Adam’s Story
By Maddie Keehn, Adam’s wife
If someone didn’t know my sweet husband, I would say this…
“Okay, picture you are in a coffee shop and a gentleman walks in. He is by far the most stylish one in there, but his style is like super trendy, hip, cool and totally effortless. He has tattoos everywhere and the biggest smile. You watch him order and he is already smiling, laughing, and conversing with the worker.
Through his conversing with the worker, the gentleman goes, “my wife and I love this place; we take our dog here all the time,” while showing the person his phone screensaver, which is a picture of “his girls.” You can tell how much he loves God, his wife, his soon-to-be-born daughter, and his dog, even just by overhearing the conversation. He orders an iced vanilla latte with oat milk and a warmed-up ham and cheese croissant. He finishes his order by saying, “Thanks man, I appreciate it, God bless you!”
He walks over to a table and takes out a deep theological book and the Bible, with a pen and his black journal. He goes on his phone — you later learn it was to text his wife, letting her know he made it safely to the coffee shop, and to snap a picture of his coffee and book for social media, and to Shazam the song playing overhead. The gentleman’s name is called, and he goes up and picks up his order, again greeting the worker with the warmest smile: “Thanks brother, I appreciate it.”
The gentleman’s name is Adam.
Adam sits down and starts reading, journaling, and highlighting like crazy — his book and the Bible, all while saying out loud, “mmmm, wow, that’s so good.” He reads, journals, sips his coffee, takes bites of his croissant. Repeats. You decide to go up to him and ask what his book is about. He greets you with the sweetest smile and then talks your ear off for the next two hours. You see Adam is so passionate about God and all that he is learning. Adam is confident in the man he is and in what the scriptures say to be true. You already see that the scripture has penetrated his whole life; it flows out of him.
He will talk to you about the book he is reading, using “big” theological words and helping you understand their meanings, ever so patiently. You notice he actually gets excited at the fact that you don’t know those words, so that he can teach you them. He tells you he is a husband and father-to-be, and how those are his greatest gifts, with tears in his eyes. He tells you he is a youth pastor and how he loves junior high students, because that’s when he started to take his own walk more seriously. Adam actually didn’t fully surrender his life to Jesus until college; he tells you about the men who have impacted his life — Dana, Justin, Steve, his dad, and pastors like John Piper and Matt Chandler.
Adam tells you he is a pastor’s kid, and how he never wanted to be a pastor himself. He tells you about his stroke when he was thirteen and shows you the tattoo on his right arm. He tells you how he is from Dana Point, and everywhere he has gotten to travel — whether mission trips or family trips — all while giving you recommendations for food places. He tells you about his brother, who was adopted from South Africa, his sister who is a nurse, his mom, who is Hispanic, and how he can speak Spanish, and all the hats his dad wears, and the redemption story of that relationship, with tears in his eyes.
He tells you he graduated from Biola and lived in the Corp House with nine other guys, and about one of his best friends, Evan. He tells you his whole testimony up to that point, and how his tattoos play a part in all of it. After that two-hour conversation, where he was the only one talking, he says, “One second, I need to call my wife and just update her — I would love you guys to meet sometime.”
As he calls, you hear and see how much he loves her and how much she loves him — they are each other’s worlds. He greets her by saying, “Hi my love,” and follows with, “still at the coffee shop, met someone cool and I’m telling them about the book I’m reading, I’ll be heading home in twenty minutes.” He finishes by saying, “how is Kinsley girl? I love YOU so much, I’ll see you soon my love. I will call you when I’m leaving, okay bye baby, loves you,” while giving kisses through the phone to his daughter, his dog Penny, and his wife. He hangs up the phone and says, “wow, I love her…” while smiling. You can see how much he loves and respects his wife.
He tells you how Maddie and he met while serving in junior high ministry, and how they’d been serving together for the last four years. He says he can’t do what he does without her — later you realize they are a team, balancing each other out in every way. He tells you how he and Maddie want three more kids, and that their dream is to move down by the beach, serve students, and own a coffee shop. He gathers his thoughts again to finish the conversation.
In the conversation you see what he loves — his passion, his confidence, but also his humble heart toward Christ and others; who and what is important to him; Christ in him; his warm smile; his clear blue eyes; his ability to make you feel important; his funny humor; his interest in deep theology, coffee, tattoos, Star Wars, fashion, the outdoors, video games, music, food, photography, and soccer. He loved to teach others, but also loved to learn, constantly looking for ways to grow and deepen his relationship with the Lord and be more Christ-like in all his relationships. You see his love for his family — how he loved being a husband and father. How that was his top priority, his focus, his motivation.
Adam was 24 years old when he passed away suddenly from a brain aneurysm on June 8, 2022 — three weeks before the birth of his daughter, Kinsley Joy.
Adam lived his life to spread the gospel in a way that allowed others to be seen, loved, and cared for; just as Jesus does for us.
Maddie Keehn