“Go out and launch into the deep.”

Josiah Trombley didn’t immediately know what that meant. While visiting a church, a man prayed over him and told him to consider what that phrase might mean for him. At the time, Trombley was considering ministry, knowing it likely meant either missions or chaplaincy work.

Soon after, Trombley, who will graduate from Samford University’s Beeson Divinity School next month, recalled reading the story in Luke 5 of Jesus calling Peter as His disciple, miraculously filling the fisherman’s nets with a large catch after a night where he and his friends had caught nothing. Later that day, Trombley went with his friend to see a recruiter for the United States Marine Corps, thinking he was there to support his friend.

Moved by what the recruiter told him about his own opportunities, Trombley began to pray about military service, and the phrase uttered by a man he did not know became clear.

“If I’m going to launch out into the deep, why don’t I join the (U.S.) Navy?” Trombley said.

In order to better understand the experiences of the sailors he would soon serve, Trombley enlisted as a sailor himself in 2016.

Trombley is currently a Naval reservist, which includes training regularly to stay ready, in every sense of the word, for deployment.

While serving in the reserves, Trombley married his wife, Callie, in 2019. Callie serves at Beeson as the Global Center’s program assistant. The couple are expecting their first child, a daughter, in February 2025.

Chaplaincy comes from the Old French word “capella,” and derives from St. Martin of Tours, a Roman soldier who covered an elderly beggar in the street. Christian tradition hold that the Lord later revealed the beggar to be Christ in a dream. It is that commitment to compassion and Christlikeness that drives Trombley and other pursuing chaplaincy.

“It is the church going to the darkest places and meeting people with the light of the Gospel,” Trombley said. “It’s Psalm 139:8 embodied. ‘If I make my bed in Sheol, you are there, and darkness is not dark to you.’ The chaplain, representing the church, is an embodied reminder of that promise, whether in the hospital room, in prison, with the firefighters at a fire, on deployment with troops in war, God meets us where we are and reveals Himself to us in the person and work of Jesus Christ through the church.”

Beeson, which offers a chaplaincy emphasis for interested students, has been excellent at preparing Trombley pastorally, he said.

“I have learned to be unapologetically Anglican, with a pastoral focus and theological rigor, while also understanding other denominations on their terms and their beliefs and knowing where we can minister together, where we disagree, and how far our ecumenism can go,” Trombley said.

That experience will serve him well as he enters into a ministry that is not only interdenominational, but interfaith. While able to remain committed to his faith, Trombley will serve those of other faiths, making ways for them to practice their faith while being able to provide pastoral care from his own Christian, and, specifically, Anglican, perspective.

Specifically at Beeson, Trombley credits professor Stefana Dan Laing for instilling a love for the church fathers and preparing him theologically, along with Laing’s husband John, who recently retired from military chaplaincy, for helping him learn to apply what he’s learned in the classroom to chaplaincy.

After graduation, the Trombleys will move to New Braunfels, Texas, close to Callie’s family. Josiah will serve as a curate at Christ Our King Anglican Church, gaining the necessary pastoral experience before applying for a chaplaincy position with the Navy.

Trombley said he is excited to see how he and Callie grow in parenthood, marriage and in ministry.