Introduction

My Story

We are all born into God’s story.

Let me tell you my part.

Peru

I was born on the beach in Lima, Peru in South America. Well, the hospital was actually on the beach anyway. My mom and dad were serving as Assemblies of God missionaries when I came along to join my five-year-old sister and seven-year-old brother.

Doug Marsh

God had called my parents to start churches around Puno, Peru where they had none. It’s on the shore of a big lake high in the Andes Mountains, called Lago Titicaca.

After starting their first churches, they established a Bible school in the city of Puno to train men and woman to be pastors. The amazing Quichua people they ministered to were farmers. The school met for only four months each year; classes started right after the planting season and continued until just before harvest.

My family on the “floating islands” near Puno, Peru.

When classes weren’t in session, we would travel three-to-six months in the back of our camper. There were six of us—my family and our volunteer teacher from Texas who lived with us and homeschooled us. Every night we would have a candlelit dinner because electricity was scarce.

After dinner the six of us would help clean up our beloved home on wheels, and all but my parents would wait outside so they could prepare for bed. When they were ready, they would thump twice on the inside wall of the camper with their hand to signal that my sister and our teacher could climb in and get ready. They would convert the table where we had just eaten into a bed and sleep there. My brother got the bunk over them. And, me, the youngest of the family, well, you know where I slept, right? You got it. On the floor!

My bed was special. My dad received generous funds to print gospel literature that helped us tell Jesus’ story in the local language. I slept on top of those boxes every night. At the start of our journey the boxes were full and my bed was firm. But as the literature was distributed, my bed got lumpy. But I wouldn’t have traded it for anything; I liked the adventure of traveling in the Andes, and we loved the people dearly. I spent my nights on the Word of God, literally.

When we were not on the road, my dad and I had a morning tradition. We called it our Think Pill Session. (Sounds so official, doesn’t it?) I’d take a glass of Coke for each of us to my dad’s office. Hidden behind his books on a shelf out of my reach, dad kept a big stash of Peruvian candies similar to M&Ms. For about ten minutes we’d down some chocolate and drink Coke. It was the highlight of my day as a kid.

One morning I went into his office for our Think Pill Session. Rather than let me take the seat I normally did, my dad called me over to sit on his lap. He pointed and instructed me to open his lower desk drawer. Inside there was a small package with my name on it from America. I was so excited! It was my first piece of mail.

Inside was a thin booklet that I immediately discarded in favor of the colorfully embroidered patch inside. I’d never seen it before but immediately liked it. I jumped off my dad’s lap and took off with my new toy, but he caught me and explained I’d have to earn the patch. Earn it? What’s that about? He explained what each of the colorful points meant, and once I could recite them from memory, I’d officially be a Royal Ranger—a program that would teach me how to become a godly man.

I was motivated. I wanted to become a real man! The Andean farmers our family served impressed me. They were tough. They planted high in the mountains and raised animals in very harsh conditions. I admired my dad, too. He was a preacher and a teacher in a place where God’s Word had never been heard. His love and passion inspired me. I wanted to be a real man.

Two weeks later I had met the requirements, and my dad pinned that patch on my shirt. In that moment, God did something supernatural in my heart—He placed a seed of understanding of the man I’d grow into, and I knew that I knew God wanted me to become a missionary and a minister who helped boys become godly men.

As you know, it takes time for a seed to germinate, grow, and produce fruit. I had a lot of learning to do still. I was only six years old. Never doubt that God speaks to you in your youth.

Bolivia

By the time I was seven years old, my parents had already served in Peru for sixteen years. The work was strong. Sixteen churches and the Bible school had been established. The leaders were healthy and taking the work to places we could not reach. The national political conditions were changing. It was time to move. God was leading my parents to a new place of service. We moved from Peru to Bolivia, which is on the other side of Lago Titicaca. For the next eleven years, I’d call its capital city, La Paz, my home.

Admittedly, I was a little confused by the move at first. What would happen to our father-son times of learning about becoming a godly man? Can you do that in a new place? Funny the questions you ask as a kid, isn’t it? Of course, I’d eventually learn that God can shape you into the man He wants regardless of the place or circumstances of your life—and that is something worth remembering. Little did I know that God had big plans for me, stirred in with some smiles, some tears, and lots of learning.

Teacher comment from my 4th grade report card. These are the words that changed my life.

The biggest change that I faced was school. For the first time ever, I was not the only student in the classroom. I had been homeschooled and would now be in a classroom with twenty to thirty others! Who are these beautiful creatures? They call them girls? Wow, amazing. I’ve got to meet them, all of them! Recess? What is that? Time for king of the mountain! Soccer and more soccer. Physical education? Is that really a class? Love it, can’t get enough of that! After school activities? More soccer, you say? I am there!

See what’s missing? By the time I finished fourth grade, I was excelling at everything in school except academics. Then came the biggest blow of my childhood. I was required to repeat the fourth grade. It’s not like I didn’t see it coming. The poor grades, the tutoring that interrupted my love of sports and time with friends, the warnings from my parents and teachers should have gotten my attention, but they didn’t.

I’ve never cried so long or loud in my life. What would my friends think? I was embarrassed. I was disappointed in myself. But over the summer months and with the help of my parents and a few friends, I chose to “man-up” to my failure. I stopped blaming others and took responsibility. I stopped telling myself I was a failure—a script my dad would not allow me to play over and over in my head. After all, the line you believe determines your future. If that line is a lie, you’re doomed. If it’s truth, your future is sure.

My mom and dad helped me realize how capable I was but that my priorities had been out of line. I’d also let myself drift spiritually, going through the motions. Life had become all fun and games, all adventure and no work or discipline. A balance was needed. But to bring that balance, I’d have to sacrifice lots of fun to catch up.

That first day back at school was tough. Last year’s third-graders, who had looked up to me (or feared me) on the playground, were now my fourth-grade classmates. They didn’t mind rubbing my nose in my failure. Last year’s peers, now fifth-graders, joined the chorus. It was not easy! But my parents had a plan, I knew what it was, and we were going to show everyone what I was made of.

I repeated and successfully completed the fourth grade and with the additional help of a tutor achieved the standardized scores in all subjects expected of a boy ready to enter the fifth grade. I’ll never forget the name of my fourth-grade teacher, Señora Vientemillas. She had married a man from Spain whose last name literally meant twenty miles!

Next, things got really good. I dropped out of school. Well, kind of. I returned to homeschooling again. I’d complete fifth and sixth grades in one year. No small task!

After my second fourth-grade adventure, I sacrificed my summer and started fifth grade two weeks later and finished just before Christmas. After another short break, I started sixth grade and entered the seventh grade to rejoin my original class. You should have been there the day I walked back on campus. The look on my classmates’ faces was priceless.

My senior year of high school.

Through it I learned that God could help you overcome life’s biggest setbacks. These challenges serve the purpose of making us strong.

Through all this, I was on a quest to become God’s man. I was active in Royal Rangers and had some outstanding mentors who modeled Christlike behavior and spoke words of encouragement and life into me. One such leader was David North, a college student called to minister to young men. I had shared with some people my dreams for the future and had grown discouraged by their responses. I risked sharing with one more person, David, and he has been a source of encouragement in my life now for over twenty-five years.

The church I was attending closed Royal Rangers down because of some difficulties. I was discouraged and thought my days in the program were over. The encouragement from David and my parents challenged me to find a way to make something good come out of the situation. It was a call from a pastor who asked if I could help their church start Royal Rangers that set things in motion.

I was fourteen-years-old and asked to train grown men in La Paz, Bolivia, how to mentor boys. I was terrified, but refused to admit it. I accepted the pastor’s invitation and started training and strategizing with his leaders how we would reach the boys and young men in their community and shape them into godly men. About three months later, we launched an outreach and held our first meeting with eighty in attendance. I thought for sure we would whittle that down to about thirty or even twenty. But, no, it only grew. Then other pastors called, and the story repeated itself over and over again. By the time high school graduation rolled around, I had started thirty-three groups and trained over 125 leaders who were influencing over a thousand boys for Christ each and every week all across Bolivia.

Naturally, during those high school years, I was doing what every teen guy does: I was dreaming about the future and trying my best to land on some concrete plans. I knew what my heart was calling me to but didn’t know how to get there or even know if I could get there. I wanted to be a missionary who could inspire and train leaders everywhere to mentor future men of God.

College

God unexpectedly made things fall in place. It’s something Jesus promises to do when you “seek first his kingdom and his righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well” (Matthew 6:33). King David wrote, “The Lord makes firm the steps of the one who delights in him” (Psalm 37:23). I was washing my dad’s car one afternoon when he ran out to the drive, excitedly shouting, “Doug, Doug, you’ve got a phone call from Springfield, Missouri.” Living in Bolivia, we didn’t get too many calls from America because it was extremely expensive. So I hustled in while drying my hands so I wouldn’t get the phone wet. All the while I’m thinking to myself, “What have I done wrong to get a call from the Assemblies of God headquarters? I’m just a teen; these calls are for my dad!”

On the line was George Davis, one of my most-beloved mentors. He said, “Doug, let’s keep this short. I’ve got three questions for you:

“First, do you plan to attend Central Bible College when you graduate from high school?” The answer was yes. In fact, just days earlier I had been accepted.

“Second, will you need a job?” I thought to myself, Duh! but answered respectfully, “Yes, sir.”

“Third, would you consider being the training coordinator for Royal Rangers in Latin America and the Caribbean and helping me develop the curricular and training resources for the whole region?” I immediately shouted, “Yes!”

The Lord opened doors that quickly. During the four years I attended college, I was able to travel all over Mexico, Central and South America, and the Caribbean training leaders to shape the next generation of men. During these college days, I also met and married the fairest lady of the entire universe. We moved to Costa Rica in Central America as Assemblies of God missionaries shortly after graduating from college.

World

During the nine years we lived and served in Costa Rica, the Lord enabled us to build ministries to men and boys in nineteen Latin American countries. We also established Camp Summit, an eighty-acre training and discipleship center, designed to challenge and inspire men and boys to love God with their whole hearts and serve others selflessly. Our two children, Jon and Katelyn, were also born while we lived there.

Then in 2002, our leadership asked us to expand our ministry globally by starting Royal Rangers International (RRI). So we entered a new season of adventure and challenge. Today, we are ministering in over eighty-six nations and every sign points to continued growth. It’s so amazing to be part of what God is doing in the lives of young people on every continent.

The Lord then threw us our greatest surprise in 2007. The executive leadership of the Assemblies of God asked if I would also lead the Royal Rangers ministry in the United States. What a ride it’s been! Our role is unique as we continue as missionaries while also serving as members of the National Leadership and Resource Center, representing their commitment to the value of mentoring future men. To see this value also taking root in so many churches across the nation is humbling.

You

The point of my story is this: “The one who calls you is faithful, and he will do it” (1 Thessalonians 5:24). God has dreams for your life that would absolutely blow your mind if He sat next to you and shared them all in one setting! So walk with God, and He will help you reach your dreams! God loves to fulfill the desires of boys and young men who fear Him. (See Psalm 145:19.)

Another thing I hope you have concluded from reading my story is that this book represents a quest of my own. My whole life I’ve asked God to shape me into His man, and this is the journey I’m on. I’ve also asked Him to help me influence millions of boys and young men to avoid the pitfalls of immature manhood. So as you read the pages ahead, in a real sense, we are on a journey together to manhood.

Are you ready?