The oldest son of a Pentecostal preacher, Nate Larkin graduated from Princeton Theological Seminary in 1982 and spent five years as a pastor before resigning in despair over his inability to conquer compulsive sexual sin.
He then switched careers, building a successful engineering business and remaining active in church life, while his addictive behavior continued.
In 1998 Nate and Allie moved to Franklin, Tennessee. Here, after years of praying, fasting, pleading and repenting in private, Nate finally found help for his sex addiction—in the form of authentic friendship and the safety of a 12-step recovery group. In recovery, Nate began to see life differently.
His circle of friends steadily expanded and eventually included a large group of men with diverse weaknesses—addicts and potential addicts of every description, united by a common faith and a need for true companionship.
Most of these men had not found deep and honest relationships in their churches. Why they asked each other, did a guy have to end up in a 12-step group to talk honestly with other men?
So in 2004, several of these friends formed a mutual aid society for Christian men called the Samson Society.
Nate, who drafted the Society’s charter and designed its first meeting format, has written a book about his experiences entitled Samson and the Pirate Monks: Calling Men to Authentic Brotherhood, which was published by Thomas Nelson in February 2007. (He is also the author, with Darrell Waltrip, of Sundays Will Never Be the Same, published by Simon & Schuster in 2012.)
Nate is featured on the I Am Second website and appears in several documentaries. He is a popular speaker at conferences, colleges, and retreats, and is the host of the weekly Pirate Monk Podcast.