My Story

I’ve always wished I could say I had a fantastic testimony; that the Lord had spoken to me in some magnificent way, or that I had that epiphany moment where I realized my need for Christ. I don’t. In fact, my testimony is rather plain in my estimation, but our God is a God of the outrageous and the mundane.

I grew up in a Christian home. When the doors of the church were opened, we were there. My parents taught me well. I learned the Scriptures from a young age, which I am grateful for. At the ripe old age of four, I asked Christ to be my Savior. That was the first step, but I have spent the last eighteen and a half years since then finding Christ as my Lord.

I was taught to do the right things. It was rarely legalistic, but more so became ritualistic. Like the Pharisees, I was taught to look pretty on the outside. It was never intentional. It just happened that way. I spent most of middle school and my high school years in a mega church youth group. I was a student leader, played guitar in the praise band, lead worship, ran the soundboard, and went on mission trips. I said and did all the right things, and man, did I look good.

Then came college. I moved to Murfreesboro, Tennessee to go to Middle Tennessee State University. I knew next to no one. I found my faith to be shaky; built upon a church, a building, some friends, and how “plugged in” I was. I was lonely, and I was hurting.

I found a church right away. I never really searched; just settled on the first Baptist church I came to because it was all I had ever known. They had a large college ministry, and it felt like home. The relationships I made were shallow, and for the first time in my life I found myself walking alone.

In my loneliness I turned to drinking and desperately longed for female companionship. The guilt was too much to bear. I partied Saturday nights and skipped church in the morning. I was wondering, but the Lord never gave up on me. My foundation was firm, despite the storm raging above.

My wife Kolby and I met in the fall of my sophomore year. We were next-door neighbors in an apartment complex. I remember spending many a night talking to here next-door as my roommates were partying and drinking. The Lord used her tremendously in my life. She had her reservations about me and confronted me with them. I knew all along I needed to come back to the Lord, but the gulf seemed to ever widen between Jesus and me. She invited me to church with her as we started dating, and slowly I began turning around.

In July of the following year I was asked to play the bass in the worship band at church. This was the ultimatum to me from the Lord. I knew to stand in front of the body on Sunday mornings I needed to change my ways. I knew I needed to be an example to others and not a hindrance.

The Lord began taking hold of my life and calling me deeper. In January of the following year I volunteered to serve as a leader for the youth ministry of our church. This experience has molded me in ways that nothing else has. I have been called to give my life away to teenagers and display the love of Christ to them.

All these events lead to me serving as the intern for the youth ministry. Beginning in the fall of 2006 I raised my salary for the year through donations. I started work in March of 2007. I performed mostly administrative tasks, but this gave me the opportunity to work alongside the pastoral staff and learn from them. I also spent much of the past year taking a hard look at my life and what the Lord was doing in and through me.

That led to the Southern Baptist Theological Seminary where I’m pursuing a Master of Divinity. God is always at work. He is writing my story line by line, and filling its pages with signs of himself. I now, and always, am SEEKING THE FACE OF GOD.