Francis Chan

In 2020, Chan moved to Hong Kong. As of 2020, he lives and works in Sham Shui Po, the poorest area in Hong Kong and the neighborhood where his mother used to do ministries in the 1950s.

In September 2014, Chan joined the board of elders of Abundant Life Christian Fellowship; as of August 2016, he was no longer an elder at that congregation.

In June 2011, he stated he felt called to San Francisco, CA. He moved to Northern California and started a church planting movement of house churches called "We Are Church".

On Sunday, April 18, 2010, Chan announced to his congregation that he felt called to resign at Cornerstone in Simi Valley.

After earning his seminary degree, Chan "landed a youth pastor position" in Chatsworth, California, at the Church at Rocky Peak. Christianity Today, reporting in 2009, has Chan characterizing this as a period where his personal life was not lived consistently with his religious ideas, stating "Those were the worst years of my life... a sinful, hypocritical time." For reasons not explained further, Chan left that pastoral position for a job at a restaurant, waiting tables. Before becoming a senior pastor, Chan worked different retail and fast food jobs.

After a three-month leave from Cornerstone, ca. 2008, Chan said he felt convicted to sacrifice more for God. Chan gives away about 50 percent of his income, doesn't take a salary from his church, and has donated most of his book royalties, which have totaled about $2,000,000, to various charities. All of it goes to organizations which rescue sex slaves in foreign countries. Furthermore, in 2008 it was reported that Cornerstone would give away 55% of its income to charitable causes.

Chan started Eternity Bible College in 2004 as a ministry of Cornerstone Community Church, with 100 students. In 2008, Eternity launched an abroad program in Ecuador. As of 2009, the college had 47 graduates serving in various parts of the world.

Chan, his wife Lisa, and 30 others founded Cornerstone Community Church in 1994; within two months, the church had grown to have 100 attending. The church continued to see increases in attendance, and by the year 2000, it had received approval from local officials for building expansion to double its capacity, in support a 1,600-member congregation. As of January 2008, Cornerstone was one of the largest churches in Ventura County, California.

Chan is married to Lisa, a singer. They wed in 1994, and as of December 2014 they have seven children. Their eldest is singer Rachel Chan.

Chan was sent to Hong Kong to be raised by a grandmother, a Buddhist for several years. During this time, his father married Amy Law [羅笑容] and gave Francis a half-sister, Gloria. In 1976, when Chan was eight years old, his stepmother Amy Chan died in an automobile accident.

Francis Chan (born August 31, 1967, in San Francisco, California), is an American Protestant author, teacher, and preacher in evangelical churches and related settings. He is the former teaching pastor of Cornerstone Community Church in Simi Valley, California, which he founded in 1994. He also founded Eternity Bible College, and served as its early chancellor, and has been a board member of several Christian and social justice organizations, including Children's Hunger Fund and Gospel for Asia.