Although my wife, Loretta, and I have been married for eleven years this past August, it was the traumatic birth of our first child, Andy, just a little over six years ago which ushered us into adulthood emotionally and spiritually. This is not to say I suddenly found Christ. The main influence in my life, since childhood, has always been my relationship with Jesus.

I grew up in a home in which both my parents as well as my three siblings actively pursued (and still pursue) Christ-centered lives. In fact all of my grandparents were also devout Christians.

Although lay-people at the time of my childhood, my father and mother gave of themselves in all sorts of ways to Christian service. My mother became both a Bible teacher and a regular speaker in Christian women's groups while my father was a board member and Sunday School superintendent. Both sang in the choir. I grew up with almost the assumption that working with the people of Jesus was natural and expected to do the same myself. Like so many children, I had no idea what a treasure this background was, but my home life laid down the foundation upon which my inner self with all of its expectations would be built. Before I could read, I accepted Jesus as my savior at a children's crusade held at our local church. Since then I have continuously sensed, relied on and sought out his presence in my life.

I grew up in the Church of the Nazarene and was active in both the teen and later the adult choirs. I was president of what was then called NYPS, took part in quizzing, was a representative in youth in mission, sang in the New York Impact team, was a member of the New York District delegation to the 1978 International Youth Institute in Switzerland, and also attended all the district camps regularly. Camp Taconic (New York District Camp) will always be special to me. It was a shelter for growth, and I sought the experience of sanctification there while still a young teen. Although painfully shy, I had within me the anchor of God's love throughout my teen years even when enduring the typical turbulence of adolescence. When the time came for higher education, I attended Eastern Nazarene College. I honestly never considered going anywhere else.

During all of this I was continuously trying to draw close to Christ and to follow the life that would please him. At one point I even considered the ministry, but realized that my God-given talents might be better used in a different direction. Sometime in college I became convinced that I wanted to be a teacher at one of our Nazarene Colleges. I also met my future wife at ENC, but it would take nearly a decade of friendship before we figured out why God kept on having our paths cross all the time.

Furthermore it was at this time that I became a "Pastor's Kid" when my father retired early from the FBI and entered the ministry as an ordained pastor. Not long afterwards my mother was also ordained.. Now my college years were filled with the new challenges of a small, struggling church (19 original members) while I also worked as a member of the college work team at Camp Taconic.

Even after I had graduated from ENC and while serving in VISTA I was active in the local Church of the Nazarene in Caruthersville Mo. and served among other things as a Sunday School teacher and as a delegate to the district assembly.

I followed the same pattern of Christian service while pursing my Masters at Lehigh University--singing in the choir and becoming actively involved in the singles group at the Bethlehem Church of the Nazarene in Pennsylvania. Upon completing my Masters I was offered an interim position at Point Loma Nazarene College which I accepted and immediately immersed myself in the activities at Point Loma First Church.

In 1988 Loretta and I finally married, and I began my doctorate at the University of Rhode Island. There was no Church of the Nazarene in the area, so we became members of a local evangelical Methodist church pastored by an Asbury graduate. Loretta and I were soon deeply involved in church activities: Children's Church, Sunday School (I became the Sunday School Superintendent) and Vacation Bible School. While there I initiated the Saturday morning men's prayer breakfasts and the "Wednesday Night Song and Prayer" sessions. These activities brought me great joy as I shared the delight of praise to God and the power of communal prayer to believers who had not experienced it in such a format before.

Through all this time I had felt a certainty in God's leading although I often had no idea where I was ultimately going. Wherever I had gone, the Lord had opened up doors of fellowship and service. I received my Ph.D. in the spring of 1992. Andy was born in September of 1993, and then my life seemed to fall apart. My baby boy was born with a genetic difficulty which compromised his airway which meant--even with help--taking care of him was going to give challenges about which we could not even comprehend.

It was not that I lost faith in God. Loretta and I clung to the strength and hope provided by our faith in Jesus more desperately than ever before. Nor did the fellowship of believers fail us. We had prayer support from around the country, and doors opened that allowed us to both take extended times off from our work to deal with Andy's difficulties. But what we found was that maintaining him and upholding one another suddenly took all the energy we once had for countless other activities. And the very nature of our Christian walk changed. I clearly remember one day, after sitting for hours in the intensive care unit, looking at my wife and saying "our childhood is over."

It is ironic to note that just as our childhood was ending, my truly child-like reliance upon the Lord began. After receiving my doctorate, I moved mountains of papers and forms, aggressively attempting to find a teaching position in a Christian college. All of that stopped with Andy. Nothing got out. Keeping him alive was my main priority. I can remember holding him while the nasal-gastro-tube fed him, saying "You're mighty cute; I guess you're worth canceling my career." For the first time in my life there was nothing I could do but just hang on and trust the Lord.

And yet God was working. Andy went through three cases of aspiration pneumonia in his first four months because of a second undiscovered compromise in his airway. When the doctors in Boston found it and his health improved they finally told us. "We've done all we can; the people you need to see now are in Ohio." How could we get to Ohio? I didn't have a job to even help pay for such long distance trips. A month or so later Dr. Anderson contacted me about the possibility of me coming to Mount Vernon Nazarene College in Ohio. The Lord had timed it perfectly.

Since coming to Ohio we have seen one mighty act after another. But still Loretta and I are forced to recall that we are in a different stage than our first five years of marriage. We heavy responsibilities and far less time to do all the things both she and I had assumed God expected of us.

Shortly after our second year here, and just after we had bought our first home, Loretta's mother and father moved to Mount Vernon. As a result we began supporting one invalid parent with the other in failing health. At the same time Loretta discovered that she was pregnant again. Laura was born in that spring. Andy, meanwhile, continued to need surgeries to try and build a functional airway which could free him of the need for an artificial trachea. Not all of these have gone as well as hoped. These developments drew from the pool of our energies which Loretta and I learned was not infinite. How guilty we felt when we compared the many ministries we had been a part of with the way our lives seemed to be going. And yet God's sustenance has continued. Loretta's folks are better now than they have been in years. Laura Sue was born happy and healthy. Andy, meanwhile, has gone through procedures impossible just a few years ago. His over-all health is excellent. And although he has paralyzed vocal chords, Andy talks and sings.  In Jan. 2000 they finally closed up his trachea hole.  And this past summer I had the joy of watching him play in the mighty surf of York Beach, unafraid and free.

We are still active in our church, the Lakeholm Church of the Nazarene. Loretta plays the piano, I lead Wednesday night singing, and we recently team taught a junior high Sunday School class. Occasionally one or both of us sing in the choir, but can't do as much as what we used to do. Andy needs watching and even Laura in all her "normalness" has added new wrinkles in time management. Yet, I think I have learned that while God enjoys the times we work and worship in ministry, it has nothing to do with the fact that he loves us and is working for us--continuously. This past Fall I was deeply moved by the words of Brennan Manning. There was not a session I attended that Manning's teachings did not move me to tears. And yet what he reminded me of is an absurdly simple truth: Jesus loves me--really, really loves me. I've known that all along. I sang it, talked it, taught it, believed it, but now, in the midst of my own weakness, I'm learning to really lean on what Jesus' faithfulness has always confirmed. Praise His name!