Having lived in Colorado for over 40 years, Russ was Born in Eureka, CA, in 1963 to Ernie and Gloria Beeson. Russ spent many years of his life in and out of Christian churches serving in various ministries, but he did not know the Lord. In a life and death situation at the age of 36, Russ met the Lord on the side of a mountain. Russ bargained with Him and said that if He saved him from death and delivered him out of the situation he was in, he would forever belong to Him. Indeed, God delivered Russ and his life has been forever changed! From that point forward he lived with the intent to love and serve the God he met on that fateful day, the God who saves, the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, the God of Israel.

Within two weeks after the year 2000 mountainside experience, Russ found a church and began faithfully attending. A year later, Russ began sensing a full-time call to ministry and so he enrolled in the Heritage Institute of Ministry in Aurora, CO. But, no matter how hard he tried, Russ struggled to get some very basic Biblical questions answered. Questions like, “If the Bible is the Word of God, why has two-thirds of it been done away with?” “Why doesn’t anyone in the Bible celebrate Christmas or Easter?” “Why does God command holy festivals that none of us pay attention to?” “Why don't we as Christians keep the Sabbath like the Bible says to?” And, “What and when exactly is the Sabbath? It is the fourth commandment, right?” Yet no one was able to answer any of these seemingly simple questions, at least from the Word of God.

In 2002, Russ was presented with a Messianic perspective on the Word of God and almost immediately these once difficult questions began to be answered, and straight from the Bible. Russ learned that the God who does not change really does not change! Russ began a new walk, trying as best he could to do the things that Yeshua (Jesus) and His disciples did. Russ found out that Yeshua and the apostles really were Jewish! With the scales starting to fall from his eyes, Russ began studying the Word of God with a greater understanding than he had before. Russ graduated from Messianic Bible Institute - Yeshiva in Hampton, VA with a Certificate of Messianic Studies and also completed the Harvest's Leadership Training Program in August 2009. Russ was licensed in September 2009 and currently serves as an Associate Pastor at Kehilat T'nuvah (The Harvest) in Thornton, CO. Russ married his beautiful wife Erica in 2006, and all together they have four children, Lindsey born in 1986, Brent in 1995, Philip in 1997, and baby Avigail in March of 2009.