My Faith Story

Introduction

Good morning! As Scott said, I am Kat Cochrane. I am an official candidate for ordination with the Board of Ordained Ministry of the Global Methodist Church. That is just a fancy way of saying I’m training to be a pastor in the Global Methodist Church. I am married to Travis Cochrane, wave Travis. We have three children, Alexis who is 16, Noah who is 15, and Seth who is 11. I am currently the Communications Director at Asbury Methodist Church in Corpus. I have been on the path to ordination for a little over a year now, and I am on track to be ordained in February of 2027. I am happy to be here this morning and to share my faith story with you.

Saying Yes to Jesus

I was born and raised in Midland, Texas in a Southern Baptist Church. I like to say I am a recovering Southern Baptist! I have always been close to God for as long as I can remember. When I was 5 or 6 years old, I was determined to walk down that aisle at the altar call to say yes to Jesus. I remember it was a Sunday night service, and my mom had prayed with me before we left for church in her bathroom. I have no idea what she said, but I do know that when I walked down that aisle and met one of the deacons at the front, I opened my mouth and all the right answers to his questions came out. That is the first time I remember being sure that God had answered our prayer. I wasn’t even old enough to read the materials they gave me, but I was sure about my faith then, just like I am sure about it now.

College Faith & Struggle

My faith had its ups and downs throughout middle school and high school. By the time I graduated, God wasn’t a very big part of my life. But in college, my faith was reawakened when I joined a Christian Fellowship on campus. I began to feel closer to God than ever before, and the people in the fellowship had some really deep and inspiring faith. Unfortunately, the devil was not resting, but prowling, and it seemed like as soon as my enthusiasm for God was at its highest, he was ready to attack me with some pretty significant sin. It all seemed pretty innocent at first, but before I knew it, I was in a really dark place. I was angry and confused. I couldn’t see why God allowed me to fall into this gaping pit that had opened up before me. I also had some pretty significant self-hatred. I just knew that God was so mad at me for what I had been doing. But, it turned out that God wasn’t mad at me at all. He was making a way for my rescue. And he did. He pulled me out of the pit of my sin, he put my feet on the rock, and he restored our relationship. I am so thankful for his goodness and his provision during that really tough time.

Marriage & a Move to TN

Not long after that, my husband and I began dating, and after about a year, we decided to get married. We married in January of 2004, and in June I got a job with IBM in a little town outside of Nashville, TN called Smyrna. There was a Nissan manufacturing plant there, and IBM was responsible for their technology. I was sooo excited - this was the dream job, the whole reason I went to college. They paid for packing and moving our little rent house in Lubbock, and we moved to TN away from our family with just us and our two dogs. While the move was really exciting for us, my job did not end up being so exciting. In fact, I was incredibly bored and really miserable. All of the people I worked with were in California, so I ended up talking to them on the phone, and I almost never talked to the people who were actually in the office with me. So, I ended up teaching myself graphic design and how to build websites. The job may not have been a good fit, but moving to TN was the best thing for our young marriage. We were on our own, we were independent, and we didn’t have family support nearby. We had space to figure things out for ourselves and to develop into the team we needed to be. It gave us strength and a closeness right out of the gate.

Children & Motherhood

Travis and I moved back to TX after a year and half in Tennessee. At this point we thought we were ready to have children, in the way all young couples “think” they are ready to have children. We struggled for a year with infertility at first, but thankfully a medication adjustment was all we needed. In November of 2008, our daughter was born. Parenthood threw us for a loop like it does all new parents, but that did not stop me from being impatient to have our second child, so in April of 2010, our first son Noah was born. At the time, I was helping to develop a new communications position at First United Methodist Church in Kerrville, and after Noah was born, I was hired as the first Media Coordinator they had. I was really happy to be able to serve God in such a direct way and use my creative skills too. I worked there until I got pregnant with our third child in 2013. Then I decided to stay home with my children instead of paying for three kids in daycare. I was terrified to stay home with three kids under the age of 5, but I wouldn’t trade those years for anything. I was doing what I needed to do - being their mom and raising them. I would say at this stage, my faith was very ordinary. It wasn’t particularly strong, but I was leading Sunday School, small groups, and praying and reading the Bible regularly. I wouldn’t really say that I was actively looking for more in my walk with Jesus, but I knew I didn’t have that fire that I had experienced a few times in my life before.

Call in New Braunfels

When the kids were still small, Travis got a job at the City of New Braunfels, and after 8 years in Kerrville, we packed up and moved there in 2015. We really loved New Braunfels. We tried Gruene United Methodist Church at first, but it just didn’t seem to fit, so we went to First United Methodist and that immediately felt like home. As I was listening to Jason Adams give a sermon one Sunday, he mentioned something about seminary. Then I heard God’s voice say to me, “Well, what if you went to seminary?” I wasn’t exactly sure how to react, but I immediately felt that God was calling me to become a pastor of some sort. Over the next few days, I prayed and tried to confirm what I had heard. I really did feel like God was calling me, so I reached out to our District Superintendent. There was a class for those trying to discern God’s call, but it had already started, and they didn’t allow me to join late, so I had to wait six months for the next class. I told Travis what they had said, and I began making plans in my head to attend seminary in Austin. We sat down and had a really open, honest talk about my entering the ministry. He pointed out that our kids were very young (they were 6, 5 & 2 at the time), so me leaving each week to attend school would be REALLY difficult on the family. He also pointed out that spending $40,000 on a Master’s of Divinity was not feasible for us financially either. I knew what he was saying was true, but I was angry. I felt like his faith was too small and he wasn’t allowing God space to work and make a way for this to happen. I saw him as a roadblock standing in my way of doing what God was asking me to do. I came to see that God was telling me to wait, but initially, I blamed the waiting on Travis instead. It took me a good while to work through that and accept that it was really God who was telling me to wait. I had no idea that when He said wait, he meant to wait 8 years. I was forced to put aside my calling for the time being. I worked at First United Methodist in New Braunfels as their Nursery Director and then as Communications Director until God called us to move to Corpus Christi in 2018.

Corpus Christi & “It’s time”

At first, we were excited about the idea of moving to Corpus. Travis was recruited by the IT Director of the City of Corpus Christi to be the Assistant IT Director. She was close to retirement, so the idea was that he would take over for her in a year or two. Well, that excitement was short-lived. His boss ended up getting fired three months after we arrived. The same person who fired her then fired Travis. He was hired by the Water Department because they liked him. It wasn’t long though that his position was “eliminated” by the City Manager and he was fired again. He was a victim of politics that began long before he even got there. It was a time of real questioning for us - why did God bring us here? What were we going to do? Should we move back to New Braunfels? It turned out that moving back was not an option: my parents told us that God was calling them to move from Kerrville to Corpus. We were stuck - or so it felt. I was working for First United Methodist Church in Corpus as Communications Director. Travis was able to get a new job with a company in Victoria during COVID. We thought it was temporary, but he’s now been with them for 5 years! Travis and I didn’t have much choice about Corpus - we were here and that looked unlikely to change. I left FUMC after a year, because it just really wasn’t a good fit for me. I offered my services to Asbury UMC, and a job was created for me as Communications Director.

Things were going well at Asbury, but in 2022, our church began to read and to hear what was going on in the United Methodist Church in regards to a potential split. Many in our congregation wanted to vote on disaffiliation, and so we began a 6-month discernment process. I honestly didn’t consider how the vote would impact me personally, but once I heard what was going on in the UMC, I knew that disaffiliation was going to be the best course for our family. In terms of my call, I had told the pastors that I worked for, but no one else. I didn’t even tell my parents. Not because I was ashamed, or embarrassed, or anything like that - I just honestly wasn’t sure if it was real. I knew what I heard, but that was 7 or 8 years ago, so I was beginning to question whether I had heard anything at all. I didn’t want to tell everyone I knew, and then be wrong completely! Back to Asbury, it turns out we did disaffiliate in 2023. Our vote was over 90% for disaffiliation. Just two or three months later, I was sitting at the bar eating breakfast at home, and I heard God tell me, “it’s time.” He told me to tell Travis right then and there, and so I did. I had no idea what the plan was, or how things were going to go, but I knew that God was telling me to let Travis know so he would not be caught off guard when things started to happen.

Two weeks later, I got a call from our Associate Pastor who said, “I think it’s about time we do something about your call to ministry.” I laughed and said, “it’s funny you should say that, because I just heard God tell me it’s time.” She said, “Ok, good - I’m glad I heard that right!” I cannot tell you how affirming it was to hear her say those words and what excitement I had but also peace knowing that after all this time, God had not forgotten. I knew I hadn’t forgotten, but sometimes you wonder if God has. I began my discernment process with Trudy Paul, our Associate Pastor; I was approved by our charge conference, I had my first interview with the Board of Ordained Ministry, and had my psych evaluation. I am now finished with my first four classes and will take my final two for Deacon this summer and fall. It has really been an incredible journey, and sometimes it still feels surreal that this is happening.

My Portion Forever

When I was preparing for this talk, I wanted to incorporate scripture into it in some way, but I couldn’t decide between talking about waiting on the Lord and God being our portion every day…so I found one on both! I want to read Lamentations 3:24-25 for you today. “The Lord is my portion, says my soul, therefore I will hope in him. The Lord is good to those who wait for him, to the soul who seeks him.” Now, I haven’t had to wait for as long a lot of people, but waiting on the Lord to fulfill what I felt like he was telling me for 8 years was no small thing. Waiting is a part of this life - sometimes longer and more frequently than we would ever care to experience. But it is in this time of waiting that God does his best and most beautiful work. When we wait, we are seeking - asking, is today the day? Is this the year that I will get what has been promised? Is this the day I will get what God knows I need? We are in frequent communication with him, and we beg him to answer. I have found that it is in these moments that he himself sustains me. He gives me himself, and all that goes with it, the peace, the growth, the new facets of his character, as I wait. These are what allow me to get through the times of anxiety and uncertainty. It ends up that God himself is so much better than whatever it is I was waiting for!

When we say yes to Jesus, We say yes for eternity - that is true. But we also say yes to Jesus for right now, today! God doesn’t wait to give us the good stuff until we meet him in the next life. God gives us what we need right now! He nurtures us in our trials and in our suffering, and as we wait on him. If I had not waited for him to grow and change me from the inside out, I would not have been ready to stand before you today and tell of his goodness, his faithfulness and his love. So, if you find yourself in a place of waiting on the Lord, try to be patient. Thank him for the opportunity to get to know him in a deeper way and to be able to receive more of him. In the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit, amen.