CSU Chapel: When hurt turns to triumph

By Caleb Summers | January 31, 2020

Missie Branch shares her testimony at CSU Chapel. Photo by Richard Esposito

Charleston Southern’s newest Board of Trustees member, Missie Branch, shared her story of motivation, success, and her path to salvation with students at CSU Chapel this week.

Branch is the wife of Christian rapper Duce Branch (The Ambassador) and currently serves as the assistant dean of students to women and director of graduate life at Southeastern Baptist Theological Seminary.

At a very young age Branch’s parents were divorced, and she grew up living with her mother in a home that was condemned by the city.

“The Lord was kind because He didn’t allow me to become a product of the environment I was surrounded by,” said Branch. The area of Philadelphia where she lived was saturated with people and activities that could have drawn her to a very different path from the one that she would eventually take.

“It doesn’t make sense that a little brown girl from the ghetto would end up on the Board of Trustees at CSU,” she said.

However, she now views the struggles of her youth as a blessing.

“God can take the most crushing thing in our lives and use it to build us up,” said Branch.

She related her struggles to the struggles that many students are facing right now with classes and other responsibilities. Branch encouraged CSU students to view hard times as a path to greatness.

“I think the point of my greatest hurt was the greatest triumph for God,” she said.

Caleb Summers is a student contributor for Marketing & Communication and is a senior majoring in communication studies.