Gospel Ministry Training
I am on a gospel ministry training journey. I was born in 1981 and raised in East Texas. I started my journey with my family going to a church. When I was eight, the sudden death of my 14-year-old brother rocked our family. Not knowing how to grieve, our family drifted apart from the inside while putting on a false pretense that we were normal, devoted, and moving forward in our family walk. Of course, as children, my sisters and I didn’t understand much of what was going on behind the scenes. We did not see our parents drifting apart until they actually separated. This separation came when I was 13. Up until this moment, my life had been very structured with church and school. I was at the top of my class and a good kid.
I moved in with my father who left the church, moved, and remarried. The structure of my life was gone. Because I had always been a trustworthy good kid, my father had no problem giving me whatever freedom I requested. My relationship with my mother was horrible and my father, with his new wife, gave me freedom and lost touch with much of what was going on with me. At the time I had no complaints about this new freedom. However, we moved to a small town just up the road from where I had grown up to this point. I was hated by many because of my “other” small town roots. I found those who accepted me were the rebels. Skipping class, smoking, drugs, lying, and stealing became me. It all seemed to happen overnight.
I will not include to this testimony all the details of the remainder of what my life has been up until now. It is shameful and detestable. I have spent the last 20 years lost in addictions. It is plural because there have been many. I have spent the last 20 years in and out of trouble with the law, in and out of rehabilitation centers that focus primarily on cognitive intervention. Everything that was taught in each of these programs was sound, intelligent, textbook instruction to changing the way you look at your life. There is something though that no person, book, or system can teach…..How to WANT the change that is needed!
May I mention that throughout these years, I did work, learned a few trades and earned a license as a Plumber. I also met my wife Amie and we started our family. Not all times are hopeless while in addiction. I feel it would be unfair to my wife and children and the progress I’ve made working with my hands if the only picture I painted for you, the reader, was a rotten image of my entire adult life. No, not all was bad, but I have always been confused and I have always been lost.
My wife and I took a plunge in our marriage about four years ago. God was not #1 in our household and we did not fight fairly at all. This unresolved conflict in my marriage led me way deep in addiction to hard drugs again. It is very humbling to talk about. I was a failure in every regard and I had given up. Depression consumed me and all I knew was to attempt to drown it out with more and more substance. This lifestyle also brought me to a prison cell where I found my Bible. I fell in love with it and I thank God for calling me to it. I read and read and read and then read some more. I have a hard time expressing in words how wonderful I feel it is to have a copy of the Word of God available to me. Oh, how lost I was for so long! How though? I always had this book on my shelf! But by the grace of our Father, he has opened up a whole new world for me. I have a new life now in Christ! I am Born Again and while I constantly find myself asking God’s forgiveness, the heavyweights of sin that used to so easily trip me have been stripped off and I have become a Slave of Christ rather than a Slave to Sin.
With this new man I am attempting to become, I find that I am consumed with questions. I am in awe and wonder of God, His Word, and how He is using me. What theology is sound? What is my calling? WHAT NOW??? I know there is a purpose and now I am seeking gospel ministry training. I feel in my soul that my testimony of wandering, sin, and rebellion will be valuable in God’s church. This is my mission! To get training and to help in my congregation in any way that I can to bring others to the Good News of Christ.
Christian Leaders Institute is crucial to me now because it offers everything that I need to take the next step in my gospel ministry training journey and provides it on a platform that works perfectly with my schedule and the demands in my life. Thank you so much for this gospel ministry training opportunity!
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Worship Leader Training
My name is Erin Burkhardt and I am receiving worship leader training at Christian Leaders Institute. I am from North Carolina in the United States of America. I currently serve as a Worship Leader and Music Director at Oasis Bethany Church. My father is a pastor and I started my journey in the Faith at a young age. I was raised in a household where my father, mother, and siblings were all active in ministry at our local church, in our region, and in our church’s affiliations across the globe. For this, I am extremely blessed and eternally grateful.
I now serve alongside my family at Oasis Bethany Church where my father is the Senior Pastor and my younger brother and I lead the worship ministry. Occasionally, I travel to Kentucky and serve as a guest musician at 3Trees Church where my older brother serves as the Worship Pastor and the Production/Technology Director. I also play bass in the Christian band We Were Once. Our mission is to be a light in a dark place and to share the Love of Christ through our music and the way God has gifted us. We have had the opportunity to go on tour with the Extreme Tour and played with artists such as the Newsboys, Family Force Five, Tricia Brock, Disciple, Decyfer Down, Seventh Day Slumber, Emery, Norma Jean, Artifex Pereo, Sumerlin, and many more. We released our EP Piece by Piece and our first single has been on the Billboard top 20 for several months now. We are very excited about what God has done and is doing through this ministry.
Besides my faith, my two major passions in life have always been science and music. I obtained my Bachelor of Science in Biology from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. Using this degree, I taught high school science at Freedom Christian Academy for the last four years. I loved the opportunity to interact with my students every day. I taught them science and how to use science to defend their faith and strengthen their belief in God as opposed to letting misconceptions and false teachings draw them away from their faith. While at Freedom, I also had the opportunity to coach softball where I could connect with many girls on a much more personal level and speak into their lives. While I loved my time at Freedom, I knew that teaching was an intermediate phase of my life. So, towards the end of the 2016-2017 school-year, I chose not to renew my teaching contract despite being offered multiple raises and perks for staying on. I knew that God was calling me to move on, but I didn’t know where or how at the time.
I attended Bethel Worship Nights in Lexington, KY and in the breakout session the tour pastor spoke about planting a seed and going for it instead of letting fear keep you on the sidelines. He encouraged us to write down three seeds that we wanted to plant. My first seed was about going all-in in worship ministry and the second was about attending a school of worship. I had the chance to talk to Pastor Eric after the session and without knowing what I had written he felt that he needed to be bold with me and tell me that I should attend worship leader training and that environment could become the catalyst that launches me into my next season. This confirmed what I was already feeling in my spirit!
After that, I spent a lot of time researching worship schools and praying for my next step in this new adventure. This led me to Christian Leaders Institute. In my research, I found many opportunities for worship leader training. However, since I was coming from teaching at a private Christian school and taking the step to go back to school full time while continuing to serve at my local church, the funds for those programs were quite a stretch. A scholarship from Christian Leaders Institute would provide me with the Biblical foundation and worship leader training that I need while keeping me from going into debt. It also allows me to be able to stay at the church that God has placed me in and continue to serve here while I am becoming more equipped to do what God has called me to do. My hope is that I am able to get a solid Biblical foundation through CLI, while I am continuing to learn and grow in worship ministry. I plan to then take what I have learned at CLI and intern in a worship ministry where I can grow into the worship leader that God has called me to be.
As I make this journey, you can join with me in praying that God continues to make the path He wants me to take clear and that He opens the doors so that I can do all that He has called me to do.
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Spiritual Dream Revelation
My name is Shawn Villela and I have had a spiritual dream revelation. I currently live in Algonquin, Illinois. I am from a wonderful family of four with one older brother. I graduated Northern Illinois University in 2010 and was hired as a Youth Counselor at a Juvenile Justice Center later on that year. I always wanted to work with the youth. I am truly privileged and honored to be in a position to make an impact in these kids lives. Unfortunately, our countless attempts to change the youth’s life rarely work out. It was for this reason that I found myself at a crossroads a few years ago and wondered if this was the job for me.
My brother had told me it was a good idea to start writing down memorable moments in my life, so I did just that, but I took it a step further. Over the years, I began to compile over 200 pages of my life starting from 2011 to the present time. Little did I know that what was happening in those years was actually leading me to Jesus and my spiritual dream revelation. You see, I had always “believed” but it was never personal or applied to my life, and I didn’t read the Bible. Over those years of writing, I began to experience some of the greatest times of my life. It wasn’t that anything material was changing in my life, but rather, I was beginning to learn who I was in Jesus Christ and it shook my world. I finally gave my life to Him in March of 2014, and this was just the beginning of my spiritual dream revelation and journey. I saw that the race is there for us to endure, and slowly but surely I began to grow.
So, here I am, a man of God that is still finding his way. What led me to Christian Leaders Institute was part of that 4-year long process of writing and understanding my own life. While learning about myself, I began to try to let my family and friends know about how my life had changed, and as is the case for most people, it didn’t go over so well, except for one of my best friends. He began to apply some of the things that I had shared with him that the Lord taught me. Eventually, he was saved, and it wasn’t until a couple of months ago that he asked me to officiate his wedding. I was very honored for him to ask me to perform such an esteemed task. Surely, I couldn’t say no, so I said I would do it. I began looking up what I needed to do to officiate weddings and there were so many junk websites that had nothing to do with the unity and sanctity of Jesus in their wedding officiating “programs.” It wasn’t until I stumbled upon the wonderful CLI website that I found an opportunity to learn and enrich my faith even further–in a college type setting. This was just what I wanted! The fact that it was mostly free because of faithful Christians that donated their time and money was a huge plus. This was truly where I was meant to be, because I didn’t want to just get a “certificate,” I wanted to grow.
I knew the Lord wanted me to get more involved in ministry and I just never knew how. I was trying to lead the youth and my family and friends to the Lord, but it was always on the back burner of my life and it never had much direction. Now, CLI is an avenue the Lord opened up for me and by now I am starting to see how the Lord works in my life. I jumped at the opportunity, although I must admit I didn’t know it would be this much work! Joking aside, it was just what I asked for and needed. I feel like every day I am in the position that the Lord wants me to be. I find myself growing in the Lord alongside my fiance and I couldn’t be happier.
I ask for all of your prayers as I walk the narrow path with our Lord. I pray that I am able to grow in a way that best serves our community because that is where we all must begin our fight against the enemy. I don’t know what the Lord has in store for me, but I couldn’t be surer that He is the only one I want to follow, and I know, although times may get tough, in Him I have my strength.
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