Born and raised in California, Brandon Holm grew up with a love for imagination, media, and the kind of worlds you could step into and forget the noise for a while. That love wasn’t a phase—it was foundational. Even early on, he was drawn to big ideas, bold stories, and the belief that what you consume shapes what you become.
Before he was a pastor—before he even turned seven—Brandon was already working as a child actor, appearing primarily in commercials and printed toy catalogs (the kind you’d flip through, circle your favorites, and dream about). It was an early crash course in discipline and consistency: show up, hit your marks, learn fast, adapt faster. It wasn’t fame—it was formation.
After graduating from Westlake High School, Brandon stepped straight into the working world—taking on a range of jobs in retail and food service. It was unglamorous, hands-on, and formative: dealing with deadlines, customers, pressure, and the daily grind that doesn’t care how you feel.
Among those early roles, he also worked as a ticket agent for the City of Thousand Oaks in their theater department—an environment where timing matters, details matter, and people matter. It was another layer of real-world training: patience, professionalism, and learning how to serve an audience—years before he ever preached to one.
Brandon married his high school sweetheart early—building a life together before the route ahead was fully visible. The plan was simple: stay faithful, work hard, and follow the next set of orders as they came.
After a series of military-connected moves—from Florida to New York to Virginia—the final relocation brought him to Tucson. It was the kind of season that teaches you flexibility: new cities, new routines, new pressure, and the constant feeling of rebuilding stability from scratch.
In Tucson, Brandon worked as a technical support specialist with America Online while enrolling at the University of Arizona. He pursued a History major with a Judaic Studies minor—disciplines that trained him to think in timelines, patterns, and cause-and-effect, not just feelings and opinions.
During that season, September 11 attacks happened—an event that shook the nation and redefined the atmosphere of military service overnight. Brandon was also in Air Force ROTC at the time.
Then, one week after September 11th, his marriage ended in divorce on the grounds of his wife’s adultery. Soon after, he was medically found unfit for ROTC. He tried to press forward with his studies, but department changes to both his major and minor made continuing at UofA feel economically unrealistic—so he stepped away, carrying a mix of loss, disappointment, and unanswered questions.
While attending the University of Arizona, Brandon met the woman who would become his current wife. It wasn’t a clean, cinematic “new beginning”—it was real life: two paths crossing during a season marked by pressure, uncertainty, and big decisions. But that connection became an anchor point—something steady in a timeline that had been anything but.
After college, Brandon worked a string of jobs—taking what he could, doing what was needed, and pushing forward. Eventually, his wife was transferred to Phoenix, and the move triggered one of the hardest stretches of his life. He struggled to find work, and the longer it went, the more he felt disconnected from being the husband and father he wanted to be.
That’s when his wife suggested something simple: go to church. One week. Then another. Then another. Not as a performance—just as a step. And that step became the beginning of a new direction.
What began as “just go to church” became a pattern—then a foundation. Brandon kept returning, not because everything instantly got easier, but because something was shifting internally. Before long, he stepped into volunteering. Serving became the place where purpose reconnected to his life: people, mission, consistency, direction.
In that season of service, Brandon felt the call to become a pastor. He completed his studies, passed the exam, and became a Certified Minister with the Assemblies of God.
A few years later, another conviction followed: plant a church. Not a copy of what already existed—but a church built for the culture he’d loved as a kid and still loved as an adult: nerd life, geek culture, gaming, and the worlds that shape imagination.
That vision launched through iterations—Nerd Church, then The Greater Guild—until it culminated in Power Up Church: a future-focused, nerd-centric church with a sci-fi mission frame.
Today, under Fleet Commander Brandon Holm’s leadership, Power Up Church reaches people across more than 25 countries—including Antarctica. What started as a personal reset has become a global signal: a future-focused church built for believers, seekers, skeptics, and anyone who’s ever felt like they didn’t fit the “normal” church mold.
Brandon is especially proud of the crew who consistently watches, engages, and runs the mission together—through the live-stream Mission Briefings and the gaming sessions that follow. For him, it’s never been about building an audience. It’s been about building a community: people learning Jesus, growing in faith, and finding purpose—one mission at a time.