Our God is in heaven; he does all that he pleases.

Gary was in the US military for fifteen years. He served in Iraq and Afghanistan. He started out a belligerent atheist. God broke him. His wife called and said, I’m done. I’m leaving with the kids. He didn’t blame her. He knew he’d neglected his family.

He sat in his trailer for two days, surrounded by desert, crying out to God. When a voice called him by name, “Gary you can keep on doing what you've always done, or you can follow me, and it will change everything.” Halfway around the world, his wife, Jenni, was also crying out to God, saying, “If you bring Gary to you, I’ll follow you.”

Gary returned home and they began following Jesus together. When they explained their decision to the children, their eight-year-old asked, “Daddy, what is God?”

They began attending a local church where they met a couple with young children who were making disciples and forming groups in Afghanistan. God was preparing Gary and Jenni for a calling that would come four years later.

Today Gary serves as a movement catalyst among Afghans. Gary says the Taliban takeover of Afghanistan in 2021 was a massive catalyst for people coming to faith in Christ. Many feel, “If this is Islam, I’m out!”

In just one stream, hundreds have come to Christ and over twenty churches have been planted. There are streams of disciples and churches among the ethnic groups that make up Afghanistan—Hazaras, Pashtuns, Tajiks, Uzbeks and even some Turkmens. The movements are spilling over the Pakistan border.

Gary quotes Psalm 115, “Our God is in heaven; he does all that he pleases.”

Our God has rescued this broken soldier, his wife and family. Through the turmoil and destruction that is Afghanistan, God is gathering the peoples of Afghanistan to himself.

Watch out for my podcast interview with Gary in a few weeks.