Meeting Needs & Reaching the World: A conversation with Jesse Reimers of Samaritan’s Purse.

Whether it’s instantly responding to Natural Disasters, sharing the gospel with children through a shoebox halfway around the world or ministering to Military Families the ministry of Franklin Graham and Samaritan’s Purse are active on every front. Jesse Reimers serves as the Regional Director, Church Engagement with Samaritan’s Purse. Be encouraged and challenged by the vision, passion and commitment to Christ of this global ministry as you listen to this inspiring conversation.

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:05

Hi, welcome to the Brad Jerkovich Podcast. Super excited about our guest today. When you talk about making a global impact in ministry and leadership and outreach, Samaritas Purse is doing it all day long. And Jesse Reimer's one of the regional directors for church engagement. Yes, sir. Uh for Samaritas Purse is with me today. Jesse, thanks for coming, man. Thank you for having me. I'm excited to be here. You bet. You have been a pastor, and then you've also now been serving for several years with Samaritas Purse. So tell us a little bit about your story, man. You got into ministry, you've been serving, and then God called you into Samaritas Purse. Can you just give us a little bit of that?

SPEAKER_01 0:41

Yeah, for sure. So, Pastor, I spent a number of years, as you said, 20 plus years in the local church as a pastor, and and uh loved doing that and loved the interaction with people on a regular basis. And in 2018, we had a tragedy happen in our family, or 2017, excuse me. My wife's father passed away and he was in Texas, and we were in Washington. We planted a church up there and God was doing great things. And and uh, you know, we had to spend a year kind of processing what does that mean for us? Well, at the time, uh, and this may be another podcast, I was uh I was struggling to balance a healthy home and ministry, and I was just so gung-ho and addicted to what God was doing in ministry that I was neglecting my family. Well, when you combine that with the tragedy of uh of my father-in-law passing, it was the ingredients for us to really reevaluate our life. And so we did, and and we kind of settled on the fact that you know what, we need to take ourselves out of full-time pastoral ministry for a season and figure out what the Lord wants to do in us, get some healing, get some clarity and some redirection. So we did. And so we packed our bags and we moved from Washington State to Texas. No ministry, no house, wow, nothing. We just had crazy, man. We had a U-Haul truck full of stuff and a hope that God would do something. And so, you know, it was the only job. So I I remember sitting in the Starbucks the first day we got to Texas, and I thought, I don't know what I'm gonna do with my life. What can what can I do? Yeah, and so I saw a job opening with Samaritan's Purse, and we had connected with them over the years, packed some shoeboxes, served in the central drop-off, you know, so we were familiar with them, and I just thought, gosh, they're they're they're looking for a regional manager of leadership development. Well, I can dig the leadership development. Maybe this is for me. So I applied, and man, it was a long process, but man, by the grace of God, the door opened and I got the position. And so I didn't have to leave. I was right there in Texas. Wow. And I stayed there for about six years in that role. And then about a year and a half ago, almost two years ago, I moved into this role, uh, regional director of church engagement.

SPEAKER_00 2:34

That's that's amazing. And I'm wondering if your background and experience, Jesse, of being a pastor, how has that helped you when you talk about that role, that title of church engagement? What how has that helped you, buddy? What does that mean for you, man, when you're engaging with churches in your region?

SPEAKER_01 2:50

Yeah, I think it means a couple of things. I think first off, you know, my responsibility, a part of that is to share what God is doing to Samaritans person. Okay. And so those years of public speaking, the years of being in front of people and engaging with people help. Also, I'm working directly with pastors. Yeah. And sometimes that's hard when, you know, you're not a pastor to connect with a pastor. Yeah. But when you are and you're like, hey, I pastored for 20 years, a pastor's heart opens up and they say, Here's somebody I can talk to, here's somebody who understands my world a little bit. And so, with the combination of those two things, it makes it a natural shoe-in for me to be able to do my job well because of the ministry of both speaking and then just being a pastor.

SPEAKER_00 3:30

It's it's amazing. I and I just want to say, Jesse, how much you've encouraged me as a pastor. I mean, seriously, your your passion for the Lord, this isn't just a gig to you, and that comes across. I've met you a couple times now over the last two years, and and you've ministered in our church at first posier, and it just means a lot, brother. Um, so anyway, I'm grateful for you being willing to be used like that, you know, even as the Lord has kind of directed your steps all the way. Really, really cool. I do think it's been amazing, as global of a ministry as the Billy Graham ministry, right? I mean, just an incredible story in in Christian history and ministry for Franklin to step into that role, his family to be in that role. Um, I was in seminary with Will Graham. I saw that passion. I mean, it's it's real. It's it's not just a gig to them, it's a calling. But that's a global ministry. But one of the things I've appreciated, Jesse, and you've communicated this so well, is that they are so committed to the local church.

SPEAKER_01 4:27

That's right.

SPEAKER_00 4:27

Can you expand on that a little bit? What what that heart behind this global ministry, why the local church is so important to you guys.

SPEAKER_01 4:35

Yeah, well, there's a saying that we have within our ministry all the time that we say behind the scenes, and that is that God's plan A to reach the world is the local church. Okay. Well, that Samaritan's purse is in the local church. And so for us to assume that God's plan to reach the world would be anything but what he had already set out, the local church, would be foolish. Yeah. And so we know that that's his bride, that's his passion, that's his heart. And so for Samaritan's purse, we know that the best way to do God's work is God's way. And God's way is through the local church. And so whether it's domestic or international, everything that we do as an organization is always going to be through the local church. And so domestically, that looks like, for instance, Operation Christmas Child, you guys being a central drop-off.

SPEAKER_00 5:19

Right.

SPEAKER_01 5:20

You guys are the ones who are packing and collecting. And then we we we use that collection to take to our distribution centers, and then we're able to ship them. Now, when they land in another country, those are picked up by local church people who then take care of all the distribution, and that's where all of those children get the chance to hear the gospel is through local church settings. And so everything we do, disaster, international disaster, medical, everything has the church attached to it in some way. And here's why. At the end of the day, people are not going to remember Samaritan's Purse. They are going to remember the cross and they are going to remember the local church. Because when we're done and we move on to the next major crisis, what's left? Yeah. What's left is the pastors and the local church. Wow. And those are the people that we want them to know. These are here for you. These people are the ones that are going to do life with you.

SPEAKER_00 6:14

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 6:14

That's why we do it through the local church.

SPEAKER_00 6:16

Well, I just think it's really cool. I and I would say to any pastor watching or a staff member or even just somebody that's attending church going, wow, they really are. I've never once sensed, hey, you guys just kind of break away, we got this. It's more like, how do we help you? Yes. How do we help you do what God has called all of us as believers to do in it through his church? So anyway, man, just it's meant a lot to me. I've seen it up close in person over the years. Um, super, super cool. When people think about Samaritan's purse, can you just highlight, you know, maybe 40,000 square feet, 40,000 square feet, 40,000 feet, whatever, uh, in the air. What are what are all those programs or dynamics or avenues? I mean, I know there's a lot, but can you just kind of give somebody listening going, man, I didn't even know Samaritan's Purse did all that?

SPEAKER_01 7:00

Yeah, we do a lot of things. Matter of fact, last week I was just in Kenya being a part of some of these projects that we do. And so, you know, most people know Samaritan's Purse through Operation Christmas Job.

SPEAKER_00 7:09

Okay.

SPEAKER_01 7:10

Or if they're domestic here in the US, they know us through disaster relief. Yes. You know, they hear Franklin come on and talk about how we're responding. Yeah. You know, internationally, we have disaster relief. Internationally, we have uh our our our medical. Wow. We do a lot of medical work.

SPEAKER_00 7:24

That's a big deal.

SPEAKER_01 7:25

Absolutely. We do so much medical work around the around the world. Uh we have hospitals through Kenya, East Africa, we do a lot of work there. You know, in crisis places like when Israel and Gaza were in the middle of that conflict, we were there providing medical aid to both sides. When the Iraqi war had finished and we were in Mosul, we had a war, or excuse me, we had a hospital where we have ISIS fighters and women and children who have been wounded by those very ISIS fighters in the same hospital at the same time.

SPEAKER_00 7:54

Wow.

SPEAKER_01 7:55

And we love it because it gives us an opportunity to share the gospel to all people. Because the gospel is for all people. And so we do medical, we do um uh what we call wash projects. It's water uh sanitation, hygiene. Uh, when I was in Kenya, I got a chance to see some of the water filtration. You know, they have uh what they call water pads, and it's really just a big mud puddle that people are drinking out of. Wow. And they're carrying their water jugs around, and we know that that's creating bacteria and death and all kinds of things. So we go in and we not only provide water sanitation through our um through our filtration systems, but we also provide uh drills, or we we drill wells to provide water for people in addition to that. Uh, we do a lot of livelihood projects. So when I was in Kenya, and I I wish I had pictures to show you right now, sure. Uh we do like a goat project where we have we teach people how to rear goats, and that's gonna provide people not only uh uh milk, goat milk, but it's also gonna provide meat for them. And so we provide them with five females and one male. And then when they when their herds start to grow, then those people, after they learn how to grow their herd and take care of their herds, they now take five females and one male and they gift those to a neighboring tribe or a neighboring community. Wow. And they help them as well to learn how to rear goats. And so, I mean, just simple things like that. And so, whether it be chickens or whether it be goats or whether it be cows, we're trying to provide that. We also partner with organizations that help women and children, which is a major part of what we do. You know, they they suffer tremendously uh uh around the world, and so we try to come in and provide ways to teach women how to do agriculture, teach women how to cook, teach women how to sew, teach women how to run businesses, teach women how to do those kinds of things. And so that's a big part of what we do. And so, again, disaster relief nationally, internationally, Operation Christmas Child, uh, women's projects, livelihood projects. Um It's so many.

SPEAKER_00 9:48

I would I would I want to h highlight this for a minute, though, Jesse, because you know, in Bozier City we have Barksdale Air Force Base, which is the largest B-52 base in the world, uh, Global Strike Command, nuclear, you know, command center for Air Force around the globe. I mean, that's here, massive community. I did not know that Franklin had such a passion for the military, yeah, and Samaritas Purse has a specific ministry. Can you expand on that? I just thought this was awesome.

SPEAKER_01 10:12

Yeah, so Operation Heel are patriots, that's another piece of what we do. And so up in Alaska, we have a we have some land and we have some cabins and we have a retreat center, if you will, where we take military families, veterans, yeah, that are are really struggling in their marriages. Yeah, right. There's a lot of trauma that comes with active duty military when they come back. And again, I I'm not former military, but just being a part of listening to their stories. And we select families and couples and we take them up there for a retreat where we preach the gospel, uh, we help them with their marriages, we we counsel them, we coach them. And then when they're selected, we stay with them through the duration of their life. And so we provide counseling and coaching and and chaplaincy support for their whole families. And we do this with couples all around the world. And so 2012 is when we began this ministry. And we've taken over 2,000 couples through that. And we do marriage renewals, we do baptisms, they have salvations. It's a big part of what we do.

SPEAKER_00 11:09

Um you follow up with them beyond the retreat? Absolutely.

SPEAKER_01 11:13

So through that their whole life. Yeah. So we stay in contact with them, our chaplains are with them, check in in with them regularly. Yeah, many of them actually end up becoming leaders and become the people that are coaching and helping those other newer couples that come in. And so it's a growing, thriving ministry right now. Yeah. Um, I think it can be bigger, and I don't know Franklin's heart for it, but I know he's so bought into it. Yeah, I don't know where it's gonna be or how the Lord's gonna take it, but it's a big part of what we do.

SPEAKER_00 11:40

It's amazing. I I'm just saying, when people do think of Samaritan's Purse, I'm not sure that would have been, you know, at the top of their list of just awareness. So I just think thanks for taking some time. One of the things that I do, I would love for you to speak on this. Look, you've been a pastor, you've been a leader of a local church in ministry. Now you're in this this global, you know, amazing ministry. But one of the things I've appreciated, Jesse, is that Samaritan's Purse, it's not just, okay, we're giving a uh shoebox to a child. It's not just we rebuilt a home or a disaster. It is all about the gospel. I I just what I'm saying is I think there are some efforts around the world. I'm not saying they're they're you know bad motives or whatever, or they don't mean well, but they're gonna build something, they're going to give something, but they never share the gospel. I don't sense that with Severin's purse. You guys are very, very intentional. Can you unpack that for a moment?

SPEAKER_01 12:32

Yeah, and and I, you know, I've mentioned this to you just offline when we were running on the podcast, but Franklin says it this way he says we're an evangelistic organization that gets to do disaster relief, gets to do medical. That's a cool way to say that. Yeah. And he believes that. I mean, it is at the core of who he is as a person. Yeah. The gospel is the primary. That's why we do what we do. And so that's why our logo is a cross. That's why we say in Jesus' name. I mean, whether it's an airplane flying in with that on there or it's just a tarp.

SPEAKER_00 13:00

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 13:01

Everything that we do is about the gospel and we talk about it. You know, as a staff, we talk about the gospel on a regular basis. I mean, I'll go so far as to say this, and and I don't know if I'm supposed to say this, but I don't think it's anything secret.

SPEAKER_00 13:13

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 13:14

As a staff member, in order for me to be hired on, I had to be able to articulate how I can share the gospel with somebody else, even to be hired on. I love it. And so we can't even be on staff unless we can articulate how to share the gospel. And so it is what we do, it's it's who we are. You know, Franklin says this we have work to do, and we're gonna keep sharing the gospel until we can no longer do that.

SPEAKER_00 13:39

I love it.

SPEAKER_01 13:39

And so, even if we couldn't do disaster, even if we couldn't do any medical, even if we couldn't do any hygiene, even if we couldn't do any heart surgeries for children, we're not gonna stop sharing the gospel. Yeah. And that's really the essence of who we are.

SPEAKER_00 13:52

I just think it's, I mean, man, what a world in which we live. Yeah. And and and that's why I'm so excited for people to just even listen to this because it's like you guys are just in so many, God's opened so many doors, but that's the heart. And I just think God's honoring that, is what I'm saying. I think is because of that conviction. You always saw that with Billy Graham. Yeah. And obviously with Will out there preaching and all that, Will Graham, but obviously Franklin has carried that. I just think it's cool that it's woven into all that. And I just think that's a real great conviction in our times when some people say, Well, we just do good stuff. Well, it's good to do good stuff, yeah, but what are we pointing people to and what's the bridge? Yeah, you know. How can people engage with Samaritan's Purse? What does it look like for a church or an individual? Can you just kind of outline some of that? Yeah, there's lots of ways to engage.

SPEAKER_01 14:41

I think if if you're a church, we have we have partnering churches, sending churches, lighthouse churches, lots of different ways that you can partner, and a lot of that stuff you can find on our website, SamaritanPurse.org. Sure. You can find that out. But these are primary ways churches can can connect and engage with us. And so, you know, they're they're tiered. There's a lot of nuances to each one of those ways that they can connect with us. But as a volunteer or as a person, as an individual, our website has so many different ways. I mean, you can engage with Operation Christmas Child all year long. You can uh connect with uh uh disaster relief when there is a disaster right now. We have six deployments in the U.S. right now. The one in Enid, Oklahoma is a big one right now. 170 volunteers showed up yesterday. First day. Amazing. 150 of them right from the Air Force Base that was partially here. And so you can engage 15 or over, no skills required. You can just step in, we'll do the training for you, and you can help and serve. Um, there's year-round volunteering again with Operation Crystal Chow, seasonal at the processing centers with OCC. And then, of course, you got our Dart team, which is um, you know, they're they're people with unique skill sets that want to come on board and be more like a staff member. So they are still a volunteer, but they're they're kind of like the highest level volunteers. They're people that are doctors and and and nurses and optometrists and people that have unique skill sets that come on board and partner with us to do things both domestically and internationally. And so lots of ways of involvement.

SPEAKER_00 16:07

It's amazing. Jesse, you know, you've been doing this for seven and a half years. What's just a couple things that go, man, that is phenomenal. That fires me up. I've seen it internationally, I've seen it domestically. Just a couple things, man, as we kind of wrap up today, because it really is amazing. I can't thank you enough for your time today, man.

SPEAKER_01 16:26

Yeah, thank you. Uh, you know, I'm reminded of a story, and and it comes out of Ukraine. So we know in 2002 Ukraine war happens, Russia comes in and invades. We know the whole story. We don't hear about it much anymore because we're on to the next thing that's got the next crisis in Iran right now. So we're we move on. But there's still a major conflict that's happening there. Well, one of the stories, Kenny Isaac tells it, and he just wrote a book um uh Running into the Fire, phenomenal. I mean, mind-blowing. God used Kenny Isaacs more than anyone else in the entire organization to open doors and the opportunities for Samaritan's persons all over the globe. Absolutely worth the read if you want to know the story of Samaritan's.

SPEAKER_00 17:04

It's called Again Running to the Fire Into the Fire. Running into the fire.

SPEAKER_01 17:06

Kenny Isaacs, worth it. Okay, so Kenny tells a story to us, his staff, a couple of years back, and and he says, when he went, Ukraine war happens, and so we immediately call all of our network of pastors, and we have about 3,500 pastors, because that's been one of the churches or one of the cities, excuse me, one of the nations we've partnered with for longer with shoeboxes than anyone else. Okay. And so about 3,500 pastors. So he gets on the phone and he calls immediately. I need to get in country. We need to help, we want to do medical, we want to provide relief support, food, whatever we can do. And so they say, Well, you got to talk to a lawyer. There's a lot of litigation in Ukraine, it's very hard to do things, you gotta talk to a lawyer. Well, who should I talk to? They said, You gotta talk to this guy. So he flies in to Ukraine and he sits down with this lawyer, and they're talking and talking and talking, negotiating what this means. What do we want to do? How do we do this? What the government allows us to do, right? And so at the end of this discussion, there's always gonna be a conversation. How much is it gonna cost? Not because we're worried about it, God's gonna provide, but we don't know how to budget, how to allocate funds, you know how that works. And so he uh he's talking to the lawyer, and the lawyer stops as he asks that question and he looks Kenny dead in the eye, and he says to Kenny, he says, He says, When I was 14 years old, just a little kid. He said, There was a group of people that came and brought some boxes. And before they gave us these boxes, they shared a story about a man named Jesus Christ. And it was that day that I gave my heart to Jesus Christ, and that day I opened my shoebox and he says, and Jesus changed my life that day, and ever since I've been changed, he says, So as long as Samaritan's person wants to do anything in Ukraine, it won't cost them one single penny. Holy cow. Okay, so when I think of what gets me pumped, right? What gets me pumped up so good what God's doing in Samaritan's person, it takes me back to those kind of stories. Only God can align something 20 years ago. Some kid gets a shoebox and then ends up becoming the doorway for us to step into a nation to provide aid and relief. And so it's it's I think first of all, it's those kind of stories of God really, only the miraculous things God can do. That's right, first of all, and then second of all, what we touched on a few minutes ago, yeah, that we work through the local church. Wow. Have having been a pastor for a number of years, I have a heart for the church. I love the church, I believe that that's again God's plan for reaching the world. And knowing that we are so behind that, and that is the avenue at which we do our work, just makes me say, you know what, if I'm not preaching the gospel from week to week as a pastor, I want to be a part of an organization that is truly and and really preaching the gospel in more than 120 countries right now, today, and is really working through the local church.

SPEAKER_00 19:45

It's amazing. Jesse, I know you're busy. I know you you've just came back from an international trip. God's using you personally, but obviously organization's amazing. I I hope our listeners and viewers would just say, you know what, that's something that that the Lord's using in ways that we're not even, it's not even on our radar, man. But thank you for giving us some more insight, okay, to that. We are. We're praying for you, your family, um, you know, the organization. It's really, really cool, but thank you so much for being with us.

SPEAKER_01 20:13

Yeah, it's a pleasure to be here. Thank you, Pastor.

SPEAKER_00 20:15

Awesome, man. Well, thank you guys for connecting with us today on the Brian Jerkovich podcast. Can't wait till the next episode. Connect with you. Pray you've been encouraged today. Let's go make a difference for King Jesus.