Jamie's story
With the ability to connect to people of any age group, culture, or background, Jamie Vaughn lives with a passion to see the lost come into a relationship with Jesus and see the saved encouraged and challenged to make a deeper, more intimate, commitment to Him.
Jamie has been blessed with a beautiful wife, Kacie, and three beautiful children: Jordan, Alex, and Julia. The life, death, resurrection, and message of Jesus Christ is the centerpiece of all our outreach efforts. All this being said, it’s important to note Jamie’s life has not always been this way.
Abandoned at the hospital by his birth parents as soon as he was born, his early childhood was filled with foster homes, abuse, and neglect. Jamie was blessed to be found by his grandparents and raised in a Christian home. However, his early childhood experience left Jamie angry, bitter, and lonely.
Jamie’s grandfather (the only father he had ever known) passed away when he was ten years old. Why did God allow these things to happen if God was so good? His heart and mind were even more clouded with anger and confusion.
Jamie began studying martial arts, and it was then that he discovered his initial calling in life. He was a fighter and always had been. Now, he had the tools to protect himself, and never be a victim again.
Over the course of Jamie’s adult years, he led an interesting life. He competed in martial arts competitions, joined the military, and eventually opened his own business teaching others how to not be a victim. At this time, Jamie was married to his wife, Amanda, and together they had one daughter, a house in the suburbs with a pool, took three to four vacations a year, and lived what many call the ‘good’ life. Everything was good on the outside. What people didn’t see were the demons that still haunted Jamie. His wife was diagnosed with heart disease at age 18. She had been in the hospital at least twenty times in less than six years. She had undergone numerous procedures including open heart surgery. Her faith was so strong, which confused Jamie even more. If God is so good, why are you going through this?
In September of 2011, Amanda passed away suddenly. Their daughter was 10 years old, and the glue to the only family Jamie had was now gone. He was devastated. His anger towards God was red hot. However, he maintained the business and parented the best he could. People would even comment on how good of a dad Jamie was, and how he was so strong. He and his daughter continued going to church and going through all of the religious motions, but Jamie was totally dead inside. The world didn’t know that he was an alcoholic, depressed, with thoughts of suicide. He had become the very thing he had worked his whole life not to be. But he hid it very well. Or so he thought.
As the business grew and thrived, Jamie became a successful MMA (mixed martial arts) coach, training and managing fighters and traveling all over the southeast. He was constantly in bars, strip clubs, nightclubs, and large venues, with every vice you can imagine at your fingertips. From alcohol to girls to drugs, it was truly a rock n’ roll lifestyle. Jamie remembers very vividly, after a long bender of a weekend, this life he had built was a sham and a total wreck. He had decided he could no longer continue to fake it or make it better. At this moment Jamie was at the lowest point of his entire life. He remembers walking into the nice gym he had built from the ground up, looking at his dream, and thinking “I’ve got everything I could want: money, a successful business, popularity in some circles, and it doesn’t mean anything”. After a short drive to the land he owned in the country, he had come to the end of his rope.
This was it. He had lost his wife, the life he built was in shambles, and he was convinced his daughter would be better off without him. He was ready for it to be over. Jamie fired off a couple of rounds to be sure the weapon was good to go. He placed the barrel of the gun in his mouth. But, when he pulled the trigger to take his life, the only sound heard was a click. Talk about feeling like a failure in everything! In Jamie’s words:
“At this point, I fell on my knees, broken. Tears rolled down my face, and I came to my senses. My daughter needs a daddy; not a suicidal drunk. It was at this point I told God that I could not go back home the same man I was when I left. This wasn’t living. This was just existing. I was tired and exhausted. There was no rehearsed church prayer. I was a completely broken man who had lost almost everything desperately crying out to a holy God for mercy. And He answered big time! I had never felt such a rush of emotions and feelings and fire as I did in that moment! I knew religion and had all kinds of awards from Sunday school and VBS to prove it. But for the first time in my life, I knew I had met the God my wife had known and walked with and trusted right to the end. I dropped to the ground in a heap as a broken man who was dead inside; I stood up as a completely new child of the living God. All I could think was ‘Thank you God the gun is out of bullets.’ But a good soldier always clears the weapon to be sure it’s empty just in case. When I pulled the trigger and it fired off a couple of more shots without hesitation, my faith in the power of God was sealed. Why did He spare me?
Fast forward, I married my wife Kacie in 2014. She had been abandoned by her husband for drugs and other women. She had two small children: a son who was 8 and a daughter who was 2. The Lord found her and drew her to Himself before we met. When we did meet, we were two broken families who had decided to trust Jesus with our lives, and that was it. I adopted her two children, and Kacie became the mother my daughter needed. We are a living, breathing example of what our God can do. He takes a mess and makes a miracle!
When I look at our lives, all I can think of is the kid with the lunch, and there were thousands of people to feed. In the kid’s hands, it was just a Lunchable. But in God’s hands, it was a miracle. When you trust God with the little that you have, no matter how small and insignificant you think it is, give it to Him. Trust Him. Then watch what God does!”
Jamie has served as a student pastor at two churches and is currently on staff at Philippi Baptist Church in Union, SC as the pastor of students. Although he loves what he does, he also has the desire to tell God’s story of redemption in his own life to as many people as possible. To tell them that they can never get too far from God and that He will split time and space to get to them. It is a radical story of what God can and will do if we trust Him!
Statement of Belief
The mission of Jamie Vaughn Ministries is to preach the gospel and make disciples. We serve the local Church through evangelism, discipleship, outreach, and events.
We believe that we have been called to make a local, national, and global impact for the gospel, and love to partner with churches and organizations that want to do the same.
We are blessed to be a part of God’s worldwide plan to redeem His creation back to Him. Our philosophy is based on forming long-lasting relationships with pastors, youth pastors, students, and the local churches that we serve.
JVM operates as a 501-c3 non-profit organization.
We Believe
The Bible is the inspired, infallible Word of God and the supreme and final authority for our lives and the Church.
In the virgin birth of Christ, His sinless life and death on the cross for our sins, His resurrection from the dead, and His return as King of Kings and Lord of Lords.
In one God, eternally existing in three Persons– Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.
The Gospel of Jesus Christ is the good news of salvation and is the hope for our world.
Salvation is offered freely as a gift of God’s grace to anyone who will repent of their sins and trust Jesus alone as their Lord and Savior.