I remember when I first got into comedy…it was by sheer “accident”. I had a job as a deejay on a sleepy little AM Christian radio station in Shreveport, Louisiana. Trying to shake things up I started doing these weird characters and different voices…basically trying to add a little joy to people’s lives as they rode around town listening to the radio. One afternoon I get a call to come do my “characters for a group of teens” at a conference…turns out it was several thousand teens and dozens of youth pastors. The rest…as they say…is history.

It was that initial desire to see people laugh…to bring joy…to break down walls with humor so I could share Christ with disconnected people…that got me into the whole stand up comedy thing in the first place. Then all of a sudden I’m on a plane flying around the country…getting picked up by a booking agent…landing a management deal…getting invited to the right kind of gigs…major record label interest…and watching the miles go by out of the window of a tour bus. Somewhere along the way it became more about product sales, how many weekly interviews I was doing, concert attendance numbers, how prestigious were the events I was hosting, in-store appearances, getting on the biggest tours and how many “connected” people I could have lunch with…than the simple joy and ministry of making people laugh. Too many people…with too many agendas…that were not my calling….were whispering in my ear. Because of the noise and confusion…I stopped listening to God..and starting buying into what I was hearing from those around me. I had lost my focus…my reason for doing it…my first love. It all stopped being a ministry to further the Kingdom of God and starting becoming…a competition.

It wasn’t long after that realization that I walked away. I would still occasionally do comedy as a platform team member with a international prison ministry…however the CCM lifestyle was clearly in my rear view mirror. I also made a promise to God that if it ever stopped being about reaching people far from Him with the Good News of Jesus Christ…I would walk away.

Four years into this journey called church planting it’s still about reaching disconnected people for Christ. It’s not about how many people are in the seats on Sunday, how much financial reserve is in the bank, whether I’m being asked to speak at the “right” conferences or whether I get to sit at the “cool kids’ table” in the church planting world. I think those things eventually come…if you keep your eye on the ball. The ball? Reaching people far from God with the Gospel of Jesus Christ and helping them grow in their knowledge of God’s Word. If it ever stops being about that…I’ll quit again. I’d rather walk away from something deemed successful in the eyes of man…that disappoint my Father in Heaven again.