From Paramedic to Christian Singer: Ryan Stevenson Talks God’s Plan

Published: October 13, 2023

From Paramedic to Christian Singer: Ryan Stevenson Talks God’s Plan

By Movieguide® Contributor

Christian artist Ryan Stevenson shared how his experience as a paramedic allowed him to launch a music career.

Stevenson grew up interested in music but chose to pursue medicine. After two years of paramedic school, he became a full-time paramedic for seven years. During this time, he was an amateur musician, playing at open mic nights and writing his own songs—something he had been doing since high school.

While he still dreamed about music, his steady, comfortable job kept him from risking a music career. However, that changed after responding to a call about a lightning strike.

When he arrived at the scene, he saw a woman in her 30s who had been stuck by lightning and had gone into cardiac arrest. She had been unconscious for nearly ten minutes, and Stevenson didn’t think she would make it. However, he and his team loaded her into the ambulance and resuscitated her. Miraculously, she began to come back, and by the time they got to the hospital, she had a steady heartbeat and blood pressure.

Months later, the woman connected with Stevenson, and they became friends. Once, she asked what he would do if he wasn’t a paramedic.

“My dream is to do music full-time, to make a living playing music and helping people and ministering to people through my songs,” he recalled telling her, per Fox News.

She told him that if he ever decided to pursue his dream, she wanted to help in any way possible. Stevenson never planned to take her up on her offer, but a few months later, he felt called to seriously pursue music.

He reached out to the woman because he needed $4,000 to record his first set of songs, and she had coincidentally just received a $4,000 check in the mail for the lightning strike. She happily handed the money to Stevenson, allowing him to record his first songs to get started.

These songs connected him with Toby Mac, and everything began to fall into place.

Stevenson incorporates divine moments like this into his music.

“It’s not about me, it’s the Lord and His divine hand in the details of our lives meticulously crafting our story if we let Him,” Stevenson said.

“My story isn’t one that makes a lot of sense,” Stevenson added in an Instagram post. “It’s unconventional, it’s quirky, 11th hour type stuff—but I’m thankful for the narrow road. The path of keeping a quiet heart, and letting the Lord lead is truly a continuously unfolding lane of mystery.”

He also focuses on the truths of life and helps speak life into the dark places that everyone ends up in at some point.

“We are all going to face trials,” he said. “I think the one thing that unifies every single human being is the fact that we are all going to face trials. I always just want to speak to [that]. Because I have those things in my own life, and the times I have grown the most and have been healed the most have been when people have spoken hope and healing in the midst of my heartache or pain or uncertainty.”

He recently released his song “Amadeo (Still My God).”

“We live in an uncertain world, and the truth of our humanity is the fact that we will all face uncertainties in life,” Stevenson shared. “My prayer for this song is to encourage all of us, to trust God no matter what our circumstances may be, to remind us that whether in crisis or victory, our first response should always be to cry out to the Lord!”