Bridges Of Light

Tim grew up in a family of eight, was saved as a   child and baptized as a believer. He is a graduate of Rockdale High School (Conyers, GA 1974), a veteran (US Navy, 1974-77), a former firefighter (Alaska Fire Services, 1978-84) and a graduate of the University of Alaska (B.Ed.1984). Grace is citizen of Barbados and Canada, a graduate of University of Manitoba (B.Ed., BA, English, 1978), a Children’s Ministry Institute adjunct faculty member (2001), a home educator (A Beka Academy), and a missionary. The Hatches are members of First Baptist Church in Conyers, Georgia.

Prior to marriage, Tim taught elementary, middle and high school and coached athletic teams at middle and high school, college and university levels (University of South Alabama) while Grace taught in rural Canadian villages. Introduced to international missions by Campus Crusade for Christ (Athletes in Action Basketball), Tim served in Ecuador, Peru, Brazil, Bolivia, and the Philippines (1985-1990).

Tim and Grace met while teaching in Lhasa, Tibet and Heng Yeng, Hunan Province, China respectively (English Language Institute, 1991). They married in Winnipeg, Manitoba (1992) and team-taught middle school at Zion Christian Academy in Winnipeg before moving to Milwaukee, Wisconsin, where all three children were born. The Hatches served as directors of Child Evangelism Fellowship of Southeast Wisconsin from 1995 to 2003. In addition to their local leadership, which included training pastors and lay people, discipling teens and adults, and placing after school Bible clubs in 37 public elementary schools, Tim served as Wisconsin interim State Director.

In the fall of 2003, the family moved to Minneapolis, Minnesota where Tim and Grace studied Bible and Missions at Bethany College of Missions in preparation for service overseas. Tim accepted a teaching position at the Royal University of Law and Economics in Phnom Penh, Cambodia (2006-2008), there becoming involved in a church-planting movement among Mekong River villages bordering Vietnam. Grace served as a high school English teacher at HOPE International School.

Today, the Hatches teach 5th Grade, high school English and Bible at HOPE International School in Phnom Penh, Cambodia, investing themselves in the lives of missionary children like theirs, thus enabling parents to serve in the capacity of God’s calling as career missionaries. Additionally, they work alongside expatriate and indigenous Christians in evangelism and discipleship in local churches and church planting movements – “a light to the nations so that His salvation may reach to the ends of the earth” (Isaiah 49:6b).

To learn more about the Hatch family ministry, please visit http://www.bridgesoflight.net