Sheila joined the office staff at Immanuel in February 2022. She was born and raised in Missouri and briefly lived in North Carolina before moving to Virginia in 2021. Her background is in Early Childhood Education, and she spent many years working at her previous church as the Special Events Childcare Coordinator for their preschool children's ministry program and has a very extensive administrative background as well.  Sheila and her husband Jim have two children: Zach and Mariah. Prior to working at Immanuel, Sheila assisted the Chief of Police at Wake Forest University. Since moving to Virginia, she has taken a less stressful avenue by working at Immanuel, being a petsitter and is also a licensed Real Estate Agent and Travel Agent. Her passions for both working with people and communications have been a great benefit to our congregation. 

Ashley began serving as preschool director at Immanuel in August 2021. She is a graduate of Old Dominion University, where she received a Master of Science degree in Elementary Education. Ashley and her husband Paul have two children: Abigail and Alton. In their free time they enjoy being outdoors, hiking, kayaking, and camping together in their pop-up camper. Ashley's love of, and talent for, nurturing young children is an invaluable asset to our community. 

Gabrielle Maes is a professional singer, actor, and pianist. Her first degree was in Piano Performance, her second instrument was voice and then fell in love with singing. She continued her education in this subject, obtaining a Masters in Early Sacred Music from Concordia University, Montreal Canada. 

She went on to perform and organize events all over the world ranging from Musical Theater, Sacred Music to Opera. She has most recently organized a full scale opera, producing, artistically directing, and marketing the entire event in collaboration with Latin Ballet of Richmond, Quill Theater and Jefferson Baroque. 

She continues to write and perform her own one woman shows, collaborate with other artists, teach and work as a free lance musician as well as sing lead in her church.

She loves spending time with her family, hiking, camping and teaching yoga.

Bunny joined the team at Immanuel in the early 90’s. She, and her husband Jerome, are long-time residents of Old Church and active members of Mt. Zion Baptist Church. She has two daughters: Angelique and Rhonda.  In her free time Bunny enjoys playing cards and fellowshipping with others. Our community is so blessed not only by Bunny’s work here at Immanuel, but even more so by her sweet and caring spirit.