Biography

Life is a story… full of heart changing episodes too numerous to mention in a short biography. But Stormie's testimony is rich and colored with the legacy of a family ministry, the death of a child, the challenges of marriage, money, and memories. Her early years are filled with thousands of road miles, hundreds of church services and enough experience to fill an enormous book. Like all childhood memories, these years on the “road for Jesus” are the source of humor, pain, longing, and a deep abiding sense that God is her ultimate home.

The Singing Shells (Stormie’s family ministry) traveled all over the country, Canada and Europe sharing the Gospel through song and leaving behind the fingerprints of God’s providence. Miles and miles of travel require traveling mercies and safety that only God can provide. From the life threatening experience of bus tires literally coming off in route to a concert to the humorous episode of finding a great parking space in a church’s septic tank, the family ministry prepared her for her current calling.

Like all callings of depth, the harvest has not been without many seasons that seemed like drought and famine. Much like the prodigal son, Stormie left home at an early age and squandered her spiritual inheritance. But the running was symptomatic. She knew how to serve God, but had never had a deep sense of His personal love for her. “I spent most of my early years fighting for control. I was so afraid I had no say in the direction of my life. Underneath all the doing and the Christian service was this festering bitterness. Because I knew God had rules, I was so afraid His will was punitive and confining. This fear impacted my home life, my marriage, and ultimately my ability to rest in God.”

But the lessons of life are often slow in learning and Stormie’s running led her through more “works” to find God’s favor. Tired and weary from a life of leadership with little grace and mercy, Stormie saw her emotional life collapse, a marriage unravel, and a desert time of isolation from family and church that left her devastated and literally on welfare. “I remember standing in a food stamp line saying to God, ‘Father, how did I get here? I should be helping these people and instead I am here just as broken and needy.’” As prideful as this sounded — and in some ways was — it took Stormie’s cry from the deepest place in her soul to finally realize just how much God loved her and wanted to comfort her.

These “seasons of the soul” are now bringing a harvest as Stormie is able to talk to leaders who have done all the right things for the wrong reasons, teens whose woundedness is fueling a rebel heart, and marriages that are based on perceptions and pretense. “I have seen the impact of decisions made from anger and rebellion. I have seen the progression of hurt that comes with distancing oneself from God’s family and grace. But more importantly I have seen the restorative power of God’s love redeem and atone for things in my life that previously seemed hopeless and beyond healing.”

The hallmark of Stormie’s ministry today could very well be Paul’s simple but profound statement, found in Galatians 6:14: “But may it never be that I should boast, except in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ through which the world has been crucified to me and I to the world.” When Stormie died to her fears, died to her bitterness, died even to her calling, she discovered a sovereign loving God who had really ultimately desired a relationship with her, plain and simple. This indeed is the starting and ending point of each Christian life. We come full circle to find our longing is holy and can only find its rest in God.