STEVE BROWER discovered the reality of Jesus after a number of years of hard living, involving shadowy affiliations, and alcohol and drug abuse. Upon hearing 2 Corinthians 5:17; that “If any man be in Christ, he is a new creature: old things are passed away; and behold, all things are become new”, Steve turned his life over to a loving and forgiving Lord, Who would wipe his slate clean. After his dramatic salvation experience in 1986, Steve almost immediately began serving the Lord; first parking cars in the church parking lot, then ushering. He soon after founded a ministry to feed the needy called “Operation Oasis”, and then began “Free Indeed”, ministering to those bound by addictions, compulsions, and more.
Steve was ordained in 1994 after serving for eight years in these various capacities. He and his wife Roseann founded and began pastoring “Christ the Redeemer Church” of Shirley/Manorville NY in 1995. Steve then became the Senior Pastor of “Word of Life Ministries” in Freeport, NY in 2005, and has since founded “Faith & Victory Fellowship”, also in Freeport, where he and his wife Roseann serve as Pastors today.
He has headed up local and regional ministers associations, and also traveled to Antigua, Israel, and Uganda, where he preached and witnessed God’s signs and wonders.
Steve had ministered under the ordination of Covenant Ministries International, founded by the late David T. Demola. Today, Steve is an ordained minister with the Church of God whose international headquarters are in Cleveland, Tennessee.
ROSEANN BROWER was “saved” during the 70’s revival that swept the nation. Hers was a very personal experience, with Jesus revealing Himself to her during a very hard time in her life. She soon began to pray for her husbands salvation, and saw her prayers answered when he came into the Kingdom in the mid 80’s. Since that time, Roseann has attended Bible school, taught for years in a Christian Academy, served in numerous capacities while training for the ministry, and was initially ordained a Pastor in 1994. Since that time, she and her husband Steve founded and served for 10 years as pastors of a church in the Shirley/Manorville area of Long Island. Later she served as co-pastor of Word of Life Ministries in Freeport, NY for eight years, and in 2013 she and her husband Steve founded and now pastor Faith & Victory Fellowship, in Freeport, NY.
She had been ordained for years by Covenant Ministries International, headed by the late David T. Demola. Today, Roseann is credentialed by the Church of God, headquartered in Cleveland, Tennessee.
Roseann recently completed her first book; Victorious Living in Perilous Times, which is now being published and will be available as a E-Book and also in print.
She is the mother of three grown children; Alison, Stephen, and Paul, all of whom serve in the ministry as well. She is also the proud Grandmother of Alexis.
STEPHEN BROWER was raised in a Christian home; the son of two Pastors. He was taught respect, moral values, and to put God first in his life. Although he heard it from childhood, it only became reality to him a bit later in life.
His late teens/early twenties brought about a curiosity for substances to which he would eventually become terribly addicted. The battle would last nearly ten years, until he Embraced the Grace of God, grabbed hold of his new beginning, and dove headfirst into allowing the Lord to reinvent him as a New Creature.
In spite of his challenges, Stephen managed to graduate a respected college as a Certified Teacher, and today uses that training and education to serve as a Behavioral Consultant, working with special needs children and young adults.
Stephen had given himself to serving the Lord in whatever capacity he was needed. At church he began operating the overhead projector, then videoing our services for Cable TV and for social media. Eventually he began doing the weekly announcements at live services, and today he is serving as the Associate Pastor at Faith & Victory Fellowship Church of God, where his beautiful and gifted wife Adriane also serves as the Worship Pastor.
What did it take? A humble heart, a willingness and desire to serve, and a faithful God!
ADRIANE VELASQUEZ-BROWER was raised in a Christian home, by musically gifted parents who trained her from a very early age. Her father was a trained opera singer, and her mother is a pianist and vocalist as well. At a very young age, after singing in church for years, Adriane discovered her musical niche- contemporary praise & worship.
Adriane became the Worship Leader at Word of Life Ministries in Freeport, NY in 2009. It was here that she married Stephen Brower, an old High School acquaintance. In 2013, her father-in-law began a new work, and Adriane served from day one as the Worship Leader at Faith & Victory Fellowship COG, now in Massapequa, NY, where she serves as Worship Pastor today.
She is the fruit of her parents prophetic visions; both of them having seen her as a Pastors wife, and as a Pastor herself! God is faithful.
Pastor Adriane pours her whole self into the praise and worship of her Lord, to whom she is eternally grateful for all that she is, and for all that she has! And He’s only just begun!