Tim Lacey has served more than four decades in ministry, and of the many things he has learned, one lesson stands out.
“In none of the work I have done did I have the ability within myself to do what God was calling me to do,” said Lacey, who recently retired as minister of music and senior adults at First Baptist Church Winfield. “None of us is good enough for His ministry. Being in the right place in our hearts, though, to see where He wants us to go will open the door to His love and His power, and then we’ll have a ringside seat to see the awesome work God will do through us.”
Lacey served at FBC Winfield for 27 years, with a total of 44 years of ministering through music in Southern Baptist churches.
Finding his way to church music
Lacey’s life went through what some would call random twists and turns before he was called to church music. He has no doubt that it was God directing his life at each pivotal point.
At 7 years old, he felt God touch his heart during a church invitation and was saved. During elementary and high school, he continued to attend church, but choosing to play the trumpet at Robertsdale High School would later change the course of his life.
Selecting instrumental music at the University of South Alabama as his major, Lacey’s goal was to teach high school band. Before the year was over, another seemingly arbitrary choice led to attending two concerts by the contemporary Christian music group Truth.
“I was blown away by the power of God’s message put to contemporary music in this — at that time — brand-new format,” Lacey said.
So when Roger Breland, Truth’s leader, announced at the end of the second concert that Truth needed replacements for the next year’s tour, Lacey and a couple of his friends decided to audition in the spur of the moment.
Opportunity to serve with Truth
In spite of being told he needed more vocal training at the audition, Lacey wasn’t upset. However, before leaving he happened to overhear one singer being invited to the follow-up audition at Mobile College (now the University of Mobile) on June 7 of that year.
Moving past the audition, Lacey got a summer job working for Alabama’s highway department cutting grass. After his second day, he was told they had over-hired. Lacey was promptly laid off.
Needing that money for school, he awoke the next morning still without a plan. He soon realized it was June 7 and recalled what he had overheard at the audition.
“I also remembered that even though they weren’t interested in my vocal ability, they needed some horn players. So I just grabbed my trumpet and headed over there,” Lacey said.
It was a good decision.
“[Breland] said, “Our two trumpet players are Stace Howard from Winter Haven, Florida, and (pointing at me) that guy right there, and I don’t know who he is,’ ” Lacey remembered. “Evidently, another trumpet player had been invited to join them, but he had a conflict and could not make it. He had not contacted Mr. Breland about it, and so they naturally assumed when I arrived that I was that guy.”
After the mix-up was sorted out, Breland sat down with Lacey to find out who he was. After inviting Lacey to play with the group, Lacey ended up playing trumpet for two Truth tours.
Lacey transferred to the University of Mobile, graduated with his original major and got a job teaching high school band, his initial goal.
The summer after Lacey’s first job teaching high school band, God once again changed Lacey’s trajectory.
While attending church with his parents, Lacey felt God’s call to become a church music minister. In two weeks, he was offered the minister of music and youth position at Pleasant Grove Baptist Church in Pensacola, Florida, where he later met the love of his life, Debbie.
‘Wait on the Lord’
Lacey attended seminary and served in a few other churches before being called to FBC Winfield.
One more seemingly arbitrary occurrence — a missions trip to Ukraine — again altered his life. He and Debbie adopted Kristi, an 8-year-old girl from Ukraine, in 2004.
“When Russia invaded Crimea in 2014, [Kristi’s older brother and his wife] came with their two small children to live with us here in Winfield. They became independent and now have three children, and Sasha’s mother, Natali. She was a refugee of the current Russia-Ukraine war,” Lacey shared.
Throughout his life and ministry, Lacey has learned that God’s ways are not his ways.
“When I was in college, if I knew then that God was going to lead me in this direction, I probably would have tried to manipulate or engineer my path to be the best minister of music — in my understanding — as I could,” Lacey said. “However, God knew that I would need so much more than what I understood at the time to do what He was going to call me to do.
“Today, it’s still the same. I have to remember to wait on the Lord, and I don’t usually see what God is doing until I get on the other side and look back.
“I know that this story doesn’t stop here, though. God doesn’t put His tools on a shelf to get covered with dust and rust. It’s just a time to rest a little and then change directions again, maybe?”
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