“Jesus saved my life, and he used Providence Church as a tool to change it.”

Many days I still look around and cannot quite understand how I got here or why God would choose to place someone like me in vocational ministry. I am Whitney Eaton and I serve as Providence’s Director of Ministry to Women. Anyone who knew me ten to twenty years ago would find that sentence shocking. Though I grew up in a gospel-centered home and have always professed Christianity, I lived a self-centered, unrepentantly sinful life through my twenties. My testimony found its hinge point when I met my husband, Danny. As newlyweds, Danny recognized the need to attend church to lead his family well. He researched churches in our area that taught the Bible, and Providence was the first one we attended.

For one year, Danny and I only attended Sunday services, sat in the back row, and avoided making connections. It is impossible, though, to sit under the teaching at Providence without it piercing your heart and eliciting a response — after all, the word of God does not return void. We joined a community group. We began living out the one anothers of Scripture: loving, welcoming, encouraging, comforting, and exhorting. Other parts of our lives began to change: we prayed together, we developed spiritual disciplines, and we began considering God and others in our decision-making. We began living gospel-centered lives. We were being sanctified. 

We attended membership class, met with an elder, and signed the covenant. We committed ourselves to joining with the body of Providence to fulfill its mission to make disciples. 

Every aspect of my life now shows the ripple effects of walking through the doors of Providence. The commitment I’ve made to being a covenant member of this church is not a reluctant one. I made the commitment to Providence with indescribable joy and gratitude at being given the opportunity to formally and publicly join the body as an integral part of the whole. Like a surgeon might graft a lifeless organ into the body of a living person, by becoming a covenant member at Providence, God has changed me from an iced appendage to a life-filled and life-giving organ, both benefiting from and contributing to the whole body.

Jesus saved my life, and he used Providence Church as a tool to change it. 

I celebrate with the many new covenant members we have at Providence! I pray that you feel as much joy at being a part of this body as I do and know what a gift you are to the rest of us. 

If you’re considering covenant membership at Providence, you can register for the next membership class today. I look forward to welcoming you into the body and its mission!