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Dr. Tony Evans and son, Anthony Photo Credit: Sommer Swindle

As the young pastor of a fast-growing Dallas church, Dr. Tony Evans couldn't help looking at his namesake toddler son and wondering whether someday young Anthony Evans, Jr., would feel the tug of ministry, too.

Twenty-plus years later, the 55-year-old preacher has his answer, though not exactly the one he envisioned.

Anthony, now 25, has just released his debut CD, an eclectic mix of Christian pop and R&B, and ministers from the concert stage rather than the pulpit.

But sometimes for father and son, the two converge, with Dr. Evans preaching and Anthony singing.

"That's a dream come true," Dr. Evans says.

"There's nobody I'd rather be out there with than my dad," Anthony adds.

Many ties bind Evans senior and junior—their names, their relationship, and, most of all, their call to reach souls for Christ.

Toward the end of Anthony's CD, Even More, he sings a gentle, thoughtful song called "Just Like You." It's about his dad, pastor of the 7,000-member Oak Cliff Bible Fellowship in Dallas and an internationally known speaker and evangelist. But those achievements don't really matter in the context of the song. It's about faith, handed down from father to son, generation to generation.

"I saw my grandfather's faithfulness fulfilled in my father's life, and I'm here now because my father was faithful, too," Anthony says.

In the name of the fathers
If you've ever heard Dr. Tony Evans preach, you remember it. Evans is renowned for dynamic, biblical messages that inspire and provoke listeners into a deeper understanding of what it means to follow Christ. Most people know his distinctive voice—that scratchy, authoritative tenor that often rises into a rhythmic, high-pitched wail once he gets warmed up—from his popular radio and television broadcasts, not to mention his numerous speaking engagements.

But of all his accomplishments—postgraduate degrees, best-selling books, and international ministry—Dr. Evans is most proud of his family life and how he's managed to balance the demands of ministry with being a good husband to Lois and father to Anthony, Chrystal, 31, Priscilla, 29, and Jonathan, 24.

In fact, a lot of his teaching focuses on the importance of keeping your priorities straight. "The biblical order is your relationship with God, your relationship with your family, and then your ministry," he told CBN's Scott Ross last year. "The last couple of verses of Malachi in the Old Testament says, 'The land is cursed when there's fatherlessness, and it abounds.' Today, you see it, in crime and juvenile delinquency, in the rebellion. That's why it's such a passion with me to see men take their rightful fathering role. Because it has a lot to say about how the kids wind up."

Back when Tony Evans was a boy growing up in Baltimore, Maryland, it wasn't always clear that his dad would succeed in his fathering role. "Our family was in disarray, and we were on our way to becoming another statistic," he remembers. "My father was a decent man, but all I remember growing up was the conflict. There was always conflict in the house. It was not a happy place to go home to.

"But when my dad came to faith, that totally transformed him."

Dr. Evans was around 12 years old then, and he'll never forget that day when his father, who was a fisherman working out of Baltimore Harbor, came home a changed man.

"We didn't know this man who came home. He brought this new faith with him, and my mother resisted it," remembers Evans. "She didn't like him already, and this new thing made it even worse. But she would see him get up late at night and pray for his family, and eventually he led her to faith, and we children followed.

"When my father came to faith, he started taking us all to church," Evans says, "and that revolutionized the family. That's when I realized the importance of faith for the family, because the family is critical to the future. We've tried to do that with our family, too—family and faith connected."

That philosophy is evident in Dr. Evans's marriage. Lois Evans also has a doctorate and is senior vice president of The Urban Alternative, Tony's national teaching ministry.

Though none of the Evans children were pushed toward ministry, three chose that path. Daughter Chrystal, the oldest, is an accountant and full-time mom who directs one of the church's choirs. Priscilla, the second daughter, followed her father to Dallas Theological Seminary and now writes books and speaks to groups across America. Anthony, the elder son, found his ministry in music. Jonathan, the youngest, is a student at Baylor University.

"Our parents never pressured us into anything," Anthony says. "My dad would once in a while mention 'seminary,' and then he'd laugh. He knew that once I got my college degree, I wasn't interested in going to school anymore. I think that's actually a great testimony about my parents—they never tried to make us go into ministry, but we went in that direction because we've watched them lead the lives they live."

Faithful decisions
Dr. Evans takes none of the credit for his children's decisions. He leaves such things in God's hands. But he admits his kids had plenty of exposure to ministry opportunities at Oak Cliff, where active involvement isn't only encouraged, it's required. "We knew the possibility [of going into ministry] was there because they were so involved with church. Church was everything. They were always around it."

And what about his son's decision to make music his ministry, something even Anthony calls a surprise?

"We knew that was a possibility, too, once we heard him sing," Dr. Evans says. "But he wasn't sure that was what he wanted to do until after college."

Instead, Anthony thought he'd get involved in Christian camping and youth ministry, "because going to camp had had such a huge influence on me as a kid, and I wanted other kids to have that same opportunity."

Says Anthony: "Growing up, I never thought about music, and I never thought about pastoring a church."

But watching his pastor-father gave him all the proof he needed to see that God's plan is the best, even if it doesn't match up with our own ideas.

He's seen Dr. Evans build an active, faith-filled church dedicated to improving lives in the inner-city community around it, though his father's initial plan was to become a professor at his alma mater, Dallas Theological Seminary. Instead, Dr. Evans answered the call to plant a new church in the South Dallas suburb of Oak Cliff, Texas, a prospect that promised an uncertain income and a lot less prestige.

Of course, today Dr. Evans is one of the evangelical community's most res-pected spokesmen, and his willingness to follow God's call looks like a no-brainer. But it wasn't that way 30 years ago.

"I've learned so much watching my father," Anthony says, " because despite what you see, he isn't an extrovert at all. Preaching doesn't come naturally to him. The animation you see from him in the pulpit isn't what he is in private life. But God gave him an ability, and he applied himself, and he continues to grow in that."

A preacher's kid
As Oak Cliff Bible Fellowship grew, and his father's teaching and broadcast ministry brought him increasing prominence, it also brought Anthony a fair share of attention from his peers. He was inevitably branded "a pastor's kid."

"I didn't notice it at all when I was in private school, but when I switched to public school when I was 12 or 13, going into junior high, I did get picked on a lot—getting called 'church boy,' things like that," Anthony says.

"But I adjusted, and it made my skin a little thicker and I held onto my convictions. And by the time I got to ninth grade, people knew that's who I was and I wasn't changing."

Dr. Evans suspects Anthony might have had a tougher time than his other children.

"I think it was particularly difficult for him, because not only was he 'a pastor's kid' but he had my name, too," Evans says. "People put expectations on him. Living in a fishbowl, he thought he had to perform to meet an image rather than just be himself. He never complained about it, but you could see his reaction to it, his frustration."

Does that explain Anthony's decision to follow his dad into ministry, but in a much different form?

"I think he wanted to have his own identity, and I think that's good," his father says. "And he certainly can do things that I can't."

Launching a career in the crowded Christian music market is a huge challenge, and one that keeps Anthony on the road quite a bit, either performing on his own or as part of gospel superstar Kirk Franklin's touring group. Still, he finds time to join his father at speaking engagements around the country.

"Now that Anthony is doing his music full time, the opportunities to be together happen more and more often," Dr. Evans says proudly. "He's at maybe half of the events I do. Sharing ministry together is exciting."

For a father dedicated to ministry, and for a son following his family's walk in faith, those moments are precious.

"I'm so proud of my family and my heritage," Anthony says. "It's not just one fact or principle that I've learned from my parents; they've given me a whole blueprint of what it means to be faithful. They've taught me so much about loving God with my life."

Mike Young is a freelance writer in Dallas.

GENERATION 2 GENERATION
The Musical Son All I desire is to follow in your footsteps for the rest of my life, so one day when I have a son of my own, I pray that he'll see in me all that I see in you, and I'll hear him say, "I want to be just like you."    —Anthony Evans,from his song "Just Like You"
The Prophetic Father How can you have all these churches on all these corners with all these preachers, people, and programs, and still have all this mess? The church has become too "ingrown." Anyone joining our church must serve in a ministry. Because otherwise, it's "preach to me, pray for me, sing to me, but don't expect anything from me." That's the existence of a leech.    —Dr. Tony Evans in a CBN interview	Images courtesy of Anthony Evans

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