By: Patricia Duran
Deanna Kincheloe grew up in a Christian household doing Christian things. She attended a private Christian school, went to Sunday school and church every week, went to high school Bible studies, and attended youth conferences every summer.
“For as long as I can remember, I’ve been a Christian,” said Kincheloe.
However, at times, her faith was tested, estranged, and lacking as everyone’s might be.
Knowing a thing or two about how popular culture and media portrays college students, most would assume college students forget or leave their upbringing in faith because they’re no longer under parental authority. Kincheloe’s story explains otherwise.
During the summer of 2016, she started working at an internship that she hoped, “would propel me professionally,” with a faithless and terrible boss. “In reality, God used the internship to propel my faith.”
She was overworked, exhausted, and underappreciated at her internship. To add onto the stress—she wasn’t in the mood to head straight to a church youth conference in Nashville to serve other people once the internship lapsed.
Imagine getting paid to fix someone else’s intentional problems without any acknowledgement, and then heading to a voluntary conference after being hurt.
“The last thing I wanted was to volunteer and serve people without anything in it for myself. I was grumpy, wasn’t excited and I complained, but I was also so very wrong [for doing so],” said Kincheloe.
She learned the important lesson to serve and love people without expecting compensation.
As a result of the internship, she was focused on expecting the worst possible outcomes and becoming crushed by inconvenient circumstances. At the youth conference in Nashville, the venue suddenly became unavailable, and the conference staff had to make do with what they could on short notice.
“The only building we could get to fit 2,000 conference attendees was a practice football arena in the hot and humid weather,” explained Kincheloe.
“I was wrong [to have complained about the arena, because] I have never felt such a great sense of faith after singing my favorite hymns with my brothers and sisters in Christ on a turf football field. I realized I didn’t need a church to worship the Lord.”
Listening to Kincheloe’s story, we would assume she had to learn from her complaints to enjoy the youth conference. However, two solid influences came into her life at the perfect time to teach her about walking in faith and trusting that all things will work together.
During the internship, she met two sweet and kind interns who became best friends to her. They became two significant staples in her journey. They helped revive her faith so she could live it out loud regardless of circumstances. Since she met the two, she says her faith has been the strongest it’s been in her entire life despite being a Christian her whole life.
“One friend would play Christian music at work, and she would tell me if I didn’t want to listen to it, she would turn it off, but it gave me the connection [to God] I needed. My other friend held a women’s Bible study every week, and all of us would gather at her house for worship and community,” said Kincheloe.
“These were some of the greatest nights I had my senior year of college.”
In the middle of a stressful situation, in a place she thought God couldn’t be found, and in two women she never would have thought had the same beliefs as her—He showed up at the right time.
Having these two faithful Christian women working at this terrible internship showed her God never forgot about Kincheloe when things got hard or when she felt too lonely and weak to seek him for herself.
“I was at [a] point in my life where school and work were overwhelming every moment of my life. I was barely taking [care] of myself, let alone my faith,” she said. “I hadn’t been to church in a while, and I wasn’t walking in my beliefs [like I wanted].”
“Looking back, college made it easier to believe in my faith. I was opened up to so many people of different creeds and beliefs, I realized to truly love like Christ, I had to have compassionate-unconditional love for all people. He died for everyone, even the people who will never believe or follow.”
At times, Kincheloe felt that living out her faith in a collegiate atmosphere was hard. However, the collegiate atmosphere softened her heart.
“In high school, I was very [hard-hearted] about my beliefs and I didn’t stop to think about what it meant to truly love like Christ loved us. I felt I could only love people who believe exactly what I believe. [Now that I’ve grown and experienced college], showing God’s love is as simple as being kind regardless of how anyone treats you. To love without bounds,” she explained.
For her, the hardest part about being a Christian was when people were surprised she was one.
“When they said, ‘Wow, you’re a Christian?! But you’re so nice,’ it was like a sock in the gut. People who claim they have experienced the greatest expression of love and grace, but wrong God’s people are living the opposite of Christians,” she said.
After hearing about how her friends of all religious backgrounds were hurt by people and refused to have faith, she hopes that through her, the Holy Spirit’s true compassion and love, will call others to begin a journey in faith.
Kincheloe graduated from ENMU last May and is currently attending graduate school in Louisiana.
Kincheloe says when she first met the two interns; she never thought God would use them to change her life. That summer was a constant reminder of God’s presence in her life no matter where she is at.
