About John Lemay
This sermon, Psalm 78: Share the Gospel, includes my personal testimony. The Gospel infographic I use is at the bottom of this page.
Childhood
I grew up in the suburbs of Wilmington, Delaware, raised by my father, J. A. Leo Lemay, who was a professor of Early American Literature, and my mother, Ann Clarke Lemay, who was a real estate agent. However, my grandmother, Muriel Clarke, had the most significant spiritual influence on me. During my life my father refused to have anything to do with the church, although there is an amazing picture of mom and dad kneeling before the cross at their wedding. Mom generally followed dad’s lead, but my grandmother required that mom attend Grace United Methodist Church every Sunday and bring her children.
Thus, I grew up Methodist. I was baptized and later confirmed in the United Methodist Church. I memorized the Lord’s Prayer and have fond memories of the amazing stain glass windows and awesome pipe organ. To this day, I love traditional hymns, and one reason I cherish the Christmas season is that it is the one time each year I can fully enjoy them. But Grandmother Clarke and the church’s influence did not penetrate my home. At home there was no discussion of Jesus, God, or the Bible. I did not develop any spiritual practices – I did not pray, read the Bible, seek to have a personal relationship with Jesus or follow his commands. Grandmother Clarke had a wonderfully positive influence by bringing the church into my life, but she never discussed her faith, Jesus, or spiritual disciplines with me.
As a boy, I loved the outdoors and joined the Boy Scouts where I earned my Eagle Scout and formed a close relationship with Dr. Harke, the scoutmaster. He was a West Point graduate and former Army Ranger. I was interested in joining the Army, and under his mentorship my desire matured from joining the Army, to becoming an officer, to attending the United States Military Academy.
Army
I graduated from the United States Military Academy in 1997 and commissioned as an infantry officer. During my twenty-five years in the Army, I fought in Afghanistan twice, in Iraq twice, and completed four other overseas tours. However, the most significant thing that happened was I transformed from a dog tag Christian into a disciple through hardship and meeting my future wife, Tara.
When I joined the Army, they asked me what my religion was. I responded Methodist and they faithfully printed it on my dog tags. That was as deeply as I pursued Christ for many years. I was fully committed to achieving the Army’s missions and to obeying its regulations and my identity became formed in the Army – that of a Soldier. At the same time, I did not pursue a relationship with Christ and certainly did not demonstrate my love of Christ by obeying his laws (John 14:15, 21, 23). Nor did I attend church as Grandmother Clarke had required.
The one circumstance that I did seek God in was hardship. I turned to God during Ranger School but promptly turned away after graduation. During my 2005-6 tour in Iraq, I again sought God to strengthen me. But after I completed my tour, I turned my focus back to the world. In 2007, I was assigned to the Pentagon in Washington, D.C. and met Tara. She was working as a Senate staffer and had a fantastic Bible study with a group of godly women. One of those, Missy, studied peace operations at George Mason University with me and introduced us. I was smitten by Tara and sought to date her. However, Tara refused to go out with me. Eventually Missy explained to me that the most important relationship in Tara’s life was a relationship with Christ, and, therefore, she was not interested in dating anyone who did not have a deep and personal relationship with Jesus.
Tara’s firm stance gave me something to think about and I began attending church and exploring what it meant to have a relationship with Jesus. However, I was still living without keeping Christ’s commands or spending personal time with him. I deployed to Afghanistan in 2011 for my second, and most difficult, combat tour. I stood next to one of my Soldiers attempting to comfort him as he died of his wounds. The medic’s efforts to do chest compressions on Michael as he died is by far the most violent thing I have ever seen. During this tour, I again turned to God for comfort. In the middle of the night, I would wake up and stare at the night sky. We had very good light discipline at night, that is, we ensured there was no ambient light present for the enemy to use to aim rockets at us. So, the stars in Afghanistan popped – they seemed very close and real, and I felt the presence of God, as if I could touch his face, when I took a brief nightly reprieve from combat to gaze up at the night sky. God was faithful and strengthened me, allowing me to do the work the Army required me to do.
When I returned from Afghanistan I was overcome with a deep sense of hypocrisy. I was a hypocrite because I turned to God during hardship but did not seek him during times of comfort. I resolved to go all in for Jesus and to live according to his commands. I began to read the Bible regularly and participated in formal Bible studies. In 2013, Tara left her position on the Senate staff, and I hosted her and her mother Jackie as they drove from Washington to Fort Collins. With Jackie’s encouragement, Tara and I began to date, and we were married on November 15th, 2014. Four years and two combat tours later, we retired from the Army.
Seminary
Because Tara is from Colorado, I secured Fort Carson as our last assignment. Tara and I joined Mountain Springs Church shortly after moving to Colorado Springs. There we met Mike Schmid, a Navigator, who invited us to join his Bible study. Mike stressed having a daily quite time with Jesus and using various Bible study methods. Mike and I began to have one on one weekly discipleship meetings and soon Tara and I were leading one of his small groups. Then we were organizing his program at Mountain Springs Church. Mike encouraged me to pursue my faith at Denver Seminary and was my TM mentor for my first two years. However, Mike developed lung cancer and died while I was a student. But throughout his prolonged process of dying from cancer Mike mentored me, set an example of Godly living, and demonstrated how a deep connection to Jesus Christ gives purpose to death.
During my terminal leave from the Army, Tara, Eva, Luke and I went on a month-long cross-country road trip, camping at national parks along the way. During the trip we caught the national parks bug. So today my family is on a quest to visit all 63 national parks, and I've started journaling the Psalms in the National Parks.
Today I love Jesus, am active in my new church, which is Cathedral Rock Church, part of the Evangelical Free Church of America. Seminary has been a wonderful period of spiritual growth that I’ve shared with Tara, because she has been able to audit at least one class a semester with me – although I can't wait to graduate in the Spring of 2025! I enjoy spending time with God each morning by reading a chapter of the bible devotionally and journaling on it, using the Journey of the Heart Bible Journaling method.
