Chaplain pursues his calling through study and service

Navy Reserve Chaplain Adam Erwin ’16, pictured above, now a lieutenant commander, describes what might be his most memorable deployment, speaks about his vocational path, and tells how he has used insights from his Doctor of Ministry (D.Min.) studies to benefit others. 

From Due West to Deep Freeze

Erskine’s reach extended to Antarctica when Adam Erwin was deployed there from December 2016 to February 2017, shortly after completing his Doctor of Ministry degree at Erskine Theological Seminary.  

Assigned to the icebreaker USCGC Polar Star as part of Operation Deep Freeze (ODF), Erwin ministered to the officers and crew and even preached at Chapel of the Snows, the southernmost church in the world. 

“The mission was to break ice for the resupply ships to reach the American science stations on the continent of Antarctica,” Erwin explains. 

The Southern Ocean, with its waves and winds, is “more like the Bering Sea or the North Sea,” he says. After the ship sailed through rough seas, he remembers, “the water suddenly became calm, then gray, then misty over the span of a day.” After two days, “the fog cleared, and we were surrounded by enormous icebergs.” 

Several days later, “the sea added more ice, with fewer bergs, looking more like the crushed ice in your drinking cup,” and then “even this went away, and for several days it was clear, somewhat calm seas—and cold air.” Those serving on the Polar Star saw “what looked like white ground” but was actually “the fast ice, the ice sheet.” 

Unrelenting impact 

Erwin experienced what the Polar Star could do when it crashed into the ice sheet, “immediately breaking a vast amount of ice in an enormous crack.” At that point, “the ice got thicker, the penguins, orca, and seals more numerous.”  

The U-shaped hull of the ship enabled it to “ride up on the ice and break it under the weight of the ship,” and this process went on incessantly. 

“Have you ever ridden on a boat on the lake that gently beached to let people on and off?” Erwin asks. “Imagine that, but on a much grander scale, as the icebreaker rode up onto the ice. Then a 6.0 earthquake as the ship shook, reaching for every inch of ice to crush. Over and over and over again. Eating, bathing, walking, preaching, showering, sleeping.” 

Though the Polar Star was designed to be an icebreaker, “things on the ship break” during the process, Erwin says. The original plan, Erwin recalls, was to break ice for 12 hours, make repairs for 12 hours, then repeat. Instead, he says, “We broke around the clock, repairing while moving, fixing in the middle of the earthquake—that was our voyage.”  

His work at Erskine was worth it 

That all-out approach to the icebreaking task resulted in 74 miles of ice being broken by the Polar Star that year—far surpassing the 12 miles broken in the preceding year and the 18 miles the year after. “It should go without saying that it was hard on the crew,” Erwin says. “Burnout and lack of self-care was a big problem.”  

Erwin’s studies at Erskine Seminary served him well aboard the Polar Star. His dissertation advisor was Dr. Loyd Melton, and he says Dr. R.J. Gore also exercised influence on the project. He credits them both with “guiding and sharpening” his work. 

From his D.Min. dissertation, “The Creeping Death: Combatting Compassion Fatigue among Behavioral Health Unit Staff,” Erwin says, he “pulled out the portions that specifically dealt with burnout and the portions on self-care and prevention of burnout” and presented them to the Polar Star crew and leadership. He remembers that “leadership made good notes” and “implemented what they were able.” 

It was a good start for a newly minted graduate. “The captain gave me a medal and a perfect performance evaluation, and the crew earned a Coast Guard Meritorious Unit Commendation, so I hope I was helpful,” he says. 

Offering a footnote to his Polar Star experience, Erwin says that the ship and its crew “made some international headlines for assisting in fighting the 2017 Port Hills Fires in New Zealand” on the way back from the mission in Antarctica. 

What might not have been 

Focused since sixth grade on becoming a Navy submarine warfare officer, Erwin resisted the call to become a chaplain, until, in God’s providence, a statement by a stranger changed his mind. 

At Georgia Tech, where he did his undergraduate work and joined Navy ROTC, people told him, “You know, you should be a chaplain,” he recalls. “And what would I say? ‘Nooooo, I don’t want to be a chaplain. I’m doing submarines.’” 

After his first year at Georgia Tech, he went to a church event where a booklet of classes was on display. The first class he saw listed was on the subject of military chaplaincy.  

“So I went to the class, got info, went down to the ministry booth that evening,” he says. No one was standing at the booth to talk with him, so he took a brochure, but it was not “Army/Navy/Air Force specific,” he recalls. “I wasn’t standing there three seconds when a man I’d never met before came up and said, ‘The Holy Spirit is telling me you’re going to be a Navy Chaplain.’”  

That experience, Erwin says, led eventually to his ordination in the Pentecostal Holiness Church (the denomination of his upbringing) and to his commissioning as an officer. 

Lifelong learning, plus preaching and teaching 

After completing a bachelor’s degree at Georgia Tech in History, Technology, & Society, Erwin added to his resumé a 72-hour Master of Ministry degree in Military Chaplaincy from Southwestern Christian University. 

He served as associate pastor at Honea Path Pentecostal Holiness Church and did a residency in Clinical Pastoral Education at AnMed Health. Then came his studies at Erskine, “for which I am ever grateful,” he says. 

Erwin is currently enrolled at Columbia International University, where he reports he is “one year from completing my Doctor of Philosophy in Intercultural Studies.” His dissertation is entitled “‘There’s Gold in Them Thar’ Hills’: A Look at the Ecclesiastical Ethnography, Cultural Histories, and Religious Beliefs of the Northeast Georgia Appalachian Peoples.” He says his doctoral work “examines three of the settling cultures in northeast Georgia’s mountains and the denominations they brought to the area, and how they merged and changed their denominational beliefs and practices.”

Originally from Dewy Rose, Georgia, Erwin now works as a full-time hospice chaplain with Northeast Georgia Health Center. “Compassion fatigue is an epidemic among caregivers, and this has been how I’ve been able to use my Erskine D.Min. project the most,” he says. 

Just as he was able to use knowledge gained at Erskine to encourage the crew and leadership on the USCGS Polar Star in Antarctica, “I’ve been able to deliver the same education and assistance to staff members at Northeast Georgia Health System,” he says. He has used his D.Min. dissertation as part of a symposium and also to assist the families and caregivers of hospice patients. 

“In addition to being a full-time hospice chaplain, I’m also an adjunct professor of religion at Southern Wesleyan University, and an adjunct professor of world religion at North Georgia Tech,” he says.  

Erwin hopes to find his way back to Erskine, perhaps for a Master of Divinity degree. He also expresses a desire to engage in advanced studies “examining the Pentecostal/Charismatic theology of the extra-Biblical Dead Sea Scrolls and other Second Temple Period texts.” 

The busy and energetic chaplain adds a fun fact to his account of his academic and ministry experiences. Although he describes himself as “rusty,” he says he can “play piano, alto sax, tenor sax, and trombone well enough for the occasional performance.” 

Erwin, right, in red academic hood, is greeted by Dr. Mark Ross at the 2016 commencement.

Summer in Antarctica: Erwin, left, with a friend on the Ross Ice Shelf

Erwin’s promotion to Lieutenant Commander was a family occasion.

The Erwin family

LCDR Dr. Adam Erwin ’16 enjoys family life in northeast Georgia with “a wonderful Hawaiian wife who is a children’s author and runs her own business making scripturally based herbal teas,” he says. “We have three young sons who are my pride, my hope, and my joy.”