As a Youth Pastor in Chicago in the early 1990's you get exposed to a lot of different things. There was culture clash between old school & grunge with an apathy for the conventional. In this environment we discovered CCG gaming. It was so popular we held tournaments at our youth room and turned them into evangelistic outreaches. We played the Decipher games and made many long lasting connections with the overall gaming crowd. We made the trek up to Milwaukee WI each summer for GenCon and the hour and half ride to and from turned into an impromptu faith sermon complete with gaming analogies and a captive audience. It was awesome. (Incidentally only after the fact did I come to learn that Rob & Cactus had a booth at the show while I was there but we did not connect). At the end of 1999 we felt the call to move back home to New England and sought out the gaming community there. This next youth group that we began featured something called Gamers Gauntlet. It was at this juncture we discovered Redemption CCG. It was a monthly gaming day at our youth facility were our teens could invite their friends for gaming of all kinds ( including sports) with an evangelistic component. We would fund raise for good causes and from that effort Gauntlet Games was born. I have been a Cactus Game Design distributor since 2005. In 2006 I began to run the Gauntlet Games/ Cactus booth at Creation Northeast. I have presented at many outreach shows over the last 9 years including SoulFest in NH, GenCon, TotalCon, Southern New England youth conventions, Morningstar bookstore chain and lots of other gaming expos. I love meeting up with the Redemption community all across the country. I consider this community my extended family, my tribe. I have been at every National tournament since 2003. I was asked to join the leadership team in 2008 and perform tasks ranging from Nationals Judging & detail management, play-testing and card development as well as representing Cactus in the Northeast. To me, its a great responsibility taking God's word and translating it into a game format. It may be the only exposure some may ever have to the Bible. I look at it not just as a game that we play but as part of our larger mission. I look forward to where God wants to take this community in the coming years and what impact we can have on the mission of expanding His Kingdom.