Elders
Paul Alexander, Senior Pastor
Paul serves as the main preaching pastor for Grace Covenant Baptist Church. He grew up in a Bible-believing, church-going home, and experienced conviction of sin and conversion to Christ at age 12 through the teaching of his parents and the ministry of his local church. After graduating from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill in 1995, he served for two years on staff with Cru at Michigan State University and then completed an MDiv at Trinity Evangelical Divinity School in 2003. He was further trained for pastoral ministry in the pastoral internship program at Capitol Hill Baptist Church, where met his wife Laurie, and co-authored The Deliberate Church with Mark Dever (Crossway, 2005). After further experience in pastoral ministry, the congregation that would become Grace Covenant called him to plant the church with them and serve as their pastor in 2009. Paul and Laurie live in the historic district of Elgin with their six children – Olivia, Braden, Jackson, Clayton, Garrett, and William.
Jeremiah Zuo, Associate Pastor
Jeremiah is our Associate Pastor and oversees Adult Education. He is happily married to his wife Lexi. The two previously served as missionaries in Uganda where Jeremiah taught at a local pastor's college and Lexi worked in orphan care. They love parenting their five children and spending time with their church family. They have been members at Grace Covenant since 2014 and deeply cherish being able to worship and serve with this local body. Jeremiah did his graduate studies at Westminster Theological Seminary and Trinity Evangelical Divinity school. He is currently pursuing his Ph.D. in Hebrew Language at the University of the Free State. Jeremiah is passionate about careful, deliberate, and joyful exposition of the Bible and encouraging a high view of Scripture in his fellow believers.
Tim Lloyd
Tim was born and raised in the Metro Detroit area where he earned an engineering degree from a local university. After a number of years working in the automotive industry, Tim put his trust and faith in the Lord Jesus while in his early 30’s. After coming to faith in Christ, Tim met his bride, Nicole, and they were married in 2004. Since then, they have been blessed with 5 children and a bustling household. In May of 2009, Tim and family were relocated to the Chicagoland area through his career in the IT Industry. And, as God would have it, Tim and Nicole quickly partnered with a group of Christians who were eager to plant a gospel-centered church right here in the local area, and shortly thereafter, GCBC was born. Since then, Tim has continued to minister at GCBC where he’s currently serving in his second rotation as a non-staff elder.
Julian Hellmann
Julian resides in Elgin with his wife Mary and their 4 children. They have been attending Grace Covenant Baptist Church since 2018. Julian is currently serving in his first rotation as a non-staff, elder.
