“I have given you a story for you to use it.”
Those were the words God spoke to me on a mission trip in the Rio Grande Valley during the spring break of my junior year of high school.
I can still picture that moment like it was yesterday.
I remember the concrete steps where I sat at Valley Baptist Retreat in Mission, Texas. I remember the music playing in my headphones—“Fullness” by Elevation Worship—as I sat down to spend time with God. I remember the group debrief that night, when nine students stood up to share how Jesus had changed their lives.
And after the group meeting was over, I couldn’t move. I could barely speak. Sitting there in tears, I began to pray.
And in that moment, God spoke these words to me: “I have given you a story for you to use it.”
At that moment, I knew God was calling me into ministry. Suddenly, no part of my story felt accidental.
My call made clear
By that point in my life, I had already walked through identity struggles, depression, low self-worth, habitual sin, heartbreak from my parents’ fresh divorce, and confusion about who I was.
God reframed my pain. What once felt meaningless now felt redeemed. It was as if the clouds pulled back on a rainy day, revealing purpose in the heartache. God was giving me a story he could use to point others toward the good news of Jesus.
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I remember praying, “Okay God, where would you like me to serve?”
Moments later, a friend rounded the corner in tears over conflict with another student. I remember laughing quietly to myself: “Oh, student ministry. And you want me to start now.”
God made clear he was calling me to vocational ministry, and specifically to walk with students as they wrestled with faith, identity, and obedience to Christ. He was calling me to be what I needed most in a pastor and friend when I was a middle and high school student.
He was calling me to be a student pastor.
But recognizing God’s call and confidently walking in it turned out to be two different things.
My call confirmed
In college, while pursuing a degree in theology, I often wrestled with whether there would be a place for me in ministry. I was a woman in a sea of men at my Baptist university, and insecurity often whispered louder than my calling.
Would any church hire me?
Could God really use my voice?
Did my story matter?
Yet, whenever fear surfaced, God brought me back to the same words he spoke years earlier in the Rio Grande Valley: “I have given you a story for you to use it.”
Looking back, I can see how God was preparing me all along. My education gave me grounding. Serving in student ministry gave me experience. My own struggles gave me empathy for students wrestling with identity, shame, anxiety, and faith. God was forming a pastor long before I believed I could carry the title.
During the first church staff hiring process I went through at age 20, I remember driving away from my second interview in tears. I called my mom and said to her: “I was not just called to this, I was made for this.”
Made for this
I’ve come to realize ignoring God’s call on my life—whether out of fear, shame, or others’ expectations—would mean saying “no” to the very thing God created me to do.
Psalm 139 reminds us God knits us together with purpose. When I reflect on my call to ministry, I am reminded I was not just called by God to follow him into kingdom work, but I was knit together to lead his people to know him and make him known.
My story, education, gifts, and experiences were not obstacles to ministry. They were preparation for it.
Today, I have the privilege of serving students as they discern God’s call on their own lives. In our ministry, six high school students are currently wrestling with a call to ministry. Half of them are young women. What a gift to serve in a church that encourages them to follow God wherever he leads.
By God’s grace, I have now served in two Texas Baptist churches that believed in my calling because they believed in the God who does the calling.
The same God who entrusted resurrection news to Mary Magdalene continues to call people to proclaim good news today.
And every time I begin to doubt myself, I still hear those words from long ago: “I have given you a story for you to use it.”
What a gift it has been to spend my life doing exactly that.
Kassidy Turner is the student pastor at Sugar Land Baptist Church in Sugar Land. The views expressed in this opinion article are those of the author.
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