About Us

Mission Statement
The purposes of this Church are to bring glory to God by equipping God's people of all cultures for the work of the ministry and to bring its member to the point of Grace.

History
GracePoint Fellowship had its beginning when a group of people decided to meet together to finish the study of John's Gospel begun during the term of service of Jerome Wernow as an interim pastor. Meeting in various backyards and homes of the summer of 2000 to study John, to pray, and to fellowship, a vision was born to begin a church. A desire to live "considered" lives, growing through study of the Word of God and the practice of spiritual disciplines was held in common by the group. The Washougal Grange building was home to the fledgling church which officially formed in September of 2001. After meeting at the grange for a year, the group had outgrown the facility and looked for another venue. Now meeting at Prune Hill Elementary School in Camas, the church has grown in number as well as in God's grace


Jerome and Mary Ellen

Pastoral Team
Jerome Wernow Ph.D., R.Ph. and Mary Ellen Wernow Ed.D.

Jerome’s Journey
I was born into a family with both Jewish and Catholic traditions and came to know Jesus Christ in my childhood through catechism classes taught by a Franciscan priest in a small rural Ohio town. After moving to a big town environment with an institutionalized church, cathedral and all, I exchanged the values and traditions that I learned in childhood for the pleasures, buffoonery, and idealism of the late 60s and early 70s radical movements. This trail ended in despair as I was terminated from a graduate program in pharmacology, a crushing blow that softened my stony heart. During this crisis I encountered the reality of Jesus Christ again in the gentleness and peacefulness I once knew as a child.

Life and truth came back into my journey, and what a journey it’s been! Since those days of spiritual transformation I have walked the paths of medical missions as a pharmacist in Borneo, directed a hospital pharmacy in Portland, received awards for helping chemically dependent pharmacists, survived the ups and downs of the healthcare industry, completed a doctorate in Europe, researched and taught as a European scholar, buried a church and a seminary program, founded a bioethics center, and have been enriched by a host of other stories of success and failure. During this journey, an inner desire has emerged to use my education and life experiences to help others who seek to deepen their spiritual encounters with God through intelligent scriptural study, prayer, meditation, authentic worship, and service in the local community.

Editors note:
Jerome is pastor of GracePoint Fellowship in Camas, Washington and was ordained by First Baptist Church of Corvallis, Oregon. He is also the executive director of the Northwest Center for Bioethics in Portland, teaches as an adjunct faculty member at Western Seminary Portland, Oregon and at Golden Gate Seminary in Vancouver, Washington. He has published widely in the areas of theology, bioethics, and philosophy. Some of his works can be found at www.ncbioethics.org and
www.cbhd.org.

Mary Ellen's Story
I grew up in a missionary/ pastor’s family, moving back and forth between cultures in Africa, Guam, and the Northwest. I can’t remember a time when I didn’t know Jesus, but during a five-day club I attended at age six, I realized that I personally needed to make a decision to become God’s child and to follow him. Following high school, I spent eight months working on an Israeli kibbutz, an experience that broadened my vision of God and his heart for the world. College and graduate school, combined with church ministry and a variety of jobs, provided excellent training for life and further ministry. It was during this time that Jerome and I met and were married. In 1989, our family moved to Belgium to serve with Greater Europe Mission. Language and cultural studies, Bible school teaching and administration, local church ministry, outreach via English as a Foreign Language classes, women’s Bible study facilitation, church leadership, and family responsibilities were all a part of my life in Belgium. Our return to the Northwest at the end of 1996 enriched my life further through friendships, church ministry, joys, sorrows, and a deepening of my relationship with the Father. As a result, I seek to know God more each day, to be transformed through the indwelling presence of Christ so that I may walk in his truth with an undivided heart, following his path for life, fearing him, praising him, glorifying him, and enjoying him for all eternity. I seek to share his grace with others in order that they also may know and follow him. (Philippians 3:10; Galatians 2:20; Psalm 86:11-12; Psalm 16:11.)

  GracePoint Fellowship · PO Box 632, Camas, WA 98607 · Phone (360) 600-0980