I'm 16, that night we had the worst youth service. I pretty much quit. I'm just waiting
to call my uncle who is my pastor and tell him that I'm not called to be a youth pastor. That
is not my calling. That is not my purpose and it's just not for me and so my parents go to
WinCo store on the way home and they decide to get some shopping. So the whole family goes into
the WinCo store to get some shopping. I asked my mom if I could stay in the car and just really,
just stay in the car. But in reality I was really broken, pretty depressed as a teenager and
so I was there whining. So tears rolling down my eyes and I'm complaining to God that I was given
a responsibility for which I am not equipped. I am not anointed. This is not my calling. My uncle has
pushed me into it, all of these whining things and when I was done, I felt the voice of the
Holy Spirit. I would say this was the first time, I heard the voice of God. It wasn't audible but
it was so clear that it changed the trajectory of the rest of my life and I heard the Lord say,
"Look at the WinCo store." So as I looked at it and I saw people walking in empty,
I saw people walking out with carts and with bags full of groceries and I felt the Holy Spirit spoke
to my heart. He says, if you don't quit. So I'm about 16, a little bit younger than 16. He says,
if you don't quit the church that you will pastor, will be like a WinCo store. People will come in
sick and they will leave healed. They will come in broken and they will leave whole. They will come
in empty and they will leave full and they will not come because somebody gave them a flyer but
because everyone in the community will know that there is bread here and people will come because
of that, because up to this point, the only reason why people came to our church actually and they
didn't even come through that is we handed a lot of flyers but people still didn't come and
so for me, the idea at the age of 16 that people will come to church without me handing a flyer
was a miracle. So at that time, I wiped the tears off of my eyes and I received this call, felt that
this call that if I persevere, the Lord will let me be a part of a church. Pastor a church. Lead
a church that will be similar to WinCo store. Few things that will happen is, as you see it's
a 24-hour savings. I really felt that 24 hours, God will be saving people. Come on somebody. Yeah,
that's right. That's a deep revelation. Yeah, yeah also what I felt was very strong is that the front
of this building is attractive. It's nice, the doors are automatic. The back of this building,
it's not as pleasant and it's not as attractive. But the back of the building is where the semi
trucks bring all the food which is why, people come through the front of the building and right
there and then at the age of 16, I knew right away what that meant is that for HungryGen to
be a place where people would want to come to, it has to have the front door and it has to have
a back door. And the back door has to be prayer and fasting. This is that door through which the,
I would say semi trucks, the spiritual forces, the spiritual blessings come through and so and
that's one of the reasons why a huge focus and emphasis started to happen in our church
on prayer and fasting. And so I've never made that call to my pastor at the age of 16, things
got harder after that, things didn't get better, youth group did not grow for a decade and more,
things were the same. Sometimes a little bit better. Sometimes worse. When things got too
difficult for me personally, instead of throwing the towel, I would park my car at this parking lot
and I would remind God that You called me. You gotta see me through.