"And then I began to minister to him and pray to him and talk with him"

“I finished the message, I did the altar call and he stood right up, came up to the altar, and gave his life to Christ,” Wright said. “I came down and prayed with him and we embraced. It was like a father embracing a son.”

Wright whispered in the man’s ear that police were waiting in the vestibule because he had scared a lot of people.

Then the man asked to speak to the 60 or so churchgoers. He apologized to them, telling them when he set out that evening he intended to do something terrible that night. But the Lord spoke to him, he said.

Wright described the gunman as emotionally distraught even though his life seemed to be on the upswing.