Dwayne and Donita Carson
Dwayne and Donita Carson have been married since June 4, 1988 and Donita will tell you that one of the most impressive things about Dwayne is that he never forgets a date. Combine that with his sincere love for the Word of God makes this ministry tailor made. The concept of Date the Word was conceived in the Summer of 2000 during which Dwayne was leading a small group and was asked how he memorized Scripture. His reply was that he often linked numbers to Scripture references – for example, March 16 (3/16) immediately makes him think of John 3:16. To test him the members of the group started peppering him with dates, like their birthdates. Out of curiosity, the next morning he sat down with a calendar to see how many verses (from memory) he knew that matched a date (it was well over 220). Over the next several months he added to that until he added at least one verse for every date. He would then use that verse to wish friends Happy Birthday on Facebook as well as offer a short devotional. Fast forward to 2021 when Dwayne met Stu Epperson, Jr from Truth Network who he shared his passion with discipleship with and Stu suggested the name, Date the Word.
Our heartbeat for Date the Word is found in Psalms 1:2-3 – “But his delight is in the law of the Lord, and on his law he meditates day and night. He is like a tree planted by streams of water that yields its fruit in its season, and its leaf does not wither. In all that he does, he prospers.
We want to create a site where you can come to enrich your walk with your Lord and grow deeper in your knowledge of Scripture. One of our biggest hopes it that it will help Christian parent be able to live out Deuteronomy 6 as they find verses for their children to learn. This website exists to provide you with some resources to help your family hide God’s Word in their heart in a practical way.
My story starts with me growing up in the country on a large cattle farm in Amherst County VA along the James River. As a family – Dad, mom and 3 sisters – we attended a small country church. At the age of twelve, I joined the church and was baptized. Since the age of thirteen, I have felt God wanted me to preach. Most of my teenage years could be characterized as religious years. I was a good, church-going country boy. However, my late teens turned to be rebellious years. At twenty-one years of age I realized something was missing in my life and joined a Southern Baptist Church. I answered the call to preach and began preaching in February of 1982. My pastor advised me to attend Criswell Bible College in Dallas, Texas. In August of 1982 I journeyed from Lynchburg, Virginia to Dallas. Maybe somewhat strange to some, I found the chapel messages convicted me that I was not really saved. I had been religious all my life, even attending church when I was rebellious, but I had never been reborn. On February 15, 1983, I realized once and for all that I was not saved and that night I accepted the Lord as my Savior at a revival service. I spoke with Dr. W. A. Criswell the following night and asked if I could be baptized. I was baptized at First Baptist Church of Dallas the next Sunday. I also asked Dr. Criswell about my calling and he helped me understand how I was called before being saved. He said I had been working for my salvation; now I would be working for my Savior. While at First Baptist Church, I had the awesome privilege of working as an intern for the Beginner Department and learned invaluable lessons on how a large church can minister up close and personal to so many people. I also preached in various revival, church and rescue mission services. Through God’s leading in the Spring of 1984, I transferred to Liberty University in the Fall of 1984 and graduated in 1987. I was a Prayer Leader in 1984/85 and a Resident Assistant in 85/86 and 86/87, all on Dorm 18-1. After graduation, I spent a summer in Oak Ridge, TN as intern to the Senior Pastor. In the Fall, I was a Resident Director and also attended Liberty Baptist Theological Seminary where I graduated with an MAR in 1989. In 1988, I made the second greatest decision of my life and achieved my greatest accomplishment by convincing Donita Hershey to marry me. On June 4, 1988 we were married in her backyard. Today we have four incredible children (Kristi, Katie, Kirk and Klayton). I will add here before talking about my ministry that I very much enjoy being involved in my children’s lives. I enjoyed having opportunity to coach my boys in youth baseball and to spend time with them fishing. And I like doing bonfires! Right after our honeymoon, I resigned from a church where I was interim pastor in Amherst County and started at Liberty University as one of the Campus Pastors. I would serve in many roles as a Campus Pastor for the next 23 years from preaching in campus services to offering counseling to performing weddings and unfortunately funerals as well as working with our convocation programs and our college for a weekend program. It was my greatest joy and privilege to not just pastor the students of Liberty University, but to be the director of the Prayer Leader and Spiritual Life Director teams all those years and, in mid-Fall 2006, to be the Director of the Office of Student Leadership which had me overseeing over 1500 student leaders as we sought to minister, mentor and mobilize the 7200 on campus students. The Office of Student Leadership was responsible for 4 teams: Resident Directors, Resident Assistants, Spiritual Life Directors, and Prayer Leaders. Being a part of Dr. Jerry Falwell’s vision to train champions for Christ was indeed a special privilege. In the Fall of 2010, I once again considered a call to come on staff at Genoa Baptist Church and in February of 2011 I joined the staff at Genoa Baptist Church in Westerville, Ohio (Northeast Columbus). It is a growing church in a growing area with a desire to be a church to all generations. I served as the Pastor for Spiritual Development until the first of March, 2013.
In mid 2013 we planted a new church in Lewis Center OH that we named Epic Life Church. We pastored this church until 2018 when God called us to be the Head of School at Salem Baptist Christian School and Associate Pastor at Salem Baptist Church. At the conclusion of the 21/22 school year we resigned our role as Head of School to give our full attention to the development of DATE the Word ministries!
Doctrinally, I believe the Bible is the Word of God and is inspired, inerrant and infallible. I believe all men need to hear the message of Christ and that each Christian is an ambassador for Christ. I am involved in carrying out the Great Commission. In the past, I have been involved in door-to-door evangelization in Lynchburg, Las Vegas, Dallas and New York City. I have traveled to Romania, Hungary, Russia, Japan, Hong Kong, China, India, Canada, Kenya and Argentina to take Bibles and tracts and to share the gospel with the wonderful people of those countries while also practicing personal evangelism at home. Many of those trips also allowed for training of pastors. We also love to take people to Israel to tour the Holy Land.
I am also passionate about prayer and I believe, as did Dr. Jerry Falwell, that nothing of eternal significance ever happens apart from prayer. I am passionate about discipleship. I think the Christian life is about becoming as much like Christ as possible. Thus, I am commited2equipping the next generation. I am passionate about spiritual leadership. As a pastor, I see leadership from the lens of being a shepherd. Every church deserves great growing shepherds to help God’s people grow and be all they can be for Christ.
My life has gone from religion to rebellion to religion and finally to rebirth. Today I desire to see revival. Every person needs to know about Jesus Christ and every Christian needs to become like Him. This is my heartbeat.
We believe in one God, infinite Spirit, creator, and sustainer of all things, who exists eternally in three persons, God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit. These three are one in essence but distinct in person and function.
We believe the Father is the first person of the Trinity and the source of all that God is and does. From Him the Son is eternally generated and from Them the Spirit eternally proceeds. He is the designer of creation, the speaker of revelation, the author of redemption, and the sovereign of history.
We believe that the Lord Jesus Christ is the second person of the Trinity, eternally begotten from the Father. He is God. He was conceived by the virgin Mary through a miracle of the Holy Spirit. He lives forever as perfect God and perfect man: two distinct natures inseparably united in one person.
We believe that the Holy Spirit is the third person of the Trinity, proceeding from the Father and the Son and equal in deity. He is the giver of all life, active in the creating and ordering of the universe; He is the agent of inspiration and the new birth; He restrains sin and Satan; and He indwells and sanctifies all believers.
We believe that all things were created by God. Angels were created as ministering agents, though some, under the leadership of Satan, fell from their sinless state to become agents of evil. The universe was created in six historical days and is continuously sustained by God; thus it both reflects His glory and reveals His truth. Human beings were directly created, not evolved, in the very image of God. As reasoning moral agents, they are responsible under God for understanding and governing themselves and the world.
We believe that the Bible, both Old and New Testaments, though written by men, was supernaturally inspired by God so that all its words are the written true revelation of God; it is therefore inerrant in the originals and authoritative in all matters. It is to be understood by all through the illumination of the Holy Spirit, its meaning determined by the historical, grammatical, and literary use of the author’s language, comparing Scripture with Scripture.
We believe that Adam, the first man, willfully disobeyed God, bringing sin and death into the world. As a result, all persons are sinners from conception, which is evidenced in their willful acts of sin; and they are therefore subject to eternal punishment, under the just condemnation of a holy God.
We believe that Jesus Christ offered Himself as a sacrifice by the appointment of the Father. He fulfilled the demands of God by His obedient life, died on the cross in full substitution and payment for the sins of all, was buried, and on the third day He arose physically and bodily from the dead. He ascended into heaven where He now intercedes for all believers.
We believe that each person can be saved only through the work of Jesus Christ, through repentance of sin and by faith alone in Him as Savior. The believer is declared righteous, born again by the Holy Spirit, turned from sin, and assured of heaven.
We believe that the Holy Spirit indwells all who are born again, conforming them to the likeness of Jesus Christ. This is a process completed only in Heaven. Every believer is responsible to live in obedience to the Word of God in separation from sin.
We believe that a church is a local assembly of baptized believers, under the discipline of the Word of God and the lordship of Christ, organized to carry out the commission to evangelize, to teach, and to administer the ordinances of believer’s baptism and the Lord’s table. Its offices are pastors/elders and deacons, and it is self-governing. It functions through the ministry of gifts given by the Holy Spirit to each believer.
We believe that the return of Christ for all believers is imminent. It will be followed by seven years of great tribulation, and then the coming of Christ to establish His earthly kingdom for a thousand years. The unsaved will then be raised and judged according to their works and separated forever from God in hell. The saved, having been raised, will live forever in heaven in fellowship with God.