Staff Team
Deric Thomas Local Disciple-Making Associate Minister
What is your job at Brook Hills?
I oversee adult on and off campus small groups, train and equip our leaders, preach and teach at times, and provide pastoral care and counseling.
What is your favorite part of your job?
Having the privilege of serving God’s people on a daily basis through pastoral ministry (Word and prayer, Acts 6:4). I love the local church (Jn. 21:15)!
How & when did you first come to Brook Hills?
I first came to Brook Hills as a 2 month old Christian after my first year of college at the University of Alabama (1999). After being away from Birmingham for a while for Seminary and serving two other churches, I came back to Brook Hills as a staff member 4 years ago (2007).
Where are you from?
I grew up in Birmingham (Homewood), Alabama, but I have also lived in Louisville, Kentucky, and Miami.
Who is in your family?
Heather (wife, married in 2001), John Deric (born 2003), Simon (born 2005), Anna (born 2007), Victoria Grace from China (adoption process now, 2011/2012).
Please provide a short testimony about your relationship with Christ?
God saved me when I was 19. I knew the facts of the gospel (Jesus’ perfect life, death, and resurrection) at that point, but started reading the Bible for the first time. God used the account of the birth of Christ, and His Spirit, to open my eyes to the fact that I was worse than I thought I was (sin), Christ was greater than I thought He was (Lord), and that Jesus really was alive. I turned from my sins and trusted in Christ that very night. I praise God for His grace and His work for me through Christ!
What’s your favorite Bible verse?
You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind. This is the great and first commandment. And the second is like it: You shall love your neighbor as yourself. On these two commandments depend all the Law and Prophets. (Matthew 22:37-40)
What is the best place you have ever visited?
The beach with Heather and the children, now. Nanny and Paw Paw’s house, growing up. Both had good food, good fishing, and good family time.
If you could live anywhere in the world, where would it be?
Israel, but only for two weeks, just long enough to see everything in the land where the Bible unfolded. Long term, I could live anywhere in the world as long as my Heather Bear is with me!
“I recommend…”
We learn to humble ourselves so that the Father does not have to humble us (James 4:6-10).
These are a few of my favorite things…
Food: My wife’s beef brisket with sauteed asparagus, a side salad, and basmati rice.
Candy: Peanut M&M’s.
Book: How People Change, by Dr. Paul David Tripp (other than the Bible of course).
Movie: The Chronicles of Narnia (all of them). Hobby: Sports (especially fishing, football, baseball, and basketball), but now that I am an “old man”, I spend most of my time either with my family or reading.
Sport: Baseball (especially coaching my sons).
What silly trick can you do that most people can’t?
Hold my nose underwater with my upper lip. I have been doing this since I learned to swim as a child.