Meet The Team
Jeff Durbin
Pastor/Elder
Jeff Durbin is the planting Pastor and has been the Lead-Teaching Elder of Apologia Church since its inception in 2010. He worked for many years as the head Chaplain at a hospital for people struggling with substance abuse and addiction. Jeff started Apologia Studios, a platform that has produced Gospel-centered content and programs that have received almost 1-billion views across numerous platforms. He leads a ministry that has brought the Gospel to various different cults, world religions, and Atheists. He has regularly engaged in evangelism to the lost and has participated in numerous moderated public debates in defense of the Christian Faith and Worldview. His work and ministry have been seen and reported on by the New York Times, CNN, MSNBC, FOX News, CBN, Metro, the 700 Club, and the History Channel.
Jeff leads the ministry, “End Abortion Now.” EAN is a global ministry and network that has raised up and trained over One-thousand churches in America, Canada, Australia, Northern Ireland, the Republic of Ireland, Germany, and more. These churches have collectively saved 10’s of thousands of babies from death at abortion-mills. Jeff, through the work of EAN, has engaged with legislators in States across the country in order to get bills of equal protection and the complete abolition of abortion. Jeff and his team were responsible for the historic bill in Louisiana that was the first bill of abolition (since Roe v. Wade) to pass the hearing and make it to the floor. EAN has worked with other churches and pastors to successfully get dozens of bills in to States across the union.
Jeff has earned a Master’s of Divinity in Pastoral Ministry from Whitefield Theological Seminary. He is also the Fellow for Evangelism and Apologetics for the Ezra Institute. Before Jeff entered vocational ministry, he was an entrepreneur and business owner and owned or operated numerous martial arts schools where he taught thousands of students. He holds 5 Black belts. He was ranked 1st nationally in his division for NASKA. He won every major National, International, and World championship for NASKA, NBL, and IMAC; including many of the Grand Champion titles. He qualified for, participated in, and medaled in the Junior Olympics. He was Johnny Cage in Mortal Kombat the World Tour (a multi-million dollar stage production of the popular franchise). He was the fight scene and stunt coordinator and played Michelangelo and Donatello for the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle franchise. He did the stunts and fight-scenes for various video games, such as Age of Empires 2, the Untouchable, and Mission Impossible. He was also a fighter in MTV’s “The Final Fu.”
Jeff has been married to his wife, Candi, for over 26-years. They have 7-children: Sage, Immagin, Saylor, Stellar, Augustine, Norah, and Piper. They also have 6-grandchildren.
Luke Pierson
Pastor / Elder
Luke has been a Pastor/Elder at Apologia Church from its inception in February of 2010 and serves as Discipleship Pastor, primarily focusing on one-one-one discipleship and counseling, as well as overall general spiritual growth of the body at Apologia.
Pastor Luke PiersonLuke, along with Pastor Jeff, co-founded Apologia Studios and End Abortion Now, and is Co-Host of the church’s radio and TV programs, Apologia Radio and Apologia TV. Luke, serving as Vice President of Apologia Christian Ministries and has been involved in outreach to the occults and various religious groups since 2000.
Luke is fourth generation in a long line of missionaries and full-time ministers of the Gospel going back to his great-grandfather in the early 1900’s. He also served in youth ministry for nine plus years, at Bethel Church in Crown Point, Indiana and at LifeQuest Church, in Phoenix, Arizona. Luke and his wife of over seventeen years, Cheryl, have two daughters Evangeline Grace and Eliana Faith.
Zack Morgan
Pastor/Elder
Zack Morgan functions as the pastor of local outreach as well as serving with Pastor Jeff and Pastor Luke as they go about caring for the flock day in and day out. He’s lived in Phoenix since 2015 and resides from sunny (and expensive) San Diego. His pride and absolute joy is his lovely wife Jessica and their 6 children.
God graciously saved Zack at the age of 18 and he’s been committed to serving the local church since day 1. The last 20 years he’s walked with the Lord, he’s had numerous roles and functions in the local church which have all led his family to Phoenix and then to Apologia to wholeheartedly serve and pour out their lives for the sake of the gospel of the Kingdom. As Zack was pastoring in the summer 2012, he was awakened to the abortion holocaust and has never been the same since. The Lord turned his life upside down at that time and filled his heart with a passion to end abortion and rescue preborn babies headed to death at abortion mills in the Valley. You can find him, as well as many from Apologia, serving on public sidewalks outside of abortion clinics and preaching the gospel publicly in multiple venues around the greater Phoenix area. Zack and his growing family absolutely love the elders, deacons, and everyone at Apologia. He and his family are here to see the church healthy and effective as they continue to further the gospel and accomplish the manifold mission Jesus has given the Church.
James White
Pastor/Elder
James White is the director of Alpha and Omega Ministries, a Christian apologetics organization based in Phoenix, Arizona. He is a professor, having taught Greek, Systematic Theology, and various topics in the field of apologetics. He has authored or contributed to more than twenty four books, including The King James Only Controversy, The Forgotten Trinity, The Potter’s Freedom, and The God Who Justifies. He is an accomplished debater, having engaged in more than one-hundred sixty five moderated, public debates around the world with leading proponents of Roman Catholicism, Islam, Jehovah’s Witnesses, and Mormonism, as well as critics such as Bart Ehrman, John Dominic Crossan, Marcus Borg, and John Shelby Spong. In recent years James has debated in such locations as Sydney, Australia, as well as mosques in Toronto, London, and South Africa. He is a Pastor/Elder of Apologia Church in Arizona. He has been married to Kelli for more than thirty-seven years, and has two children, and four grandchildren.
SERVICE
Church of the Redeemer
717 N Stapley Dr Mesa AZ, 85203
Sunday 4:00pm
WHEN AND WHERE WE MEET
Church of the Redeemer
717 N Stapley Dr Mesa AZ, 85203
Sunday 4:00pm
Apologia Radio P.O. Box 1545 Chandler, AZ 85244
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Partnered With
Apologia Studios || Action For Life || End Abortion Now || Red State Reform