About Me

“Peter Chin is a nationally recognized speaker and writer, having several books to his name, and pastors a church that is several tens of thousands of people strong.  All the best and most famous pastors proudly give him ringing endorsements, including that guy in Colorado, and the other one in Minnesota.  His Twitter followers number in the tens of billions.”

Psych.  I’m not that kind of guy.

I don’t believe in the fusion between Christianity and celebrity status, that a Christian’s worth is measured by how famous they are, or how many Twitter followers they possess.  I don’t feel that I should have to wear shirts with lots of superfluous buttons on the shoulders to be relevant.  I don’t think authority is derived from the number of letters that follow your name, but instead, from the Name by which I’m saved.  I’m not going to play that game, and refuse to identify and distinguish myself in this manner.

So who am I then, if not a famous and widely recognized Christian leader?  Well, I grew up in Chicago, went to college on the east coast, and seminary on the west.  I’m a pastor, who has served at a number of churches, and even planted one.  I’m married with three children, and one more on the way.  And I’m a man who came very close to losing it all, and sees much more clearly as a result.

In December of 2009, only two months after planting a church, my wife was diagnosed with an aggressive form of breast cancer.  Our health insurance terminated our coverage, labeling her condition as “pre-existing”.  And minutes before her mastectomy, we also found out that she was pregnant with our third child.  We managed to survive all of that turmoil and joyously celebrate the birth of a healthy son…only to have the church close soon afterwards for lack of funding.

I don’t share these things as a lament of some kind, or a hidden plea for pity.  I share this because it was through these experiences that my flimsy, juvenile, and incomplete conception of God and His ways were reformed into something much better, and much stronger.  And much closer to the truth reflected in Scripture, in the life of Christ, and the life of the early church.  In other words, I don’t follow God because my life is free from suffering.  Suffering has allowed me to see God for who He truly is: mysterious, wise, and compassionate.

So that is why I write, and that is why I hope you will read – not because I’m famous, or smart, or influential.  But because through a season of intense hardship, I see faith much more sharply than I did before.  And the new vision is much better than the old.