On a quiet stretch of Bollinger Road in Cupertino, California, West Valley Presbyterian Church opens its doors each Sunday for a 9:30 am worship service that draws a multi-generational congregation from across the Santa Clara Valley. The church's tagline captures its ambition: "Where strangers become friends, friends become family, and together we serve the community in Christ's name." Members describe the body as a congregation committed to "God's heart, hands, and feet" for the surrounding community, and as an ECO (Evangelical Covenant Order) Presbyterian church, it ties that local calling to a broader Reformed tradition.
The Vision Frame: Embracing Strangers to Become Family
The clearest window into what West Valley Presbyterian Church wants to be is its Vision Frame, a four-part document organized around Mission, Values, Strategy, and Measures.
The mission statement reads, "Embracing strangers to become friends, Friends to become family, and Family to become God's heart, hands, and feet." The four values the church says it is "passionate about" are growing closer (offering comfort, support, compassion, prayer, and healing), growing deeper (hunger for Scripture and discipleship), growing stronger (praying wholeness into one another and encouraging each other), and growing further (extending gracious care and tender justice through ministries of healing, teaching, prayer, and service).
The strategy the church uses to accomplish its mission is grouped into four practical commitments: Living the God Life Together through supportive fellowship; Cultivating Corporate Worship that is "heart-felt, meaningful worship" where each person can come to God just as they are; Creating Mission Makers and Mission Takers who work for healing, restoration, justice, and reconciliation; and Developing Youth of Good Character by modeling intellectual growth, healthy habits, and spiritual depth for community young people and their families.
The measures of success are equally concrete. As members grow in Christ, the church expects them to become increasingly "Whole-hearted in Worship," "Skilled in Scripture," "Practiced in Prayer," "Steeped in Story," and "Working in the World." Whole-hearted worship, the document explains, is whole-life worship, unrestricted to a weekly time and location, lived out individually and as the gathered people of God.
Worship on Sunday Mornings
Sunday morning worship at West Valley begins at 9:30 am. The service centers on God, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, and the leaders describe the gathering as one where "messages of hope and help for transforming lives to be Christ-like" are shared. After the service, members are invited to the patio for coffee, a treat, and a chance to greet friends and newcomers.
The music program reflects the congregation's stated intention to be a multi-generational community. Worship Director Hardy Hemphill leads a small group of musicians, and the livestream blends contemporary and traditional selections. The music ministry quotes Ephesians 5:19-20: "Speak to one another with Psalms, hymns and spiritual songs. Sing and make music in your heart to the Lord, always giving thanks to God the Father for everything, in the name of our Lord, Jesus Christ." The weekly choir and contemporary ensemble were put on hiatus during the pandemic; the team has been experimenting with socially-distanced, masked special music as conditions allow.
Behind every Sunday gathering is a team of people serving in sound, video, and lighting. The church welcomes anyone interested and skilled in those areas to join that team; inquiries go through the church office.
The service is livestreamed on YouTube at 9:30 am on most Sunday mornings, and an archive of past messages stretches back more than a decade to 2012. The sermon archive includes every recorded service by date, scripture text, and preacher, along with bulletins and sermon notes for many recent weeks.
Pastoral Leadership and Governance
The current pastor of West Valley Presbyterian Church is the Rev. Florence (Flo) Deans, who serves as Part-Time Transitional Pastor. Pastor Flo was born in Hong Kong, the daughter of missionary parents. She attended a British school with international classmates and learned Cantonese playing with the neighbor children. After high school, she moved to upstate New York to attend the University of Rochester, where she discerned a call to vocational ministry. She then moved to California and earned a Masters in Intercultural Studies from Fuller Theological Seminary's School of World Mission, followed by a Master of Divinity from the School of Theology.
Pastor Flo moved to the Bay Area in 2000 and has served in pastoral ministry with children, teenagers, college students, adults, and seniors at several Bay Area churches. She and her husband Bill, a software engineer, have three children. Before stepping into her role at West Valley, she led a small group at her home church, Menlo Church Saratoga, while volunteering in her children's schools.
The Rev. Janet Russell serves as Moderator of the Session and continues to preach regularly. The Session, the church's governing body, includes Jeff Stanish (Administration Commission), Terri Dias (Christian Education), Nancy Hobbs (Worship), Kevin Pasquinelli (Personnel), and Jim Liddiard (Clerk). The Board of Deacons is led by Maggie Day (Moderator), with Janet Shaw as Secretary/Treasurer, and members Anna Brafchak, Karen Clark, Melanie Eslinger, Bob Kuechler, and Bonnie Ngai.
The staff team includes Lanette Bell as Office Manager, Lidia Fernandez in Facilities and Maintenance, Hardy Hemphill as Director of Worship, and Terri Dias as Director of Children's Ministries.
KidsConnect: The Children's Ministry
Children's ministry at West Valley Presbyterian Church happens through KidsConnect, a program for kindergarten through fifth grade. The church teaches that "each and every child is created and loved by God," and offers a safe place for children to grow spiritually, nurtured by "dedicated, loving members of our Christian community."
KidsConnect exists to help children "build a lasting relationship with God, explore His message to us in The Bible, and what it means to live out their faith." Teachers and leaders are thoroughly screened and trained and serve as mentors and positive role models. The director of Children's Ministries, Terri Dias, is the contact for the program and can be reached through the church office.
Two scripture passages frame the ministry. Proverbs 22:6 reads, "Start children off on the way they should go, and even when they are old they will not turn from it." First Corinthians 12:27 reminds the congregation that "now you are the body of Christ, and each one of you is a part of it."
Men's Prayer and Study Fellowship
Men at West Valley meet each Thursday morning from 8:30 am to 9:30 am for a virtual Prayer and Study Fellowship held over Zoom. The hour combines fellowship, prayer, and discussion of the previous Sunday's sermon. The format is intentionally simple and accessible for men who want to connect with other believers during the work week without committing to a longer program. Contact the church office for the link to participate.
Local and Global Missions
West Valley Presbyterian Church commits at least 10 percent of its annual church budget to local and global missions. The church frames this commitment in plain terms: members want to "tangibly make the love of Christ known to a hungry and hurting world." Mission Department members include Donna Perry (Moderator), Sandy Todd, Sue Willey, and Parker Willey.
On the local side, the church supports a range of partner organizations across the Santa Clara Valley:
- Adults Toward Independent Living (atilhouses.com): An all-volunteer, non-profit organization established in 1976 that provides housing for disabled adults in specially designed facilities that let residents lead independent lives while sharing the costs of attendant care.
- CityTeam Ministries San Jose (cityteam.org/sanjose): Provides hot meals, safe shelter, showers, and clean clothing for the area's homeless population, along with recovery programs for men and women, including Heritage Home, which serves homeless pregnant women and their newborns.
- Real Options (realoptions.net): Fully licensed free community care clinics offering pregnancy tests, ultrasound exams, information, counseling, and support for men and women making pregnancy-related decisions, plus STD/STI education, prenatal care, and post-abortion and post-adoption assistance.
- Teen Challenge (teenchallenge.net): Provides recovery for men, women, teens, children, and families struggling with destructive, abusive, and addictive lifestyles through mentoring, education, training, and spiritual direction.
- The Refuge: A ministry of New Beginnings Church, sponsored in partnership with WVPC volunteers who serve a meal and bring worship music monthly at Sunnyvale's Murphy Park Community Center.
- West Valley Community Services (wvcommunityservices.org): Provides housing, food, and other emergency services in the community.
Internationally, West Valley supports:
- Pioneers (pioneers.org): Missionaries serving throughout the globe.
- Rancho Santa Marta (ranchosantamarta.org): A non-denominational Evangelical Christian ministry for orphans and special-needs children from low-income families, located on a 450-acre ranch in San Vincente, Baja California, Mexico. WVPC sends an intergenerational short-term mission team to the ranch each February.
- World Venture (worldventure.com): Adam and Anna Day, a WVPC-sponsored missionary family currently serving in the Netherlands.
On the months that have a fifth Sunday, the congregation and community members gather for Service Worship Sunday, performing a variety of service projects for individuals and groups in the community. Disaster relief funds are sent through The Outreach Foundation, ECO's partner in social services, when earthquakes, hurricanes, wildfires, or war strike a region.
The Refuge: A Saturday Meal for the Unhoused
One of the most concrete mission commitments of West Valley Presbyterian Church is The Refuge, a monthly Saturday afternoon ministry that serves unhoused and under-served people in the South Bay. The Refuge is sponsored by New Beginnings Church, with WVPC volunteers preparing the meal and leading music and worship.
Each month, the team gathers in McHattie Hall on the WVPC campus at about 1:00 pm to prepare a hot meal for around 40 people. After cleanup, everyone loads the food into cars and travels to St. Mark Lutheran Church at 125 E. Arques Ave in Sunnyvale, where the meal is served at 3:00 pm. WVPC members lead singing, prayer, and a short message of encouragement in Christ starting around 4:15 pm, with cleanup following at about 4:45 pm.
The ministry welcomes anyone with "a heart for the homeless, under-served, and under-nourished among us," and people can come for part or all of the afternoon. Janet Shaw coordinates the WVPC team.
Community Partners on the Bollinger Road Campus
The WVPC campus is shared with a number of community partners during the week.
Delight Montessori Preschool provides a Montessori-based program for preschool children in the community.
Mandarin Academy provides a Mandarin-immersion education program for children in the community during the week.
Boy Scouts of America, Troop 407 and Cub Scout Pack 433 use the campus as their meeting home. Troop 407, for boys ages 11 to 17, meets most Monday nights starting at 7:15 pm, with an emphasis on leadership development through youth-led training and outdoor outings. Pack 433, for boys in second through fourth grade, meets the second Monday night of each month. Scouts from the community and the church are welcome to join either unit. The troop's ongoing fundraiser is collecting and recycling aluminum, glass, and beverage containers.
Onnuri Church of San Jose also meets on the WVPC campus, a reminder that the building has long been a shared space for ministry beyond the West Valley congregation itself.
What the Church Believes
West Valley Presbyterian Church is a congregational member of the Evangelical Covenant Order (ECO). The Session of the church adopted a summary of the Essential Tenets of the Christian faith on October 1, 2010, originally developed by the San Diego Presbytery's Committee on Ministry. The full document walks through six essentials of the Reformed faith.
The Authority of Scripture is the church's first and final authority in all areas of faith and life. The Bible is "God's uniquely revealed and written Word, inspired by the Holy Spirit," and "speaks to us with the authority of God himself." The church confesses Jesus Christ as the living Word and the Scriptures as the written Word that bears "true and faithful witness" to him.
The doctrine of God affirms belief in the holy Trinity: one God in three persons, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, infinite and eternal, Creator of all things. God in the beginning created the universe for the manifestation of his glory, continues to uphold and govern creation by his providence, and will certainly triumph over evil and bring creation to a glorious consummation.
Humanity was created by God in his own image, in true righteousness and holiness. Our earliest forebears disobeyed God and brought sin and death upon themselves and all creation. Human nature is now radically broken and corrupted by sin, and no human effort can fully redeem this defect.
Jesus Christ is fully God and fully human, the eternal Son who uniquely entered human history in the person of Jesus of Nazareth. He is truly the Word of God, the perfect expression of God's mind and heart, present from eternity in the Trinity and fully engaged in creation and redemption. His divine-human identity is witnessed in his virginal conception and birth, his supernatural works, his obedient death, his bodily resurrection, ascension, and exaltation.
The atoning work of Christ is central to the Christian faith. Jesus' death on the cross was the atoning sacrifice for the sins of the world. In his death he fulfilled the office of High Priest and was "the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world." Now exalted at the right hand of the Father, Christ continues his saving work as prophet, priest, and king.
Salvation is God's gracious work through Jesus Christ to reclaim humankind and all creation from sin. It is a gift of grace received by faith, with Christ's righteousness and atonement as the sole basis for human salvation. Justification is the righteousness of Christ imputed to a sinner through faith alone.
Prayer, Care, and the Meal Train
West Valley describes itself as a church committed to prayer. Anyone can submit a prayer request through the church's online form; requests may be marked confidential and will then be held only within the small Prayer Team rather than shared on the wider prayer chain. Members are encouraged to get the agreement of anyone else named in a request before submitting it.
Pastoral care flows through the Deacon ministry. The Deacons check on members who are not able to attend, run errands such as groceries or pharmacy trips, and provide rides when needed. They coordinate the Meal Train, a team of cooks who deliver food to families experiencing illness or grief. Anyone can request prayer or reach the Deacons through the church office.
Memorial Services and the WVPC Foundation
West Valley Presbyterian Church offers pastoral support and counsel to families when a loved one passes. A representative of the Pastoral Staff is available to visit with and counsel the bereaved family, and to walk through the options for a memorial or funeral service. The church notes a basic guideline: any service held in the church sanctuary may not have the casket present, but a graveside service, either private or public, can be combined with a memorial service.
Couples planning a wedding are also served by the church. Those interested in either a memorial service or a wedding are encouraged to contact the church office.
The WVPC Foundation was created by an act of the WVPC Church Session on February 18, 1982 to provide an entity to solicit, receive, and invest gifts and bequests to the church. The Foundation is managed by a Board of Managers that meets quarterly, with Donna Perry serving as President. Three endowment funds are held: the First Fruits Fund (dedicated to capital improvements of the church facility), the WVPC Vacation Bible School Fund, and the Christian Education Fund. Only the income from these funds is spent. Donations may be made in cash, securities, real estate, or other assets.
Giving at West Valley
West Valley Presbyterian Church offers two regular giving options. Members can set up automatic monthly withdrawals from a checking or savings account, with the giving amount deducted around the fifth day of each month. Those who prefer to give electronically can make a one-time donation by credit or debit card through the church's online giving page. The Finance Chairman, Dave Blanchard, is available to answer questions about giving.
Planning a Visit
Visitors who want to attend in person should plan to arrive for the 9:30 am Sunday service at the church campus at 6191 Bollinger Road in Cupertino. Office hours are Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday from 10 am to 2 pm, and the office phone is (408) 252-1365. Those who cannot attend in person can watch the livestream on the church's YouTube channel at 9:30 am most Sundays, or visit the sermon archive to revisit messages going back to 2012.
The church encourages anyone interested in getting involved to send their contact information and interests through the church's online form, where they can also sign up for the weekly email newsletter. From there, members can connect with small groups, the Men's Prayer and Study Fellowship, KidsConnect, the music ministry, the Mission Department, or any of the regular service opportunities that keep the West Valley community outward-facing and engaged with its neighbors.