Greetings in the name of our blessed Lord, Jesus Christ! I am both honored and humbled to have been called to serve those in the Ola community by Pastoring Eastside Baptist Church!
My parents, Tommy and Judy Hill have been members of FBC Stockbridge my entire life. My father Tommy has served as Deacon there, and has also been a Gideon for many years. My Mother Judy has served the church over the years through various committees and volunteering in the children’s department and teaching Sunday School. I give much credit to their Christian example for my very early love for the Lord and His Word. At the age of 8 I accepted Jesus Christ as my Lord and Savior, and faithfully attended and served at FBC Stockbridge until I graduated High School.
My first call to ministry was as a summer interim youth minister for Bethany Baptist Church in McDonough. I was 19 yrs. old, and continued to teach and lead Southern Baptist youth for the next 10 years at a few different churches. I was licensed and ordained in 2001while serving at FBC Lovejoy, GA. I served Austin Oaks Baptist in Ellenwood as Associate Pastor in 2007 until Westridge Baptist in McDonough called me to serve as Senior Pastor in 2009.
I committed to giving the Lord control of my love life when I was a teenager, and to remain pure for my wife. I never “dated” in the worldly sense, but instead followed the concept of courtship-dating in order to find the wife the Lord had chosen for me. It seemed to take forever, and twice it seemed as though I had met my life-mate; but each time it was plainly revealed to me that no, this wasn’t her! I had almost given up, and started wondering if the Lord had planned for me to serve Him as a single man my whole life! Of course, what He was waiting for was for me to give Him 100% control instead of just 99%!
I met Alisha Fernandes on November 19, 1999 – the day she started working with me at a cell phone repair depot. She was a single mother who was not interested in having a man in her life! She did become interested in learning how to have Jesus in her life after about 4 months of active witnessing by myself and several others at the depot and accepted Christ as Lord and savior! On May 12, 2000 we went out on our first courtship-date: we were married exactly one year later on the anniversary of that date (5/12/01)! The next August (8/29/02) we welcomed our second daughter, Cady to the family! We fostered 8 children between November 2006-April 2009, and on August 14, 2008 our family grew to 3 daughters with the birth of Aliyah.
It is my calling in life not only to strive to be the best husband and father that I can be to my family; but also to preach the gospel of Jesus Christ to the lost, to teach, educate and minister to the body of Christ, to assist believers in finding their spiritual gifts and help guide them in utilizing those gifts for the glory of God, and to show true “religion” by helping widows, orphans and those in need while trying to remain uncorrupted by the world.
