About Thad
Though born and raised in Mississippi (or just Mi’sippi if you’re a local) by graduates of the University of Southern Mississippi, I happily followed the scholarship money to Mississippi State, where I quickly became a bulldog — again, bulldawg, if you’re a local. I graduated from State in December of 2014 with a degree in Philosophy and minors in English and Linguistics with a calling and intention to serve the Lord through full-time missions. #hailstate.
But I’ll rewind.
I grew up in an area right outside of Jackson with parents who loved me deeply and raised me in the church, but my faith was my parents’ faith. I was consistently in church, always doing the things Christians do, always trying not to do what they don’t. But boiled down, I was one of the “Lord, Lord” Christians that Jesus spoke of in Matthew 7 — on track to go before Him on that day and boast of the things I did in His name, only to be told that He never knew me. And that was the problem. I wasn’t alive, I didn’t know Him. The relationship didn’t exist.
And that relational void is exactly why my superficial religion didn’t hold up in January of 2007 when we lost my dad to cancer — just three months after his initial diagnosis.
In Lewis’s Problem of Pain, he describes the human tendency to mistake kindness for love — “Kindness cares not whether its object becomes good or bad, provided only that it escapes suffering, while Love would rather see them suffer much than be happy in contemptible and estranging modes.”
Essentially, I didn’t want Love. I wanted kindness. Because kindness is easier. And it’s convenient. God’s plan for me was different than mine, and I told Him that mine was better. I oddly never experienced a time in which I denied God’s existence. Rather, I actively opposed Him, and I made sure to tell Him that.
I maintained the public image. I was in church the day after dad died. I had people who had expectations of me, and I fulfilled those expectations publicly. But in private, my life was falling apart.
I was drowning, but I was discreet.
During the summer after my freshman year of high school, I had the opportunity to study at Cambridge University in the UK, but what could have been an incredible experience was instead an opportunity for me to let my private depravity go public. I was a million miles from my church, and there wasn’t a single person there who knew anything about me. Without the bonds of the public eye, I cut loose. When I came home, I met with my youth pastor for lunch because he wanted to hear about my trip. I made up stories because I was ashamed.
I left feeling guilty and duplicitous. I had a problem with the fact that I was living two separate lives. I knew I had to pick one, but I honestly wasn’t sure which one was actually who I was.
My best friend called me that day and invited me to a small group at his house. I don’t remember what we talked about in group at all. But when everyone else had left, we took a walk through the neighborhood and I told him everything. When I finished, he opened up about how rough the last two years were for him too. He prayed for me on a tennis court. I wasn’t comfortable doing so.
I went home that night and had an experience with the Lord that I can’t begin to describe, so I won’t try (see the tail end of Luke 15 for details).
I started seeking the Lord when I was 15.
Now I’m 22, and I’ve been called to serve Him, sharing my story and bringing glory to His name in all the nations.
I’m insanely thankful for the World Race.
