Dr. Joseph Walker III grew up in poverty—but he had parents who worked hard to give their kids a bright future and teach them about God, which provided a way out of their lifestyle. Walker says God grew him during difficult times to shape his character.
“One day I said, ‘I’m going to live on a street with a sidewalk,'” Walker says of his childhood in poverty. “It’s kind of interesting, right? As a kid, 7 years old, all I wanted was a sidewalk. On the other side of the tracks on Elmer Street, they had sidewalks; streets were paved. …
“Think about it, man, what my dad had to endure, what my mom had to endure, for us to be able to do what we do today. Out of that, you get these amazing kids who come along and do these extraordinary things, judges and lawyers and CPAs. … Nobody did anything bad; we just made it. And I think it has a lot to do with understanding that Scripture says, ‘Train up a child in the way he should go; when he’s old, he will not depart from it.'”
God had different plans for Walker than he envisioned, he says on the Next Level Leaders podcast on the Charisma Podcast Network. Though he thought he’d be a lawyer, he ended up in ministry.
“You could not have told me that I was not going to be a lawyer, touching the world through law,” Walker says. “Here I am in ministry. It’s all because God had plans long before I was born.”
For more of Walker’s testimony, click here to listen to the entire episode.
