My Spiritual Autobiography

For my United Methodist Discipline class, we were asked to write a "spiritual autobiography." I wasn't exactly sure what would come out when I started writing it, and planned to go the direction of telling the story of how I was called into ministry. I suppose that what I ended up with did that, but not in the way that I was expecting it to. I considered adding to it, but since the assignment was to write 400-450 words, I decided to just post exactly what I wrote for my assignment. Here it is.

I was born into a family that was involved in the United Methodist Church. I was baptized as an infant into the United Methodist Church. The church has always been an important part of my life. I even met my fiancée, Crystal, at Annual Conference when were both in high school. The church has been a HUGE part of my life and my spiritual development. Because I felt so comfortable with the church, I also felt comfortable with my faith, and I felt like I could question and doubt, knowing that there was a community there to catch me.

Though I had periods where I doubted God, I always had my family and the church to support me. I remember having fairly deep conversations about God with my dad when I was young. I think I actually asked pretty good questions, though I don’t remember exactly what they were. My dad never told me what to believe, never forced me to accept his beliefs… Actually, he did quite the opposite, giving me his beliefs on the subjects, but always pushed me to develop my own beliefs.

Both of my parents have been hugely involved in the church throughout my life. They spend more time at the church than a lot of pastors do, through committee work, participation in various groups, as well as being on staff. My mom is the director of a childcare center at the church, but I have realized over the last few years that her job is also as a minister. She ministers to the children that come to the childcare center every day, as well as to the families of all of the children who have attended over the years. In some sense, she is a missionary into the community.

What does this have to do with my spirituality? It has everything to do with it! I grew up in this environment, seeing my parents involved in a huge range of different settings of church ministry. Though neither of my parents are pastors, I feel quite comfortable in circles of pastor’s kids.

When I was twelve years old and told my mom that I wanted to be a pastor when I grew up, I think I knew at that time that I really would end up doing that. I’m not sure if I knew exactly what that entailed at the time, but I think I knew that it meant that I would be able to be the kind of Christians that my parents modeled for me, and to be able to serve others the way that I saw my parents serving.

Thank you, mom & dad!