This is my friend, Nicholas Ghidina. I met Nicholas in 2018 when I was doing an ACAPP ride along at the South station. Often times a rider shows up at briefing and the sergeant announces, "We have a rider tonight. Who wants to take them?" This is generally followed by an awkward silence and by the sergeant telling the officer with lowest seniority, "OK, Officer Newbie, you have a rider today." Fortunately, that day in 2018 was different...when the sergeant asked who wanted a rider, Nicholas volunteered to take me (we had not met before that time).
I don't remember if the shifts were 8 or 10 hours then, but we spent the time patrolling, talking and getting to know a little bit about one another. I discovered Nicholas was not only a Christian, but he also had a passion for ministering to police officers. We spent the last part of the ride along talking about coming together to do some sort of cop Bible study. At the end of the shift, we said "good-bye and let's keep in touch."
Nicholas and I touched base a few times over the next year or so, but in the summer of 2020, Nicholas called and said, "Let's have lunch". As we talked, he laid out is heart for cop ministry and floated the idea of Cop Church hosted at Vine Fellowship. We would start out meeting once a month, have fellowship, worship and time in the Word. We would bring in speakers with a law enforcement background to whom officers could relate. Cop Church kicked off that August. Over the next 9 months, Cop Church met 8 times (we did not meet in December), building a small core not only of officers but also church ladies who PUT OUT THE SPREAD to feed officers before church each month. Nicholas brought in a variety of retired and active-duty law enforcement speakers from within APD's ranks to out-of-state officers. Nicholas shared his heart with officers a couple times (in a round-table discussion format officers loved) and I got to share with them a couple times as well.
2021 brought unexpected changes with my job and the Lord asked me to pull back from ministry for now so that He could work some things in my life. I am not sure why my time with Nicholas and Cop Church was so short, but I do know I am extremely thankful to have had this opportunity to partner with Nicholas and see Cop Church get started. God is faithful and has provided a new home for Cop Church. I look forward to visiting them sometime down the road to see what kind of exciting things God is doing there.
I am thankful for this friendship and the ministry opportunities God allowed us to participate in together. I do not know what God has for me ministry-wise down the road, but if I get to team up with Nicholas again, that will make me very happy. Until then, I look forward to our lunches together encouraging each other and talking about what the Lord is doing in our lives.
