Journey of a Lifetime

Over 24 years ago, I was invited to a church in the heart of Times Square. I never imagined it would be the beginning of some lifelong relationships that would span the globe and decades of life changes.

Life was full in NYC. I spent years going to conferences, serving at the Lambs theater (and rapelling down the side of the Lambs in a rope and harness…don’t do that…seriously…don’t…), leading life groups, speaking at churches in Great Neck and Jamaica (Queens), being a VLI assistant, discipling and being discipled, slaving over a hot CD burner at 1am in the morning in the Lambs basement…Even the abysmal failures of mine like handing out tracts in Times Square (thank you Pastor Adam Burt for that experience) were pretty amazing.

Over the years, what started as a visit to Morningstar New York referred to me by Danielle Kimmey Torrez and Lisa Kimmey Winans led to some pretty amazing moments throughout my lifetime. New York is a fairly transient city of people on different stages of their journeys in life. Many of the people I’ve met at what is now EveryNation New York City have journeyed on to places as far off as Taipei, the UK, South Africa, Ukraine, Austin (Texas), Raleigh Durham (North Carolina), New Orleans (Louisiana), and Beverly Hills, California. The church has equipped people for their journeys and not held them back – but helped equip propel them forward over the last 25 years. The church has been unique in many ways.

I’ve always thought of EveryNationNYC as unique – it is a church but it doesn’t look like church. It’s a place where people who are unchurched or de-churched can come and be comfortable – and just be people. I’ve always thought it’s greatest strength is it didn’t look like church. It is an easy place to invite people and an easy place to be. It’s been a nomadic church as well – staying strong no matter where it finds itself in the city often defying church-growth odds and standards. It’s never been afraid to have church in the strangest of venues. I’ve also thought of it as an equipping church. Most of us end up other places in the world over time but we end up equipped to handle what God has for us in the next place our journey takes us and we end up with something more – at least in my experience –  a group of people who come with us on the journey. My own journey really began when Ieft.

When I left EveryNationNYC in 2007 for Nashville, TN I never thought these relationships would follow me – but they did – several times:

• My first realization of this was when I began to do community outreach in East Nashville, an area under-resourced in Middle Tennessee. Nathan Lewis, someone I’d labored with in Zambia, financially partnered with me as I opened my home to gang kids, the fatherless, and others-in-need. Nathan was there when I took the first steps of living-on-mission. Nathan is someone I met as I was getting started, and someone I want there at the end.
• Later, I would end up in Davidson County Chancery Court legally adopting a teenage girl and while many didn’t fully understand where I was at with it, one thing I learned was that in NYC we viewed ministry differently and many who had journeyed on from EveryNationNYC came back together to help make this adoption successful including ENNYC’ers who had moved to Louisiana, South Africa, North Carolina, and many other places. I didn’t have to explain myself much or why I did what I did.
• Finally, when I found myself being gentrified out of my rental home and effectively homeless, I’ll never forget how Pastor Ron, Kevin Nah, and many others came around me to help me through that time. There were dark moments for me where the light of this church shone through.

There have been times in the life of the church where even when I’ve been away, I’ve never been forgotten.

• Pastor Ron and Lynette invited me and several others back together to the White House for a forum on human trafficking. I learned so much about an issue that still happens today.
• A few years ago when Pastor Ron was launching his “What Are You Thinking?” Podcast, he reached out and gave me the opportunity to help in a small way.
• In Los Angeles I desperately needed the help of a former model to sit down with my daughter and talk about that world. Erik Willanger dropped everything he was doing, met us in Beverly Hills and sat down with my daughter. Erik was in the life group I led in NYC. I’ll never forget how he just showed up in Beverly Hills, no questions asked. 
• When I was diagnosed with a chronic illness that would forever change my life – I was in denial – but I was able to – from Nashville – send my lab results to Dr. Ugo Iroku – my life group leader from 8 years prior – and he reviewed them and woke me up to the ending of my life I was staring down at if I didn’t take immediate action and take the labs seriously. I’m still here amazingly enough both due to Ugo’s quick response and a medical referral by Dr. Brian Miller that led to my now-personal physician through a friend of Dr. Steve and Kristy Robinson.
• Losing my adoptive sister and mother in a short window was difficult but Pastor Ron never let me deal with it alone – which is where I thought I found myself.
• On a trip to London, Kevin Singleton and Kevin Nah both lended an assist to me as I journeyed on a mission that was in Zambia.
• Dr. Brian Miller became the best pet-sitter ever despite being allergic.
• Processing the experience 20 years later with Genelle Willanger was a great moment. I hid her ENLI binder in the Lambs basement so she wouldn’t have to carry it around everywhere. Fun times.
• Whenever I have felt disconnected I’ve just reached out to Tammy Iroku – who gets me feeling reconnected in no-time and has for years.

Over the years I’ve been able to see many who have found themselves so many places in this world.

In 2024 I was given the opportunity to speak about how I came to America as an immigrant / refugee at an outreach at a shopping center. The person who discipled me at EveryNationNYC in 2002, David Miller, helped me by reviewing my outline, making sure the story made some form of sense given the heavy edits required since it was a bilingual presentation. I had to cut a lot of plot and plot-like substance as well as cut any humor, cultural references, and make other changes when presenting with an interpreter. Since he had been there for much of the content it was also nice to have a set of eyes – even if it was all the way from Texas – to also review it for accuracy. Our memories can play tricks on us sometimes and it was good to have some accountability to what I was about to present. The night I presented, one of my former pastors from ENNYC was there in the audience – one I hadn’t seen in 15 years.

In my most recent season, I faced a “big-bad” that was different than any I’d ever faced – life itself. Facing the mundane, the depression, disillusionment, the anxiety, everything that comes with ordinary life was much more challenging internalized than dealing with a big bad from outside. I knew if I didn’t come home to NYC I wasn’t going to make it through this. Once again, I found EveryNationNYC was there, in particular Pastor Shino, who extended an opportunity to me to help with a specific outreach – from a distance. Going back to our time in Nashville I’ve come to believe Pastor Shino ‘gets me’ – and I believe he knew I was coming home broken and needed fixing from the big-bad. Coming to visit and helping from a distance I believe helped slay the big-bad for 2025 and ultimately helped cast a vision for my life in 2026 and where I believe I’m headed on my journey. It was probably the darkest place I’d been where the light of this church shone the brightest.

I’ve always felt supported by EveryNationNYC in whatever I chose to do in life. I’ve never not felt supported – whether it was by the church as an institution or the people from it now spread all around the world. I think that’s what a good equipping church does. Pastor Ron, Rice, Kevin, and the many others who journeyed to New York in the wake of 9/11 along with Pastors Kaz, Nathan, and Shino have created and maintained a home I can come back to when the big bad world gets too hard or too much.

Very few stay in NYC forever – most of us go somewhere, sometime, and I like to think over the years for me at least, the church has gone with me – no matter where in the world the people of the church have been. Here’s to 25 years and 25 more – and to the lives that will be changed and equipped like mine was – and weaved with relationships that will go with them wherever they go.