Walking by Faith: Geri Evans
Editor’s Note: The following is an interview with APR, PRSA National Committee board member, Geri Evans, as part of a series of weekly conversations with members of the campus community about living out vocational faith
Q. Tell me a little bit about your current position and how you got to that position.
A. I formed my own firm in 2003. I got to that by virtue of moving to Florida in 1996. I first worked in the hotel industry there with a boutique hotel builder and designer, and I was his first corporate Public Relations person. Then I moved into health care and became the vice president of communications for the Florida Hospital Association.
From there, I intentionally went to an agency of a good friend of mine and started doing P.R. for him, because I wanted to see what the agency world was like.
Quite frankly, I was ready to be on my own. I had worked hard all my life. Prior to moving to Florida, I had taught communications all my life. We lived in six states in 14 years because my husband was in the Air Force, so I was ready to be my own boss and take my own clients and figure out what it was like to be own my own and have flexibility. That is really how I got to where I am.
Q. How do you demonstrate your faith in your position?
A. You just have to act as you hope God wants you to day in and day out, situation in and situation out with clients or without. A long time ago, I read a quote that said that “character is what you do when no one is looking.” I think there is something that is parallel to that when it comes to demonstrating your belief and your faith.
Whether people are watching you or not, it does not matter. You just have to try to live out the values that you were taught and that you believe in and act in the way that Jesus wants you to. We are going to fail, yet we have such amazing grace through Him that we just continue to try and try to do better.
Q. Have any situations within your profession strengthened or affirmed your faith?
A. It would be easier if you had asked if there were times that situations have shaken it, because there have been times in my life where I have felt as though I was without resources or where I felt as though I was being abandoned by colleagues or my boss, but I knew God would never abandon me. I had to talk a little harder and stronger and pray harder several times in my life. There were some personal things that shook us as a family and as a couple. I lost our first baby. He died at 6 months. A lot of times you really are faced with some amazing challenges, and then you realize that there are some amazing answers. I had no idea which direction my life would go. Every time we moved into a new community, it was like a leap of faith, and we had to start again. We had to start with new neighbors and a new church and becoming established in a community.
I so fully believe that we are put here to give back and that when you go somewhere new, you should leave it better than when you found it. It was always a challenge. There are few constants when you are constantly moving, but your faith and set of values has to be that constant. You can change churches or communities or friends or careers, but God is always there. I didn’t know my husband very long before we got married, so that was by faith. Then, after getting married in August, I got pregnant in December, and that was something that we hadn’t planned. Then, I was sick for the entire duration of the pregnancy, even to the point that they thought that the baby was dead. Then a nurse said that God told her that the baby was not dead.
The nurse stayed with me in the hospital all night, and we heard the baby’s heart beat the next morning. I have no idea why that happened.
Then, at six months, I delivered the baby. He was two and a half pounds. With today’s technology, he may have survived. But we did have an autopsy, and he had nothing but blood clots on his umbilical cord that he would have been a vegetable for the rest of his life.
That wasn’t God’s plan for us or for him. Two days later, while I am still recovering in the hospital, my husband receives orders to go on a remote assignment to Korea. We hadn’t even been married for a year. That is when I told God that is enough, I can’t do it. But He helped it happen.
My parents moved to Milwaukee that very year, and couldn’t find anyone to rent their home. Then, a speech teacher doesn’t show up at the very university that my father had taught at. The head of the speech department was one of our best friends and a neighbor, and he called me and asked if I would come to teach the speech class. So I was able to heal among friends and in our neighborhood at the university in which my father was very well respected and that I had attended football games and served as head of the pom pom squad. That was an amazing year, because God said, you have had enough and now it is time to heal. Because I could stay within my parents’ home, I didn’t have to pay so much rent, so my husband and I could save in order to start our lives when he returned from Korea. When people ask if there is a God, I say I don’t know who else could’ve known and been there with the pain and helped with the joy in my life. I think it is beyond me and beyond human understanding.
Q. Has your faith continued to grow as you have developed relationships within your profession?
A. Yes, it has, but I wouldn’t attribute it to either of my professions. Certainly, staying in a community and being a part of a church has been such a blessing.
We have an amazing Sunday School class, and I have been involved very much with the church, so I have a wonderful relationship with our pastor and other people of great faith. That has helped me to grow. I certainly have met some wonderful Christians in various jobs, but I wouldn’t say that the Public Relations profession has particularly strengthened my faith. I think part of it is a maturation process. Another part of it is that my career has been a journey, and I believe that it always will be. Learning and faith and growth are also a journey. For me, there hasn’t been a direct correlation between my profession and growth in my faith.
I think it has to do with now being able to stay put in a community of people and that I am growing older. As you mature, you have different perspectives on faith and how God has worked in people’s lives. Whatever profession a person chooses, I would hope that they really look at their core values. It really does set the course for life, relationships and your ability to respond to tough situations. You really need to be focused and centered on something. You have to have core values. I think God is speaking to you and is speaking through others to you, and I think you need to be open and centered on that.
Then, in your life, your career and everything else will become secondary to that because it will all work out.