What is My Denominational Perspective?

I receive inquiries from time to time from people trying to figure out where I’m coming from in terms of my theological perspective. So, here it is.

The answer to the question that people are usually asking: I’m not a progressive or theological liberal.

If I were to summarize my approach to theology, it would be an eclectic mix of ancient faith, evangelical and Charismatic. On my platform, I try to focus most of my teaching on areas of agreement between various streams of the Faith. That's probably way I have followers from a wide variety of denominational perspectives. The theologians/scholars I most closely identify with would probably be Kenneth Samples (Reformed), Craig Keener (Charismatic) and Tom Oden (Methodist). I have linked to the key statements of faith that I adhere to on my BIO page.

My approach to discussing theological issues has 4 key features: Scriptural authority, deference for tradition (when it aligns with Scripture), grace for mistakes and learning, and an allowance for the miraculous.

The Longer Version

My grandparents grew up in the Dutch Reformed Church. My great-grandfather (George Gustav Theodore Leih) was a minister at the Reformed Church in Amsterdam where the royal family worshiped (Nieuwe Kerk, Amsterdam). My grandfather (Cornelius Leih) emigrated to America when he was 8 years old. My grandfather was my childhood hero. He had the spiritual gift of evangelism and modeled authentic Christian faith for me.

During the Depression (1930s), my grandparents heard Dr. Louis T. Talbot teaching on The Biola Hour. Despite growing up in the Reformed Church and living their entire lives in Dutch communities, Dr. Talbot’s teaching was their first exposure to the Gospel. It was at this time that they truly came to an understanding of Jesus as their Savior. Shortly after that, my grandfather transitioned from furniture salesman to evangelist and church planter. He went on to plant (I think) eight Baptist churches throughout CA, many of which are still in operation.

One of my uncles (Virgil T. Leih) is also an ordained minister. I am proud of our family’s heritage and I now follow in their footsteps.

I grew up in a Conservative Baptist Church in southern CA and attended an evangelical college, Biola University. I attended seminary at Talbot School of Theology, which is fitting given the role Dr. Talbot played in my grandparents’ conversion story.

In 1993, my husband (who also grew up in a CBA church) and I began attending at Bible class taught by Kenneth Samples. Ken was the first Calvinist/Reformed Christian we ever met. We began to look into Reformed theology and reading books like RC Sproul’s, Chosen by God, and listening to The White Horse Inn radio program. We began exploring Reformed theology by attending a United Reformed Church (URC), as well as a 1689 Reformed Baptist church for a time.

In 1995/96, we settled into attending churches in a prominent URC church and attended there until around 2001. We were very excited to be a part of these Reformed fellowships, which we viewed as doctrinally more accurate than other churches. During our years there, we journeyed deep into Reformed theology, including presuppositional apologetics and theonomy.

In 1999, I began working at Reasons to Believe even though I had reservations about their evidential approach because I had been so heavily influenced by presuppositional (Van Tillian) apologetics.

Over time, there were aspects of the Reformed tradition that became deeply troubling to me and my husband. We noticed that there wasn’t a strong emphasis on evangelism in URC churches. The churches we attended supported only a handful of missionaries (in contrast with our Baptist upbringing where mission work was a huge component of church life). The pastors actively and frequently ridiculed those evangelicals who engaged in activities like street witnessing and taking friends to the Harvest Crusade. There were several other troubling aspects of church life, including a pattern of protecting abusers.

In the early 2000s, we left the Reformed tradition and returned to the Conservative Baptist Church (now Venture Church Network) of our childhoods. Although we didn’t agree with all of their theology (we still largely viewed ourselves as theologically Reformed), we felt like the overall environment of the church was an emotionally and spiritually healthier environment for raising our young children. That turned out to be a good decision for us.

I discussed some of my personal influences (from the early 90s through early 2000s) and how they shaped me in this older podcast with my former co-worker and mentor, Kenneth Samples.

Somewhere around 2012, I had a close friend convert to being Coptic Orthodox. Her journey had a great impact on me, deepening my appreciation for historical theology. I interviewed her on my podcast back in 2023 about this process and the impact that it had on me and my family.

In the fall of 2014, my husband and I began a journey which led us to explore "continuationist" theology. Although we see problems in some doctrine and practice in the NAR and traditional Pentecostal churches, we have also come to appreciate how the Holy Spirit continues to work today. We enjoy praying for the sick and we’ve seen many, many miracles. Our views in this area would be compatible with those advocated by the brothers at the Remnant Radio podcast. We appreciate their approach.

It was during this season that my husband and I migrated away from Reformed theology as a system. I discussed this aspect of our journey in this podcast.

During the quarantine of 2020, our family "attended" (virtually) a very traditional, theologically conservative, Anglican parish via livestream. This was a wonderful season of increasing our family's understanding of the liturgy. During this time, our family started working through the Anglican catechism.

In January 2022, as our state was finally coming out of Covid, we began attending a house church. We discussed this adventure on an episode of the All The Things podcast.

Attending the house church was a wonderful season of our lives, but by July 2025, my husband and I had become empty nesters and needed to find a fellowship closer to home. We once again returned to our childhood roots and began attending a mission-oriented conservative Baptist church. We enjoy attending the traditional service, singing the hymns of our youth, hearing the missions updates and fellowshipping with God's people.