If I had to look back at my life and find a moment or a period of time that made me who I am, I would find a lot of different things. However, one three week trip called Operation Barnabas made the most positive effect on my life. I was introduced to the program shortly after a youth retreat with my current church in Philadelphia. My youth pastor, Christian McAllister (PMac for short), recommended that I apply for the program. He then helped me through the steps of raising money and preparing me for what it was going to be like. When I first heard of the program, I thought it was going to be God’s way of ‘cleaning me up’ so I could be closer to him. Needless to say it did not ‘clean me up’. Operation Barnabas trained me in ministry, not just in the church, but in real, practical life. It showed me for the first time how God’s work could be done through me in my daily life. It taught me to have a heart for the lost, for encouraging other believers, for God, and for full time ministry. God used OB to change me from a person who was bent on always following the rules to a person who was bent on following God. For the first time in my life, my faith became my own, and it changed who I was. Ever since I came back …show more content…
It is a six month program where the OB alumni gets to be discipled while discipling another younger person. I chose Pmac to be my mentor, with no clue as to how much that decision would impact my life. He mentored me for the six months that were required to complete the program, and then he went on to mentor me for another year until he left to pastor a church in Ohio at the end of 2017. He helped me grow from a kid eager to learn to a man who was learning about God constantly. His talks were challenging, heart-wrenching, and loving all at the same time. In some ways he was my father when my father was not always there. I am so thankful for the way God used him in my