Manchester High School student, Caleb Eckerd, is one of our youngest Noble Men and has been involved with the mission of Noble Warriors almost from the start through his friendship with Ben Young. Caleb says he was practically the Young family’s fourth son.
“I joined in working alongside them for the ministry whether that meant stuffing envelopes or setting up for conferences.”
Caleb grew up in Christian home where his parents instilled Christian values in him at a young age, however, he admits he wasn’t sold out.
“I never really did anything more than what I needed to do to make my parents happy and to keep me out of trouble. I tried to do what I thought Christians should do, but it wasn’t where my heart and joy were.”
Caleb continued in the role of a Christian, but it wasn’t until a family tragedy that the Lord began to work on Caleb’s heart. Caleb’s Uncle John didn’t return home one evening having passed away during his run after work. Caleb wrestled with emotion and began to question God and his motives.
“I was mad that the Lord would take away such a good man from his family at just the age of 44.”
But as time continued, Caleb recognized that what the enemy had intended for evil, God had intended for good. He saw people come to know the Lord and how lives were changed after the death of his Uncle John.
“I witnessed the testimony of a dedicated Muslim man saying, ‘Your uncle followed a God far different than mine. He followed the one true God.’ It was then I chose to give my life to Jesus because he was the Way.”
Caleb was all in from that point forward.
As a believer, Caleb began to grow in faith through studying the Word and as he dove deeper, he began to feel the call to International Missions. Caleb has recently published a book titled Destination God where he recounts his testimony and how the Lord revealed his calling to long-term missions.
“The book is full of successes and failures in my life, and I explain how the Lord used them to bring me to where I am today.”
So far, Caleb has traveled to Guatemala and to Bangladesh. He is also planning to go to Mongolia in December. He says that while he is in the states, evangelism “looks like loving all people of all ethnicities and using the love of Christ to show them that the Gospel is for people of every tribe, tongue, and nation.”
When asked about his plans were after high school, Caleb says he will either attend VCU to major in some form of engineering or will be taking a gap year to go preach the Gospel in Asia.
Until then, Caleb continues to serve faithfully in his local church body through discipleship groups and through Noble Warriors. He and Ben Young have lead guys through the Authentic Manhood 33 Series and Caleb looks forward to hopefully leading a breakout session at a future Noble Man Conference.
When we asked Caleb how he could encourage guys his age to pursue their calling, he suggested the following resources:
“I would recommend they start by reading the book Let the Nations be Glad by John Piper if they’re interested in missions because Piper does a great job of explaining what missions “is” and “is not”; he explains why we go, but he also gives reasons why someone shouldn’t go.”
He also gave strong recommendations for This Changes Everything by Jaquelle Crowe and Do Hard Things by Alex and Brett Harris. And of course, most importantly: the Bible.
“It’s impossible to pour out into people and serve Christ if you’re not maintaining a relationship with him and pursuing him above all things.”
We hope you can find encouragement in Caleb’s story. You can find more information about Caleb at https://grounds4faith.com/. Destination God can be purchased HERE!
Caleb is currently reading Stealing from God by Frank Truek and listening to Andy Mineo.
Christ’s call on the young is massive; it is far greater than many adults recognize, think is possible, or even imagine. God can quickly get a hold of your life when you are young and lead you in a direction you had not, for one second, thought you would go. That’s the sovereignty of God; it catches hold of everything it touches. –Caleb Eckerd (Destination God, p.19)