Tom Mercer

Tom has been in pastoral ministry for almost 50 years. For 38 of those years, he served as the Senior Pastor and primary teacher at the High Desert Church in Southern California. During that time, the church grew from 125 to over 14,000 regular attenders, from one campus to four.

For the past decade, Tom has also been an ambassador for the oikos principle around the world, frequently speaking at conferences, churches, university classrooms, and denominational gatherings, challenging church leaders to become more efficient through simplification.

Tom received his formal education at Biola University and Talbot Seminary. He is the author of three books, 8 to 15—The World is Smaller Than You Think, Not My Church, and Diary of a World Changer. Tom and his wife, Sheryl, have been married for 44 years. They have three married children and eleven grandchildren.