Celebrating 45 Years of CS

Brett Davis as a teenager.

I looked longingly at the row of seats in front of ‘A Block' where all the coolest guys in school sat. Greg was the centre of attention, the best surfer, with his long unbleached hair and any girl he wanted….the guy I wished I could be… As a 14-year-old high school student, a lay-in possession of the worst reputation a young man could have; I was in the top classes at school, didn’t drink nor did I smoke, I didn’t hang out with girls and got on well with parents and teachers alike. Surfing, I hoped would change all that… Surfing was my ticket to a world of ‘cool’.

By the time I was 16 I had given my life to surfing and it had delivered me a platform of acceptance amongst my peers and an exciting new life. Surfing was everything I thought the Christian faith was not; exciting. youthful. creative. But there was this continuous nagging doubt in the back of my mind - that surfing wasn’t all that I’d hoped it would be. A wind change, a mistimed turn, an extra few people in the lineup and the joy was all gone. Greg was one of my idols, but watching him turn up at the beach wasted on drugs and dismissing anyone else who was not as good a surfer as him was unsettling…I aspired to his surfing, but did I want to become him?

Brett Davis and Surfboard

Life changed when I met my first Christian who surfed and I was amazed. Surfing and Christianity didn’t mix in the 70’s but here was a Christian who understood my world. After a wrestle with God, I came to Jesus in sorts, and became a Surfer who happened to be a Christian. After two years of this, I realised something was not quite right there. I was a  proud surfer first and an embarrassed Christian second, yet Jesus had given it all for me. “Give up your surfing!” I sensed God speak this gently but firmly one night after attending my local church. It was a ‘long night of the soul’ as an 18-year-old wandering the beach in the dark with this God I said I believed in but didn’t identify with. “Ok, you can have it, I will never surf again if you don’t want me to. '' I tried to catch the words before they made it to heaven, but it was done, surfing was gone.

BD on the nose circa 1978

“I have this crazy idea that we could start a Christian Surfers group” my friend suggested just two weeks after my surrender, and in that moment I sensed God saying “Ok, you can have surfing back but remember whose it really is. Use it to promote me not yourself”. So a group of long-haired, unruly, disrespectful teenagers began meeting around my mother’s kitchen table….and we were the leaders of the first Christian Surfers Group! And that’s where it all began. - Brett Davis