Stories - The Christian Heart

How Everyday People Live Out Their Christian Faith

Illustrating how men and women display their love for Jesus in their day-to-day lives.
Little things that may have an eternal impact. Might these stories motivate you to use your talents?

Loss Of Loved One Overcoming Obstacles Recovery
FINDING GRACE IN GRIEF

The week of Thanksgiving is meant to be joyous. It’s a celebratory, anticipatory week that culminates in a big family gathering, filled with gratitude and nostalgia. On November 22, 2022, that’s exactly what I was anticipating. Then, I got a phone call that changed my life forever. It was my parents. They called to tell me that my older brother, Jason, had been in a helicopter crash off I-77 in Charlotte, NC. As a television meteorologist, Jason was in the air that morning learning the station’s new camera system. It was supposed to be a routine trip, but it turned into my family’s worst nightmare. Jason and the pilot both passed away in the crash. Instead of a Thanksgiving feast, we ate funeral casseroles around a dining table that had one seat too many. It was the worst week of our lives. We all grieved differently, but we grieved hard. Jason left behind the love of his life, my sister-in-law Jillian, along with their four teenage children. Nothing made sense, and everything hurt. We were shrouded in darkness, unable to take any next steps. For our family, it was a Good Friday moment. We’d suffered a terrible loss, but God doesn’t leave us by ourselves in that darkness. He walks alongside us, ever gentle, ever waiting, until Sunday comes. It didn’t happen in three days. It didn’t happen in three months. It will be three years this Thanksgiving, and we still have difficult days. But God has been working mightily on our hearts and in our lives. Since losing Jason, I’ve recommitted myself to making faith… Read More

November 26, 2025
Adoption/Foster Care Children Loving Your Neighbor
CHANGING LIFE’S PATH FOR KIDS

As a kid who lived on the streets of Uganda for almost five years, I know what it feels like to grow up in a world where love, caring, and kindness are nowhere to be found. But I was helped by the kindness of a stranger who brought me to the Lord. And wanting to change life’s path for kids that have been neglected, I have now fostered 47 children and adopted 6 kids, all as a single dad. I had a very abusive father; so abusive that I thought he would eventually kill me. This led me to run away from home at age 10, and I lived on the streets of Kampala for nearly five years. To the outside world, my dad was extremely religious. So for him to be so abusive was very confusing to me, and turned me off to all religion. It also created a lot of anger in me toward my dad. While I lived on the streets, the abuse continued from time to time, but since it wasn’t someone I knew, it just didn’t feel as bad. One day, a stranger gave me something to eat. I thought this would turn into another abusive situation. After all, everyone I knew that did something nice for me turned out to be hurtful. But I was hungry, so I took the meal. But there was no abuse. He continued to buy me lunch every week. Then he invited me to eat with his entire family. Again, I was skeptical since everyone who previously cared for me was abusive. I was that… Read More

November 19, 2025
Overcoming Obstacles Recovery
“FEAR NOT, FOR I AM WITH YOU”

“If there is a god, he will have to beg my forgiveness.” Whether or not these words were found carved into the wall of a Nazi death camp, it is certainly how I felt trudging through the jungles of Vietnam in 1966. “Why would God permit such mayhem and horror?” I was told that God was good and loving, but I found no love or goodness in the rot of war. While I remained culturally tied to Christianity after returning to the United States, I was, for all intents and purposes, an atheist. My job as a police officer only reassured me of my convictions, as goodness and love were once again alien to my surroundings. As my resentments grew, my relationship faltered. To boot, I had a heart attack at the young age of 31! Utterly alone, worried, and depressed, I felt a hand on my shoulder and heard a voice say, “You are not alone, I am with you!” To say these words changed my life would be a massive understatement. They led me to the scriptures, “life’s instruction manual,” as I like to call it. I learned that it was not God who needed my forgiveness, but I who needed God’s. As I confessed my sins, I discovered not only a forgiving God, but one who is not indifferent to the plight of human suffering. God himself, through the person of Jesus Christ, suffered for all humanity, giving us hope to find peace, not necessarily from hardship, but in hardship. Soon after my encounter with God, I met the woman who would become my wife… Read More

November 12, 2025
Recovery
FOLLOWING A DIFFERENT PATH

My life looked perfect. I was 19 years old, but deep down, I felt an emptiness. I suffered from depression. I felt I had no future, no meaning in life. There was a voice telling me horrible things about myself. I tried to find happiness in parties and became addicted to sex. But ten minutes of carnal desire did not give me peace. Hours later, the depression would return. Since I was a little girl, my aunts took me to church, but I never believed in God. I felt I was my own God. I didn't want to follow rules. I wanted the things of the world. But every day, that world disappointed me more and more. As a teenager, I continued to visit the church, sporadically, and one day I heard a song that touched my heart: Joy, joy, I wanted it but I was looking for it where there was none, but one day Christ, the giver of life, gave me the joy I wanted; Peace, peace I wanted peace, but I was looking for it where there was none... In the praises and the preaching, I found everything I needed: peace, comfort and love. I was about to turn 20, and for the first time in my life, I knelt down before God and said, “If you are real, I am going to give you this decision and let you guide me.” God's answer was not long in coming. Within a week, I was in the emergency room for appendicitis, had surgery and was hospitalized for 10 days due to complications.… Read More

November 5, 2025
Loss Of Loved One Recovery
EMBRACING GOD’S COMFORT

At the end of a busy day in my 34^th week of pregnancy, I realized I hadn’t felt my baby move. A hospital ultrasound confirmed the terrible truth: my baby girl had died. I wasn’t in the habit of praying. I did believe Jesus was my savior and had accepted Christ into my life at the age of 8. But by the time I left for college, and even after I got married and had my son, church was just a weekly ritual. Even though I believed, I just didn’t feel prayer or a relationship with God was necessary. I was fine. Life was “good.” But on January 17, 2005, my “good” life turned completely upside down. The next day, I delivered my daughter. I was able to hold her and love on her for several hours. But then I had to say my final goodbye. The grief that followed was unimaginable. This is how my prayer life restarted: with anger. I had MANY conversations with God, questioning His ways. Questioning His love. I needed His healing so badly, but I shut Him out. But God was completely looking out for me during my grief. The people He’d already placed in my life stepped up to help me as I healed, surrounding me with love and prayer. It took time, but the presence of God’s love in their hearts gradually soaked into my own. I began to realize I needed to embrace, not blame, God. That I couldn’t get through this without Him. I let him in. I prayed. I experienced the freedom—the relief—that comes from trusting… Read More

October 29, 2025
Children Church Activities Senior Citizens
HELPING KIDS LEARN ABOUT JESUS

At 76, I’m old now, but I’m still perkin’. I’m an extrovert, and I love to welcome people and make them feel at home at church. I’m trying to live a good life and find avenues where I can have an effect. I consider myself a back-slappin’, hand-shakin’, hand-clappin’ kind of guy; a Barnabus. I can build people up, encourage them, and be a friend. I’m a creature of the 50s and 60s where most of my ministry is now, but I taught school and coached for 37 years, so I also love the kids. As I’ve gotten older, what worries me is that it seems the church is losing the youth, so after I retired from teaching middle school, I continued to substitute. I love to communicate with people of all ages, so to stay connected to the teens, I created a collection of what I call, “Substitute Raps.” The kids loved them, and they even made their way around social media. Not long ago, however, I realized that the only age level of kids I hadn’t really tried to influence were the primary school ones. That changed when I started going with my son to the Goodwill store. While he browsed for relics, I made my way over to the book section. That’s when I noticed all of the young children’s Bibles, Bible story books, and Christian literature. I knew exactly what I could do. Each time we went, I bought all the books that were in good shape and took them to the Sunday school teacher at church who taught… Read More

October 22, 2025

Browse all categories

Adoption/Foster Care 39

Church Activities 61

Financial Help 18

Loss Of Loved One 48

Loving Your Neighbor 69

Mission Work 52

Overcoming Obstacles 135

Prison Ministry 12

Senior Citizens 23

Special Needs 49

Unique Ministries 176

Verbalizing the Gospel 80

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