L.A. friday Pre-summit Speakers

At the young age of 5 Gabriel gave his life to Jesus. A little boy who was surrounded by brokenness began to have an insatiable desire to preach. Back then, stuffed animals were the perfect audience. At the age of 13 Gabriel was called into ministry and called out of poverty, gangs and violence. To date Gabriel has ministered in 25 different countries across four continents. His heart burns to lead a new generation to fall in love with Jesus and live their lives with God’s word as their source of truth. Gabriel has the ability to articulate and inspire people to action. He is passionate about recognizing and releasing people in their gifting and calling and through intentional discipleship help them to be rightly placed in their Kingdom assignment. Ministry, for Gabriel, is done alongside his wife of 13 years and as a family with their 3 children.

Chris has been the Lead Pastor of Foothill Church in Glendora, California since 2006, an 80-year-old church that has seen great change and growth by God’s grace in this time. Chris’s passion is preaching, teaching and leading people into a growing relationship with Jesus Christ, rooted in the gospel. Chris has been happily married to Michelle for 28 years and is the father to four of his favorite people in the world: Gabbie, Tucker, Berkeley and Gracie.

Abe Cho is the Senior Director of Training for City to City New York and North America. Previously, he was a pastor at Redeemer Presbyterian Church in NYC for 14 years. The last six of those years he served as the Senior Pastor of Redeemer East Side where he led a staff of 30 full-time and part-time staff. In 2021, he stepped down from leading in this more structured, hierarchical context to leading in the far more decentralized, movemental context of City to City North America where he has had to learn an entirely new set of leadership instincts. He is married with four children which is, itself, yet another entirely different set of leadership challenges

Born and raised in the city of Los Angeles, DK is the son of immigrant parents from South Korea and is a lifelong fan of all LA sports teams. DK serves on the executive team at Mariners Church as the Lead Worship Pastor and provides leadership over all weekend experience teams across the 7 locations in Southern California. Among his responsibilities is the joy of serving alongside young worship leaders and witnessing God’s work in and through each person.
DK loves going on dates with his wife of over 17 years, Sadie, stays active by playing basketball and enjoys conversations with friends around a fire pit. As for title, perhaps “A worship leader manifesto” — open to other titles!

Pastor Mark, a Miami native born to Cuban immigrants, has a remarkable story of transformation and redemption. His father was a former drug dealer, but after giving his life to Christ, Mark and his father started a ministry preaching on the streets of Miami and helping drug addicts find freedom in Jesus. Mark himself felt a call to ministry at the young age of 10 and has dedicated his life to spreading God’s love and serving those in need. He is married to his high school sweetheart Leilani and they have three children. With a passion for working with marginalized communities, Mark founded LOVE+UNLTD with the vision of spreading God’s love and compassion throughout Miami, especially to those who are most in need.