Staff
Pastor Gary is a devout believer that “a great church seeks to live out the Great Commandments and the Great Commission.” Thus Jesus’ charges to “love God with all your heart,” “love your neighbor as yourself,” and “go and make disciples of all peoples” form the foundation for his pastoral ministry.
Dr. Olsen is an Equipper for the ChristCare small-group ministry system, having trained in St. Louis with Stephen Ministry. Along with the rest of the Rolling Hills Equipper team, Gary has outfitted over 60 church members for Christian ministry leadership. Utilizing ChristCare for the first time ever in the design of a research project, Pastor Gary earned his Doctor of Ministry degree May 2007 at Asbury Theological Seminary in Wilmore, Kentucky. His dissertation’s title was “Disciple-Making Boards: The Impact of Training a Church’s Governing Board in Small-Group Spiritual Formation Leadership.”
In 2002, Gary and his wife Joyce each earned the Certificate of Advanced Church Leadership from the Beeson Institute, a three-year seminary program to take pastors and church leaders to cutting-edge, teaching churches across the United States. Through Rev. Olsen’s leadership, Rolling Hills has been a pilot congregation for the latest programs from Stephen Ministry and Purpose-Driven Churches.
His latest venture in 2008 has been to become a certified online workshop provider, exploring the possibilities of the Internet to make and grow disciples of Jesus Christ.
When asked about interests and hobbies, Gary lists his wife, their two children and their spouses, and their two grand-children!
A native of southern California, he has earned: a B.A. degree from the University of California, Los Angeles, with a major in Urban History and a minor in Cultural Geography; a Masters of Divinity from Nashotah House Episcopal Seminary, near Milwaukee, Wis.; and Clinical Pastoral Education units at Pawtucket Memorial Hospital, Pawtucket, R.I. through Interfaith Healthcare Ministries. Rev Olsen possesses ordination standing in the United Church of Christ and the Christian Church (Disciples of Christ).
The Rev. Dr. Gary L. Olsen began his ministry at Rolling Hills Community Church on October 1, 1992. Our unique four-denominational concept was a positive force in his decision to become our pastor. His enthusiasm and dedication to the unique challenge are readily apparent as he continues to fulfill a very vital role in the leadership and spiritual growth of our church.
Dr. Leonard McCormick - Organist/Choir Master
Dr. Leonard McCormick, organist of Rolling Hills Community Church. Dr. McCormick leads the congregational singing in the traditional Sunday worship services at 8:30 and 11:00 a.m., as well as accompany the choir and provide concert-level performances to enhance worship.
Dr. McCormick comes to Rolling Hills after a four decade career as a music educator and college administrator at Tarrant County College, in the Dallas-Fort Worth area. He started at the College as an instructor of music in 1967. He later served as a department chair on the South Campus for 18 years, then moved to the Southeast Campus in 1996, where he became Chair of the Humanities Division in 2001. In 2002, McCormick was appointed Dean of Instruction of the Southeast Campus, where he oversaw faculty, curriculum, and student academic matters until his retirement in July 2005.
In 1999, McCormick received the Chancellor’s Award for Exemplary Teaching. Two other recent acknowledgements include the Elston Brooks Lifetime Achievement in Theatre Award given by the Live Theatre League of Tarrant County, and the Dallas-Fort Worth Theater Critics Forum’s 2002 Outstanding Achievement for Musical Direction in a production of Stephen Sondheim’s Putting It Together at Stage West.
McCormick earned his doctorate in higher education from Florida’s Nova University and his bachelor’s and master’s degrees in music from the University of Texas at Austin. Additional graduate work was completed at the University of North Texas and Southern Illinois University.
Judy Geddes - Youth & Care Coordinator
Judy Geddes began membership and her employment at Rolling Hills Community Church in 1998. She has been actively involved in youth ministry during the past nine years as director of the Youth Choir, Coordinator of the elementary youth programs, and this past year she has taken on the responsibility of the Middle School and High School youth ministry. Judy is a Stephen Leader in the Stephen Ministry program, Christ Care Small Group Leader, and Lay Ministry Leader in the Church. She is involved in the Care Ministry of the church, and oversees most care needs of those who request help. This can include prayer requests, food needs, hospital and nursing home visitation, or fulfilling a request for a Stephen Minister.
Judy and her husband Bill love camping, gardening, animals (especially cats), and their five granddaughters. Wherever they go Judy always keeps her cell phone handy and is in constant touch with the church. Reaching her is never a problem and she welcomes any and all calls regardless of the time of day.
Dave Hart - Praise Band Leader
Dave spent most of his youth growing up in Northern California. At an early age he was interested in music and started his musical journey by taking up the drums. He studied percussion with a respected instructor, Todd Fleming, for several years. In his senior year of high school he started playing guitar and singing to expand his musical knowledge. This was prompted by an opportunity to join a new band that was being formed. Dave continued his education at Santa Rosa Junior College where he majored in music. While attending college he maintained his professional music career in a bay area band named Steele. This band went on to be offered a record contract, but the band decided to turn it down in hopes of a better offer. While Steele did not become a national act, they were well known in Northern California and played with many nationally known artists. Dave went on to form other bands in the later part of the 1980’s and eventually transitioned into writing, producing, and recording his own music as well as other artists. He continues to write, produce, and record Christian music currently.
Dave’s non-musical carrier resides in the software industry. He has been working for software companies for over 20 years in various roles. He attained a senior management position in a Northern California firm that produced various automated insurance rating programs. In 2003 Dave and his family moved to Lago Vista and he joined Highland Lakes Software. This company produces enterprise programs for telecommunications billing and accounting. He currently holds a senior management position overseeing the software support and quality assurance departments.
Dave, his wife of 21 years Jamie, and his daughter Sabrina joined Rolling Hills Community Church shortly after moving to Lago Vista in 2003 and have all been active members ever since. Dave joined the contemporary praise band in late 2003 as the bassist and a vocalist. He later transitioned into a lead guitar role and continued to sing lead and backup vocals. He took over the leadership role for the praise band on January 1, 2010.
Sherry Hoyt - Communications Coordinator
Sherry joined Rolling Hills Community Church staff in October of 2000 as Communications Coordinator. She has 20 years experience in the Administrative field. Her responsibilities include preparation of weekly worship outline and powerpoint information, weekly electronic newsletter, all advertisement literature and newspaper ads. She also maintains the church database and website.
Sherry is originally from Dallas, Texas and moved to Lago Vista in 1997. She and her daughter, Danielle, joined the church in 1999. Prior to joining RHCC staff she worked as a substitute teacher for LVISD.
She and her husband Bill were married in January of 2004 by Rev. Gary Olsen. Bill retired from Continental airlines in 2008 and started his own computer repair business "Hoyt Computer Consultant LLC" http://www.hoytcc.com/. Danielle Graduated from UTSA May 8, 2010 with a BBA in Marketing and is pursuing a career in the marketing field.
Jan joined the staff as Bookkeeper at Rolling Hills in 2000 following seven years as an office volunteer. She brings 25 years of experience to the job having spent most of her working life supervising the office activities for Dallco Industries. Her office days are Tuesdays and Thursdays. She handles most of the accounting and bookkeeping functions for RHCC.
Jan and Bob moved to Lago Vista in 1993. They have two daughters, six grandchildren and seven great-grandchildren. She loves to play golf and enjoys reading. The Lehigh’s are active members of the Explorer Sunday School Class, an adult Sunday school class that meets Sunday mornings.
Bettie Norris - Children’s Day Out
Bettie is the Director of the Children's Day Out program at Rolling Hills Community Church. She was born in Alice, Texas in 1972. She grew up in a variety of places: Corpus Christi Texas, Chattanooga Tennessee, and Houston Texas. She graduated in 1990 from Kempner High School in Houston. Bettie attended college at the University of Houston, until she and her husband moved to Austin in 1993. She transferred to The Univerity of Texas at Austin and graduated from UT with a BS degree in Applied Learning and Developmemt, with a minor in creative drama. She is also certified by the State of Texas to teach K-8 grades and has an early childhood endorsement that certifies her to also teach in Pre-K and Kindergarten. After graduating UT, she taught at a private kindergarten in Austin for five years. They moved their family to Lago Vista in May of 1999. Bettie and Charles have been married 17 years and have two daughters, Autumn and Hayley and one son Charles Elijah. They joined Rolling Hills Community Church in November 2001. Prior to working at RHCC she was a co-owner of an Education and Enrichment center here locally. Presently she is active at Rolling Hills as a small group leader and teaches at the Sunday evening Youth activities.
Elisabeth Hunter - RHCA Teacher
I joined Rolling Hills Community Church staff in September of 2009 as a Teacher for the Rolling Hills Christian Academy. I was desperately looking for a change. I was working in the Insurance industry, where I was not happy and my heart desired to be back in the field that I felt was my calling: teaching. After praying Proverbs 3:5 “Trust in the Lord with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding; In all your ways acknowledge Him, and He will make your paths straight.” – the Lord TRULY guided me to Rolling Hills Christian Academy.
I believe that I am one of those people who “was born to teach” – in fact, in the Little Miss Broken Arrow Pageant (when I was 4 years old!) I announced that I would be a teacher. My first jobs were teaching musical theatre and acting to 4 & 5 year olds!
After an adventurous and theater-filled childhood spent in Oklahoma, New York and California, I attended college at The University of Texas at San Antonio, where I graduated with a Bachelor of Arts Degree. While in college I worked as a Pre-School teacher and a Professional Nanny. I married my college sweetheart, Jared Hunter, in May 2003, and we began our life in the Austin area in 2004.
Our precious son, Hudson John-William, was born in September 2006 and we moved our little family to Jared’s hometown of Lago Vista! Since moving to Lago Vista, I am a member of the Hill Country Singers Choir, was honored to play the leading lady role of “Rose Alvarez” in last summer’s community production of “Bye, Bye Birdie!”, and will be a part of the Lago Vista Player’s spring production of “The Dining Room”. I am a co-teacher of the Rolling Hills “Super Sprouts” (2-3 year old) Sunday school class, and a member of the “Roots Troop” Sunday school curriculum team.
My Blog:http://hudsonsmom.blogspot.com
Linda Jameson - Nursery Supervisor
My family and I have been members of Rolling Hills Community Church since December of 2002. I am originally from the Houston area and moved to Central, Texas in 1981. I have been employed at Orthopedic Group now known as Texas Orthopedics since August 1981 as a Patient Account Rep.
My husband Rob and I married in 1997 in Kauai, Hawaii under a waterfall. We were living in North Austin at the time and decided shortly after marrying to make the move to Lago Vista. We were blessed with a terrific daughter, Lily in 1998. We started visiting area churches and landed at Rolling Hills. In July of 2003 I was reading the LOG and saw the ad for a Nursery Supervisor at RHCC. I was so excited I could hardly stand it! I LOVE children! I quickly phoned Judy Geddes and after interviews with Board members and Pastor Gary, they hired me to work Sunday mornings in the nursery. It has been so fulfilling to watch the babies grow into young Christians. I have also been able to have Lily by my side to watch her grow into a young lady, trusting God and helping others. She is developing into a leader day by day and I get to be a part of it! I was also blessed to have various nursery workers starting out as teens to assist in the nursery. I have enjoyed watching them and talking with them as they grow and move into adulthood life while still keeping in touch with them.
I have been actively involved in helping with the Youth ministry at Rolling Hills wherever needed, from Pioneer Club to Kids’ Quest, youth choir and countless other areas including driving, planning trips for the children and baking cakes for various celebrations. I am also Co-Service Unit Director for the Songbird Service Unit, Registrar, Gold and Silver Award Consultant, Troop Leader for Girl Scout Troop 1185 and Robotics Coach with the Girl Scouts of Central Texas.
I consider myself blessed for being able to work with God's children in so many ways.
Bill Geddes - Building Maintenance
Bill Geddes has been employed as custodian since April 2005. He and his wife Judy retired to the Lake Travis area in 1998, after eight years of full-time RVing, and made their home in Jonestown. Bill, a retired Navy Chief, is a veteran of WWII, Korean and Viet Nam wars. He and Judy have two children and five granddaughters.
Bill considers it an honor to serve in the church, and cheerfully accomplishes his daily tasks, which always includes making coffee first thing and having it ready for the staff when they arrive. Bill will tell you that keeping God’s house clean “isn’t a job, it’s his privilege”.
