My Faith Story: I grew up in the Baptist tradition of the Christian faith, in which my dad served as a preacher and pastor. My own faith has matured throughout the typical avenues and with the typical practices and questions, wrestling with historical questions about the scriptures, grappling with the presence and experience of evil and tragedy in the midst of a world created and sustained by a good, loving God, and seeking how to live rightly in the world God has created. Within this trajectory, the purposes for which I read the Scriptures or studied theology morphed from the desire to prove the truthfulness of the Christian faith to the desire to gain nourishment and participate in God’s victory over death and His restoration of creation.  

My Ministry: I currently teach the Scriptures and theology at Houston Baptist University. I spend much of my time and energy devoted to teaching students how to read the scriptures faithfully, and consequently how to inhabit the world created by Jesus and His apostles.   

What I Believe: The church’s early creeds capture the key tenets of the Christian faith. With the testimony of the Scriptures and the creeds, I believe that God is Triune – Father, Son, and Spirit – and that God created all that there is, that He loves all of His creation, that He intends to dwell with His creation, and that He has begun to renew all creation. In the future, God will judge His creation and dwell with it once more, renewing it by filling all of it with Himself.