About chris

A life shaped by conviction, surrender, and the work of becoming.

My path has included ministry, military service, academic studies, medicine, music, business, physical training, and family life.

Each setting has added to the same formation: learning to walk with and experience God, steward what He has given me, lead my family well, become the man who I've been created to be, and build something that serves others.

The man behind the work

I am a husband, father, and follower of Jesus.

I write, speak, own businesses, and serve families as a life insurance broker. I love the process of building something that can help others.

I am still learning. I am still growing. My goal is for the work I put into the world to reflect the priorities I hold in private.

The encounter that reoriented my life

At eighteen years old, I encountered the presence of God in a way that changed everything. I sat in a parked car one California evening during a season of life that was full of uncertainty and doubt and pain. The car filled with the atmosphere of heaven as I met God. I surrendered. Everything began to align as Jesus became the center of my life.

Formation through study, worship, and loss

I pursued studies in theology and church history in Chicago, I played music and led worship, studied in Europe, and experienced the highs and lows of my first real leadership opportunities.

I also walked through deep loss, which shaped my understanding of grace, surrender, and what truly matters

Academic life and NYC

I left ministry and theological training to pursue a career in medicine, completing my pre-med studies at Columbia University in New York City.

I spent some time in Paris studying French.

During this time, I seriously explored the possibility of a vocation in contemplative monastic life.

A rule of life formed in quiet

I was drawn to the quiet of the monastery in rural Kentucky, the same place where the writer Thomas Merton spent the latter half of his life pursuing God in the simple rhythms of prayer, work, and study.

After briefly living with the monks, I discerned that I was not called to monastic life, but I took with me a rule of disciplined life that I try to live out in the world outside of the monastery.

Daily rhythms matter. Prayer, scripture, stillness in the mornings. Discipline in body and time helps me steward energy and focus for what counts.

Doctoral studies in naturopathic medicine

I moved to Portland, OR to study classical Chinese medicine and naturopathic medicine, something I deeply enjoyed. It was a natural expression of the embodied Christian life in service to others, using nature as an instrument of healing.

By 2021, that path represented about ten years and more than $500,000 of education. When the world upside down in 2020, I reached a point where continuing would have required me to violate my conscience.

I walked away knowing it was the right decision, with no clear plan for what came next.

The cost of a clean conscience

Integrity is not convenient. I have made hard calls. I have walked away from opportunities that did not match my convictions.

I would rather lose a career than lose my soul.

When I left medicine, I drove trucks on the night shift to pay the bills and begin building towards whatever might be next.

Faithfulness in hidden work

Most of life happens where there is no audience. During those three and a half years of night shifts, I began searching for God again after a period of distance. I read about the man Jesus most days. I prayed in the dark of my living room at three or four in the morning when I came home from work.

Slowly, I felt God restore things in me and in our home.

Faithfulness in private forms the foundation for everything else that lasts.