Rob Lewis
- Lead Pastor
Before I was born, my family moved from Florida to Texas when my grandfather, who was a computer programmer for IBM, was transferred from the Kennedy Space Center in Cape Canaveral to support the Johnson Space Center in Houston. I was raised in the Houston area, and was converted at the age of nine after my father was radically converted when a woman gave him a Bible while working in Detroit. Following my conversion, I was baptized, along with my father, by a pastor at a Christian homeless shelter in Friendswood, Texas in 1995.
My journey with the Lord has been all of grace, yet in the past decade I have begun to see more clearly how sweet and free is the grace of God, and how I am continually dependent upon the mercy of God each day. This is the mercy and grace of the gospel of Christ to which I am called, and desire to preach.
I served in a small church in the Houston area before spending four years traveling working with ministries that aimed to share the gospel with professional athletes across the United States and Canada. In conjunction with these ministries, I began spending a lot of time in Oklahoma in 2005 and moved to Oklahoma in 2007. During these years I began attending and serving at First Baptist Owasso. My call to pastoral ministry developed and strengthened as God began to put in my heart a desire to teach and serve. This culminated in ordination and becoming a teaching pastor, where for three years I led the Calvary campus of First Baptist Owasso in Tulsa. In May of 2020, I accepted a call to pastor Harbor of Grace Church.
My wife, Sara, and I were married in 2009, and have three children; Jazmine, Gabe, and Eliana. For the past several years, we have been passionately involved in foster care and adoption. Family is very important to us and we see the local church as an extension of the family. The members of Harbor of Grace are family to us, and I strongly believe that the local church is to be a place of love, support, and accountability, where the Christian faith is lived out in community.
Hope & Vision for Harbor of Grace Church
My hope for Harbor of Grace Church is that through our admiration and love for God, we would grow in holiness, knowledge of God’s word and obedience to it, unity, evangelism, and service to the community of Tulsa, and the surrounding areas. I pray that we would be a strong local church that serves the Church universal to further the kingdom of Jesus Christ.
May the heart of our spiritual growth and outreach be described by the following spiritual goals:
Develop a clear understanding of the Word, leading to sound theology, doctrine, and a biblical worldview.
Demonstrate a strong conviction that the Word is true, reliable, relevant, and worthy of complete trust.
Grow in obedience to the Word, leading to faith in action, seen in personal holiness and humility, which in turn leads to corporate unity, generosity, service, and faithful gospel proclamation.
Identify as those who have a great love for God and His Word, and great affection for one another.
Education
Liberty University:
B.S. Religion - Minor in Biblical Studies, Minor in Psychology
Purdue University:
M.S.Ed. Learning Design & Technology
BIOLA University:
Certificate in Christian Apologetics
BIOLA-Talbot School of Theology:
M.A. Science & Religion
Liberty University-Rawlings School of Divinity:
Ph.D. Bible Exposition - Current
Mike Roark - Elder
I was born in Hayward California and moved, with my family, to Oklahoma before I started school. I went through the school system in Tulsa and graduated from Will Rogers High School. In November 1970, I married my sweetheart, Elizabeth (Liz), to whom I am still proudly wed today, our fiftieth year. I attended university and graduate programs in Oklahoma and worked as a Medical Microbiologist in a Tulsa hospital upon graduation. I later joined the departmental staff of Microbiology/Immunology at a medical school where I also earned my Master of Biomedicine degree in microbiology/virology. Over the next fifteen years I founded and led American Biomedical, Inc. and Vironostics Laboratories, Inc. in Tulsa.
In 1986, God changed my course and planted within me a passion - medical missions. For the next twenty-two years, Liz and I led short term medical teams to minority areas of China as part of a strategy to introduce indigenous Chinese Christians into those areas to spread God’s Good News. During this time frame, Liz and I raised six children who have married and presented us with twenty-six remarkable grandchildren. For these past twelve years we have been working in Cambodia through a missions organization named Our Family Ministry, Inc., an entity founded by our family. Through it, we disciple Christian ministry leaders, plant churches, operate a feeding program for urban poor children, and other works which share God’s love and message of forgiveness in Christ.
I have had the joy to teach the Bible to adults for the last forty-five years. I was happy to serve as a deacon in two churches for twenty-seven years and was ordained into the Gospel ministry by First Baptist Church in Owasso, Oklahoma in 2019. I am a student in The Southern Baptist Theological Seminary of Louisville, Kentucky, working toward a Master of Theological Studies degree. Liz and I look forward to the new blessings and experiences awaiting us as Harbor of Grace Church steps out as a new Believers’ fellowship in carrying out Jesus’ great commission, Matthew 28:19-20.
Chris Cavner - Elder
I’m a native Oklahoman, twice born in Ponca City: once physically and again spiritually when I was six. Baptism and the life of a church kid followed after. I spent my formative years growing up on a small farm in Elmore City, Oklahoma. During this time a spiritual tug of war developed in my life; the glamours and mysteries of the secular world on one side and a call to ministry on the other. College amplified this struggle which ultimately came to a head a couple years after graduation when I learned I couldn’t live with my feet in opposing worlds any longer. I needed to choose and a newfound relationship helped me realize that.
In my mid twenties, I was lucky enough to meet Kali, my Proverbs 31 blessing. She and I have three kiddos, Rowan, Riggs and Rori Mae. We view each of them as a precious treasure given to us by the Lord to love and disciple. Meeting Kali and starting a family was the catalyst the Lord used to steer me into laymen’s ministry.
I had always had a pretty good grasp on what I believed, but when a friend struggled and then left the faith because of arguments made outside the Bible, it lit a fire in me that culminated in a love for apologetics. I began to read and listen to a myriad of podcasts and instructional books on the subject. This then led to a deeper understanding of theology and doctrine. Suddenly the faith that had grown stagnate in me was an unquenchable flame and I couldn’t get enough. Eventually I started up and began leading a small group and teaching sunday school. Though I didn’t realize it, I began to shepherd this group. This was recognized by my church leadership. I was then asked to join the Council of Elders at First Baptist Owasso. I served in that capacity for a couple years before God called my family and I to Harbor of Grace.