(Houston, Texas) -- Gregg Matte, Senior Pastor of Houston's First Baptist Church, didn't grow up as a Christian.
"My parents were divorced when I was two years old and I'd see my dad on the weekends and great dad and great mom...just kind of got into the wild crowd. Started drinking, partying, doing all sorts of things that you shouldn't do as a teenager and then I started working at a grocery store. I was a sacker and I thought the checker was cute and she was a Christian and she stared telling me about a relationship with Jesus. Took me to her youth minister's house one night and I prayed and received Christ. Junior year I was partying, drinking and going crazy and my senior year, I was leading my friends to the Lord," Pastor Gregg explains.
Rather hear the story?
Pastor Gregg is the founder of what has become a phenomenally impactful weekly Bible study at Texas A&M University called Breakaway Ministries. For the past 35 years, thousands of students have attended on Tuesday night. Hundreds of thousands of lives have been affected by the gospel.
How did Breakaway Ministries get started?
"I became a Christian my junior year of high school and went on a missions trip with my youth group and I prayed a dangerous prayer.
I said 'Your will not mine, Lord, before I leave Texas A&M let it be known as a Christian university.' So fast forward to my sophomore year at A&M we started a Bible study in my house of about 12 people and it just took off and the 12 turned 24 and the 24 turned to 48 and we outgrew the apartment. Outgrew that, moved to a conference center, outgrew that and went to a church. Outgrew that and went to two services and now it's the 35th year we're celebrating...and for the last 25 years we've been meeting in the basketball stadium of Texas A&M with thousands of students and worship leaders like Shane and Shane, Chris Tomlin...we didn't have a strategic plan...we just prayed and God did things."