I didn't set out to start a nonprofit. I set out to survive.
I was born in Colombia and raised in New York by a single mother who gave me everything she had. My father wasn't around. The streets were, and by the time I was old enough to know better, I was already making the wrong choices for reasons that felt right at the time. Those choices eventually led me to prison.
I won't name where. That part of the story isn't mine to tell publicly, and it isn't the point anyway. The point is what happened once I was there.
Stripped of Performance
Prison strips away almost everything you use to perform being okay. There's no career to hide behind, no image to manage, no busyness to distract you from yourself. It was in that stripped-down place — with nothing left to perform — that Jesus found me.
I didn't just convert. I was formed. Scripture stopped being words on a page and became something closer to breath. The Holy Spirit became a teacher in a way I'd never let Him be before. And the more I grew, the less I could keep it to myself. I started gathering other men, talking about Jesus, studying Scripture together, praying together. What began as survival became a small, real community of transformation — and it planted something in me I couldn't shake even after I was released.
Coming Home
I was released in 2021 and came back to Atlanta. I joined Victory Church and started as an administrative assistant — on purpose. I wanted to serve with my hands before I tried to lead with my mouth. Somewhere in that season of quiet service, thinkers like Dallas Willard, Pete Scazzero, John Mark Comer, Dave Ferguson, William Gurnall, and Augustine became companions who helped me put language to what I'd already lived: that leadership without formation is hollow, no matter how gifted the leader.
Why Living Water Network Exists
I started Living Water Network because I watched too many leaders — in ministry and in the marketplace — get activated before they were formed. Gifted, sincere people sent out to lead from wounds nobody ever addressed. I know that pattern personally. I almost was that pattern.
Groundwork, our formation cohort, is my attempt to build the thing I needed and didn't have early enough: a structured, communal, nine-month space to be formed before being sent. Not training. Formation. The kind that changes how you actually live, not just what you know.
Where I Am Now
Today I'm pursuing a bachelor's degree in Leadership Development and Nonprofit Management at Liberty University, I'm active in my local church, and I get to spend my time building something I believe could genuinely help form the next generation of Kingdom leaders — in ministry, in the marketplace, and in creative spaces I never would have imagined for myself a decade ago.
If any part of this story resonates — if you've ever been activated before you were ready, or you're wondering whether the wilderness season you're in might actually be preparation — I'd love to have you at the Table. Learn more about Groundwork, or just reach out. I mean that personally, not as a marketing line.
— Omar