INTERVIEW
1) Describe your childhood, your educational experience, and your family as they have prepared you for ministry.
My childhood was scarred by alcohol, infidelity, horrible verbal fights, divorce, abuse by a neighbor, and a really bad case of acne! However, my precious mother was always faithful to take me to church, read the Bible to me, pray for my Daddy with me, and pray over me while she thought I was asleep! She forgave my Daddy and remarried him. Twelve years later, my Daddy gave his life to Jesus also.
My mother’s father was the godly man in my young life. He took us in while my mother was a single parent, and loved me through some difficult times. Seeing him with his open Bible, and hearing him gently hum sacred hymns, impressed me to want to be just like him.
2) Describe your spiritual journey to conversion and vocational ministry.
I was born again at the age of 9, baptized at 10, and began actively serving Jesus when I was 16. My pastor during my teen years was a former bank robber who got saved in jail. His message was all for Jesus or all for nothing! I gave my all to Jesus! Though unashamed, I was not unafraid, to witness for Jesus in front of local bars, giving out Gospel Tracts at school, and more. I was afraid, but did it anyway.
I heard the call to ministry at age 12, and “preached” my first “sermon” (not a testimony, a message from God’s Word) at that time. At 16 I was our Church music leader and Sunday school teacher to junior boys’ class. I wanted to do more.
Trinity Bible College of Dunedin, Florida (now of New Port Richey, FL) gave me tools for ministry to go with my calling from God.
3) Describe your past and current ministries (both responsibilities and gifts used)
My service inside church walls included being mentored while serving as Youth Pastor, Associate Pastor, Young Adult Minister in various successive ministries. Eventually, I was called to be the pastor, successively, of two Christian & Missionary Alliance churches, One Congregational Christian Church, and currently, one Free Will Baptist Church.
My confirmed gift is as a Teaching Pastor.
4) How is biblical knowledge required for you to be successful at your ministry?
Extensive biblical knowledge is the cornerstone of my ministry. I am a better teacher than I am a personal counselor, in my opinion. However, my greatest “success” is due entirely to prayer!
5) How do you continually develop your biblical knowledge?
I read the Bible a lot! I study the researched works of others also. My tools include blueletterbible.org on the internet, The Life and Times of Jesus the Messiah by Alfred Edersheim, and similar deeper works. I generally avoid whole-bible commentaries as they are necessarily shallow compared to a life’s work by a single author. Dr. Roy Gingrich produced, inarguably, the best outline studies of Scripture I have found.
6) How is communication competency required for you to be successful at your ministry?
Be careful that your tools and training do not supersede your spiritual gifts in importance! However, my ministry centers on calling others to a decision. With that clear and singular purpose in mind in the development and presentation of my messages AND personal conversations, communication certainly happens! If you know the end, the conclusion, the response which you want to reach, then you can build a better path to it!
7) How do you continue to develop your communication competency?
I observe others who also teach, and observe the body language and expressions of people I am teaching, in order to determine what is reaching my audience. There is an internal process in which, FIRST, I am reading the Bible, SECOND asking God to explain it to me for my needs and for those to whom He sends me, THIRD consulting resources with an “ear” open to God’s Spirit for what is important to His purpose, FOURTH choosing the end result I will seek, and LAST building a path to that end. I also purposely provide myself two or three optional explanations or illustrations for points I intend to make, as one such will work for a few and another such will work for others.
8) How do you maintain your spiritual life as a minister?
Wisdom comes from God, but often through other ministers.
- Garbage in, garbage out: I have decided to put Bible in, and toss garbage out! What I allow into my mind directly affects my spiritual life.
- Timing is critical! When I am tired, I am most vulnerable! Late nights, alone, old sins tempt me and discouragements depress me. I have decided to recognize and avoid those situations. I try to end my day, and start my day, in God’s Word.
9) How does your ministry contribute to discipleship: making disciples (salvation of the lost), nurturing disciples (strengthening of the weak), or training disciples (service of the saints)?
I am a bi-vocational pastor (good for nothing = pastor for no pay). My employment affords many personal opportunities to lead people to Jesus. I also engage in training my congregation do to the same. We, together, host community outreach events also. My personal favorite is to meet people in our neighborhood, simply ask them for prayer requests, ask if we can come back every week until the answer is given, then invited them to celebrate God’s faithfulness with a meal at our church. We sometimes encounter needs we can meet. It accomplishes all three objectives!