Lifework Podcast

Brandon Green never set out to move his family from West Virginia to Arkansas. But a bluegrass competition, an unexpected connection, and weeks of prayer opened the door to a new calling at Williams Baptist University.

In this episode of Lifework, Dr. Stan Norman sits down with Brandon to trace a journey that began with his grandfather’s banjo and grew into a life of performing, teaching, and serving others. 

Brandon shares how a difficult season helped give rise to his family band, Strings of Green, and why he sees music as more than something to master, it’s a gift to use for others. 

From encouraging nursing home residents to helping students grow in their craft, their conversation explores what happens when we surrender our talents to God and follow where He leads.

A new assignment doesn’t always mean a new calling. Sometimes it means serving the same mission in a different way.

Dr. Brett Cooper joins Dr. Stan Norman, president of Williams Baptist University, to reflect on more than three decades at Williams and the new responsibilities God has placed before him. After helping launch and lead Williams Works, Cooper is turning his attention to making prayer central to campus life and developing WBU’s Ministry Training Institute—creating hands-on ministry opportunities for students and bringing training to rural and bivocational pastors.

Continuing Season 3’s theme, “Stewarding What You’ve Been Given,” this conversation explores what it means to hand off something you love, embrace what comes next, and use the experience God has given you to equip others. Along the way, Cooper and Norman discuss surrender, patience, and learning to trust God with both the assignment and the outcome.

What does it mean to steward a team, not just chase a winning record?

Dr. Stan Norman welcomes Justin Dee, head volleyball coach at Williams Baptist University, for an honest conversation about following God’s call and caring for the people He places in your life. Coach Dee shares how his plans for a career in mathematics gave way to teaching and coaching, and how a difficult day in Florida led to a late-night email that brought him to WBU.

Reflecting on a challenging 2–30 season, Dee explains how his players helped him rediscover the heart of coaching: developing young women who feel loved, valued, and equipped for life beyond the court. He also shares how 1 Corinthians 13 reshaped his approach to leadership, replacing ego and frustration with patience, kindness, and a commitment to helping others grow.

Continuing this season’s theme, Stewarding What You’ve Been Given, this episode explores faithful leadership, purpose beyond the scoreboard, and the responsibility of investing in the people entrusted to you.

Jordan West didn’t expect his emergency management degree to lead him into ministry. But when he served among people whose lives had been upended by conflict, he found himself using what he had learned to meet them in a moment of need.

In this episode of Lifework, Jordan joins Dr. Stan Norman to talk about his path from Arkansas to the mission field, through seminary, and eventually to Williams Baptist University as director of campus ministries. Along the way, he shares what it meant to put his “yes on the table” without knowing where God would lead next.

Their conversation turns to the students Jordan serves today and his hope that their college years will help them consider a lasting question: Will Jesus be just one part of their lives, or the center of everything?

A coach who once wanted the bigger-school path came back to Williams after being told he would never win here. 

In this episode of Lifework, Dr. Stan Norman talks with WBU Head Baseball Coach Stephen Abanathy about returning home, accepting a difficult assignment, and building something that matters beyond the scoreboard.

Coach Abanathy reflects on the relationships and Scripture-centered community that shaped him as a student, his unexpected road from college baseball to coaching, and the challenge of leading a program where culture matters as much as competition. He also shares why he measures success not simply in wins, but in graduates who become faithful men, husbands, fathers, and leaders.

Along the way, Coach Abanathy discusses building trust with players, recruiting young men who will lead when no one is watching, serving as WBU’s interim athletic director, and why he still finds refreshment in stepping onto the field with his team.

Faithful to the Assignment: Coach Stephen Abanathy on Returning Home and Building at WBU is an honest conversation about playing the long game and discovering that the work God gives you may be bigger than the one you originally planned.

Interested in experiencing the WBU community for yourself? Sign up for Preview Day on Friday, September 25 at williamsbu.edu/preview.

Kendall Davenport Layne shares how she found peace when her lifelong plan to serve overseas changed and how God led her into counseling, teaching, and mentoring students instead.

In this episode of Lifework, Dr. Stan Norman talks with Kendall about feeling called to missions from a young age, serving for two years in South Asia, and returning home with difficult questions about identity, obedience, and purpose. Kendall reflects on the long process of learning that God’s love and calling are not limited to one place, job, or version of the future she had imagined.

Now an assistant professor of psychology and child and family studies at Williams Baptist University, Kendall is discovering new ways to live missionally through counseling, discipleship, meaningful conversations, and investing in the next generation of students.

Plus, hear a special invitation to Williams Baptist University’s Fall Preview Day on Friday, September 25. If you know a high school senior who is exploring college options, invite them to come see campus, meet the WBU community, and imagine what their next step could look like.

Lifework is a conversation about calling, hosted by Dr. Stan Norman, president of Williams Baptist University. In Season 3, Stewarding What You’ve Been Given, each conversation asks a simple question: How are you stewarding what God has given you now?

Season 3 of Lifework begins with a question that reaches into every season of life: How are you stewarding what God has already given you?

In this opening episode, Dr. Stan Norman sits down with Coach Tracy Hubbard to talk about calling, faithfulness, leadership, and the unexpected paths God uses to prepare us for meaningful work. Tracy shares his journey from Michigan to Williams Baptist University, the mentors who challenged him, the moments that reshaped his sense of purpose, and what it has meant to build a wrestling program and invest in the lives of students.

Their conversation is an honest reminder that calling is not always about waiting for a future opportunity. Sometimes it means showing up faithfully in the place you are, leading with both grace and truth, and using the gifts, relationships, and responsibilities already in your hands.

This is Lifework, honest conversations about calling, hosted by Dr. Stan Norman, president of Williams Baptist University. In Season 3, Stewarding What You’ve Been Given, each guest helps us consider how faithfulness in the present can shape the work God has ahead.

Thinking about college or know a student who is? Join us for Preview Day at Williams Baptist University on Friday, September 25. It is a great opportunity to experience campus, meet faculty and students, explore academic programs, and get helpful answers about the college decision. Share this link with a student or family who needs an invitation:
williamsbu.edu/preview

In part two of Dr. Stan Norman’s conversation with Steven Nelson, Director of Housing and Intramural Sports at Williams Baptist University, Steven picks up the story as a young electrical engineering student at DeVry in Kansas City, still wrestling with God’s call to ministry. He recounts the decisive moment in a trigonometry class when he stood up, told his professor “I’m not supposed to be here,” withdrew from school, and returned home to work on the farm and in a factory while saving for Bible college. 

Steven shares how the Lord used those seasons of struggle, along with the support of his grandparents, to lead him into formal theological training at Spurgeon College and Midwestern Baptist Theological Seminary—including archaeological digs in Israel—and ultimately into his current role shepherding students at Williams. 

If you missed last week’s episode, be sure to go back and listen to part one so you can experience the full arc of Steven’s journey from farm fields to the WBU campus.

In this episode of the Lifework Podcast, host Dr. Stan Norman welcomes Steven Nelson, Director of Housing and Intramural Sports at Williams Baptist University, to share how a boy from rural Missouri found his way into shaping campus life at WBU. 

Steven reflects on growing up in a large farming family, learning perseverance in the fields and factories, and navigating complex family dynamics that forged his character and faith. He introduces how those early experiences prepared him not only for future ministry training at Spurgeon College and Midwestern Baptist Theological Seminary, but also for his calling to invest in students’ lives through housing, intramurals, and teaching. 

Stay tuned through the end of this conversation as Steven begins to wrestle with God’s call on his life and the tension between an engineering path and ministry, setting up part two of his story coming next week.

In part two of this conversation, President Stan Norman and Caleb Garner pick up Caleb’s story as he moves from Mississippi State into the world of sports media and, eventually, the classroom at Williams Baptist University. Caleb describes discovering that work is both service and worship, and how roles in sports information, media relations, and communications became avenues for telling stories while God was quietly reshaping his vocational path.

He shares how graduate studies, long hours in a “24/7” athletics environment, and mentoring student workers awakened a love for teaching that ultimately brought him to WBU to lead the growing Sports Management program. Caleb also unpacks what a sports management degree can prepare students to do—from coaching and athletic administration to sports business and media—and why he believes Christ-centered leaders are desperately needed in today’s multibillion-dollar sports industry. Listeners will hear how he is pursuing his doctorate in sport management, investing in students as future leaders, and viewing every role—from cutting grass to teaching—to be an act of worship under the direction of the “Master Storyteller.”

Learn more about the health & physical education department: https://williamsbu.edu/physicaleducation/