Known for his seven No. 1 hits on Christian radio and numerous nominations and awards for millions of copies sold, Tauren Wells is also a best-selling author and pastor of a Texas church that has baptized hundreds of people and grown to three worship services in less than two years.
But faith wasn’t always his first priority. It turns out that street hockey – not worship, preaching, or writing – was on Wells’ mind the first time he went to church.
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“I remember the first time I walked into a little Pentecostal church in Battle Creek, Michigan. The carpet, chairs, and pews were green. There was a big wooden desk in the center of the stage. There was a preacher up there preaching. I don’t remember what he was saying, but I remember he was mad about it,” Wells said.
This was on the heels of Wells’ father ruining what otherwise would have been a Sunday filled with street hockey and friends.
The end of Wells’ Sunday street hockey began when his parents divorced. His father came home and announced, “‘Ren, we’re going to church. I said, ‘Sir, we are going to church?’ This did not fit into our family culture. I grew up in one of those houses where you weren’t married if you weren’t fighting,” Wells told a Colorado congregation.
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As a youngster, he believed people were having fun at a party when police cars and flashing lights showed up at the Wells’ home. “All of a sudden, the fun was over and somebody was going to an adult time out,” Wells recalled.
In preparation for his first visit to church, Wells accompanied his father to JCPenney, where they found a navy-blue blazer with gold buttons and khaki pants to wear.
Walking into the small church, Wells realized he and his father had the most melanin in the room, but neither was bothered by that fact. Instead, the experience was amazing.
“It actually felt like I showed up where somebody was anticipating my arrival,” Wells said.
Saved by Jesus at that first worship service, Wells later went to a summer camp where he heard church music for the first time in 1996. He joined in singing from a brown hymnal with gold, embossed words “Sing Unto The Lord” on the cover.
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Following the leader, Wells remembers singing, “O I want to see Him. Look upon His face. Let us sing forever of His saving grace. On the streets of glory, let me lift my voice.”
“I don’t know what it was about the era – maybe the depression – because every song was get me up out of here, singing ‘I’ll fly away, O glory. Morning when I die,'” Wells said.
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