Early Life
Born to parents Edgar and Dorothy Gaines, Steve and his only sibling, Ed, spent most of their youth in the small town of Dyersburg, Tennessee. Their father worked for the Illinois Central Railroad and retired in 1976 as a track supervisor. Their mother founded and supervised a janitorial business in Dyersburg, for which both Gaines and his brother worked. He was baptized by his pastor at First Baptist Church in Dyersburg, Dr. Robert Orr.
During his senior year at Dyersburg High School, Gaines was selected as first team defensive end in the Big Ten Conference and as All-District in track. He entered the University of Tennessee at Martin on a full football scholarship in the fall of 1975. By the third game of his freshman season, he shared a starting defensive end position with a senior team mate. At UTM, he began attending weekly meetings of the Fellowship of Christian Athletes. In the fall of 1977 he gave up his football scholarship to transfer to Union University, a Christian college in Jackson, Tennessee. On October 23, 1977, Steve Gaines was licensed to the Gospel ministry by his home church in Dyersburg.
Read more about this topic: Steve Gaines (pastor)
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