Gerry Breshears

Gerry was born in Albuquerque, New Mexico to Christian parents. He spent his boyhood years on a farm in the Ozarks of Missouri. While there, he and his family attended the church his grandfather pastored for many years as a farmer-pastor. Gerry received Jesus Christ as his personal savior at age 8 and was baptized shortly after that. One of his first acts following that was to lead one of his friends to Jesus Christ. He moved back to Albuquerque to begin seventh grade and remained there through his bachelor’s program in mathematics and education at the University of New Mexico. He married Sherry at the end of his senior year in university. During his high school and college years he had a four-year period where he rejected Christianity for intellectual reasons. Through the ministry of a new pastor in his church, he reexamined Christianity and recommitted himself to being a disciple of Jesus Christ. After teaching mathematics for a year in a suburb of Denver, he and his family went to the Philippines to teach at Faith Academy, the largest school for missionary children in the world. During the three years serving as a Mission Associate with Conservative Baptist Foreign Mission Society (now WorldVenture), he not only taught math to missionary kids, but also became deeply involved in helping start Calvary Baptist Church. He returned to the United States for formal training for ministry. He did his seminary work at Denver Seminary and his doctoral work at Fuller Seminary. He started at Western Seminary in 1980. 

Being a professor takes him well beyond classroom teaching. He spends many hours each week meeting with students individually and in small groups to discuss theology as it impacts life as a Christian, to talk about career directions, family and church life, and a myriad of other topics. 

Beyond the campus, Gerry is an elder and a member of the preaching team at Grace Community Church of Gresham. He served as president of the Evangelical Theological Society in 1993 and continues to serve on the national and regional executive committees of that organization. He served as a founding member of the steering committee of a national study group on dispensational theology. In addition to teaching and lecturing at a number of colleges and seminaries around the world, he preaches or teaches in many churches and conferences and is a frequent guest on various radio and TV programs. 

His passion is to bring theology to life. That has led him to a lot of consulting with churches and pastors across the country and around the world. He has focused attention on helping individuals and churches wrestling with the how to think about ministry from a theological basis. He has long term interests in the relation of theology and science, creation vs. evolution. 

His wife, Sherry, is a retired computer network communications professional. They have two sons, Donn and David, and a daughter, Cyndee. They enjoy making their home a center of hospitality and ministry to all sorts of people. Gerry’s hobbies include computers, travel, hiking and reading.