St. Clair Association teenager’s determination brings Bible drill success

Dressed trendy with his auburn hair framing his face, Kevin Kerr chatted about a summer camp and about starting the 10th grade come fall.
   
Interjected into the conversation of the 15-year-old Pell City High School student were anecdotes about swimming, fishing and being a flagman at a motorcycle racecourse.
   
“He’s all boy,” declared Jessie Garrison, Bible drill leader for the St. Clair Association and Kerr’s Bible drill coach since he was in the sixth grade.
   
Kerr, who attends Mount Moriah Baptist Church in Pell City, spoke about playing racing video games and going later to help someone with a fire wall in the router of a computer.
   
Going to college to get a computer degree is definitely on Kevin’s agenda. And yet, on a daily basis, he faces a health condition that is little understood, even by some physicians, said his grandmother, Florence Kerr.
   
Suffering hemophilia, in which the body lacks its normal clotting properties, Kevin Kerr sometimes encounters spontaneous bleeds in his joints. “My elbow bleeds get really bad,” he said. When one occurs, he can barely bend that joint.
   
Such an episode prevented him from competing in this year’s state Bible drill tournament, held in May in Montgomery. He did attend the tournament, though, in support of Kate, one of his three sisters. Abby and Kelsey are his other two sisters.
   
Just to go to the dentist, Kerr has to have an injection of Factor 8 (the clotting element that is missing from his blood). It can take as long as seven minutes for the injection to be administered and Kerr previously has had to have them twice a day for as long as a week.
   
In addition, Kerr has arthritis and has undergone 10 complicated surgeries, said his grandmother.
Because of discomfort in his elbows, Kerr pointed out that he has to hold the Bible a little differently from other drillers.
   
Nonetheless, Garrison recalls that when she first saw the son of Ginger and Mickey Kerr, she noticed his larger hands and determined he would be a natural for Bible drill. “He learns his verses right off. … He’s very intelligent.”
   
Kerr, who is blind in one eye, learned by touch to find the books of the Bible. He said he knows by feel where certain books are, such as Psalms, and has memorized about how far from those books the other books are located.
   
Kate, his sister, experiences low vision in one eye. She advanced to the semifinals in the state competition, said their grandmother.
   
Health problems mounted when Kerr was in the eighth grade to the point where it seemed he might have to give up Bible drill. “But we stuck it out,” said Garrison.
   
Kerr’s perseverance through the years caught the attention of Bonnie Mullis of Birmingham, Alabama’s Bible drill coordinator, so much so that she was determined Kerr would compete at the state level this year … one way or another.
   
“He has really shown great dedication,” said Mullis. “He’s always done so well.” Kerr had prepared diligently and had qualified at the district level. So Mullis wanted him to be able to compete his third and final year in the youth division and receive his state certificate.
   
“I felt like that was very important,” said Mullis. When students work that hard and then are inhibited by special needs or circumstances, “we need to support them any way we can.”
   
For that reason, she scheduled a special state drill — just for him — at her home.
   
But even bringing that to its fruition posed a challenge. In the days before he was to go to Mullis’ house for the special drill, Kerr suffered an injury. Determined, Mullis rescheduled his state drill. Later in May, Mullis conducted her first special state drill since she assumed the post of Alabama’s Bible drill coordinator. And Kerr missed only two items, racking up 312 points.
   
“But he got all the bonus points,” laughed his grandmother and Garrison, in referring to the extra credit a driller receives for being the first to step out to give a response.
   
“I thought it was nice of her to let me do it after everybody else was done,” said Kerr.
   
“It was a pleasure,” said Mullis, adding that Kerr is an inspiration.
   
For Kerr, being involved in Bible drill gave him the opportunity to learn doctrine, memorize Scripture and recite verses so quickly that they sound like a foreign language.
   
Being required to find verses in eight seconds or less now allows him to dazzle friends and relatives with the speed at which he can flip to any Scripture.
  
However, Garrison noticed something different that happened to Kerr.
   
She said Kerr told her that being involved in Bible drill helped him to communicate better with others and to speak out. This is especially evident when he speaks about what the Scripture has to say regarding particular issues that concern Christians everywhere.