NTM - New Tribes Mission | Planting Tribal Churches

d i v i n e   i n t e r v e n t i o n

~ after being worlds apart, luke griffin and tina holewinski find their way to each other ~

by Maggie Ginsberg-Schutz (WI. Bride Magazine summer of ’07)

On August 8, 2005, Luke Griffin hit rock bottom. After years of alcohol abuse, drug addiction, ill-advised encounters and even a botched suicide attempt, the handsome 28-year-old who’d once dabbled in modeling had lost most of his teeth, due to the drug and alcohol abuse. That day, he entered a Christian drug rehabilitation facility in South Carolina.

Meanwhile, 2,500 miles away in Los Angeles, Tina Holewinski was in a whole other world and dreaming of her future husband. She knew exactly what she wanted, and at 28 she was determined not to “settle.” Like her, he would be a virgin until their wedding night. Like her, he would have spent a lifetime free of alcohol and drugs. Most of all, he’d have a great smile.

Call it what you want—coincidence, fate or destiny—but, exactly one year after Luke and Tina laid eyes on each other—the two married.

Luke & Tina tie the knot

Luke’s parents were missionaries and the family moved frequently, but the most permanent of their homes was at New Tribes Bible Institute in Waukesha. When Luke was 16, the family moved to the West African nation of Guinea. He graduated from high school there and returned to the United States alone—where everything began to unravel. On his own for the first time in his life and bombarded with seductive American culture, Luke was completely sucked in. “I wasn’t in culture shock when we moved to Africa,” he says. “The States were more of a culture shock to me. I’d never really been out in the world before.”

It was a downward spiral from there. He became deeply ashamed of his worsening behavior, eventually cutting off contact with his parents for a year. After years of struggle and an attempt to take his own life, Luke finally checked into Haven of Rest drug treatment facility in South Carolina. After eight months in the program he graduated, and stayed on for another year as a teacher and counselor. Since Aug. 8, 2005, he has been sober and has quit smoking.

Meanwhile, Tina had grown up with two passions: God and young people. After two years at the University of Wisconsin-Green Bay, she set out for Hollywood to complete her film and television broadcast degree at California State–Los Angeles, but with a slightly different goal from most of her fellow students: She wanted to expose today’s youth to what she saw as the lies in popular culture.

sharing with teens that their identity is in CHRIST not pop-culture

For nine years, Tina worked steadily on shows such as Beverly Hills 90210, Melrose Place, Lizzie McGuire, Days of Our Lives, and Dharma and Greg, all while speaking at dozens of engagements across the country every month about the lies learned firsthand while working in Hollywood as an actress.

Through her work, she met Luke’s brother, Nate, who was living in Nashville, Tenn. He told her about this brother in rehab, whom he felt could add to Tina’s testimony. Luke and Tina started talking by telephone 15 minutes each week—all that was allowed by the rehab facility. They met for the first time in Nashville six months after their first phone call. “When I first saw him I said, ‘I am in trouble,’” says Tina. “I said, ‘This is it.’”

On their second date a month later, Tina held Luke’s hand at the dentist while he had his last three teeth pulled and was fitted for dentures.

speaking @ Powerhouse event

Luke joined her on the stage and shared the agonizing story of his personal struggles. Together they were a hit, and they were asked to speak at two more congregations the next day. In between those two events, a man who had heard them speak the night before paid them a visit. He had a wedding and engagement ring set, and insisted the couple take it. It was a white-gold 2-carat antique-cut stunner, and it fit Tina’s ring finger perfectly. And, it just so happened that Luke and Tina were going to go ring shopping that very same day.

“He told us it was an extra one and he’d been trying to sell it at local jewelry stores but no one was buying it,” says Luke. “He said, ‘I’ve been trying to sell it for three months and now I know why I couldn’t. It wasn’t mine anymore, it was y’all’s.’”

On their fourth date, a visit home to Pulaski, Wis., to meet Tina’s parents for the first time, Luke stepped off the plane with a bouquet of flowers. There in the Green Bay airport, in front of her family and with the entire terminal applauding, Luke proposed.

Luke pops the ? - Tina is definitely caught off guard

Their wedding date of June 30, 2007, dawned bright and clear. Luke took the men golfing while Tina and her girlfriends set to work decorating Patrick’s on the Bay restaurant overlooking Lake Michigan in Green Bay. Around noon, the men went to dress at one home while the women went to another. A horse-drawn carriage brought everyone together at a park for the photographs, including the bride and groom. Luke was disappointed that he saw Tina in her gown before the wedding, but her beauty and radiance more than made up for any regrets.

Then, they switched up tradition a bit and held the reception before the ceremony. They wanted to have this day celebrated by their entire families. And since everyone usually comes to dinner at night to party, they thought they would host the reception first so everyone could witness their vows. Plus they wanted to get married just as the sun was setting.

Guests were greeted at the door by Tina’s girlfriend. Each guest received a gift-wrapped book on Asian missionary work that held deep meaning for the couple. They also received a small glass pebble, on the bottom of which was taped a photo of a cow or a fish, indicating the guest’s food choice. There were no formal seating arrangements; guests sat where they wished.

The couple held a Tuscan-themed dinner. One hundred twenty guests filled the intimate dining room, seated back-to-back at close-set tables; candlelight flickered warmly off the vine-painted mirrored walls, while one window-lined wall framed breathtaking views of the bay. Guests dined on Bourbon Street steak with cracked mustard demi-glaze or pan-fried walleye with pine nuts and lime juice, raspberry caesar salad and roasted garlic mashed potatoes, as they read all about the bridal party on the program-style centerpieces, or laughed about the childhood pictures of Tina and Luke placed throughout the room.

After dinner, guests were ushered outside and down to the water, where rows of white chairs faced a linen-wrapped wedding arch. Jeff Deyo, a Nashville-based

Jeff Deyo sings at the Griffn ceremony

Christian music artist, sang as the black-clad bridesmaids marched down an aisle lined with tea lights in white luminary bags. Unbeknownst to Luke, Tina had changed into a second gown so that when she finally arrived at the end of the procession, he truly was seeing his bride for the first time.

After the sunset ceremony, guests dined on lemon crème-filled cake, enjoyed a slideshow set to music and danced outside beneath Japanese lanterns.

“With all the crazy stuff that’s happened and the opportunities we’ve been given so far,” says Tina, “I can only imagine what’s going to happen in our future.”

let the journey begin...