Good Works, Inc.

Perhaps you know the story from Matthew 14 wherein Jesus walks on the water, and Peter says, “Lord, if it is you, tell me to come to You on the water.” Jesus tells him to “Come.” And Peter walks on the water. Peter looks at the wind and the waves and becomes afraid and begins to sink, but Jesus reaches down and picks him up and puts him back into the boat.

When I hear people talk about this story, I often hear them, as Jesus did, focus on the fact that he began to sink. That’s totally fair. It has a lot of lessons to teach. But I think that in that, we miss the part of the story where Peter walks on the water! Sure, he gets scared by life and Jesus chastens him for being “ye of little faith,” but we don’t talk about what that “little faith” managed to do: he walked on the water!

I started as a volunteer at Good Works in 2013 after my mom had been a resident at the Timothy House. While my mom’s health didn’t allow her to continue volunteering with me after a couple of years, I remained and additionally got involved with the student organization that Good Works led at the time on Ohio University’s campus, Service Living. I did two Summer Service internships in 2015 and 2016.

When Jesus called me into a personal relationship with Him while I was doing my first internship, the song by Hillsong UNITED called “Oceans (Where Feet May Fail)” was very popular. If you somehow managed to not hear it as it was overplayed that year, then here is the opening line: “You call me out upon the waters.” The bridge of the song goes like this:

Spirit, lead me where my trust is without borders
Let me walk upon the waters
Wherever You would call me
Take me deeper than my feet could ever wander
And my faith will be made stronger
In the presence of my Savior

It is so wonderful how music can take us into deeper meditation on the messages of the Bible.

Jesus keeps reminding me of the words I sang in those early days of following Him—of being in relationship with Him. When I graduated from Ohio University in 2018 with a degree in math education, Jesus showed me a vision of Him standing on the lake where I got baptized, asking me to get out of my boat and to follow Him out of my comfort zone, away from the plan that I had to teach. By trusting in Him, He could take the little bit of faith that I had, and He would make me walk with Him where, humanly speaking, I never could have. So, I began working at the Timothy House.

Then, the pandemic hit in 2020 and, unrelatedly, I ended up being the only staff who was scheduled for full-time work at the Timothy House by the end of 2021. My mental health, which had never been particularly strong, crashed. Jesus equipped me through that time, and He put the right people in my life to help me to keep my eyes stayed on Him (Isaiah 26:3), including my now-wife, whom I met while she was doing an internship with Good Works in 2020. Recently, God gave me this reminder through the words of others praying for me, and through meditation on the story of Peter: “Keep your eyes on Me, or you will drown.”

Now, I am the Director of Caregiving at the Timothy House. Basically, I oversee the day-to-day side of the Timothy House. In the 10 years I have been around Good Works, this position has always been held by someone who has a background in social work—something I notably don’t have—or someone with life experience raising a household and working with “the system” for assistance—something I have notably not done. I’m just a kid who wanted to be a math teacher, and here I am doing ministry with people in a very social setting. I could feel ill-equipped for this, and when I look at the wave or the wind, for a moment I believe that. But I don’t have a God who drops me into the sea and waits to watch what will happen. I have a God who is already out in the wind and the waves, calling me to join Him. My faith will be made stronger in His presence, and, like Moses, He will equip me for the work He is calling me to do (Exodus 3-4, 1 Corinthians 1:26-29).

Outside of ministry at and through Good Works, I spend my time playing video games, building community with friends through tabletop games, reading, and leading a small group through my church.

“In self-giving, if anywhere, we touch a rhythm not only of all creation but of all being. For the Eternal Word also gives Himself in sacrifice, and that not only on Calvary…. From the foundation of the world He surrenders begotten Deity back to begetting Deity in obedience…. From the highest to the lowest, self exists to be abdicated and, by that abdication, becomes more truly self, to be thereupon yet the more abdicated, and so forever.” –C.S. Lewis, The Problem of Pain

And so forever. 😊