Teena Myers

The Star Maker

When I learned Billy Graham’s grandson, Will Graham, would speak at the Katrina Anniversary Prayer Rally hosted by First Baptist New Orleans, I called Pastor David for permission to photograph the service. During our conversation, he gave me permission to copy material from his website to post on my Faith blog, and I requested to write about his ministry.

After hearing David’s story, I had to reevaluate what “knowledge puffs up” means (1 Corinthians 8:1). He is a busy pastor of a large church, yet he not only made time in his schedule for me; he sought to give me as much time as I desired. His Bachelor of Arts, Master of Divinity, and Doctorate of Religion failed to puff. David dripped with humility and gushed with compassion for the poor.

At the tender age of seven, David experienced a deep sense of being lost. He approached his father to share his fear of spending an eternity without God. “I really want to have Christ in my life and know that I am saved,” David told his father. His father led him to commit his life to Christ. That experience became a defining moment that set the course of David’s life.

Four years later, his father accepted the pastorate at a church in Texas, and David’s ministry began. Eleven‑year‑old David and three of his eight brothers formed a quartet and sang before their father preached at a rescue mission in El Paso. He recalled with fondness praying with the men who came to the altar and then joining them for a meal after the service. David assumed leadership of the quartet when he was seventeen. Before the brother’s quartet disbanded, they traveled to three hundred churches in eleven states, sang on two weekly radio programs, and made four albums.

His family moved to Central Texas so his father could pursue a degree at Howard Payne University. While studying at the university, David’s father accepted the pastorate at a Baptist church. “There are two reasons my family became Baptist. My father had a good rapport with the Baptist church, and he wanted his children to attend accredited schools,” said David.

David enrolled at Baylor University to study journalism. In the middle of his freshman year, he encountered a crisis of faith. He had always studied the Bible from a devotional point of view, but the religion classes he took approached the Bible from a scholarly point of view. One of his professors believed in Darwin’s theory of evolution, leaving David confused and frustrated.

His professors shook his faith, but the solid foundation of Christ proved stronger than the wisdom of man. “The night I asked God what to do,” said David, “‘Jesus is all you need’ rumbled out of my soul. From that point on, I became both intellectually and spiritually a Jesus person. I knew God had called me to preach, so I changed my major to religion.”

After David graduated, he served as senior pastor in various churches. During his pastorate at Trinity Baptist Church, he met the infamous pickaxe murderer Karla Faye Tucker. Karla had accepted Christ six months after her arrest while incarcerated in Houston’s Harris County jail. David baptized Karla in the prison while she was awaiting execution.

Tucker’s appeal to commute her death sentence to life imprisonment drew support from world figures Waly Bacre Ndiaye, the United Nations commissioner on summary and arbitrary executions; the World Council of Churches; Pope John Paul II; and Italian Prime Minister Romano Prodi. Pat Robertson, founder of CBN, delighted death penalty opponents when he called for clemency.

Shortly after Tucker’s execution, David told the Baptist Press that Karla exemplified the love of God as well as anyone he had ever known. He also reevaluated his position on capital punishment. His relationship with Karla put a face on the death penalty and made him question whether society can implement capital punishment equitably.

David had purchased forty‑one acres and built a house for his family in Texas. He loved his ministry, his new home, and walking outside at night to look at the stars. When a committee from New Orleans contacted him about a church on St. Charles Avenue, he wasn’t interested.

The committee called a second time. Confident his wife would not be interested in moving, he discussed the offer with her. During a time of prayer, the Lord impressed upon his wife’s heart that they should talk to the committee. David traveled to New Orleans in 1996 intent on doing little more than talking.

He met with the committee and returned to his eleventh‑floor hotel room for a restless night. Around 4 a.m., he walked onto the balcony and looked up to see the stars. “The stars at night are big and bright deep in the heart of Texas,” said David, “but they were not so bright deep in the heart of New Orleans.”

Dismayed, David exclaimed, “God, where are the stars?” A twinkle caught his eye, and he looked down. The city, dotted with a sea of man-made lights, sprawled awkwardly around the river. As he pondered what he should do about the committee’s offer, he heard a voice as clear as though someone spoke audibly: “The people in the city are your stars now. I want you to come to New Orleans and help people ‘shine like stars in the universe’” (Philippians 2:15).

David smiled broadly. “That is my calling. I’ve been here longer than any other place, and I don’t plan on leaving.” Since David accepted the pastorate at First Baptist, he has led his congregation to put their faith into action by practicing Jesus’ command to love your neighbor as yourself.

In 2004, he heard Mayor Ray Nagin say, “The single most important factor to permanently lift a family out of poverty is home ownership.” Intrigued, David contacted the Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) and the New Orleans Redevelopment Authority (NORA) to verify the statement made by Mayor Nagin. Both HUD and NORA confirmed that home ownership permanently changes the economic future of a family.

David immediately founded the Baptist Crossroads Project and partnered with Habitat for Humanity to build forty single‑family dwellings. Plans were delayed by Hurricane Katrina, but not forgotten. In 2006, the Baptist Crossroads Project built sixty homes for the displaced citizens of the Ninth Ward.

I’ve heard many stories about people salvaged from the depths of sin by Jesus’ grace. No one had the profound effect on me that David did. The greatest story of all is a selfless life spent in service to others. From the young boy who prayed with derelicts to the man who baptized Karla Faye Tucker to his quest of permanently lifting the poor out of poverty, David has consistently extended a hand of hope to the hopeless. There are few people better equipped than to make God’s people shine like stars.