Work Worth Doing: a conversation with Larry Coffey

One of my goals with this podcast is to introduce an audience I love to people I love. I’d love for you to meet Larry Coffey.  Larry is 85 years old, but you’d never know it by talking to him.  He’s articulate and thoughtful with a kind smile and an engaging way about him.   

Larry and his lovely wife Joan are beautiful people.  They have seen a lot in their lives and yet after 53 years of marriage they still speak fondly of one another and you can tell genuinely love one another.  Larry is retired now, but he was a very savvy businessman who was blessed with much success.  Success that he consistently and firmly attributes to the Lord.  Larry kindly gave me of his time (even retired he is busier than most folks) to sit down and talk about life.  We discussed American culture, money, the power of philanthropy, family, marriage, and what makes a successful life.

"Remember, you are loved, so go, love better!"

Transcript

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I’m Scott Beyer and this is the Love Better podcast where we explore the truths and lies about love and more importantly how to turn love into a skill – something we can get better at and hone.

One of my goals with this podcast is to introduce an audience I love to people I love. I’d love for you to meet Larry Coffey.  Larry is 85 years old, but you’d never know it by talking to him.  He’s articulate and thoughtful with a kind smile and an engaging way about him.  Larry is rarely the first to speak, but when he has something to say, it is worth listening to.  He treats you like an equal and a friend, but I catch myself always wanting to call him Mr. Coffey instead of Larry.  Something about him exudes dignity worthy of title.

Larry and his lovely wife Joan are beautiful people.  They have seen a lot in their lives and yet after 53 years of marriage they still speak fondly of one another and you can tell genuinely love one another.  Larry is retired now, but he was a very savvy businessman who was blessed with much success.  Success that he consistently and firmly attributes to the Lord.  Larry kindly gave me of his time (even retired he is busier than most folks) to sit down and talk about life.  We discussed American culture, money, the power of philanthropy, family, marriage, and what makes a successful life.

         I entitled this conversation ‘Work Worth Doing’ and I think you will find that behind Larry’s gentle demeanor are some strong lessons on the value of doing something with your time here on earth and finding a way to build a habit of giving early on.  I’m better for my time with Larry, and I know you will be, too.

Scott Beyer: When did you become a Christian? 

Larry Coffey: When I was 20 years old. 20 years old. I was raised in I denominational church and my parents, my grandparents. My mother and father's family, they were from Big Family seven and eight. And they were all Methodists or Baptist?

I was raised in the Methodist church. Okay. And so until I was 20 years old, I was a junior in college. 

I was raised in Lebanon, Kentucky. I was born in Adair County, Kentucky, which is the further down in the state.

Larry Coffey: But, and my parents were from Adair County, but my dad moved to Lebanon, ran a, a gas station, Gulf Gas station. And there, and our next door neighbor, they were members of the church on Winche, was his name, and his wife Rachel. And they had talked to my dad and and we, he'd gone to church a few times and with them, wrote to worship with them.

And I went a few times, but talking with him, he was basically the. Impetus for me obey the gospel now. Then I started attending tent meetings. Back in those days we had tent meetings. Donald Townsley was the preacher. He's long he's dead now, but he was the preacher at Lebanon.

And they would go to set tent up in this part of the county and stay there Monday through Friday and preach. And then they go this part of the county and this part of the county. It was a summer. And so I with Owen and going to those tent meetings, I obeyed the gospel in August of 1959. I was 20 years old.

I just turned 20. 

Scott Beyer: Psalm three, seven. David says, I've been young, now I'm mold. And he talks about there were things that he saw, he's looked over the years what have you seen? What do you wish people knew? 

Larry Coffey: Of course you wish people would become more spiritually minded and be more interested in spiritual things. That's in this country, , people are focused on other things. And and it's hard to get them to focus. \ but, what I see that people mainly focus on things of this life. What do they love? You have said on your podcast they love this, we love this. And that's what people do, they love other than the Lord. And it's, I don't know how you persuade them because they've got things.

In the Philippines for instance, there's nothing to hear of a gospel meeting when they baptized 50 people. 

Two or three days. But here you, good luck, you baptized 50 people in two or three years. 

Scott Beyer: Do you think a lot of that has to do with the financial circumstances of America versus the Philippines?

I think it absolutely does. I think that's what 

Larry Coffey: Jesus said, it's the poor. It's the humble, it's the, it's not the rich and the wealthy who interested and the gospel. It's poor people.  

Go back and listen to the old Negro spirit spirituals. They used to sing. 

What hap what was the focus on those? Not this life, all those songs. Or most of them, the focus was on heaven and what's what they're going to get, not what they had 'cause didn't have anything.  

Yeah. I think in the Philippines, that's the way it is. People, they don't have anything and so the gospel is more appealing to them.

Scott Beyer: What they can get that is standpoint eternity versus having things 'cause they don't have things. And here people have things and I've, people have said that to me. I've gone to talk to people and they say I'm happy and I don't wanna change. I don't want to change my life, and study, and I'm sure you've experienced the same thing. 

And even in America, it feels like our prosperity has increased. People are always talking about economics and it's bad time in the stock market or this or that. But if you look over the past 60 years, it seems to me that we live a lot more prosperous life now in general than we did 60 years ago. 

Larry Coffey: We do when, I grew up very poor. I, when I was first grade, we lived in the country. I went to a one room schoolhouse, eight grades and one teacher. And in the summertime, in the spring, when the weather's right, I went to, I walked to school barefooted on a gravel road. It's about a mile.

I didn't have shoes to wear in the summertime. Only shoes I could wear to church or, but no I had to, I hated it. But I remember my mother would take my shoes and put a string to put 'em on a nail back on the porch. I couldn't get to 'em. I remember one time I got a chair and got up there and got those shoes and put 'em on and my, and wore 'em outside and my mother spanked me.

Think about that. I got spanked for wearing shoes.

My times have changed. So we, yeah, in the forties and fifties, it was a different culture here than we have today. There's no question. But it's changed. ' cause the gospel is more appealing then than it is now. I don't know if now if I hadn't obeyed the gospel, somebody talked to me, I'm not sure I'd be interested.

I'd say I don't really need anything. I get everything I need.  

But I, people who are searching for things, they. It needs something. Those are the people you're more likely to be able to teach. As I say, it's not something I came about, but it's right there in the scripture.

Sure. 

Scott Beyer: Yeah. Now, it is a little funny to me though, you're saying all this, but when you went to school, what'd you get your degree in? 

Larry Coffey: Accounting. 

Scott Beyer: Accounting? Yeah. Okay. So dealing with money. And over the years you, you've had business businesses. And how do you balance those two?

Because you've, is it fair to say you've been successful? Yes. It's fair to say that. So how do you, and I don't think they're opposites, but they are two different things. There's, okay, we have all this prosperity and it has had a negative impact on spiritual things. We love the things, the world and not the Lord.

But then on the other hand, you've been successful and I don't see any injunction in the Bible against being successful. 

Larry Coffey: No, I don't either. 

Scott Beyer: But how do you do that and not lose the love of the Lord? How do you keep those two things together?

Larry Coffey: Again, of course it's what you, it's your main focus. What's the most important thing to you now? I, yes, I did. I was the first person in my family to graduate from college on my dad's side. Nobody even went to college before I did. Now, since then, of course they have. But when I did, so I, I graduated from college and went to work.

Now, one thing I taught was taught at home was to work to be busy and honesty and all that, even though I was not a member of the church. All the basic good moral things that we read in the Bible was what my parents taught me. An example they set. Hard work was the main thing. And so I did graduate from college and and got married and went to work for an accounting firm.

And I worked hard. And that's the thing. I worked hard and I never really worked to get promotions. That never was my goal. My goal was always to put food on the table for the family. And I knew if I worked hard and did a good job, I would have a job, but if I didn't, so it wasn't like if I do this or do that, then I'll get that next promotion.

But as a result of working hard and really working, lots of hours, then you ask promotions come along.  

And that's what happened. And so I was promoted and after being a accountant with a CPA firm, I went to work for a private company and a newspaper company actually. And was the controller of that company.

And then I was advanced into management. And so the last lot of years I worked, I was in management. And newspaper business was successful back in those days when I newspaper business started, losing its financial stability about turn of the century. I retired in 20 at 2001. And so I just saw the, now newspapers are really doing poorly, but they were strong up until that time.

Mm-hmm. And then the company I worked for was purchased by bigger company who owned a lot of other things, television stations and they owned the, and they started the Weather Channel, they from scratch back in 1980, thereabouts. And that was part of the company. And so the company's very successful, privately owned company and so the company's very successful and I was forced 'em to be part of that company.

Scott Beyer: But it wasn't ever working for the money, per se. It was No, it wasn't working for the 

Larry Coffey: money. I, yeah, I guess you won a wage, right? You, you wouldn't have gone to work without getting paid. But No, I would I recall, and I'm not saying this, pat myself on the back, but I pour, I, once I was advanced in this company, I became the manager of this small the small newspaper division.

We owned newspapers and ended up only 45 newspapers in 12 states, which I managed that. And I reported to someone in Norfolk and we'd have good years. And so my boss in Norfolk would say, okay, I'm gonna give you this raise. And it would be a big raise. And I'd say, wait a minute. You understand it's not me that's doing this.

I've got all these people out there that work for me. I work for the company. And I happen to manage 'em. They don't work for me. We all work for the company. Nobody worked for me. But and he would say yes, that's true, but you hired those people. If you had hired bad people, you wouldn't be getting a raise.

You won't even be here if you hired bad people. It was, no, I never, I always, I would challenge the raise several times. It was too much. Now I'm not, again saying that, but I didn't need that much money. It just happened. And of course the company was very successful, particularly the Weather Channel.

'cause the Weather Channel then got, was sold

for $3.5 billion in 2008. And of course, what the owner of this was a private company, what the owner of the company did, his executives, he let them buy stock in the company, his company. 

Now you paid for it, but he gave you a nice plan where you could pay so much a year.

I mean. With low interest rates, that kind of thing. And of course, I became a stockholder in the company, and then the company was successful. That's how I got to be successful. But it was all hard work. I worked hard. That was really, I think I never, I didn't graduate at the top of my class, nothing like that.

I made okay grades, but I was just, every sort of student. So 

Scott Beyer: you just tell people work hard, whatever you do work hard. What I've 

Larry Coffey: always told people. Yeah. Our preacher trainee, I, I've worked with him, so I said, Alexander Campbell got up at four o'clock in the morning, went to bed at 10 o'clock at night, and that's, and he did it every day.

And he worked all day. He didn't have a television to watch, you work hard. If you wanna be successful. There are some people, smart, very intelligent, and they can get by with not hard work, but the average person just needs to work hard if they wanna be successful.

And as I said I did, I worked hard to keep the job that I had, not to get the next job up. I didn't, in fact, I was talked to about going to Norfolk to work there. That's the main office. And I said, no, I have no interest in doing that. I'm happy here. But it just worked out good for me.

Scott Beyer: Along the way with that, so you're just working your job, paying the bills, not working for the next job. You're not trying to climb the ladder, but you were blessed along the way. So then it seems to me that the way that we often do it is we work and then all of a sudden we become complacent and it's like David, he stops going out to war and that's when he ran into all those problems with Bathsheba. 

How do you not do that? How do you as you get the success, how do you not become complacent?

How do you let not let those things go to your head? How do you keep yourself grounded?

Larry Coffey: Again, not working for a promotion, but still working hard, had to do with just feeling that I needed to lead the company in a way that it performed well. And the way to do that was to work hard and persuade people who work for me to work hard. And I think the best thing you do is the example you set more so than what you tell people to do or direct people to do.

They see what you do if you are in a leadership role. And and they saw how I worked and so they knew if they were going to work there that they were expected to work too. I didn't expect people to work as hard as I did, don't get me wrong but I expect people to really work hard. Not, and if people didn't work hard than I, unfortunately, I'd have to terminate 'em.

 It was more of warning the company to perform. Was more of a, mm-hmm. Achievement for the company, and then it was for raises. That wasn't it. But, we were a division and they had to, there were several divisions and we had to, these division meetings we would go to, and I didn't wanna go to division meetings and say our sales were down last quarter, 

Scott Beyer: or whatever.

So there's a certain sense of, it's, I feel like the word that keeps coming in my head is duty and responsibility. You felt a responsibility for the position instead of, what is this position got in For me, it's what I've been given this opportunity. What am I gonna do with it? 

Larry Coffey: Yeah. That was it. Yeah. I could have retired, earlier on that from the, but I just, I felt duty and responsibility and I felt, then of course, I got to the point where when I could have retired earlier, I thought the longer I work, the more money I will have.

And I don't take this wrong. To help other people. I don't, I may be sound like I'm patting myself on the back too. I 

Scott Beyer: don't take that wrong. That's a biblical phrase there like that. But it was, if you have a thief, new Testament says, what do you tell the thief? You tell him stop stealing instead of work hard.

So you have something to give to others. That's the biblical model is that we should work with a thought of how can I have something to give to other people and do good with it. Yeah. Ephesians 4 28. 

Larry Coffey: You're right. That's right. And no, I really, because it was a lot of responsibility and of course, you're expected to perform and course you wanna perform. 

But then I, when I switched over to when I got to the point where I didn't have to work anymore, I continued to work. But now I only worked to 62 because the owner of the company expected his managers and the divisions to retire at 62 so he could promote other people. Gotcha. It's sort like the military in a way.

You don't see many, they have cutoff. You don't see many 60-year-old admirals running ships. Those guys are 35 to 45. Really? These, and they promote people, they're still admirals and they're in, but they're in more executive positions. And they actually, and so that was his, he wanted people to be brought along and so it needed to have opportunity for them to be promoted.

So I retired at that time, 62. But I could retire earlier, but I didn't, 'cause I just felt like that I could, that's one thing I 

Scott Beyer: could do. Do you think we don't give enough responsibility to people when they're younger? I mean that you talk about the guys on the ships are in their thirties and forties and they're running entire ships.

That's right. Do you feel like that's something that, that we don't do enough of entrusting people at their younger ages to get. Be responsible for things? I don't know. 

Larry Coffey: It's it depends on the job. Realize that, like in the church for instance, people need to have some experience and age and wisdom and that kind of thing.

You gotta be careful how you going. You put people into leadership positions. Sure. But in industry, yeah. There, there are people there are lot of people who do perform young, and I think they're, if they do perform well when they're young they get promotions and they do well.

We've had young people elected president. I guess Kennedy was pretty young when he was elected president. 

Scott Beyer: Yeah. 

Larry Coffey: And I don't say that it's, that doesn't happen. I think it should happen. I've talked to some people, for instance, young people who talk to me about should they serve as an elder, like in their early forties.

And if I feel like that they're devoted and. Really committed to serve the Lord. I'll encourage them to go ahead and serve young. If I don't see them being very hard workers or maybe they're not involved, then I'm less inclined to encourage them to do that. 

Scott Beyer: How old were you when you first started serving as a, as an elder?

The congregation? 

Larry Coffey: Understand this, the nature of our congregation at that time was fairly young. The people were young. 

Scott Beyer: You're gonna tell me a young number. That's what he's preparing me to For the number to be young. 

Larry Coffey: Yeah. Yeah, because I'm gonna tell you that it's young and even I was 36.

Do you feel like you were too young? Looking back, I learned a whole lot after I was 36, and I made more, made mistakes at 30 at that age. But as far as commitment and work, it wasn't. I worked and I was actually appointed with Joan's dad who was, 

He was, he's 10 years older than me, so he was young too.

He was like 45 or 46. But the congregation was young, but even more of a shock will be this. At that, real briefly, my first wife, we had three children. My wife died and we had three children. And Joan and I got married. I was 32 and she was 21. And I had three boys at the time. We got married, nine and five and three.

And and then we've had a son since then. But I was appointed and when I was appointed the church, one, my oldest son was a member of the church, and Joan was 25 years old. And I would say in her case, I know people who are 55 years old who weren't as dedicated and worked as hard as she did.

Even at 25, she would. You said that's way too young. It is too young for some people, but for her it wasn't too young. She has always been dedicated, hardworking for the teaching classes and women's classes, men children's classes, serving people, helping people. She does, she just spends her time doing that kind of thing.

She learned it young, she learned it from her parents who were good, strong Christians, and, but, and we've never, we've never had a problem. And she's done wonderful all these years. She really has. Yes, we were young. We were very young. 

Scott Beyer: Yeah. No, I understand it. Everything's, there's always context matters with things. That's right. It matters a lot. Can we talk about giving a little bit Sure. You touched on that. What do you wish people understood about money? Because money's this kind of mystical thing for us. As Americans.

It's it can be a God, it can be, oh, if I had such and such amount of money, I'd do this or that. But you talk about this idea of you were working when money wasn't, you didn't have to keep working. But now you would have more to help people with. How's that worked out? 

Larry Coffey: It's worked out well.

If the Lord has truly blessed me beyond I'd ever imagined and I'm not saying that I know I'm manage it I pray regularly for wisdom to spend the money in the right way that I have, that he's given to me. It's all his. Of course. We have lived in this house for 41 years.

We've not, I'm not 'cause I got raises and raises. It got bigger and bigger. The house was very nice. Don't get me wrong, but I just haven't chosen to do that. But you have to, I get to a level where you're, you don't need to have more materially, and then you can, as your income increases, you 

Scott Beyer: can give a lot more. So Contentment's a huge part of this. Oh, absolutely. You've got say, okay I've got enough. You're not, you're no longer looking for the next thing, the bigger house, the better car, the bigger vacation.  

Larry Coffey: Who gave it to me? The Lord. That's what happened.

It really, 

Scott Beyer: That's something I've heard you say multiple times. It's his money. You're just managing it. That's right. It's his money. I'm interested in the character of somebody who has done well with his family. He's done well in the church and he's done well in business. It didn't ruin you. And that's a big thing. That's not a small thing. 

Larry Coffey: Hopefully it didn't. 

When does money help and when does money hurt? 

It hurts when. I don't, I think it hurts when you just keep wanting bigger and better and more and more things.

Larry Coffey: That's when I think it hurts. What I've done in my state, the way I've set it up is that you can't see, you could say sell assets and give 'em more away, but if you sell assets, you don't have income, but if you have assets, you have income and you can give 'em away. If you add more assets you have, the more you can give away 'cause you have more income. So I keep thinking, what's the Lord gonna say? You had all this money, you didn't give it away. So this is my answer to that.

And I dunno if it's right or not. And that is the way I set my state up. When I die Joan will be taken care of, but when she dies, then my boys, I have two sons, they get 5% each. 90% goes to charity of my state. I've got a charitable trust that I operate now, and that's which where I give money through that, give it away through that other.

But, so that's the way it is. So 90% of everything I got goes to charity, which mostly is supporting gospel preachers. That's what I want most to go do. So I'm trying to think what's gonna happen to the money. 

Now, does that justify me keeping more than I should? I don't know the answer to that question.

I worry about that Sometimes. 

Scott Beyer: You mean you don't stop worrying about money sometimes even, it doesn't matter what I mean. It's part of life isn't 

Larry Coffey: Money can be a blessed and that can be a curse. If curse from standpoint had taken care of it, you wanna be responsible.

And then you want to help people. But, and it does, it keeps me busy. That's one thing it does. Being, giving money away, that really does, gives me really something to do. But the thing that is you sometimes and sometime I think and the proverbs says, don't gimme too much. So I've become content.

So I've become, I forgot the term now, but I proud. Proud. Something like that, or too little that I beg just gimme what I need. And I see the wisdom in that from the standpoint of living your life, just having what you need to live on.  

Because if you have a lot and you're concerned about it, how, if it's being spent the right way, then it becomes a worry.

And then but if you don't have it, then you can't do these good things. So that the blessing is you can help so many people. So many people. If you've got money, if that's your goal. And so that's the blessing part. The curse is having to take care of it. Being insured, it's properly invested and things of that nature.

My biggest worry about money is am I spending it the way the Lord wants me to spend it? 

Scott Beyer: If you were talking to a young person who was just getting started, they just got their accounting degree, they're gonna start somewhere and you were to give them advice about giving before they'd started their career, what would you 

Larry Coffey: tell 'em?

I'd say that you determine what Bible says. You should purpose what you give and give cheerfully the thing that you do is your very first job when you go to work, you determine you're gonna give to the Lord. And you're gonna be a generous giver, but not, obviously you've got family and all that.

You could purpose and give a dollar a week, that you got a purpose to give a reasonable, but, I know tithe in is part of the old law. And and certainly there was, but when I started, I didn't necessarily use 10%, but I used something like sort as a guideline. 

And every time I got a raise, I increased my contributions every time. Get a raise. Get a raise. Never did not every time I got a raise, always if you always keep that out there. And so that's set aside and you live on what's left. You don't live. And then what's left? Give to the Lord. You put that first and that's what you have to do.

And so that's what I did. Of course, now, of course 10%, I give way more percent down. Now, of course, I got a lot. More money. But you would tell 'em purpose put. Yeah. You got purpose in your heart right up front. Right up front. You purpose what you're going to give. And it's and it's a reasonable amount.

That's  

I'm not saying 10%. I know the Bible didn't teach that. Sure. I'm just saying that was a guideline I had early on. Now of course I've gone well over 10% now but and it wasn't 10 exactly that but it was in that ballpark and always get, and that way that always comes out first and you know what you got left to spend. 

That's what you have to do. 'cause if you don't do that, if you just say I'm gonna give, if I get another race, I'm gonna give more. I had a guy one time tell me, he said, if I can get this job, I'm gonna give it all the way here and do this. No. If you're not doing it now, you're not gonna do it then.

Scott Beyer: So the giving starts early, starts when you get your first job. First job, you start giving. Right 

Larry Coffey: then 

Scott Beyer: this is and that matches to me this biblical concept that Jesus talks about. He's faithful and little is faithful and much, right? If you are gonna be faithful in giving when you don't have a ton, then that'll go through to if you have more.

But if you don't do it, when you don't have much, if you get that big raise, it is not gonna change. 

Larry Coffey: That's right. That makes sense. That's exactly right. Now that's the thing you have to do. And it just keeps increasing. You have to do that. And I think you do to have a plan for you. But as I said, the way I've now got it set up that, it's all given up, gonna be given away over, and I have a board of directors set up, to, to oversee when I'm gone. 

Scott Beyer: What do you love? What gets you up in the morning? You don't have to work a job. You're retired. Some people retire and then they do nothing. You're not that guy. I see you very active. What gets you up in the morning? What do you love? 

Larry Coffey: Of course I served as elder for many years and and that was a always very important job that I had. And of course I've done dropped off. I had that, it was once a time I worked, served as an elder. I served on the Florida College Board for 23 years, so I had plenty to do.

And I always, I'll always like to stay busy. I what gets, if I don't accomplish something during the day, I've had a bad day. I've al you've got to get something. I've always, you, when I start the day off, what am I gonna do today? I've got to do something. I'm not gonna watch television and I'm not gonna do this.

But I have more of a balance. Back. Back then it was. When I was working, I had to work and serve as an elder. And that took, and family that you didn't have a problem having something to do. You're busy all the time. Now of course that now I retired that job. I'm not on the board anymore.

I resigned as retired from the eldership after about 45 years. So, now I get up and, I have I have this Phil philanthropic work that I do, and that takes a lot of time. As I said, I every day, I commune with the Philippines, I communicate with the Philippines and people, preachers there and then, so just trying to get things with coffee.

I do some I play you, you call it playing nine holes of golf. Nine holes of golf week. That's all. I've known people retired and they play golf four or five days a week. I play nine holes. That's it. And it is just get exercised basically. 'cause I'm too old to hit the ball anywhere.

And I do, but I just like to be busy. I like to have things to do and so that's what keeps me going is the people that you know, that I can try to help. I visit, I still leave. I not serve as an elder. I still visit elderly people and, and takes people to lunch and do that kind of thing.

I try to stay busy doing things. It's doing something that I think is helpful to people. That's the thing that I do every try to do every day. And if I don't get any of that done, I feel like man, my day has been wasted. The people who are on welfare are the most unhappy people in the world.

'cause they don't accomplish anything. A sense of accomplishment is the most important thing. You've got to have a sense of accomplishment if you do you feel good about yourself. Sense of accomplishment. 

Scott Beyer: How do you instill that? You raised kids, four kids, right? 

Larry Coffey: Two of my sons died. 

Scott Beyer: One died, I'm sorry

Larry Coffey: at age 10 and one died at age 40. But I have two, two sons now. They're in 

Scott Beyer: Bowling Creek. They're both in business. How do you instill that in your kids as you raise 'em? 

Larry Coffey: You teach 'em to start working when they're young. They got there cutting the grass. All my kids cut the grass, when's that big enough to push that mow or get jobs or have jobs around the house or encourage 'em to get jobs out of the, stay busy, have accomplish things.

All my kids, and they all work. They all have jobs and they've always worked and they've never never not. And they, that's what you teach 'em to do that. And and their kids work and my grandkids, 

Scott Beyer: they all work. And that gives that sense of accomplishment makes 'em feel good about themselves. 

Larry Coffey: I think it does.

I think that's it. Yeah. Sense of accomplishment. Oh yeah. All my grandkids, none of 'em. They all work. 

Scott Beyer: How long have you and Joan been married? 53 years last week. Okay. What's the secret? All of us youngins, we wanna know what's the secret? 

Larry Coffey: Uh, we our secret first of all is the Lord's first in our lives, both cases.

Joan said early on, the one word that will never be mentioned in his house, it'll never be said, is the word divorce. It's never to be mentioned. And it hasn't been never, no matter what that word is, never said. And of course, she loves the Lord, and I love the Lord. And I know right now she loves the Lord more than she loves me.

He comes first to her, and I know that, but that makes her a better wife I'm thankful for that. 

Scott Beyer: How do you get through the hard times? 

Larry Coffey: Jonah's very independent. Obviously. She married me and I had three boys, we've had our own son, she's had one son, of course. And that's the four.

But, uh, she's independent and I pretty independent myself. And so we clash from time to time. It's, I've seen wives are more subservient to their husbands, and that's, there's less clash. But when she's, when your wife is very independent than she's thinking about things and so she has more ideas, and so you have more conflict, but it's never, it's just conflict.

It's not, we don't. Fight or anything like that. We just have a difference of opinion and so forth. But it, what it boils down to is we might have a little spat, but it's over before the day's over. We get over it, she gets over it, I get over it, we move on. But I'm not saying we have ant argument.

'cause we have, and I think anybody says that I've lived with my wife 30 years. We had an argument. I really, I can't believe that's true. I always wonder the same thing. 'cause I hear that sometimes too, and I go, really? Yeah. But okay, somebody is just doing whatever the other one says all the time.

If that's the case, and that's not the case here. But, no, I think it's the commitment to the Lord. It's there's no question. But in our case, 53 years, that's what's, that's what's done it. And so we've and she's very given also. She likes to help people. She never. Never would complain about what we, how we help people.

Of course we help people way more than money we spend on ourselves, of course, obviously. And no, she's, there are times when we've thought we do this, do that. But no she's content. We've lived here 41 years 

Scott Beyer: almost. 

Larry Coffey: This house, 

Scott Beyer: You talked about, there's at least was a season in your life where you are raising a family, running a business that's, it's continuing to grow and your responsibilities there continue to grow, right?

And you're helping shepherd a church. Any one of those things is a lot of work. People often talk about things like work life balance. How do you maintain that balance or how do you make that work when you've got all those pieces?

Very good question. 

Larry Coffey: That's one area where I'll give you some about where I failed. I've failed a lot of things, don't get me wrong, but I failed there. I because I did work so hard and because I served as elder young and I took that job seriously, and and I, I neglected my family.

So I, I admit that I should have spent more time with my family. I, there's no question about it. How did we continue to succeed and do well, and the family do well is because of my wife. She never had to work outside of the home. She never had a, had to hold a job. She's always been a homemaker.

She's worked hard as a homemaker, been involved in schools and kids in school, and been on PTAs and president of PTA and involved in the community service, red Cross other safe place. She's picked up more kids at Safe Place than anybody that's ever worked for Safe Place at Louisville, Kentucky.

She picked up one this week. Girls, you know what safe place, the way that works is kids need to get away from home 'cause of all their problems, and they go to a safe place. You see the little signs? Yeah. Yeah. And then they call the place calls the Safe Place house, where they go. Then they have people to pick up people, and Joan's been one of those people.

So she's picked up more than any that's ever worked for Safe Place. Of course, it's all volunteer work. 

Scott Beyer: When you forgive my ignorance, but you pick 'em up 

Larry Coffey: and take 'em to 

Scott Beyer: the safe house, you take 'em over to a safe house where they can get the care and, that's right. I assess their situation, I'm just saying.

Larry Coffey: Yeah. So she managed the house and managed the kids and saw to it that she was involved in everything they were doing school, whether it's sports or whatever, plays or whatever. She was there all the time taking care of them. And so she managed the house, she managed the kids, and so I worked hard.

Now, I, I was always at church on Sunday, so we'd go to gospel meetings through the week. I, it wasn't that I wasn't here, I was never with them, but truth matter is looking back. I could have spent more time with my family than I did vacations. Most of our vacations for years were work vacations.

We would go on vacations, I would work, we had family would go, but I would work. Of course, then you didn't have a computer, but phones, I'd work a day and vacation a day and work another day and we'd go places. Had work. So mostly that was it. In fact, most years I never used my vacation.

Didn't, I had weeks and weeks. I didn't get paid for it or anything, but I just, I was always busy. Mm-hmm. What I didn't do as much as I should have with my family. And so I would not encourage anybody to work as hard as I did. But at the same time, I had her and she filled in for what I, 

Scott Beyer: where I lacked.

There's grace and a good wife in there. Yeah, there is. There's nothing like it. Do you feel like you figured out that balance as you got older? 

Larry Coffey: Yeah. I'd say the last years of what I worked I got, I was closer to my younger son probably because I did a little more things with him than my older son who's they're both in Bowling Green and they're both business managers of their companies.

And but yeah, I did, I spent more time with David than I did with Michael, because I just did, when Michael was growing up, I was working hard. And David, I was I just saw I needed to spend more time and of course Joan would tell me I needed to spend more time with family. So yeah, I made a little progress toward the end, but that over, over the whole my work life.

Yeah. I spent too much time working. 

Scott Beyer: I think most people who know you would say you are a successful person. How do you define a successful life, though? 

Larry Coffey: A successful life to me is it's all spiritual. You marry and your, you and your wife live together all your life and you serve the Lord.

And in whatever capacity you can use your talents that you have serving the Lord and keeping your, and teaching your children setting example for your children working to provide for your family, your wife doing her work also. And I have no doubt objection to wife working outside the home.

I know it's necessary sometimes, uh, in our society to, to pay the bills. I understand that. I don't have a problem with that. Fortunately, my wife never had to work outside the home. And turns out my daughter-in-laws, they've, once they got married, they stopped working outside. They didn't work outside the home.

So it's just not something that we've had to do. But the Lord's blessed us when with that wasn't the case. But the success is serving the Lord of being faithful. There's nothing else that compares to that. That's it. That's the main thing. I don't care. You could get a billion dollars now.

That's no, I don't have a billion dollars. Me wrong. But whatever it's serving the Lord. I'd rather, have served the Lord faithfully and just when I died, there's no money left. Than there'd been a billionaire, frankly, which I never desired to be that.

Of course. But, I think that's what's important. My parents were. Faithful. They were married over 60 years. Joan's parents married for many years. That's the main, that's what's, that's what serving the Lord and being a good family. That's what success is to me. It's not how much money you make position, you hold fame that you get.

It's not junior Bridgeman who I have great respect for, he's, right now he's big and he did a lot for this city, and I appreciate all that, but that's not what success is. Success is how your family and he was successful with his family too. He was married to the same woman all his life.

So that's success to me. Eternity, that's what counts. That's what matters. I, as I'm 85 years old, as I've said, man, if you don't have eternity to look forward to, what do you have?

Scott Beyer: It goes by pretty fast too. 

Larry Coffey: It does. I tell you, 85 years is going by really fast Lord's blessed me with good health.

That's another thing, being able to work hard. He's given me good health, he's given me opportunity. He's blessed me in so many ways. 

Scott Beyer: When when you started working with Christians in the Philippines, 

how's that changed you or impacted your Christianity? 

Larry Coffey: It's maybe uppercase. My belief in giving and helping people put an uppercase on it, make it more important. I see these people, who have nothing and you give them just a little bit and they're so happy and thankful and so forth.

And you realize that money is just not that important. You really it's trying to serve the Lord. There's what's right. I preach those people, those preachers and out there preaching and working hard and have practically nothing. Uh, it makes me, sometime I go out to eat and I think, what I've spent for dinner is more than they make in a month.

It's really, it really makes you think about how you spend your money. It really does. When you see what they have, what they don't have, it really does. I think, man, I'm spending this much money for this and what they have, but as I said, I correspond with them all the time, every day.

 They they get sick and they go to the hospital and they, and there the thing that shocks you is a lot of times they won't let 'em out of the hospital until they pay the bill. You can't leave until you pay the bill.

And I'm thinking the bill just gets bigger every day. Doesn't the bill keep going up the longer they're in the hospital? The longer the hospital, but I guess that's the way they get their money. The hospitals do, but no they've been a lot of folks over there who've, they're all in such great need over there.

I guess the thing that about there, about the work over there, which there's a priest by the name of Darel Vis, he's in the island of Palauan. And it's a Long Island in the Southern Philippines. And I'm not sure exactly how I got in touch with him, but, I was helping him some, and I asked him, I said, did you ever think about starting a radio program?

He said, I've wanted to start a radio program all my life, but we don't have the money. I said suppose you had the money. And he said if I had the money, that would be wonderful. So of all the things I've done in the Philippines I said, okay, let's start a program and I'll pay for it.

And he started that radio program. Now it's been, I don't know, 15, 20 years ago, and and it's just, the success is just unbelievable.  

And then, so what I did was the radio program. Then I started supporting the preachers in the listen area, monthly support to them. And so the radio program is on an hour a week.

And then the listeners would be out in these various areas. And so there'd be preachers that could go study with them. And that has been success. The most successful thing I've ever done in my life and all I've done is provide the money. Don't get me wrong, I've been over there teaching.

They've been doing the teaching to preaching. Dario has managed the station. He's got people to come, preachers to come to help him, to, to conduct the program. It has been very successful. And so what I've done as a result of that being so successful, I've started that now in a lot of other places in the Philippines radio station, support the preachers in that area, radio station, support the preachers in that area, and it just built up and it just, it is just been one of the, some are more successful than others, but still it's just really worked wonderfully and teaching the gospel to people.

Of all the things that I've done in life that I'd say, that's probably where I feel. I've accomplished the most. And of course, the Lord gave me the money to be able to do it, but I just feel better about that than about anything. Because it's worked so well 

Scott Beyer: That's impressive. This, I love that idea. Starts with this one thing and then it you put it in the hands of the right people and Right. And give them opportunities. And it's amazing what the Lord can do. 

Larry Coffey: That's right. What the Lord can do. That's exactly right. Yeah. It just, it's they're baptized and a quarter, 140, 50 people just from the radio program.

And it's several radio programs they'll do that. Wow. It's but the radio there is the radio was here in the fifties. 1950s. Everybody's listening radio that lists radio right now. They don't to hear it doesn't work, but there, it still works. Because they listen to the radio 

Scott Beyer: there. 

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And you're right. Radio here in America is, it is a different, yeah, different thing. But it used to be strong. Oh yes. Very 

Larry Coffey: strong. Back when I remember back in the 1950s, sixties radio programs were listened to and preachers preached on the radio programs, and they made a lot of contacts and baptized a lot of people.

But that's no longer, yeah. I'm not saying that totally ineffective, but not really anymore. 

Scott Beyer: Yeah. Not to the same degree. No. That's for sure. 

Larry Coffey: Yeah. But that's, and so that's not somebody being down and out. But that's something that was accomplished. And as I said, it's just, it's really worked.

In fact, even the Douglas Hills Church now has three radio programs that they support. Picked out different areas to and it works well for the church too, but they actually, the church does that in addition to what I do.

Scott Beyer: What advice would you give. To a new elder, to a young elder, so to speak. Yeah. Who was just, they were just gonna start. 

Larry Coffey: The main thing about service as an elder, first of all, you gotta be qualified. You gotta meet the qualifications and, first Timothy Titus so you have to be qualified and you have to beat those qualifications.

But once you are qualified and you start serving, to me the main thing that an elder has to do to lead the congregation is set the example. He's got to set the example. Anytime the church does anything, he's gotta be right there leading. If they want to have a Saturday, when they go do something in the neighborhood, he's gotta be there.

If they have a men's Bible study on Thursday night, he's gotta be there. Whatever the church does, he's got to take, even in social events. I think if there's, I know that you can't attend every last one, but social events, he needs to be there. I don't think there's any substitute. For example, if you clean the building, which we do part of the building and part of it's professor clean, close the building, you need to sign up.

Your name needs to go on the board to sign up your name needs to go on the board to close. Always leading by example is critical. If you want to serve as an elder of the church and be effective. That's what I told 'em. In fact, that's what we told every, when we had elders to before the congregation, we met with them, and I would give that speech more lengthy than what I just gave you, because I think elders are held to a higher standard than the average member.

I think preachers are held to a higher standard. People expect more from the preachers and they expect more from the elders. Somebody's in the hospital, the elder goes and sees them. Somebody's in nursing home, the elder goes and visits 'em. I'm not saying every day, but makes appearances. I think they have to do it.

I think that's a set example. If they don't, if they don't, I don't think they can be nearly as effective as they could be if they did that. That's what I think they, they need to be effective. I think that's what you have to do. And we'd drive that home to every new elder that was appointed, so that's what, and if they didn't do it, I've, we've had elders who didn't step up to the plate and I'd go into their house and said, I say, you wanna service elder or not.

If you wanna serve, you gotta start. You gotta step up. If you don't, then you need to step down. Now that takes nerve to do that, I have to admit. But see, I was in business and I worked. And I had to talk to people. We had meetings and we had arguments, and we had disagreements and those kind of things.

And that's not easy to do but yeah, and I think you're an equal and it's not like I'm the boss or anything like that. But and it, and in most cases when I did that, they would step up. And I'm not saying it happened often, but it's happened. And so I that's the way I see it.

Like elders really got to step out there, take the lead, because I think, again, they're held at a higher standard than the members are.

Scott Beyer: We've talked all around. Preaching and being a elder in the, in Jesus' church. But, we haven't talked specifically about Jesus.

What do you love about Jesus? What does he mean to you? 

Larry Coffey: I don't know that I can tell you anything different than what you read in the Bible, but of course he means everything. Without him believing heaven, you think about where he was and coming here and living. And he didn't, he lived a common life.

He didn't have the fanciest chariot to ride or living the biggest house. He just lived a common life, very common life. And a, a reputable job as a carpenter, we guess as his father, as a carpenter. But but but then of course when he, he did that. And then when he started his ministry, then he healed the sick and performed miracles.

And he proved beyond a shadow of a doubt that he was the son of God. I think about when he was arrested, and they, they mocked him and they spat up on him. Can you imagine that? I can't imagine a thing worse than being spat up.

And I think a lot of times,  

He could have snapped his fingers and put those people away. And I got, I kept thinking, I believe it was me. I would've at least done that to those guys and I'd going ahead and died on the cross. But I had to take care of those people. Now, of course, obviously you can't do that.

You can't do that. But, when I see the willpower, the power he had to withhold 

To do that. I don't know why I could done that. I just don't know that good. It's just, you'd think if you could do something about it, but he could have done something, but he didn't. And for somebody to make that kind of stuff, and of course the horrible death he died, but to do that, what he did for us and what he, the treatment he received when he should have been held in the highest of esteem ever.

So when somebody does that for you and if you don't love them and appreciate them I'm not sure what, what would prompt you to do it? I don't know what they would do. I don't know there's anything they could, and of course that's why Christianity is so much, of course it's better 'cause it's true than the other, 'cause nobody ever died for anybody and these other Muslims or Buddhists and so forth.

No one made the sacrifice. That God himself to in the form of Christ did look what he did. And so that's the thing that Christianity has got to draw people. It's the truth. The others aren't. But to draw people than that what could be more? And he draw, look at the people I know.

Christianity and the broad assist, I think the last time I checked it was like 2.4 billion people. 2.4 billion people claim to be Christians, quote Christians. Think about that. I know we think, you need to follow the New Testament. And I think we do and all that, but still in the broadest sense, when it's when Jesus died on the cross and what he did for us, look what the impact that's had on the world.

Yeah. Despite how bad. People are, and all we've already said, materialistic. But it is been, it is a tremendous impact 

Scott Beyer: it is amazing in a world where we're so easily caught up in materialistic things, who has what the man who made the most difference gave it all up.

That's right. And we're drawn to that. We're drawn to somebody who would give it all up for us. 

Larry Coffey: Yeah, that's right. And that just, and that draws people. Many people who may not doctrinally do what we think the Bible teaches should do. We'll talk about, you hear him talking about Jesus has been everything to me.

That's what they'll say. And I wanna follow the Lord and so forth. I saw an actor on TV a couple weeks ago, one of the, his name now, but he's a famous actor, but he was talking about, he's. Jesus has meant everything to him, and he was willing to, I think he was interviewed by, I don't interviewed, but somebody I don't know what his religion is. 

I'm still impressed when I see people who profess the Lord and want to serve him and in the way they think they should. And it's it's just impressive to me.

Scott Beyer: Thank you, Larry. Thanks for taking the time. I really appreciate it. I know you are a very busy guy, and for you to take the time to, to talk to me about these things means a lot.