Canyon Church — Partner With Us
Aerial view of American Canyon, California

A church with generational impact.

We believe God wants to establish a church in American Canyon, CA, and has already been preparing the people to do it. Our desire is to mobilize and equip those people to establish a church that pushes back darkness and spreads God's glory throughout our neighborhoods.

Give toward the launch Email Damian
$460,000Everything it takes to open the doors in September 2027
Viable at LaunchFinancially self-supporting from day 1.
Map showing American Canyon near Napa, Vallejo, Fairfield, Walnut Creek, and Oakland along the San Francisco Bay Area

The City

American Canyon, a young, growing, and diverse city, is in the beginning of its story. People came here for affordable housing, a slower pace, and a good place to raise kids, and now they're putting down roots.

Nearly half the households in American Canyon are raising children, close to double the national average. And the San Francisco Bay Area is the most unchurched metro in the United States, with roughly 96 percent of the county not attending a gospel-preaching church in their own city.

We do not read that as a closed door. We read it as a wide open field: thousands of people who have never heard the gospel explained clearly, and believers with no church home nearby. A church here can serve this city for generations.

Damian and his family

Our Family

Gizelle and I met in Bible college in Southern California, and went into full-time ministry together in Burbank in 2013. After serving there for five years, God started uprooting us and calling us toward a team that was planting Storyline Church in Oakland.

In 2019, we moved north by faith, without fully knowing what it would take, started a local business, and served bi-vocationally to help launch Storyline. Over the years God has continued to shape us and lead us as we served in Oakland and grew our business.

A few years ago, God began to unsettle our heart in business and call us toward church planting again. Through much prayer and counsel, we believe God wants to establish a new church in American Canyon and that He is calling and sending our family into that mission.

Now, seven years after that first move, Storyline is sending us out to plant Canyon Church in the North Bay, alongside Send Network and Vintage Mission.

Damian & family

Trained, Coached, and Held Accountable

Send Network

Provides assessment, training, and ongoing coaching through the church-planting process, and connects us to a wider network of planters walking the same road.

Vintage Mission

Running our family through a hands-on residency before launch, covering doctrine, leadership, and the practical work of planting a church.

Storyline Church

Our sending church in Oakland. The same pastors who have walked with our family for years continue to provide direct oversight and accountability as we plant.

We are a people:

Called by God.
Formed in Christ.
Sent on mission.

A People

We were not a people. Now, by His mercy, we are His people.

1 Peter 2:9-10
Called by God

This is His church, and everything we do is for His glory.

Romans 11:36
Formed in Christ

God is shaping and forming us into the image of Christ.

Ephesians 4:15-16
Sent on Mission

We don't just gather. We scatter on mission, in our neighborhoods and to the nations.

Matthew 28:18-20

How We Live This Out

Shaped By
Truth

Scripture doesn't just inform us. It corrects us, trains us, and equips us for whatever God calls us to do.

2 Timothy 3:16-17
Captivated By
Glory

Worship isn't a warm-up act. We praise with passion and worship with reverence, engaging vertically with God before anything else.

Psalm 96:1-9
Sustained By
Prayer

Jesus said apart from Him we can do nothing. We refuse to attempt spiritual work in human strength.

John 15:4-8
Compelled By
The Gospel

Christ's love compels us to stop living for ourselves and reach the people around us.

2 Corinthians 5:14-20
Marked By
Good Works

God's people are saved for good works, not by them, and commanded to be eager to do them. This is how His people are recognized in the community.

Titus 3:8, 14
Our vision is to be…
A Place where people feel welcomed, loved, and valued.
A Catalyst for spiritual transformation in the Bay Area.
A Source of leaders, church planters, and kingdom workers on mission for the glory of God.

Through prayer and collaboration with other churches in our area, we want to be

a hub of spiritual restoration across the Bay, by establishing churches that serve our cities for generations to come.

“For the earth will be filled with the knowledge of the glory of the Lord as the waters cover the sea.” Habakkuk 2:14

Our measure is not what we gather, but what we send.

A Unique Model: Built By A Core Team

Canyon Church will not be established by our family alone. The Core Team is a working team, on mission together, praying, giving, building, and sacrificing to establish a church in their city. The team allows us to launch with momentum and move the mission forward quickly.

Now

Residency and Preparation

Completing the Vintage Mission church planting residency. Praying, raising support, and gathering the first families who will build this church with us.

January 2027

Core Team

The Core Team grows to 60 to 80 adults who are compelled, committed, courageous, and contagious. The team meets weekly for training in doctrine, culture, and leadership, and hosts Vision Meetings across the city, our front door for new members joining the team.

July 2027

Launch Team

The core team becomes a trained launch team. Serving roles are assigned, leaders are trained, children's ministry and volunteer teams are established, and we run practice services.

September 2027

Public Launch

Canyon Church goes public with a congregation already formed, already serving, and already giving.

Why this makes the church viable at launch

The Core Team's Generosity

The Core Team commits to pray, give, build, and sacrifice to establish this church. Their generosity is what makes it self-sustaining from the day it launches.

The Team Is Trained First

Weekly training in doctrine, culture, and leadership means kids ministry, hospitality, worship, and setup are run by equipped volunteers from day one, rather than staff hired after the fact.

Funded to Launch

Your gift covers the nine months it takes to get to launch day. From our first public Sunday, the congregation's own giving carries everything forward.

We are launching a church that is financially self-supporting. Here is what it takes to get there.

Scripture gives us wisdom for this work: count the cost, appoint leaders, and send with the support of the wider church. This is how that wisdom gets applied in our cultural context, a tested and proven model we're being trained in through Vintage Mission. It requires us to hit specific benchmarks before launch, because the readiness has to come first: partners outside our community, and a large, trained, giving Core Team inside it, both in place before we open the doors.

Outside support gives us the nine months of runway that gets us into the city, builds the team, and opens the doors.

$10,000

Training and Setup

Vintage Mission church planting residency and the organizational setup of the church, paid in full before January.

$150,000

Personnel and Team

Nine months of support for our family and a launch coordinator, so the mission gets full attention from day one.

$300,000

Startup and Operations

Everything it takes to run: setup and teardown, chairs, A/V, kids ministry, facility, marketing and communications, core team development, and places to meet for vision gatherings.

Total pre-launch need $460,000
$300KStartup
Where Startup and Operations Goes
Launch kit and equipment$105,000
Core team and vision meetings$87,000
Marketing and outreach$48,000
Sunday venue and storage$36,000
Administration$24,000
Fund the launch

Help us open the doors in American Canyon.

Give now Text Damian

Gifts are securely processed through Pushpay. Considering a larger gift, a church gift, stock, or a donor-advised fund? Email [email protected].