Gary Christian stood in an East Tennessee church pulpit on a sunny August Sunday, speaking about pain and death and faith and God. It’s not a place — or a point — where the father of murder victim Channon Christian would have been 18 months ago.
For 10 years Christian never talked to the Lord he had loved all his life. He left God behind after his beautiful, compassionate, smart 21-year-old daughter was carjacked, tortured, raped, beaten and murdered in January 2007.
Then, last April, kneeling at his child’s grave and surrounded by friends, Christian asked for God’s help.
God had been waiting. He’d never left.
“He restored me,” Christian says.
No hole dark enough
Now Christian, 62, gives his testimony to churches and other groups. He’s spoken to some 30,000 people at more than 64 locations. His website, garychristianseminars.com, lists his schedule and how to contact him to speak. There’s no charge.
His message is a straight-line story of a man who abandoned his faith after overwhelming tragedy, who found God again after a decade of anguish and who now witnesses for Christ.
His seminars often last more than an hour. He remembers his love for a daughter who loved dogs, shoes and clothes. He recounts the brutality of her torture and murder. His testimony incorporates the apostle Peter, Jesus’ crucifixion, the work of missionaries and God’s unwavering love. Photos of a happy, radiant Channon Christian, often with her dad, are shown in an accompanying visual presentation.