How Kenny Came to Christ

I have a friend named Kenny.

Kenny is a great guy. He’s spontaneous, fun-loving, intelligent, creative, funny, and a really good Christian.

The story of how he came to Christ is very interesting. He shared it with a mission team I was on back in 2019. 

Kenny is of Puerto Rican descent. He grew up in a poor neighborhood in Philadelphia, raised by parents who were not Christians.

One day when he was about seven years old, Kenny said he saw some white guys in his neighborhood.

“What are these white guys doing in my neighborhood?” he thought to himself.

And all they were doing (that he remembers) was playing games with the local kids. They were missionaries from some church somewhere. Kenny does not remember where they were from but they were not building houses or offering free medical care or feeding the homeless.

They were just playing basketball and other games and hanging out with the local kids. And yes, they were also talking about Jesus.

Before they left, one of them came up to Kenny, handed him a plastic, rubbery, stretchy Bugs Bunny toy and said, “Here, God told me I should give this to you.”

Now Kenny had no idea why God would want him to have a rubber Bugs Bunny, but it got him curious about who this God was. So, Kenny started finding out more and more about God. And of course, that meant he met Jesus.

Today, Kenny is the lead pastor at Horizon City Church in Winter Garden, Florida. He has been an instructor at Bethany Global University where he taught young people to become missionaries. He’s also been a speaker, a podcaster, he's written an excellent book called “Redefined,” and he’s been on over 40 missions trips --including the one I was on with him in Guatemala.

The reason Kenny told us that story at the beginning of our mission trip was to let us know we were not expected to be stars in God’s movie. All we had to be, Kenny said, was one of the extras. All we had to be was ourselves, doing whatever it was that the love of God motivated us to do that week.

If God could use a rubber Bugs Bunny to save Kenny, what kind of pressure does that put on us with the people we were there for?

I certainly felt like any prior expectation of me parting the Red Sea was totally gone at that point.

And there is such freedom in that. God is the one who saves people, not Dan Jones. God is the one who draws people to Himself. God’s own Holy Spirit is the one who does the real work. All I have to do is be faithful to love God and love others.

I’m just a bit player! 

If I love as I am called to love, others will see that in me and know it came from God. That overwhelming, never-ending love means that yes, I will testify and I will read and study scripture, and I will speak the Word of Life whenever I have the opportunity.

Yes, we do all things to His glory and we do the best we can as if doing them for God Himself.

But there is no pressure, no incredible expectation of me. Because I’m not the star.

While I was on that trip back in 2019, we went to a water park. God opened a door so I got to spend an hour with an orphan named Katherine just reading a Spanish/English dictionary going back and forth between various words and learning each other’s language. 

And yes, I told Katherine to keep that dictionary because I felt God wanted her to have it.

(Picture is of an item I purchased on Amazon as a Christmas gift for Kenny. Sadly, it is no longer available.)