Today's Featured Biography
Brian Friday
After high school, I attended Westark. My first semester was kind of uneventful, but then a friend, who had heard me sing, encouraged me to try out for the vocal ensemble. As most of you know I was in the band, but I had no formal vocal training. I tried out, and to my surprise, was placed on scholarship. So I became a vocal music major.Things were good, but at the same time something was missing. I did not feel like I was completely where I was suppose to be. As most of you probably remember I have always been very active in church, and I believed that I had a call of God on my life. That was confirmed for me in 1990, and in the fall of 1991 I moved to Tulsa, OK and attended ministry school. I majored in Biblical Studies with an emphasis on Pastoral care. What was really wild was what happened from 1991-1993 in my personal life. Right after I made the decision to follow God's plan for my life I was diagnosed with Brights Kidney Disease. It is very serious and the outlook was not very good. I had to see a specialist at least once a month and sometimes more often than that. I was pretty much told that I was just going to continue getting worse. Dialysis then possible transplant at a young age. This was scary for a 2o year old. However, I had my faith to rely on. My pastor prayed, my youth pastor prayed, my parents and friends were praying. I belived that God could heal me, and I definitely belived that all those people had strong faith, but for some reason my condition was growing worse. After about a year something wonderful happened. I was praying one day and I just thought about God, and how big He is. I mean, if He made the earth and all that is in it, then surely He can fix my kidneys. That night as I was praying, I placed my full trust in God, and I had a peace in my heart, that no matter what happened, I was going to be alright. My test results got even worse, but my spirit was at peace. Then one day after about 6 months, we went to see Dr. Coleman, and he was a bit confused because all my tests had come back negative. They tested again, and same thing. They let me go for a month and tested again, same thing. I went back about 4 times over the next several months and the results were the same evry time. God had healed my kidneys. It has been 17 years and my kidneys are like new and I'm not expecting anything different. The reaon I put this whole long story on here is because it has a huge affect on the direction of my life. While in Tulsa I met my wife, Julie. She is awesome, we have similar backgrounds, both love music, both have a heart to serve God. Julie is from Savannah and we moved here in 1994 when we were married. Julie helped open our church bookstore, and has seen it grow to one of the largest christian bookstores in the state. In 1995 I took a job with Gulfstream Aerospace. I worked in the aerospace industry for 6.5 years as a buyer. It was a very cool job. I bought all the components to outfit the interior of very high end corporate business jets. Gulfstream caters to a very unique clientel. Heads of state, and the ultra rich. I got to see and experience some incredible things, however something on the inside was telling me I was not completely where I was supposed to be. My heart wanted to be in full time ministry, but I really did not have to courage to leave my great job, with great benefits, and take a huge paycut, but something kept nudging me in that direction. Then Sept 11 2001. I was in my office right off the runway @ Savannah/HiltonHead International Airport, when a call came in from one of my co-workers wives about the first plane hitting the World Trade Center. The entire office ran down to the customer lounge and watched things unfold. That day the FAA closed down all air travel, and all the jets out on the tarmack were grounded and the national guard was deployed with machine guns to prevent anyone from taking off. Over the next few months the aviation industry crashed. I was laid off, but immediately hired as a project manager with another company. We were fabricating furniture for a fleet of gulfstream aircraft. Things were going well, but something on the inside was still nudging me toward full time ministry. I was to scared to let go of my job. The contract my company had for the fleet of aircraft fell through, as there was a huge down turn in aviation. I lost that job as well. It was scary being out of work, but in a strange way I felt it was also an opportunity. Several months passed, no work was available, I was doing odd jobs and volunteering at my church. Then in December 2002 I was hired on full time in the ministry. Julie and I are youth ministers, and we work with creative arts ministry also. I have been on several missions trips. To Paraguay, Brazil, and Nigeria. With plans to go to Ghana, Africa in the near future. There is nothing like doing missions work. I love it. I also lead our youth band. We have an awesome group of musicians, we play very contemporary worship music. I sing and play bass and guitar. Julie and I have 2 awesome kids; Landon (8), and McKenzie(2). Landon loves football and I have helped coach his team, the renegades, for the past 2 years. McKenzie is going to be a singer/musician, I can just tell. This is my story to this point. Life is good and I believe I am fulfilling my purpose. Hope to see you guys soon. Brian Friday
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