it all starts with what’s real.
coming full circle.
I grew up in the South, where being a “Christian” is often considered a birthright. But during my freshman year of college, I discovered there’s a vast difference between practicing religion and having a real relationship with Jesus. Since then, my walk with Him has looked a lot like the stock market—full of ups and downs—but always trending upward (heavenward).
After college, I moved to Denver with the goal of earning a Master’s degree in Counseling from Denver Seminary. I believed God was calling me into counseling because of the many “expectation gaps” I had already experienced—times when life didn’t turn out the way I thought it would. Little did I know, there would be many more lessons and a great deal of coaching from God Himself over the next 40 years.
Soon after arriving in Denver, I met my wife, got a job, and eventually attended Seminary. I tried launching a private counseling practice in a city already full of counselors, but that door didn’t open. So, I “got a real job,” as they say, and over the years worked for a variety of companies—large and small. We homeschooled our two sons, I started my own company, and later transitioned into healthcare leadership, managing nursing homes, assisted living communities, and even running a health plan for the nation’s largest insurance company.
Along the way, my wife and I encountered many more expectation gaps—seasons of disappointment, dissatisfaction, and distress. But in 2020, when we met Jim Barnard and learned about tiller coaching, everything clicked. We finally had language for what we had been experiencing in such seasons. I realized God was bringing me back to the calling He placed on my heart decades earlier: to come alongside men, couples, and pastors, helping them navigate life’s expectation gaps while pointing them to Jesus.
In 2025, God gave me the opportunity to retire from my professional career and join tiller as a coach. It feels like everything has come full circle. I’m now living out my original calling—to serve as a missionary through coaching, freely offering what God has freely given me. I still experience expectation gaps and God has shown me how to embrace them as part of my growth, no matter how difficult. I believe He wants the same for you.
If my coaching has helped you and you’d like to “pay it forward,” you can do so through my donation page—but it’s never required. The only thing I ask is that we show up authentically and seek the Lord together.
-tim