How a Near-Death Experience Propelled Lathan Warlick Into a Relationship with God

Published: July 19, 2023

How a Near-Death Experience Propelled Lathan Warlick Into a Relationship with God

By Movieguide® Contributor

In a recent interview with the Jesus Calling podcast, rapper and country musician Lathan Warlick shares his story of finding God amid trouble.

Lathan explained that he was raised by a mother and grandmother who always talked to him about God, but when he was young, he wasn’t interested. He went to church, but only because his family made him.

When Lathan was younger, he was a dancer. When he won a talent show one night, he and his friends decided to go celebrate at a club. It was there that he encountered trouble.

“My cousin beside me, he had problems with the guy and I didn’t even know it,” Lathan shared on the podcast. “Now I’m left by myself. I’m just standing in this situation. And as these guys are walking towards me, I’m like, ‘Dude, this definitely is not good.’ So I took off running, and when I took off running, I ran around the building of this club.”

Lathan was slowed down after running into a brick wall. The perpetrators came up to him, put a gun in his face, and attempted to shoot him.

“So I’m standing there and as I’m standing there, I can remember my grandmama always saying if I was ever in a time of need to just call on God, you know, that was like one of the one things that I can remember with my back against this wall… When he pulled the trigger, the gun clicked and after the gun clicked, I really looked at it like, ‘Oh my God, this is it. Like, this is life. Is this what death is like? Is this the experience of me going to wherever I’m going?’”

A second attacker attempted to pull the trigger but was stopped by the headlights of a car. The men ran away, and Lathan’s life was spared. After that, Lathan realized what God was calling him to and decided to follow Jesus.

“God was calling me to be a light out into the world. So if He called me to be a light out into the world, just like Luke 15 when He talks about how people in heaven are going to be rejoicing over this one person getting saved versus a thousand people that’s already saved.”

Lathan continues to share the love of God and has created a unique music style that blends country, rap, and hip-hop. Recently, he took to Instagram to share what God has put on his heart.

“God gave me this vision of GLU, G-L-U, and GLU stands for God, Love, and Unity,” he shared on the post. “God was showing me… let’s get outside of your comfort zone of what you’re doing with just hip hop and just rap, let’s put you over here on a whole other side.. During the whole time, the Lord was telling me, ‘let’s bring the people together, let’s bring everybody together, let’s put them under one roof and just show them one love.’”