Doctor Sybrand de Swardt has been the pastor of Lynnwood Baptist Church since 2009, and is married to his wife, Beth. Together they have two children, Carol-Marie and Thomas-Wayne.

Dr. de Swardt is an expositional preacher who also ministers through extensive counselling and teaching on counselling related issues. Dr. de Swardt has received a Master of Arts in Biblical Counselling from The Master’s University. He also obtained a Doctor of Educational Ministry from Southern Baptist Theological Seminary. His doctoral project developed a thirty-hour contextualised Biblical Counselling course. Dr. de Swardt has been a certified ACBC counsellor since 2018, and he is now serving as the director of SMTI, which offers advanced training in Biblical Counselling.

He has extensively trained many in counselling related issues through SMTI as well as independently in Ireland, Holland, Italy and Africa. Furthermore, Dr. de Swardt is a guest lecturer at Mukhanyo Theological College in South Africa, as well as an adjunct faculty member of Brookes Bible College in St Louis, Missouri. He has also been a speaker for the Association of Certified Biblical Counselling (ACBC) annual conferences.