2021 Maryland Men of Faith Conference: No Fear

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Maryland Men of Faith

Chris Holland

Two Kings, Two Prophets, One Message

This media has been presented to you by the Maryland Men of Faith, where men are challenged and encouraged to form the character of Christ.

For more information, please visit www.mmof.org.

We have the privilege today of introducing our main speaker.

Now some of you got a little bit of a sneak peek if you came to his seminar.

He shared a little bit and there is a bio in the program there, but I'll just say for me, I first met Pastor Chris almost 15 years ago when I was a brand-new just turned 18 year old freshman.

He was the professor for the religion section of my honors class and I remember him caring not so much about grades or difficult assignments, but rather he cared about how our learning could be practical, how we could apply the Bible to our Christian walk.

I later got the opportunity to serve with Chris on the executive committee of a regional GYC organization, and eventually learn more of his story.

I'm not sure how much he's going to share today, but I'll just tell you that Chris is a convert from Catholicism who learned about our beautiful Adventist message from a lady at a gas station in Indiana.

Now Chris currently serves as senior evangelist for Hope Channel as well as the president of the Living Hope School of Evangelism and at Hope Channel Chris also helps co-host a program known as Let's Pray, a global interactive program, the place where you don't have to pray alone.

Chris has been a local pastor, an officer in church organizations, and even previously served as the Speaker Director of It Is Written Canada, all while hiding his American identity.

Chris is a graduate of Andrews University, both for his undergraduate degree and multiple degrees from our church's theological seminary.

And for those of you familiar with Andrews, 1 of his first jobs on campus was running the Gazebo restaurant.

I haven't actually heard him tell this, I'm gonna have to ask him about what that was like.

He's been married to his wife, Debbie, for 25 years.

And when I asked Chris what I should share about him, this is what he replied.

Thank you Pastor Chris for bringing us men the bread of life today.

I you know I had the privilege of actually living not too far away from this place for 3 years of my life.

I was the pastor in Hagerstown 2010 to 2013 had the opportunity actually teach junior and senior Bible at the academy.

I was at a lunch and be careful what you volunteer yourself for, you may not know what you're getting into.

The new principal said, Jason talked about me teaching at Andrews, we were talking and I...

And so, I was at this lunch and the principal of the school says, oh hey, we would love you to come and teach a class.

Now in my mind, what I thought that meant is I was gonna come like for 1 day And I'll never forget, you know Doug Doug was 1 of the elders there Doug sales of 1 of the elders there at Hagerstown and I'll never forget.

I got a phone call from the registrar at Highland View Academy and the registrar says, Pastor Holland, your books are here to pick up.

Maybe you need to expand on what that means.

Oh, for the class you're teaching, Maybe you need to expand on what that means.

And she says, you're the junior Bible teacher.

So I said, oh, that's kind of fascinating.

And I said, and as I began to contemplate what that meant I got another phone call very quickly after that 1 from Rob Vandeman the president of the Chesapeake Conference and Rob says Chris I hear you're gonna be teaching the Bible class Would have been nice for you to talk to us about that.

And I said, well, I said, Rob, as surprised as you were, I was equally surprised.

But you know what, what a blessing that was.

Just, I preached at the Martinsburg Church here just a couple of weeks ago and had a couple of parents come up.

And it's always a wonderful thing to hear about your students and what they have done and where they are in life.

Mount Etna has been a favorite place, that little nature center on Sabbath afternoons, and then in the Chesapeake conference when you pastor to make sure that you're pastor worthy for camp meeting.

They make you lead out the juniors, excuse me, the primary department and I did that and I followed the principle while I don't have any biological children of my own.

I followed the simple principle that during the day I did everything to make these children tired so that way when they came back in the evening they were easy to deal with.

And so and if you ever swim in the pool over here just remember that that water comes from the mountain where things are colder than here.

And so, and you know, I feel, you know, I want to share with you today, and it is not a challenge with the organizers, it's a challenge with the preacher.

The title of the message today is 6 words that drive fear away.

We're just going to drop the 6 off of that because as I was traveling back to the east, I was in Michigan for a couple of days and as I was driving yesterday the Lord, it's 1 of those moments, Pastor Rojas, you know those moments where the Lord begins to speak to you and say, hey, you know what you're going to preach tomorrow?

And you say, here I am, Lord, send me, you know.

And so we're going to focus there but I suppose with Jason's introduction it would be helpful so you're not distracted the whole time wondering about this lady in a gas station and actually are able to focus in on the message.

Let me give you my testimony in about 3 minutes.

I grew up in a Catholic home and at the age of 14 I went to, in 1989, January of 1989, I went to a football game with my dad.

I lived in the Chicago area, I grew up in the Chicago area.

I'm a Midwest boy, I was born in Indiana.

San Francisco 49ers versus the Chicago Bears.

It was the NFC Championship and it was cold outside.

I think the windshield that day was minus 30 and we went there and the usual customers were there, you know, people with no shirt on and breaking the ice on their beer to drink it and you know a good place for a 14 year old to be of course and and that day was quite discouraging because the Bears for those of you that follow football the Bears got absolutely demolished by the 49ers and then and then as the day unfolded my dad took me out to eat.

And it's 1 of those – you know, it's a strange thing.

My dad took me to a restaurant – a Chinese restaurant at the corner of Wolf and Central in Prospect Heights, Illinois.

But we ate it because we were cold and the food was hot.

Yeah, some of you said, been there, done that.

During that meal, my father informed me that he was going to be divorcing my mother.

And that was a moment in time, a real transformational moment for me.

It began a process over the course of 4 years where my dad moved out, he moved back in, moved out, moved back in, moved into his own room and then finally left.

And by the way, by saying that I'm not throwing my dad under the bus, I'm not being mean, I'm just simply sharing with you the facts.

Facts that were very confusing to me the oldest of 4 boys and my 3 younger brothers and That's by I was so we we grew up Catholic I wouldn't call Wednesday we were devout, but we were in church every week.

My parents led the teen Sunday school group.

Ironically enough, my parents were preparing to lead out in marriage enrichment seminars.

And I'll never forget as a 14 year old young man, and this is a lesson and this is why I share my testimony, We knew people in the church, we had had the priest to our home several different times.

And when this all began to happen, from a church perspective, nothing happened.

I have 3 younger brothers, 6 years younger than I am, 8 years younger than I am, and 11 years younger than I am.

The priest didn't offer any support, and It was at that moment that I decided that if this is what God is about and this is what his church is about, I'm done with this.

I never became an atheist, but I just simply made a decision that this is not something I wanted to be a part of.

And that began a journey, and I have a longer testimony, but I believe the Lord took me on this journey to help me understand How bottom of the barrel I was in my life, but I went to non-denominational Church Willow Creek for those of you that are aware, Bill Heibel's, Lee Strobel, these were the guys pastoring that church.

If you want a sad story on how to not live by the principles that you espouse, you can read the Bill Heibel story, and I don't say that in judgment of him.

I just simply say that we need to not just be speakers, but we need to be doers.

And I went through an apostolic church, and I will tell you that when you're Catholic and you're in a Bible study and everybody ends in prayer and starts speaking in tongues, you want to have an interesting experience.

That was 1 for me because it was eye-opening and it freaked me out.

All of that concluded I ended up at a New Age conference because I'm looking for God.

And you know Romans 8 28 we often only quote the first portion but the back portion is important.

For we know all things work together for good to those who love God to those who are called according to his purpose.

So I'm at this New Age conference and they're doing I don't even know what you call it, but where they start telling a story and it's a scary story And you've got your eyes closed and it freaked me out people are screaming and all kind I'm like what in the world is going on.

I know now what was going on Thankfully I didn't have to deal with that demonic kind of stuff During that course of things there are 2 things that happen At 1 point in my journey I became so upset with my mom that 1 day she went to work and I left.

And I didn't speak to my mom for 2 years.

It's not something in my story that I'm proud of.

And I know during the millennium I'm gonna ask the Lord about that.

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Two Kings, Two Prophets, One Message

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