Jimmy Smuda's Reflections on Devotion, Adversity, and Growth

When the roads of life take unexpected turns, it’s the stories of resilience and transformation that often resonate the deepest. That's precisely what we uncover with Pastor Jimmy Schmuda, my spiritual compass from Trinity Assembly Guard in Westchester. Our shared Long Island roots serve as the backdrop to an engaging discussion that traverses from the basketball courts, crowning Michael Jordan as the GOAT, to the gritty streets of Chicago. Pastor Schmuda offers a candid look into his formative years marked by adversity, the profound impact of his grandmother's faith, and the pivotal moment in Florida that anchored his life in unwavering devotion to God.

Navigating the responsibilities of a church leader and addressing the challenges posed by celebrity pastors, this episode peels back the layers on what it truly means to shepherd a community. Pastor Schmuda and I explore the delicate balance between nurturing personal connections within the congregation and the potential pitfalls that megachurches face. We then shift gears to discuss the interplay of sports, faith, and family, contemplating the hard choices that arise when competitive schedules clash with spiritual commitments. Listen as we share insights on guiding our children through crises, emphasizing the nuanced approach required to honor diverse perspectives within our church family. Join us for a heartfelt exploration into the resilience of faith amid life's myriad challenges.

Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:16

Hello everyone, thank you again for joining me on another episode of the Dorsey Rush Show. Today we have a special guest with us. He is now my pastor, who I am. I'm living in PA. He is now my pastor and he's Pastor Jimmy Schmuda. He pastors Trinity Assembly Guard here in Westchester, pa, and he is originally from Chicago, illinois he will give a little bit more background on that and he was also pastoring in New York, on Long Island, where I am from, at the same time as I was living there. But I didn't realize that he and I didn't even know each other until we moved to Westchester and we started talking and we were like, oh yeah, I know this past and I know this past and we just never connected while we were on Long Island. But here we are now. We've known each other for almost three years now. Pastor Jimmy Schmuda, thank you so much for coming on the show today.

Speaker 2: 1:26

No, thank you, Dorsey, for having me. I'm so glad We've been talking about doing this forever and finally, on Easter week, we're able to squeeze it into both of our busy schedules, which is awesome. So, no, thank you, buddy, I appreciate it.

Speaker 1: 1:39

Absolutely Well, you know, as I said, you're from Chicago Illinois. You're a big sports fan.

Speaker 2: 1:49

Yep, I get ragged on it all the time. For it here.

Speaker 1: 1:55

So, since you're a big sports fan, who would you say is the GOAT of basketball, and why?

Speaker 2: 2:05

Dorsey, only you, the legend, could lead with such an important question and the question to settle every single debate. Everybody who knows Jesus knows that Michael Jordan is the GOAT hands down, and so there's really no, no comparison to it. So I'm really glad that you got the important stuff out of the way right off the top of the show. My man you are. You are a master at your craft.

Speaker 1: 2:36

When, with growing up in Chicago, did that affect what who you became and what you, how you became a pastor?

Speaker 2: 2:47

Yeah, so, so, yeah, I grew up in the city of Chicago for for the beginning of my life I had kind of the story of my grandmother raised me. My mother struggled with addiction my whole life and my grandmother was. She was a staunch Catholic. When I was a little boy we were very committed to the Catholic Church and then she had gotten radically, radically saved, honestly, at a charismatic Catholic seminar she went to, she went to a conference and basically, long story short, there was this rogue priest in our church who, I guess, kind of went, got baptized in the Holy Spirit, came back as a priest, like speaking in tongues and prophesying and all these things. And my grandmother got invited to like a prayer meeting that she went to, just kind of really, really got filled with the Holy Spirit, came back, and so we would start doing these things where she would start taking me to these prayer meetings. And you know, as a Catholic, you really had prayer meetings. You just kind of went to mass and I was the altar boy and all these things. Like you really had prayer meetings. You just kind of went to mass and I was the altar boy and all these things. But it was kind of funny because she would take us like she would take me on a Friday night after she'd get off of work and we would travel into like seven layers deep into the church, into the basement, and it wasn't until years later. I really think that this was like a rogue priest who was like holding these charismatic prayer meetings and wasn't supposed to, and just like in the secret next to the boiler room.

Speaker 2: 4:27

So you know, growing up in Chicago, it was, it was, it wasn't the roughest of neighborhood. I moved around a lot, you know, because my mom was in and out of rehab and stuff. I'd stay with this family member and that family member here and there. So I actually went to 12 different schools from first to high school. Um, I think the longest school I stayed in was three years because it was constantly placing me different places.

Speaker 2: 4:52

So I had kind of grown up in that formula of time with a grandmother who was super spiritual and who was super committed to the Lord, and then yet I had the struggle of a mother who struggled with addiction and through, like my life I had gone through like physical and sexual and mental, and all types of abuses, every abuse that you can have. So it was always like this. And then of I had, you know, growing up in the city, I had the streets kind of calling me, you know, to a thing, and then I had sports. So I kind of grew up as a kid in my Chicago years being torn in so many different directions. You know, I was torn where I was curious about this thing called church and Jesus and stuff.

Speaker 2: 5:36

I was curious about what the world had for me. I was looking for my identity because I was bouncing around so much. I was looking for stability. I grew up with, technically, like no men in my life whatsoever, four women who all loved me, you know, in their own right. And so it was my early years in a tough city like Chicago, being raised by all women, not having male influences, being torn by the church and the world, made for a real interesting upbringing, to say the least.

Speaker 1: 6:13

I know you said you went to church, but when did you eventually say look, I'm going to forget about the world and forget about what's happening out there, but I'm going to serve God and I'm going to accept Him as my Lord and Savior.

Speaker 2: 6:32

Yeah. So my grandmother, when she eventually retired, she moved to Florida. So I kind of like to say I have dual citizenship. If I'm talking to people from the city, I say I'm from Chicago. If I'm talking from friends from the south, I'm like I'm a southerner, because I kind of have a Midwestern, southern or southern upbringing.

Speaker 2: 6:54

A couple of years later my mom finally succumbed to her addiction. She passed away when I was like 15. She moved to an area that had it was basically like a three-tier thing. It was a local church, it was a huge conference center as well, like on 250 acres, and a retirement community. So ultimately, after my mom passed away, she just said you know what? I'm tired of you bouncing around from place to place. I don't want you raised in the city and I'm going to take you and I'm going to finish out your high school and we're going to do this.

Speaker 2: 7:30

So I was engulfed in kind of this like community of church, which was really unique to me, because then at that point it was like you're, you know, I learned things like youth group and I was like what the heck's a youth group and stuff. And I think my whole life I've always had leadership abilities and so I had a church that was very much like if you're here, you're a leader, you're working, you're serving. So, even before, like I had given my heart to the Lord, my church was using me in these situations and stuff and I was like I kind of was there. I wasn't really committed, but I tell people this all the time Before I fell in love with Jesus, I fell in love with the church. I loved the love that they were giving me. It was natural People cared about me. I felt like people were. And then there was it was kind of like the first real men that wanted to guide me and and and all of these things. And so my local church was amazing.

Speaker 2: 8:31

Um, and then, at the same point, I had all of these wounds and I was a skeptical person. Um, once I jumped into kind of, and my church was kind of the it was definitely the charismatic bounce off the walls, flags, just wild. And so you come from the Catholic church to like, hey, three and a half hour church services and people are grabbing flags and all of these things. And then I kind of started being skeptical of manipulation. You know, there was, there was, there was things where I was like people are manipulating. This moment and a lot of it was. My heart was hardened. So I would look and I'd be like, okay, this person is going to come up and cry and then that person's going to grab a flag and the tambourines are going to come, and here come the dancers. And I started being really skeptical. Honestly, I started feeling like people were trying to manipulate people through emotions.

Speaker 2: 9:26

Um, and the key point was this was there was a youth camp we had and the speaker who was the main speaker of this youth camp about 200 and some odd kids that are there Um, he had found out right before the service that his brother had committed suicide. And my youth pastor comes up to me and he's like, listen, you need to pray for him because, basically, like, his family member had committed suicide. And I looked and this guy was a mess. Right, he literally just found out and this is how cynical my heart was, dorsey I first of all was like why is my youth pastor asking me to pray? Like, I don't do that, I'm not that guy.

Speaker 2: 10:08

And secondly, my cynicism came in and I said he's going to use this tonight. He's going to use this to manipulate people. He's going to be like my family member just committed suicide. But I'm here and I'm such a holy Christian and look at me and stuff, and he comes out high energy first of all, and I was like wow, that's kind of impressive. It started grabbing me and he starts making all of these young people laugh, at first, like he has this keyboard and he's making fart noises right, because we're young people and that always makes you laugh and puke noises. And he's doing all of these and during the whole service I'm saying to myself when's he going to drop the bomb, right? Like, when's he going to really be like? Guess what? I just heard right before service this dude went through the entire service and never mentioned it one time, didn't bring it up, didn't talk about it, didn't use it as manipulation and stuff and my youth pastor had told me.

Speaker 2: 11:02

He said you know he cause. I thought, oh, he's not going to speak. And he said, um, no, he's going to. He feels that this message is important for someone and God wants to use it.

Speaker 2: 11:12

And when he gave the altar call and I realized he is not going to talk about this, something clicked in me and I said only God can give a man that kind of strength, after having lost my mom and going through it, to sit here and make a bunch of young people laugh and stuff. And that was my, that was my God moment of like no, there's a power out there that's bigger than me. And so he, he had a, uh, his sermon I'll never forget. He said if you're going to be the one that was his title of the sermon he said I'm going to count to three. I don't want you to stand up and I want you to scream at the top of your lungs I will be the one.

Speaker 2: 11:57

And he was like one and I jumped up and I was the first one in the whole thing and I ran to the altar man and I literally laid at the altar from probably about nine 30 at night to two o'clock in the morning, um, weeping, receiving, you know, giving my life to the Lord, um that night. Not only that, I always say I got the perfect trifecta. Um, I gave my heart to the Lord, I got baptized in the Holy spirit and I got my prayer language and I got my call into ministry. Like all in what my God was like. We might as well just get it all over with so long story, for that's kind of my journey, when I decided, you know, to stop living off my grandmother's faith and make it my own. And I've been serving him since.

Speaker 1: 12:33

Amen. So what are some of the misconceptions that you think that people have being a pastor, that people have of pastors?

Speaker 2: 12:51

Oh well, the first thing is that I think, um, misconception. Well, there's the obvious one, right, we work one day a week leading up through Easter. Right now, me and the staff, we're all like we can not wait till the like. You're excited about Easter, there's so many people coming and at the same point we are exhausted, like everybody's walking around, like so tired. I got people filling eggs and decorating and, uh, you know we're updating websites. Just everybody's running around like crazy people.

Speaker 2: 13:23

Um, so I think one of the misconceptions on that front end is hey, we just show up, give it little speech and then go back to our houses and show back up and sit around and pray. I think that's one of the generalized, every pastor would say is a misconception. But you know, I do think to speak to that. You know. I think that sometimes we've esteemed a lot of people in this celebrity status that have not done a good job showing the shepherd's heart, demonstrating that, and so I understand people's misconceptions right, because I think we, with the celebrity status that has kind of become this monster, you know, we maybe have not done this great job of showing.

Speaker 2: 14:10

You know, my heart is to show my church. I care about them. I'm here to shepherd them. I want to be there for them. I want to be at the hospital calls, I want to counsel people. I want to do all of those things. You know, that's what I want to do for my people, that God's entrusted me with and I don't know that we've done a good job showing that to people.

Speaker 2: 14:30

So I do understand where the misconceptions can come, where it's like oh, this guy, you know, if you have a pastor who's unapproachable, who you can't talk to, you can't see, you can't connect with, I mean, you see, right before we started the podcast, people walk into the door. You know there's an open door policy I have and you want to be available for your team, for people, and my prayers is my church has come to understand, after 11 years, like I can walk into his office anytime, you know, and speak to him and stuff. So being you know, the misconception I think is people don't understand. That's the reality of the job. You know, the dropping things at the last minute, being flexible, are very important.

Speaker 1: 15:12

Yeah, yeah, you don't mention names, but you do try to steer people away from those pastures and from those pastors and those people that try to dissuade and try to, you know, misrepresent the Bible.

Speaker 2: 15:36

Yeah.

Speaker 1: 15:37

Is that because of what you've seen in your past and that's part of your heart? Is that something that you know that you need to make people aware of?

Speaker 2: 15:51

Yeah, you just want to get me in all sorts of trouble here today. No, I do mention it Again. I'm called to pastor my people. I'll go on record of saying I don't think the megachurch was Jesus' plan for the local church. It's local for a reason. Now I think we're at fault. You know, we've bought the books, we've gone to the conferences, we've done all of these things.

Speaker 2: 16:18

There's a gospel that I preach. That for me it's. I want to be true to the whole word of gospel, the entire counsel of the gospel. It breaks my heart sometimes, you know, through social media, when I see my people and again I'm talking about my people and they'll repost certain things where you go. That's not biblical, right? Now what happens is I have other shepherds feeding my flock. Now that I have to fight against, right? So here I'm talking about let's say I'm talking about a subject that talks about.

Speaker 2: 16:52

If you were to pick a tough one by saying we have to wrestle with the mysteries of God, excuse me, we have to wrestle with the mysteries of God, there is the unknown. Or say, for instance, you were to take healing where it's like my stance is our job is God does heal, he can heal. We should pray for healing, but there are certain points where it's not in his will to heal that person. So I'm going to preach this. You know you and I are AG guys. I'm going to preach this balance thing of like yes and yes when I read scripture right and yes when I read scripture right. Then I'm going to have to battle against some of my members who are buying into the nonsense that says, well, it's not only God's will to constantly heal it, but it's our right to claim that healing Like we deserve this, when really the Bible says we deserve death. Right, just the fact of is, if our faith is finished by salvation alone, we've gotten more than we ever deserve as people. But now I've got these guys out there because they have a bigger platform, because all these things and listen, I am not saying this out of jealousy or out of anything because, to be honest with you, I'm not equipped to pastor a mega church. I am not gifted. I'm not equipped to pastor a mega church. I am not gifted. I have zero desire to have a mega church. There is nothing inside of me that would ever want to. I've worked at big churches and I think in the last 10 years, I've realized that I don't know. I don't know that we do it justice if we're keeping people in mind. Right, if you're.

Speaker 2: 18:25

If, for me, I love the fact that we're talking about this in the men's group a couple weeks ago. I love the fact that anybody in my church can shoot me off a text, a funny meme, a real, something like it's approachable. I know when their kids are sick, I know when they're in the hospital, and to me, you know, obviously there's a number in my head that I say I can do this much. And then we would have to launch, you know, we would have to open up another church, we would have to encourage people, because I think if we're not shepherding people accordingly, you know we're leading them astray. And so for me it's very important to talk about, to talk against self-help methods. Your best life now. All of these different nonsense. I am God, these little God theologies, the NAR movement, all of these different things, because I'm not with these people 24 hours a day. Now other shepherds are coming into my flock and they're feeding my sheep with things that I don't feel I want them to eat.

Speaker 2: 19:28

So, yeah, you probably hear on a Sunday morning, because you're very astute, the subtle, but you know very important things. You know to remember and one-on-one I will tell people stay away from this person. We've had people leave our church because we go. No, we're not going to teach that, and I think that's a stance where a good pastor has to take. You know, if you're only going to preach a part of a gospel, if you're only going to preach things that don't, you know, make people feel good, easter has become super discouraging to me looking at a lot of things that people are doing out there in terms of drawing people in and it's just sad Like the gospel is strong enough, the word of God is strong enough. We should bring it in its fullness and tell the full story and not be ashamed of that and not try to water it down. And honestly I always say this we don't have to get cute with the gospel. It does its work, you know alone.

Speaker 1: 20:30

Right. What makes you passionate about what you do?

Speaker 2: 20:40

Oh, it's easy. People Even. You know, even going through the difficult things I went through in my life, I've always loved people, whether it's been friends, whether it's been pastors, whether it's been coaches playing. You know, I have always had a love for people. In our mission statement, you know, our three key phrases are honoring God, serving people and living the gospel.

Speaker 2: 21:09

I love serving people, you know, and I think, growing up in somewhat dysfunction not having a dad, not really having a mom around there was always that draw to have family around and you know, I always had this desire to want to create that family environment. You know, we try to say here that we are a great church that feels like a large family. That's kind of like my goal. And when we get, when people come to our church and we get the how was your first experience? Nothing brings me more joy than when people write on there. It's like it's just so warm and welcoming.

Speaker 2: 21:48

I felt like it was family. You know, we just did our business meeting. You were there on Sunday and I had so many people who've been part of our church for 10, 15, 20 years. They came and they said we used to dread these meetings, like we used to just dread them. But they said you know, this feels like a family reunion, like we're all just coming catching up on everything we've done all year and stuff like that, and so that's my motivation. People are always going to be my motivation, you know, for ministry, outside of being obedient to the Lord.

Speaker 1: 22:19

Yeah, and I, you know, even I met several people. You know in my three years, now that I've been there, that I feel, you know, like my family or my extended family, testing everything yourself. I mean, you're my pastor, but I consider you my friend as well.

Speaker 2: 22:39

Yeah, you're my buddy man.

Speaker 1: 22:41

You're my big six-foot-five brother that I never had.

Speaker 2: 22:45

Well, it was easy. First of all, you are easy to love, dorsey, and you give the best hugs in the church.

Speaker 1: 22:50

I'll say it, I don't care People can be mad at me, but you give the best hugs and that always wins me, man, thank you started to realize how you know similar, but also how different you are to my home pastor as well, and I think that's what connected me to trinity as well yeah, you know the similarities that you guys had.

Speaker 1: 23:21

Now, the biggest difference is that you speak, you know, maybe 45 minutes an hour and a half, maybe an hour and a half service, whereas my other pastor would speak two and a half hours service.

Speaker 2: 23:38

Oh hallelujah, he probably has a lot more better things to say than I do. I'm sure he's a lot more smarter and probably has a lot more content with me. I'm sure he's a lot more smarter and probably has a lot more content with me. I'm a humble man and I'm a simple man, I should say, where I probably have a good 35, 40 minutes before I'm running out of good things to say, maybe.

Speaker 1: 24:05

Now, one last thing I want to talk about is your family being, you know, very sports-oriented family. And you guys, you know, you see, the balance that you have with going to your kids' basketball games and your kids' practices and everything. How do you balance the two, between going to the games but also being there? You know, being there for the church and being there when you need to be at the church, if that makes sense.

Speaker 2: 24:39

Yeah, no good question for parents out there who are struggling with their kids doing sports, because you know, I know there's a big push right now. Where it's. You know, a lot of things I've been seeing on the clips have drawn me to God to kind of check and what I'm doing as a dad. There's a lot of famous speakers out there who are saying like your kids will never make it in sports and they'll stand before the Lord one day and they kind of heap that on you know really big. And it's good because I think it's a I'm not saying that to rag on them. I think it's a hard check and, to be honest, when my first I have two daughters and a son.

Speaker 2: 25:21

Both of my daughters play college basketball and when my oldest started playing, I had a problem seeing how much church that she would miss and my wife and I actually were more resolved, especially with the amount that she would miss with practices. There was a season where I'd be like, okay, she won't be at youth group and she won't be at church. I don't like this at all and it still makes me uncomfortable, if I'm being honest, but it is the system that's there and I was talking to my spiritual dad and I just said she's got a chance to really go big. They say she's getting recruited for this national team. I said but she's going to miss so much church that I just think we're just going to trust the Lord and say she'll get where she needs to get. That's what I was on and my spiritual father he had said you know, jimmy, what I think honestly you're doing is is, I think that you have a very shallow view of her calling. And I remember saying what does that mean? He said you know, you've raised her. You've raised her to love Jesus, you've told her to be a light into the world and now you want to hide her in the walls of the church.

Speaker 2: 26:29

And I remember saying like huh, you know that challenged me because I was really staunch of like no, I'm not doing it. You know I'm going to raise the typical PK and all of these things. And just as I began to pray about it, I started saying you know what's going to happen is this is going to make more work for me, but this is the most important work I'll do. So I have to disciple my kids now. When they're missing church, I have to find creative ways for them to stay connected to the church, I have to, you know, make sure I'm doing my job at home and things like that. So it's a struggle, you know, because as a pastor I'm here every Sunday, right, and so my wife God bless her carries a lot of the load of the travel.

Speaker 2: 27:11

You know, both the girls played on a national team. My son's about to start on a national team. It stretches, but basically the work has to then become what every pastor says it starts at home. Right, it doesn't start on Sunday, you know, it starts at home. And you know, for both of them, both of my girls, they are thriving. You know, save me a lot of money for college too.

Speaker 2: 27:35

My son's going to be a beast in the sport. But for all of them, you know, we we had told them all of this is nothing if you don't glorify God with it. Like you know and I'm proud of them because you know, all of them use this sport to really glorify the Lord. But you know, sports are great, man, because they also teach you teamwork. They teach you, you know, honestly, my kids have had some really terrible good coaches, but terrible people Like you're, just like I. Just they're just not nice and it's easy for a parent to go yeah, let's pull you off this team. Or you look at them and you go build a bridge and get over it, like, like you're going to have people like this in your life. Nothing's greater than this opportunity for you to learn, because if you could withstand this clown, then you know when you have a boss or whatever an employee who is just the worst, or people, if you're in ministry, whatever it is, you're going to learn.

Speaker 2: 28:34

I can deal with this, I can deal with this and stuff. So there is the practical side of parenting where you're like this is good stuff. So there is the practical side of parenting where you're like this is good. There's the spiritual side where you know you have to say to yourself, like I've got to do a lot of work here at home, do I regret the decision we made? No, I mean, I'm sad that they missed. I'm sad that they missed some of the you know, and we would send them conferences and things like that all the time, and then when there wasn't basketball, they were here, you know. So it's like a three month season roughly. That's there that you have to be super, super diligent about. You know. So some of the things you just it's part of sacrifice too, as well, you know. You just you, you make it work and you believe that the Lord's in it.

Speaker 1: 29:18

Yeah, believe that the Lord's in it. Yeah, as we get ready to end here, if there is another, god forbid, you know, we hope it doesn't come again. But if there is another pandemic or some type of global thing and the government comes and says, hey, we're going to shut down the circus, we're going to shut everything down, would you shut down the circus? Would you go back to live streaming? Or would you just say, hey, anybody wants to come, they can come. If they don't, that's fine as well.

Speaker 2: 29:57

Yeah, that's quite a transition. Yeah, that's quite a transition. Go for my kids playing sports to covid. Part two um, I don't know that.

Speaker 2: 30:10

I don't know that I can answer that question like um about pre yeah I think during covid you know, dorsey, my, my heart was to kind of stand right in the middle. It's's kind of like with politics too as well. Look, I have Democrats and Republicans in my church I had people who were like, listen, we'll probably never see you again. And then we had people who were like we should be in church all kissing each other on the head and you are just, you're exhausted because you have people and our church is unique because it's probably split right down the head. Like, and you are just, you're exhausted because you have people and our church is unique because it's probably split right down the middle. You know, even in leadership conversations that we had, you know, um, uh, for our elders, there were those who were like we should not be meeting. And then there were some of them who were like we have no faith. Um, not not that extreme, right, but there was that sentiment because my guys are awesome and we wrestled through that, you know, and we wanted to be.

Speaker 2: 31:06

My heart was to steer my church again, my flock, by saying we want to use wisdom and we don't want to live in fear, right, like we want to have wisdom and we don't want to live in fear and Like we want to have wisdom and we don't want to live in fear. And also my heart was to say to make sure that there was no division. My heart was to lead people in a way that said how about we all just respect our decisions? So the ones who think we shouldn't meet, once we started meeting, I'd have to tell them like why don't you just respect those of us who do want to meet? Right? And then, please, we have everything set up. Stay at home, watch on livestream, tell me, as your pastor, how I can keep you connected.

Speaker 2: 31:49

I mean, we were doing drive-by visits, standing 50 feet away from doors, praying over people. We were constantly on the phone and we would tell those people who wanted to come and all just high five and drink out of the same water cups. We would tell them respect those people who still want to wear masks and who still want to stay home. Like, respect them and my job. And this was not not taking a stance, this was saying I think we have to use wisdom, logic, but we also can't live in fear. So, on the flip side, when it was like, it was like, okay, enough of this, we're starting to meet.

Speaker 2: 32:24

You'd have to address those people who were like I can't believe you would put us in this situation and it's like nobody's putting you in a situation. Stay home, like just, you know, we're not called, we don't have to check our brains at the door. Stay home, like stay home and come back when you're comfortable. And then for those who are like you know we should be meeting all the time, it's like okay, no, there's stuff that's spreading, like this is real, people are getting sick, like people are dying.

Speaker 2: 32:48

So I think those kinds of questions, if something were to happen again, I don't know that we can answer it beforehand Like here's our master plan we're doing. I think we have to read the data, trust the Lord, more importantly, and kind of go, you know, day by day, and we've had to shut down between then. You know, we've had even, like, I think a year after COVID was kind of over, we had an outbreak in our academy and we'd look and we'd go, ok, there's wisdom in here, let's shut it down for a week, let's kind of get back, and you know, kind of like that. So I think faith and logic are not enemies.

Speaker 1: 33:22

One last question what is it?

Speaker 2: 33:27

This better be an easy one. Well, I?

Speaker 1: 33:30

don't know about easy, but what inspirational message would you send to my listeners?

Speaker 2: 33:42

What inspirational message would you send to my listeners? Inspirational message to your listeners, I think it's a good one, you know. I think, going back to what I just said here is faith and logic are not enemies. God's given us a brain to use, but there's also the time where you know we have to trust him completely. You know, and trust him alone, right, like it's all about our trust in the Lord. You know, that's there, and so I think, in that sense, if I can encourage your listeners, it's stay biblical, especially going into a political season, especially when you see, like we talked about a little bit, you see so much extra biblical teachings that are out there.

Speaker 2: 34:43

You know, measure your influences against the Bible, not your feelings. You know, say to yourself if somebody is preaching something, where do I find that within scripture? It's very easy to get lulled into a wonderful analogy. But you know they say and I've come to learn that this is true at times the gospel plus waters down the gospel. All of a sudden we start forgetting about the gospel and we remember this wonderful quote or saying or thing. But it's got to be about the Bible, right, it's got to be God's heart, it's got to be, you know those things because we're leaning into some pretty perilous times here.

Speaker 2: 35:18

I think things are going to get sticky. Possibly there's the chance, like you brought up that, whether it's who knows another pandemic, another political upheaval, all of those things. But we have to remember, as Christians, the thing that I think that made me saddest the most is through the political nonsense that happened four years ago between COVID, between the race riots, between all of these things. Christianity had the opportunity and it didn't shine right, like the world didn't go. You remember 9-11, you right, being a New Yorker and stuff.

Speaker 2: 35:56

9-11 happens and the churches were packed every night, like I heard in New York and even not New York, all over the place, people, people look to the church for answers and then, 20 years later, we have a pandemic, we have political upheaval and nobody cares what the church thinks. If anything, they're shaking our fists and we've not done a good job. And I think, as leaders and pastors, you know we talked about leadership, leadership, leadership, leadership, and when it came time to lead, nobody cared what we had to say. And so my prayer is that the church will rise up to a place where it can be effective in difficult circumstances, focusing on God, trusting the Lord, staying biblical, being mature, not giving into their emotions, you know, or their preferences, but you know, really really being logical in a lot of things. So if that encourages someone, Amen.

Speaker 1: 36:55

Well, pastor Kimmy, thank you again so much for coming on the show again today, of course, yeah, man, thank you, it was an honor. And guys and ladies, if you're in the Westchester area, what's your address for the church and what times are your services?

Speaker 2: 37:15

Yeah, yeah, yeah, Trinity AG. This week for Holy Week we have a Good Friday service at 6.30. We have our regular Sunday service at 10 am. Our address is 1022 Pottstown Pike in Westchester, PA, and we normally have 10 am Sunday services. But we also have Wednesday night discipleship groups at 6.30, where we have a free meal, free dinner, community dinner, create that family atmosphere at 5.30. And at 6.30, we start our breakout classes for our discipleship process. So if you're around here we'd love to have you for sure, and Dorsey said he'll take you out to dinner after every time you come.

Speaker 1: 37:58

Well, guys and girls, thank you again so much for tuning in and for listening. We greatly appreciate Having you tuning. Hope you enjoyed this Episode of the Dorsey Road Show and hope you're encouraged and inspired by what Pastor Jimmy had to say. And until next time, god bless. Bye, bye.