Home > About Our Church >

Email | Print |  Share  Digg Facebook MySpace  Yahoo! Buzz Twitter

The Bates have served the Dothan 1st Seventh-day Adventist Church since 2004 and share a long-term vision for discipling young families and equipping the church body to use its spiritual gifts for ministering to one another and to the community.

Eric and Ann Marie Bates were married in 1989 and came to Christ together in 1990. Pastor Eric is originally from Birmingham, Alabama. Leaving a career in insurance/hospital billing, as well as nursing, he received his BA in Theology with a minor in Biblical Languages at Southern Adventist University in Tennessee in 1999, earned a Master of Divinity from Andrews University in Berrien Springs, Michigan, in 2001, and is currently working on a Doctor of Ministry in Biblical Counseling through Westminster Theological Seminary in Philadelphia. Eric was ordained to the Gospel Ministry in 2005.

The daughter of a US Army helicopter pilot and flight instructor, Ann Marie spent several of her growing years at Fort Rucker, as well as in Italy, Germany, and 8 states across the US, before graduating from the Alabama School of Fine Arts in Birmingham, AL, as a voice major. In addition to ministering through music, Ann Marie enjoys writing poetry and articles for magazines, cooking and speaking Italian, power-walking, and continually learning alongside her children through homeschooling.