Molded for Ministry
Molded for Ministry
Alice Lawson Sperapani
Print
On a warm spring day in 1958, seven-year-old Debbie Winslow ran the four blocks from Park Street School to her home in Asheboro, North Carolina, tears streaming down her face. As the little girl burst through the front door, she blurted out, “Daddy, Daddy, I’ve got to sing with a redheaded boy!”
Although Debbie was a reluctant Mrs. Radish in the school production of The Wedding of the Tasty Vegetables, her chosen partner—Mr. Radish—was secretly pleased. Young David Garner had a crush on Debbie and did his best to impress her during their duet, “I Love You Truly.”
Forty-five years later, David Garner sits back quietly as the story is recited and says with a smile, “But I won out in the end.” At 52 his hair is more gray than red, and certainly a lot happened between second grade and his marriage to Deborah in 1984, but he is a patient man, and she was worth the wait.
“You have to be patient to be a potter,” says David, whose family has thrown pots in Seagrove, North Carolina, for nearly 300 years. “It’s frustrating to learn to turn a potter’s wheel. If you can’t handle the frustration, you’ll walk away.” Then the potter/volunteer prison chaplain adds, “And you have to have patience to see faith work. Faith gets you from ‘Amen’ to ‘There it is.’ “
Indeed, faith in Jesus has taken David and Deborah a long way from their hippie days of the seventies, when they were heavily involved with alcohol and drugs. Deborah was a heroin addict when her first husband died in a car wreck, leaving her with two young sons, Robert and Jeff.
David also married young. He tried college for a while, then apprenticed under a Japanese master potter for two years. Despite that “dream opportunity,” the pain of divorce and the desire to escape his small town took David to Florida, where he followed rock concerts and sold drugs. He smuggled cash and guns, among other things. “The drug world holds no joy,” says David today, “but you don’t see a way out.”
Like the prodigal son, David awoke one morning and decided to return home. “I was tired, but really it was my mom’s prayers. When I was young she took me to church and told me about Jesus. Throughout my ever-increasing wickedness, she continued to pray.”
