A Brief History of My Journey as a Teacher

I received salvation as a child. I grew up believing that the Bible is true. And I have been teaching Bible studies and Bible classes and leading Christian groups for most of my adult life.

By nature, I am a researcher. I enjoy digging into topics, learning things, and figuring things out. For me this is a very relaxing and natural activity. I do it for fun. And I have always been this way as far back as I can remember.

When I taught Bible studies, I loved picking a topic and then doing all my research so that I would feel confident that I was accurately representing the Lord in my teaching to the best of my ability. I always had this nagging fear that if I didn’t do my research properly, there was a chance that I could present something incorrectly, or cause someone to stumble or to be led astray.

I would spend hours and hours crossing my t’s and dotting my i’s, trying to make sure that I was on safe ground with what I would be teaching. I would come up with outlines and plans and notes, and then I would teach from my notes and outlines according to my plans. To me this made me feel safe, like I was “doing my part” to make sure that the teaching was trustworthy to whatever degree I was capable.

A Miraculous Event

When I was 36 years old, during a time of prayer with friends I witnessed my wife being healed from two incurable conditions. While that was happening, I received the Baptism with the Holy Spirit and spoke in tongues for the first time. This night completely transformed my previous views of God and the Bible, and the Christian walk. A switch was flipped inside of me that forever changed my view of reality.

A few weeks later during a dinner with some people I had just met, I was given a prophetic word by a man sitting at the table. The man had never met me before, and yet he spoke to me like he had known me my entire life. He said that God had called me as a teacher that the Lord was going to make me into a minister of his word. It was so powerful that it hit me down the core of my being and I just wept in my food. Teaching was the deepest desire of my heart. This word helped me make sense of why I was always drawn to research the scriptures, and why I used to spend hour after our daydreaming about ways I could make certain topics easier to understand, and lots of other things I had going on inside of me. I have been living off of that word ever since.

An Unexpected, Undeserved Gift

Then something started to happen. It is difficult to explain, but I will do the best I can to articulate it. And it seemed so natural to me that I didn’t even notice anything changed, as hard as that may be to believe.

Whenever I was participating in a group or a Bible study, or something of that nature, I started “knowing” where all of these different scriptures were in the Bible, and I was able to quote much of it verbatim. I could be listening to someone teach, and in my mind I had this rolling video of all the scriptures that could go with what was being said. Sometimes I would feel prompted to share some of this, to help people know where these things were in the Bible. Sometimes it was just there in my head and enjoy it all to myself without saying anything.

I was never one to memorize scripture, even though I tried on many occasions. So this was a very drastic change for me. It was not simply knowing some of the “main ones” like John 3:16. This would be obscure passages that came out of nowhere, and somehow I would know where they were and what they said. It was like a tickertape was running in my mind whenever I was in these settings.

After a few weeks of this, my wife asked me one day “how do you know all of these Bible verses all of the sudden?” To her the change was very plain to see. In the right setting, I could sit there and quote scripture all day. I realized God had done something to me or inside of me, and I had not previously recognized it. Whatever God did to me, or whatever ability he placed inside of me, he did it in a way that was so natural that I did not even notice.

People that were around me started coming up with nicknames for me like “the walking concordance.” I always thought that was funny, but I tried to explain that it wasn’t because I had memorized scripture. I had not done any memorization. Whatever was going on was a gift that I did not fully understand. It was not a result of my hard work, and I did not deserve any credit for it in any way.

Through experience, I started to gain some understanding as to how this gift worked. I could not just stand there on my own, and quote verses whenever I wanted to. Rather, it would always “come to me” when I was in a setting where a scripture was needed. This could be when I was participating in a group, or talking to someone over lunch, or whatever. I was not in control of when it happened, I just had to receive it and share it when it showed up. It was a process of learning, and I am still in that process to this day.

New Instructions

A few years later, I was still leading Bible studies. I was still picking topics and doing my research, and learning how to cooperate with this new gift that was at work inside of me. Then over the span of a few weeks, I started really having problems picking topics, and it seemed like something was wrong. I would ask the Lord in prayer if I was doing something wrong, but I didn’t hear any answer. So I would prepare anyway and head out to teach the group I was leading.

But very often, while I was on my way to the group, I would have thoughts about a string of scriptures that would go together to bring some very helpful and often amazing revelation. I would be driving my car enjoying these new truths that just came to me. Then I would arrive at my group, and in the first few minutes someone would ask a question that was directly related to those thoughts I had in the car on my way over. I would share what I had just learned, and it was really amazing. This happened again and again over the next few weeks.

Then one day I was having lunch with a friend, just talking about random topics. Out of nowhere he started to prophesy to me and he said something like this: “God is changing the way you teach. You are to stop making notes and outlines, and stop preparing.”

This was amazing, thrilling, and terrifying at the same time. My preparation and my notes were my security blanket. That is how I felt safe. But God had been getting me ready for this, and it was time to let go of my security blanket and move out into a new adventure.

I still studied the Bible, but I no longer study it to teach something. I just study to learn on my own, and I trust God to work through me whenever I had a speaking opportunity.

During this time, I was teaching regularly in several Bible studies. I had to follow my new instructions and just show up with nothing prepared. I had to trust that the Lord would provide whatever was needed. I was very uneasy about the whole thing because it was so new, and I had to fight through fear and anxiety about showing up with nothing to share. But every time without fail the Lord would provide. I would know what to talk about, and all the scriptures I needed would always be there in the moment and I didn’t have to rely on notes and outlines and etc.

This continued on as I was getting invited to speak to larger gatherings…and then preach on Sundays…and then preach on Sundays where there would be livestreaming…and so on. Each time, the night before I was to speak, I would get hit with anxiety and fear that I had nothing prepared. I would feel the tempting accusation that I was not doing my part, or that I was being lazy, or something to that effect. I would have to resist and remind myself that it was the Lord that told me not to make outlines and notes and etc, and that he would provide.

And now at the time of this writing, this has been my method of teaching for 11 years. I have taught probably hundreds of times, in all kinds of settings, with no notes and no outlines. Each time, the Lord has provided. And each time I have been amazed. I used to struggle with wondering why this “walking concordance” ability was given to me. I felt like I didn’t deserve it. And the truth is that I don’t deserve it. God didn’t give it to me because I earned or deserved it. He gave it to me as a gift that would help me be more effective in my teaching. And for that I am humbled, and I am eternally grateful.