John Secrest: A Hurricane Opened Doors for the Gospel

In 1984, I was president of my college fraternity. Two of those fraternity brothers loved Jesus, loved their fraternity brothers, and I came to Christ through those men. First Evangelical Free Church of Rockford (EFCA) became my home church, and when I graduated from college, I went on staff with Cru.  

I served with Cru for two years at the University of Illinois, but I realized I needed more training and went to TEDS. [At the time], I was a parachurch guy. I came to Christ through the parachurch, and I thought it was the cutting edge of what God was doing in the world. When I went to TEDS, I met people who loved the [local] church, and I resisted the idea of being a pastor. I wanted to be a missionary, but as the professors opened God's Word, I saw that God's cutting-edge leaders for His Kingdom were pastors in churches. It reshaped my vision of how I wanted to serve the Lord. While I was in seminary, I became a pastor at the Arlington Heights Evangelical Free Church—now, The Orchard (EFCA)—and it was an amazing foundation. 

While we were [at The Orchard], the Free Church mission came calling and asked us to pioneer a new work in Budapest, Hungary. People asked the Free Church to come and plant churches. Within nine months, my wife and I were living in Budapest with our young child, launching a church-planting movement. After seven years, we trained Hungarian church planters and a Hungarian pastor to take our place.  

After a season of working in business in Tennessee and then ministry in California, we moved to southwest Florida to be with family. We couldn't find a church that was looking for or needed a pastor [in the area]. But we kept hearing people say, “We need more healthy churches.” So we planted Compass Church (EFCA) in Naples, Florida. 

People think of Naples as a retirement place for rich people—which it is—but it's also a needy place for the gospel. Affluence is a powerful analgesic for the soul. It's a very challenging ministry environment to make disciples because most of the people in southwest Florida are very affluent. But God is doing things.  

Several years ago, Hurricane Ian devastated many parts of our community with a significant storm surge. This gave us an opportunity to serve in ways that would never have happened if there hadn't been a storm. I walk around this one community, and they see me as the neighborhood pastor. Before the hurricane, they would have called the sheriff if I had walked around, knocked on doors and prayed with people. Now, they want us to do ministry in their community center.  

God has taken what many would see as a tragedy, and He's used it for good—and continues to use it for good. We don't want another hurricane, but it's changed our engagement with our community in ways that we couldn't have done if there hadn't been a need.