A father’s strict discipline and a mother’s gentle love gave Brad Lartigue the foundation for the life he now leads as a resort missionary in Montana.
LAKE CHARLES – A father’s strict discipline and a mother’s gentle love gave Brad Lartigue the foundation for the life he now leads as a resort missionary in Montana.
Lartigue was featured during promotion of the Annie Armstrong Easter Offering in 2008 for the work he does in Big Sky, Mont., at ski resorts, as an EMT with and chaplain to the local fire department, and with SBC Innovator summer missionaries in Yellowstone National Park. Little was said, however, about his Louisiana roots.
He was the oldest of five born to A.B. and Anna Marie Lartigue Sr., of French, Black, Cherokee and Italian ancestry. His father was an educator and a pastor – first in Eunice and now at Unity Baptist Church in Lake Charles. Brad’s mom’s calling was to her family and to the churches her husband pastored.
These days Lartigue conducts worship services, weddings, baby dedications and memorial services on the ski slopes of both Big Sky Ski and Summer Resort and Moonlight Ski Basin, all in Big Sky, Mont. He ministers on a snowboard – his nickname is “Shred” – at a 14-foot Logwood cross. Lartigue also volunteer ski patrols with Big Sky Ski Patrol and with Nordic Patrols at Lone Mountain Ranch.
In summer he supervises 20 Christian Innovator college student missionaries with the North American Mission Board. The Yellowstone Christian Innovators conduct personal evangelism ministries with employees at Yellowstone National Park.
“I believe my area of resort and leisure ministries is a good place to present the gospel to people because our Lord Jesus Christ gave us the example and foundation for ministering to people outside the walls of the church,” Lartigue said. “Jesus spoke to the multitudes from the bow of a boat in a lake, from the mountainsides, in the gardens, in marketplaces, and so on – meeting people where they are, in their times of work, and in times of play.
“Having the opportunity to use God’s creation as a ministry tool to point people past that creation and toward the creator is a wonderful thing,” Lartigue continued. “Jesus gave us the foundation and basis of resort and leisure ministries – taking the gospel to people outside the walls of our churches and going into our churches for nurturing and worshipping God.”
Lartigue served on the Big Island of Hawaii as a Baptist Student Union summer missionary in 1984, and as a US/C-2 Resort Missionary from 1984-87 at Taos Ski Valley, New Mexico. After graduating from Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary in Fort Worth, Texas, in 1990, he was assigned to his career assignment as a resort missionary in Montana.
But how did he get from being a lad growing up in Lake Charles to serving as a missionary?
“The thing I can remember that was instilled in us was just being honest, honest about everything we did,” Lartigue said. “And I remember the consistency of their being in the church and everything about it. I remember my grandparents being very much a part of the church that they helped start in Eunice – Mt. Zion Baptist Church. I think my grandfather was chairman of the deacon board. So church has always been a big part of family life for me.
“I think as I was growing up as a teen, there were times I wanted to rebel,” Lartigue said. “For me, I escaped into my schoolwork. … I would bring my school books with me [to church], hide them in my Bible, and study in church.”
Education was important to his father, Lartigue said.
“He instilled within us just a drive to enjoy education. … He always made us speak with correct grammar.”
One of his earliest recollections is starting school in Eunice as a 5-year-old because his father convinced the teacher that “my kid is the smartest kid in the world,” Lartigue said he remembered his father saying. He worked hard to live up to his father’s praise.
“My dad was a very strict disciplinarian,” Lartigue said. “We could not watch TV or go out and play until our homework was done. Me being the oldest, I had to set the example… My baby sister could get by with anything.
“My dad did not spare the belt,” Lartigue continued a few remarks later. “My mom was more the type to verbally discipline us. She would say, ‘We’re going to tell your dad about this.’ Whenever she put dad in our equation we knew that would be a whipping.”
Lartigue, in the soft, gentle timbre of his mother, said he believed children need discipline to learn the consequences of one’s actions, to learn a lesson.
“It wasn’t until I got older that I understood what it meant to go on our knees,” Lartigue said. “We were always told to go on our knees. ‘Go on your knees until your dad gets here.’ Going on your knees was being in a prayerful position – praying about and thinking about it. We had to stay there until we were told we could get up.
“It was excruciating because you didn’t know how long you had to stay there,” the resort missionary continued. “As a kid, the immediate is to think ‘This is terrible’ but if we were wrong, we knew why. We suffered the consequences of our actions.”
As a result, of the discipline they learned, the five Lartigue siblings all have responsible careers: registered nurse, college recruiter, legal services, and the oil industry in addition to resort minissionary.
“He instilled within us a sense of appreciating the benefit of education,” Lartigue said about his father. “I never really questioned not going to college.”
It was while a student at McNeese State University, when Lartigue joined what today is known as Baptist Collegiate Ministries – Baptist Student Union then – that Lartigue moved under the Southern Baptist umbrella. He had gone to the Caribbean as a Medical Explorer with the Boy Scouts, and when he attended his first big BSU event, he realized he could do for God the type of thing he had done for the Boy Scouts.
“My dad taught me a love for the Lord,” Lartigue said. “Seeing his love and his determination for reaching people for Christ has been the most impacting thing in my life.
“My mother, her love for people stands out for me,” Lartigue continued. “She and I think the same when it comes to people and giving a person another chance. I’ve seen her just love people no matter what they bring to the table. I’ve never known her to write someone off. … She has a big heart of forgiveness. I think she’s just an angel. I really do. … I can’t imagine my mom would do anything wrong.
“Whenever I’ve been in Louisiana and been to my parent’s home, one of the things that always humbles me is seeing my mother being consistent in her devotions and her prayer life,” Lartigue said. “She’s incredibly consistent in her walk.”