We are a small group of people learning to love one another and our neighbors more every week. We are old and young and every age between. We are single, married, divorced, healing, broken, re-married, hurting, joyful, excited, depressed, anxious, happy, and...you get it. We’re regular people, trying to turn our attention to God.

Together we’re discovering God in Christ through the Hebrew-Christian scriptures, through the history of Jesus’ church, and through our real-life experiences. In a sense, we’re learning how to join Jesus’ own work—his way of patient forgiveness, fearless compassion, and the kind of love that heals and builds everyone up.

Tov Communion is a peaceful community of average folks wanting to depart from our world’s exhaustion and chaos—to break free from the shame and fear and guilt of high control religion—and to enter a way of compassionate healing with Jesus. We are working through the difficult, the painful, and the good times of life, learning to see how God makes all things good and beautiful in time.

Our pastor, Ben Tertin, began ministering in East Portland in 2007. He served as a youth and young adult pastor until 2015 and as a lead pastor ever since. The beginnings of Tov Communion were underway by late 2018, and in late 2021 he accepted an offer to serve as a biblical research and editing scholar with an education-technology nonprofit (bibleproject.com). This vocational focus allows Ben to serve Tov Communion without pay, which is true for all who serve and lead. It’s all volunteer.

Ben and his wife, Ali, grew up in the Midwest but now call Portland home. Their two kids, Annabelle and Wesley, were learning to tie ropes and hammer nails before they learned to read. On any given weekend, you'll find them building tree houses and swings in the backyard or adventuring in the Pacific Northwest woods with Daisy, their German Shorthair Pointer. Or just chilling and doing nothing at all.

Pastor Ben is a storyteller and thinker who studies lots of Bible and theology, lots of New Testament contest, and lots about the rock band Phish, but his love for people outweighs the rest. He values mutuality in leading, which means there are no people in Tov Communion who are more or less important, more or less valued, etc.

Hoping to embrace Jesus’ instructions about good humility in leadership, Ben likes to quote Hans Urs von Balthasar and frequently remind us that “Love alone is credible.”

— TOV COMMUNION —