Pastor Don is homegrown. He grew up in the local area as a farm-boy and graduated from a nearby high school. After a relatively uneventful childhood, it was when he graduated from high school years that things began to change for Don. Two months after his graduation from high school, Don was in India as part of the Peace Corps and studying agriculture at a university there. He served in India for more than two years, living in a small village and working as an agriculturist.

When he returned to the US, Don enrolled in a Bible College where he studied the Bible and Christian thought. There, he also met Vivian, the girl who would become his wife. Don later worked for several years as a bi-vocational pastor, combining pastoral duties with his work as a logger and also a log-home builder. Through the course of his studies and through the years, he eventually finished a Master’s Degree in Biblical Studies and was ordained as a minister.

Although Don was a local pastor, he continued also to be involved in other countries. When he and Vivian were newly married, they led some summer ministry trips to Ireland and also to Mexico, where they had teams of about 30 high-school and college aged kids to do work and ministry in these places. The Rhody family grew, and it was during those years, Don and Vivian had four sons.

 

Some years later, Pastor Don and family moved to Venezuela, where Don and Vivian joined the staff of Ebenezer Bible Institute in the city of San Cristobal. Don's work there was to begin an extension program on Pastoral Training for the Bible Institute. That program grew to be an international work in which he aided in setting up Bible Training Centers in fourteen countries of Central and South America, training more than 10,000 pastors of small churches.

 

The Log Church of Tripoli, WI

Pastor Don

Because of dangerous living conditions that developed on the Colombian/Venezuelan border where they lived, the Rhody family was later evacuated from Venezuela. After a brief stay at their little farm in Wisconsin, the family then moved next to Guatemala, were they lived for about five years.

Pastor Don was next recruited to begin a similar type of pastor training work in a completely other area of the world – this time in the Islands of the South Pacific. By now, all of the boys had grown and were on their own, so just Don and Vivian moved to New Zealand. While living there, Don did some preliminary work in New Zealand and a few of the Islands, such as Fiji and Samoa.

After being away from their beloved farm in Wisconsin for so long, Don and Vivian are now glad to be back home, and Pastor Don is happy to be serving in the Log Church in Tripoli. Don also does a lot of writing. He has had four books on Biblical themes published, and is currently working on another book.

 

He also keeps up with a blog page, www.donaldrhody.com. This blog also is normally about topics of life and faith, but often just about country things and lighter themes.Pastor Don, his wife Vivian, and all at the Log Church welcome you to join them in their worship any Sunday morning or for any special services. Please keep in touch through the web site, or you may also contact Pastor Don directly atdonaldrhody@gmail.com