My name is Brian Byars. On November 27, 1973, I was born to a wonderful Christian family who taught me to love God. The television family we were most like was the Huxtables (The Cosby Show) only not as large. In fact, I am the youngest in my family, but the only surviving child. My other siblings were miscarried.

From a very young age, I wanted to be a good person, but I still got into trouble. I recognized as a child that I needed Jesus Christ if I were going to be good, so I committed my life to Him. Soon I was telling everyone I knew about Jesus Christ and how exciting it was to know Him personally.

In 1995, I met a beautiful young woman, named Alicia Claytor. I knew immediately that she was the woman I would marry. In 1996, we were engaged, and on July 19, 1997, in her uncle's Victorian townhouse, her father, a pastor, married us. Life has never been the same since.

Life got even more interesting recently.

On January 7, 2001, Ethan Robert Byars was born at 8:59 p.m. He's been a very good baby and sleeps well at night. He has his own page here. You can access it by following the link to the left labeled "Emerause du Phoenix."

Alicia and I were not satisfied with the churches we had attended before we were married, so when we moved to our new home, we decided to find a new church as well. We began attending North Hills Community Church and fell in love.

We truly felt the Spirit of God as the church is a very loving community. Not long after we began attending, I took a course the church offered on the Letter of Paul to the Romans. In that course, I learned that my understanding of Christianity had been very legalistic. That is, I believed that by doing some things and not doing others, I could please God. I then realized that God doesn't care about my silly standards. He wants me to imitate Jesus Christ in all that I think, say, and do. That has been a very liberating message for me as I continue to learn.