I have long been fascinated with pastor, author, and evangelical leader Francis Chan. I first “discovered” the man in 2005 when I was still relatively new to the Christian faith and already getting bored with my church’s sermons. I was captivated by this pastor with a Chinese name who preached, quite powerfully, to huge crowds of white people. When I heard those first audio-only sermons, I closed my eyes and imagined a short, pale Chinese guy with glasses — someone who looked like me — commanding an auditorium and changing lives.
Little did I know that Francis Chan looked more like the Chinese version of Montel Williams than the nerdy guy I first imagined, but at that point it didn’t matter. I was already sold. The man fundamentally changed the way I understood faith. I found the website for his church – a mostly white, affluent, suburban church in Simi Valley, California called Cornerstone — and downloaded his sermons every week without fail for the next several years. His sermon “Lukewarm and Loving It” absolutely wrecked my entire 2006. I owe much to Francis Chan.
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