Our Story

Open Life is the result of a divine interruption during a board meeting at Northwest Family Church February 10, 2009 in Auburn, WA. The Northwest Ministry Network was present asking if anyone on that church’s staff would feel the call to start a new church in Bonney Lake that would exist for those who were not in a relationship with Jesus. Thad Huff, youth pastor for 13 years at that point with the last 4 at NFC, felt the nudge of the Holy Spirit and the journey of trying to determine if it was God or the pizza began. Well, it wasn’t the pizza...having lived in Bonney Lake for 4 years at that point, Thad & Dana Huff and family accepted the shift in focus from youth in Auburn to the unchurched in their city!

They assembled a team by asking many of their friends through Facebook and neighbors if they would join in on the mission of Jesus in Bonney Lake; people leading people into a growing relationship with Jesus. During the summer of 2009 began the formation point of a launch team. They settled on a pre-launch gathering in the Huff home in the fall of 2009 and by January 10, 2010 the church had grown to need a gathering space; therefore launching a service in the Regal with 121 people (pictured above). Since the launch the church has experienced great favor and has become a key ingredient in the life of the city of Bonney Lake as they build and serve the community through moments like Love Week, Big Give and being strategically generous through various community partnerships. They have now moved the gathering to Bonney Lake High School and are enjoying the flexibility of meeting in this central space within community that allows for continued rapid growth.

We have discovered the reality of being a church movement and not just a church gathering. The desire to reproduce churches both locally and globally took further shape on Christmas Eve 2012 when Open Life partnered with the launch of another expression of the church in Sumner, Living Hope. Pastored by Brent Osborne who apprenticed for one year with Open Life, the focus of this campus is to reach the people of Sumner with the same DNA we have been pouring into Bonney Lake for the past 3 years. More communities are in our sights, we continue to apprentice and look for open doors as we lead people into a growing relationship with Jesus.