Our Staff

Tony Ranvestel, Lead Pastor

Our lead pastor, Tony Ranvestel, has been married to his wife Sarah since 2002. They have four children: a daughter, Raya, and three sons, Brooks, Max, and Jude. They moved to Lafayette from Champaign, Illinois in 2006 with a small team of people to start Clear River Church. In Champaign, Tony was a pastor in an established church and Sarah taught 1st grade. Tony was actually studying to be a tropical biologist before he and Sarah felt God nudging them to plant a church. Unfortunately for Tony, he's a huge Bears fan, which usually results in tears of pain and suffering after every game. He also loves backpacking, fishing for smallmouth bass, Italian beef sandwiches with fries, and changing his facial hair style as the Holy Spirit leads. Sarah is a big fan of scrapbooking, eating cotton candy, taking brisk walks and she absolutely loves being a mom!

Zach Miller, Associate Pastor

Zach Miller, our associate pastor, has been married to his wife Emi since Semptember of 2009. Zach graduated from Purdue with a degree in Mechanical Engineering, and not too longer after, decided to give up playing around with engines to obey God and become a pastor. You will more than likely find Zach in one of three places in his free time: In his basement doing the work of a carpenter, in his garage functioning as a mechanic, or falling asleep in the strangest of places (he has narcoleptic tendencies). His wife, Emi, might be the "World's Best Cook" and she also enjoys gardening, being healthy, and playing with their two "kids", Jackson, a dog, and Sassafras, a spunky cat.

Kurt McConnell, Pastoral Assistant

Our pastoral assistant, Kurt McConnell, likes to be physically active. In fact, it's been rumored that he will often run around the church building when no one is looking, although no one has photographical evidence to prove it. Kurt is a 2009 Purdue grad with a degree in Physical and Health Education. Although he hails from a small farm in Bloomington, IN he has been a lifetime Boilermaker. Kurt was a student manager for Purdue’s football team for five seasons and now is an assistant football coach at Jeff High School. He loves to play sports, watch The Office, and make people laugh, so if you aren’t laughing at him, just pretend, it'll help boost his self-esteem.

Heather Leman, Clear River Kids Director

Heather Leman, our Kids Director, gets things done. She is always a step ahead. Before you think it, she's already done it. Heather got married at age 20, became the director of our prestigious Kids Church not too long after, and, with her husband Tom, purchased a massive house to fill with kids, all before graduating college. Her husband Tom likes to build tables and work around the house, and he has perfected the art of the Farmer's Tan while he works in the agriculture industry. In their free time they both love to play board games, be oustide, and spend time with friends

Greg Smith, Bookkeeper

Our Bookkeeper, Greg Smith, doesn't like using calculators, so he counts using his fingers. Lucky for us he has 7 fingers on each hand. Greg has been working at Clear River since 2008 and just recently graduated from Purdue and is now a real estate agent. He is married to Heather and they have an energetic and springy dog named Toby. Greg and Heather also enjoy playing games with cool names like Cities & Knights of Catan, Killer Bunnies and Dominion. Just don't stay up too late playing games with Greg or he might get frozen laughing. We realize that sounds strange but just picture him laughing hysterically, then hit the pause button. Only you can't un-pause him in frozen laugh mode.

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