sociology.

Allowing God to equip her for her purpose and destiny, she furthered her studies and received a diploma of biblical studies from Heritage Christian Center, Aurora, CO. She later pursued advanced studies and received a Master of Arts, Theology (Concentration: Ministerial Education and Evangelism); Doctor of Philosophy, Theology, (Concentration: Biblical Ministerial Counseling) from Truth Bible College, Jacksonville, FL. She has authored and published a book entitled Why? How to Maintain Integrity in the Midst of Suffering.

Over a span of more than 21 years, she faithfully served in leadership areas as Church Administrator and Associate Pastor at Central Baptist Church and currently serves at Solomon Temple Missionary Baptist Church in Denver, pastorate of her husband, John Tellis, Jr. Mary and John are the grateful parents of three children and one lovely granddaughter.

Karen VanValkenburgh

Region Administrator
kvan@abcrm.org
303-988-3900

Karen was born and raised in the Chicago area. She graduated from Southern Methodist University in Dallas, TX with a degree in Elementary Education. Upon graduation, Karen was offered a management position for the restaurant company she worked for during college. Starting as an assistant manager, she held numerous positions including Restaurant Manager, Auditor, Accounting Manager, Systems Project Manager, and was the Vice President/Controller when she left. Her last corporate position was Vice President/controller for VICORP Restaurants, who own Village Inn and Baker Square restaurants.

Learning has been a passion for Karen, and she took accounting and business courses while working full-time. She obtained a Certified Public Accounting (CPA) license from the state of Texas, and three years later, obtained an Executive Master of Business Administration (MBA).

Karen considers her 17-year marriage to Mike Nedeau and her two teenage children her greatest accomplishments. The Nedeau family is an active part of the West Bowles Community Church in Littleton, CO. Family activities revolve around the kids' busy sport and school schedules (lacrosse, soccer, skiing/snowboarding, basketball, football, and lots of studying). Karen loves traveling, visiting relatives (who all live out of state), reading and Rotary.