Conversion and Calling
This is a two page write up on my conversion and calling that I submitted to the Resurgence Training Center in December for their consideration of me in their Master's Degree program. I thought I might repost it here so that my 10 readers might get to know me a little better with a snapshot of my 30 years. It is by no means in depth but covers alot in the small amount alotted. I hope you enjoy.
My Conversion and Calling
Even though my mother never married or had children of her own, to say that she never experienced labor pains would not be true. In a time when single parent adoption was not frowned upon but literally impossible, she “labored” for 5 years in court to be granted custody of me. A few years later I would be given a younger brother whom she adopted from a different family with a different abusive background. My mother did not know a lot about raising children, especially two boys, but she did realize the need for a father figure in my life. Thankfully the men from the little Baptist church that we attended on Galveston Island took on that role in full stride. The pastor himself along with most of the deacons taught me the scriptures, how to be a gentleman, how to work with my hands and instilled a strong work ethic in me. It was not until I was seven that I started to understand some of their teachings on the Gospel. I remember thinking about some of the latest sermons that the pastor had been preaching on while I was cleaning my room one Saturday afternoon. I don’t remember the specifics of them today but I do know that he had been preaching on God our Father. This idea took hold of my heart as I was fatherless here on earth. I knew John 14:6 from my Sunday school classes, “6Jesus answered, "I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me.” I knew that the only way to the father that would never leave me or abandon me or abuse me was through Jesus. To this day I do not believe that a prayer can magically save a soul, but I remember asking Jesus to save me and committing my life to Him that day. I know that He saved me right there on my closet floor that afternoon. Of course I was seven and didn’t understand it all but I was not coaxed through a prayer. I was alone. Just Jesus and I had that time together and I remember it vividly even today. I remember sharing with my mom what had happened and she prayed with me and took me to the pastor the next day. We sat down and he went through the Gospel again to make sure that I understood it all. We walked through creation all the way to sin and Jesus sacrifice on the Cross to His resurrection. After a few weeks of talking he was convinced that my conversion was true and he baptized me just a few short weeks later.
I wasn’t the perfect kid after that, but there was true change in my life. I was spared from so many things that teenagers fall prey to, even most of my “Christian friends,” because of my foundation in the word and in the community I had with my church family. I was gifted with musical ability and was a part of the church choir and any musical or drama event that the church might have hosted. Eventually, out of need, I began to actually lead the church as the worship leader when I was 15 because our music director became ill and asked me to fill in. From there I began to develop my talents on instruments and began to lead worship for our youth group and other small events. Music took over in high school as well. I joined the choirs there and eventually had honed my skill enough that I got a vocal scholarship to Texas Tech University in Lubbock. I had no plans to be an opera singer. I was more likely to be on Christian radio, I thought, but had no real plans to graduate as much as enjoy this new adventure called college. Little did I know that the Lord would lead me to college to meet my wife, join an amazing church that taught me more about the scriptures than I ever thought there was to know, and continue in music by way of church worship band and a rock bar band made up of Christians. There is not enough space in two pages or even 200 pages to write about all the stories and drama that took place with that small list of life events but I look forward to sharing it with whomever it is reading this testimony in the future.
Let me skip ahead a few years to seven years of marriage, a 3 year old son with another on the way, years of part-time itinerant worship leading, a business degree of all things and a job as a comptroller for a trucking company. This is not the picture I had of what my life would be at 28, but it was a good life. My wife and I were actively involved in our church when I was not out leading music at other churches in the community. I was in a strong group of men for accountability and we both served as much as possible. It was not until one night at dinner with my best friend and his wife that the Lord showed me another and so far the most challenging area of my life that He was going to work on. My friend was an administrative pastor at a local church and we always talked about Jesus at every meeting. No matter what was going on in the cracks of life’s sidewalk the conversation always fell to church and theology. This particular night he handed me a CD with a sermon on it called Hell’s Best Kept Secret by Ray Comfort. After listening to Ray talk for nearly an hour about scripture and the statistics that challenged the true conversion of most Christians, even within the church, my mind was blown. I knew he was right because of my knowledge of the things the Bible says, but it had never been presented to me in this fashion. I couldn’t sleep that night and the next day I searched the web for more from Ray Comfort but instead ran across a message entitled “Shocking Youth Message, So Shocking that the Pastor Was Never Asked Back.” “This ought to be good,” I thought to myself. I sat for the next 58 minutes weeping in my office over the truth spoken by Bro. Paul Washer to over 5000 youth from my own denomination. He “expounded” on Matthew 7 and confirmed more passionately and eloquently than I ever could those thoughts I had about my “Christian friends” in high school. “Lord, Lord……and I never knew you” went ringing through my head for not only the next night but the next several months and even to this day. The Lord had opened my eyes to what the true problem was in the church after hundreds of conversations about it in previous years. The bottom line was that the church was and is largely unregenerate.
I am 30 now and have been exposed to more reformed teaching since that day. I would have never guessed that one CD sermon by Ray Comfort would have led to countless sermons and books by the likes of Paul Washer, John Piper, Mark Driscoll, Francis Chan, and Voddie Baucham, to name a few. I would have never guessed that my seemingly normal life would become an adventure of figuring out how to live life in the most Biblical way possible; learning how to be the husband and father that Christ commands me to be in the midst of my “bible-belt world.” I have been gradually called by God to preach the Gospel instead of just sing about it. Paul called it a compulsion and that is exactly the way I feel about it. I know that I lack a lot of knowledge but I have the foundation with which to build on and strength and zeal from the Lord to obey this calling even if it is as Matt Chandler said “the ministry of Moses.”
I look back and see that God in his mercy and grace, saved me to eternity with him, but He has saved me from so much more than that. I realized just a short time ago that as a boy adopted by a single mother, rescued from a situation where I was neglected by my mother, abandoned by my father, and sexually abused by another man as a child, that I should be among a host of people who are mentally, emotionally and spiritually scarred and confused. I might have been a pedophile or homosexual or just simply a God-hater for allowing me to have a life like that. Christ not only saved me from an eternal hell, He saved me from Hell on earth. He knew His plan for me and walked me through it every day of my life and now He has called me to preach that saving power to others. I think Oswald Chambers said it best on September 29th,
“If a man or woman is called of God, it doesn’t matter how difficult the circumstances may be. God orchestrates every force at work for His purpose in the end. If you will agree with God’s purpose, He will bring not only your conscious level but also all the deeper levels of your life, which you yourself cannot reach, into perfect harmony.”
My Conversion and Calling
Even though my mother never married or had children of her own, to say that she never experienced labor pains would not be true. In a time when single parent adoption was not frowned upon but literally impossible, she “labored” for 5 years in court to be granted custody of me. A few years later I would be given a younger brother whom she adopted from a different family with a different abusive background. My mother did not know a lot about raising children, especially two boys, but she did realize the need for a father figure in my life. Thankfully the men from the little Baptist church that we attended on Galveston Island took on that role in full stride. The pastor himself along with most of the deacons taught me the scriptures, how to be a gentleman, how to work with my hands and instilled a strong work ethic in me. It was not until I was seven that I started to understand some of their teachings on the Gospel. I remember thinking about some of the latest sermons that the pastor had been preaching on while I was cleaning my room one Saturday afternoon. I don’t remember the specifics of them today but I do know that he had been preaching on God our Father. This idea took hold of my heart as I was fatherless here on earth. I knew John 14:6 from my Sunday school classes, “6Jesus answered, "I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me.” I knew that the only way to the father that would never leave me or abandon me or abuse me was through Jesus. To this day I do not believe that a prayer can magically save a soul, but I remember asking Jesus to save me and committing my life to Him that day. I know that He saved me right there on my closet floor that afternoon. Of course I was seven and didn’t understand it all but I was not coaxed through a prayer. I was alone. Just Jesus and I had that time together and I remember it vividly even today. I remember sharing with my mom what had happened and she prayed with me and took me to the pastor the next day. We sat down and he went through the Gospel again to make sure that I understood it all. We walked through creation all the way to sin and Jesus sacrifice on the Cross to His resurrection. After a few weeks of talking he was convinced that my conversion was true and he baptized me just a few short weeks later.
I wasn’t the perfect kid after that, but there was true change in my life. I was spared from so many things that teenagers fall prey to, even most of my “Christian friends,” because of my foundation in the word and in the community I had with my church family. I was gifted with musical ability and was a part of the church choir and any musical or drama event that the church might have hosted. Eventually, out of need, I began to actually lead the church as the worship leader when I was 15 because our music director became ill and asked me to fill in. From there I began to develop my talents on instruments and began to lead worship for our youth group and other small events. Music took over in high school as well. I joined the choirs there and eventually had honed my skill enough that I got a vocal scholarship to Texas Tech University in Lubbock. I had no plans to be an opera singer. I was more likely to be on Christian radio, I thought, but had no real plans to graduate as much as enjoy this new adventure called college. Little did I know that the Lord would lead me to college to meet my wife, join an amazing church that taught me more about the scriptures than I ever thought there was to know, and continue in music by way of church worship band and a rock bar band made up of Christians. There is not enough space in two pages or even 200 pages to write about all the stories and drama that took place with that small list of life events but I look forward to sharing it with whomever it is reading this testimony in the future.
Let me skip ahead a few years to seven years of marriage, a 3 year old son with another on the way, years of part-time itinerant worship leading, a business degree of all things and a job as a comptroller for a trucking company. This is not the picture I had of what my life would be at 28, but it was a good life. My wife and I were actively involved in our church when I was not out leading music at other churches in the community. I was in a strong group of men for accountability and we both served as much as possible. It was not until one night at dinner with my best friend and his wife that the Lord showed me another and so far the most challenging area of my life that He was going to work on. My friend was an administrative pastor at a local church and we always talked about Jesus at every meeting. No matter what was going on in the cracks of life’s sidewalk the conversation always fell to church and theology. This particular night he handed me a CD with a sermon on it called Hell’s Best Kept Secret by Ray Comfort. After listening to Ray talk for nearly an hour about scripture and the statistics that challenged the true conversion of most Christians, even within the church, my mind was blown. I knew he was right because of my knowledge of the things the Bible says, but it had never been presented to me in this fashion. I couldn’t sleep that night and the next day I searched the web for more from Ray Comfort but instead ran across a message entitled “Shocking Youth Message, So Shocking that the Pastor Was Never Asked Back.” “This ought to be good,” I thought to myself. I sat for the next 58 minutes weeping in my office over the truth spoken by Bro. Paul Washer to over 5000 youth from my own denomination. He “expounded” on Matthew 7 and confirmed more passionately and eloquently than I ever could those thoughts I had about my “Christian friends” in high school. “Lord, Lord……and I never knew you” went ringing through my head for not only the next night but the next several months and even to this day. The Lord had opened my eyes to what the true problem was in the church after hundreds of conversations about it in previous years. The bottom line was that the church was and is largely unregenerate.
I am 30 now and have been exposed to more reformed teaching since that day. I would have never guessed that one CD sermon by Ray Comfort would have led to countless sermons and books by the likes of Paul Washer, John Piper, Mark Driscoll, Francis Chan, and Voddie Baucham, to name a few. I would have never guessed that my seemingly normal life would become an adventure of figuring out how to live life in the most Biblical way possible; learning how to be the husband and father that Christ commands me to be in the midst of my “bible-belt world.” I have been gradually called by God to preach the Gospel instead of just sing about it. Paul called it a compulsion and that is exactly the way I feel about it. I know that I lack a lot of knowledge but I have the foundation with which to build on and strength and zeal from the Lord to obey this calling even if it is as Matt Chandler said “the ministry of Moses.”
I look back and see that God in his mercy and grace, saved me to eternity with him, but He has saved me from so much more than that. I realized just a short time ago that as a boy adopted by a single mother, rescued from a situation where I was neglected by my mother, abandoned by my father, and sexually abused by another man as a child, that I should be among a host of people who are mentally, emotionally and spiritually scarred and confused. I might have been a pedophile or homosexual or just simply a God-hater for allowing me to have a life like that. Christ not only saved me from an eternal hell, He saved me from Hell on earth. He knew His plan for me and walked me through it every day of my life and now He has called me to preach that saving power to others. I think Oswald Chambers said it best on September 29th,
“If a man or woman is called of God, it doesn’t matter how difficult the circumstances may be. God orchestrates every force at work for His purpose in the end. If you will agree with God’s purpose, He will bring not only your conscious level but also all the deeper levels of your life, which you yourself cannot reach, into perfect harmony.”
Comments