It is better to walk in the dark with Jesus than in the light alone,” says 25-year-old Ryan May with unfettered passion about his walk with Christ and with a spiritual maturity uncommon for someone his age.
May has struggled with the call of the Lord on his life, knowing that it often requires walking blindly into places that are not within his realm of comfort.
“I never wanted to be a pastor,” explained May, who equates himself with Jonah in fleeing from his calling. “I ran from it for years, even when I knew in my heart that I was being called into the ministry.”
May professed a belief in Christ at the age of 8. At 14, he preached his first sermon during a youth-led worship service.
“After my sermon a lady came up to me and told me that she believed I would be a minister one day. I didn’t believe her,” May said.
According to May, God woke him up one night and told him to get his life straight. In a search for discipline that was sorely missing from his life, May felt led to go into the military after rebellious teen years of drinking and drug abuse.
Soon after leaving the Marine Corps because of an injury, May entered William Carey College in Hattiesburg, Miss., and felt God pulling him toward the ministry.
While at William Carey, May met Caroline Albuquerque, a Brazilian who had come to the United States in an effort to improve her English. The couple immediately knew that they were destined to be together.
Although he was determined not to go into the ministry, May began doing occasional pulpit supply preaching in 1997.
He was licensed to preach, but insisted that his calling was in the area of psychology.
Ryan and Caroline were married in 1999, less than a year after they met at school. Caroline continued her education, and Ryan continued his quest for a psychology degree.
“That’s when God dropped a bomb,” recalls Ryan. “Caroline received a call from Pleasant Hill Baptist Church (Choctaw Baptist Association) asking if I would be interested in being their pastor.” Bewildered, the Mays began to pray fervently about the position.
“We thought we had it all figured out about our future, but then we had to ask ourselves, ‘Is this really what God wants?’” Caroline said.
“God gave me a Scripture, 1 Timothy 4:11–16, and I knew that I was going to have to change my mind about the ministry,” he said.
During their 14-month pastorate at Pleasant Hill, the Mays led the tiny congregation into a period of growth.
What began as a group of about 10 active members grew to more than 40 under their leadership. “It was like planting a church and starting from scratch,” Ryan said.
The idea of church planting began to be a prevalent thought in the minds of both Caroline and Ryan.
“I didn’t even know what a church planter was,” Ryan said, “but I kept being led in that direction. I didn’t know what God had planned for us, but I knew that I had to find out.”
Ryan began to search the Southern Baptist Convention Web site for job listings.
In all, he found 33 listings, and he applied via e-mail to all of them, sending his resumé as an attachment. “I sent out 33 resumés,” he said.
“All except one of them contacted me and said that they could not read my resumé,” he said. “The only one who got my resumé was a church planting position in Tucson, Ariz.”
Throughout his quest for God’s will for his life, May was constantly reminded of Barnabas.
He considered himself like Barnabas in many ways, knowing that his spiritual gifts included encouragement and teaching.
Now, like Barnabas who planted churches throughout the Mediterranean area, May will be doing the same in Arizona.
The Mays will leave for Tucson in late January to plant a church in an area where churches are few and far between.
There are approximately 33,000 people in the area and only two Protestant churches. The target group for their ministry will be those who are 30 years old and under. Worship services will be more contemporary in nature, in an effort to reach the younger generation.
“These people are spiritually hungry,” said May.
“They are looking for that one thing that will fill the void. We are going to show them that only Jesus Christ can fill the void.”
Their new ministry is being coordinated through the North American Mission Board (NAMB), along with the Catalina Baptist Association in the Tucson area.
In an each-one-reach-one type of ministry, the Mays will be forming a core group of believers who will branch out to form other small groups until a larger group of believers can be established.
The ministry will be working out of apartments and homes, with the goal of acquiring a building for worship services.
The Mays have given their new ministry a name fitting for the message they hope to convey — New Vision Church. It will be a new vision of hope for those who are searching for answers, and is a new vision for the Mays.
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