Don was born and raised in Salt Lake City, Utah, into the home of an Independent Baptist family. His parents were members of the only Independent Baptist Church in the city of Salt Lake. At the age of five, Don made a profession of faith and was baptized three years later. When Don was thirteen, Don’s family went with their pastor to establish the Anchor Baptist Church in southern Salt Lake City. During high school, the Lord brought Linda’s family to Salt Lake City. She and her mother began to attend the Anchor Baptist Church, and that is where Don and Linda met.
After graduation from high school, Don went to Minnesota to attend Pillsbury Baptist Bible College. During his third year of Bible school, Don realized that he had been trusting in his prayer at the age of five and not in Christ. He accepted Christ as his Savior in the spring of 1968 and was Baptized in the First Baptist Church in New Ulm, Minnesota, the next fall where he worked with the young people during his final year in college.
Linda was born in Tacoma, Washington and saved at the age of six in her home. After her family’s move to Salt Lake and Linda’s graduation from high school, Linda stayed in Salt Lake City studying a three year nursing program. Upon her graduation from nurse’s training, Don and Linda were married in Salt Lake City in July of 1968. They returned to Minnesota for Don’s last year of Bible college.
After Don’s graduation, they returned to Salt Lake City where Don served as the associate pastor of the Anchor Baptist Church for one year and Linda worked at a local hospital. While at the church, Don worked specifically with the young people, helped in the construction of the church’s education building, made visits, and preached in the pastor’s absence.
During Don’s childhood years, many missionaries passed through Salt Lake City visiting his church. Every year at camp, there were missionary speakers. When Don went to Bible College, he went to prepare to go to the mission field. The day that he truly accepted Christ as his Savior was a Wednesday, and that night he went forward to make a public profession of faith. The pastor asked him what he felt God’s plan for his life was, and Don responded saying that unless God changed things, he was going to go to the mission field. God did not change them. He fortified them during the year that he served as associate pastor in Salt Lake City.
In July of 1970, Don and Linda were sent out by the Anchor Baptist Church in Salt Lake City and approved as missionaries to Brazil under the World Baptist Fellowship. They left for Manaus, Brazil, in June of 1972. After two years of language study, they moved to southern Brazil where they served in various locations establishing churches, Bible schools, and a mission agency, until they returned to the States in 1998.
In August of 1998, Don took the position of Mission Director of the IBFI Mission Agency in Fort Worth, Texas. They moved their church membership to Victory Baptist Church, Weatherford, Texas which became their sending church. In 2001, Linda joined Don in the office and has served as the mission office secretary.
In November of 2006, the Lord began to lead Don and Linda to return to Brazil. They were endorsed by the Global Independent Baptist Mission Agency on February 20, 2007 and are presently on deputation raising the needed support to return to Brazil.
Don and Linda have five children who all faithfully serve the Lord. All five have graduated from college, and four of them are married. Their second son lives in Brazil and manages a Christian radio station. They also have five grandchildren.