Episode 10 - Mike Goforth

Join us for another episode of Worship. Grow. Follow. as we talk with Mike Goforth about life and ministry!

Transcript

SPEAKER_03 0:15

Welcome back to Worship Profilo, the podcast of Gillam Springs Baptist Church. My name's Jamie Pruitt. I'm the pastor at Gillam Springs, and it's a privilege for me to be here today with uh two great guys, and you will notice they have the same last name. Jake Goforth is our relatively new uh minister for media and missions. And uh we are so grateful today to have his dad Mike Goforth with us. Mike, thank you for being here.

SPEAKER_00 0:42

Thank you.

SPEAKER_03 0:43

We are so honored, thank you. We want to talk a little bit today about uh pastoral faithfulness, longevity and ministry. And so I did not come up with a list of questions. I just want to maybe see where the Lord takes this conversation. All right. But um I always love to hear people's stories. So tell me where you grew up and uh maybe how you came to know the Lord.

SPEAKER_00 1:07

All right. Uh I grew up down in Walker County. Really my dad was pastor for 50 years, and uh I went to school at Parish, Alabama, way down in Tornado Country.

SPEAKER_03 1:21

Yeah, yeah, I know where that is.

SPEAKER_00 1:24

I went there 10 years, and then my dad was working on the railroad plus pastoring, and the Lord called him full time at a church he was at, so my tenth grade year, between 10th and 11th, we changed schools and I went to Curry, Alabama on Smith Lake. Yeah. And uh I was a basketball player and played at Parish and now playing with a new team at Curry. Wow and we played each other. So anyway, that's that's uh where I grew up and I finished school at Curry and uh and then got married not long after high school and uh the Lord called me to preach. And uh I pastored in that area for a long time, and and of course now I've been here on Sand Mountain for last Sunday was 26 years. Oh wow.

SPEAKER_03 2:14

Now I do want to dig into that a little bit, but let's go back. Um was your dad already a pastor when you were born? Yes, so you never knew anything but being in a pastor's home.

SPEAKER_00 2:26

I grew up in a pastor's home, and uh my mom and dad, my mother was from Kentucky, and my dad was from Tennessee. Okay, and the railroad moved him to where we were, and he was working there, and uh, but he pastored by vocationally for a long time.

SPEAKER_03 2:41

Sure. Yeah, sure. You you are one of those that uh we joke about you had a drug problem as a kid, you got drugged to church.

SPEAKER_00 2:49

Never knew a Sunday when I wasn't in the Lord's house.

SPEAKER_03 2:51

And uh, you know, you know about living in the fish bowl, so to speak. Sure. Um, but my goodness, did that prepare you?

SPEAKER_00 3:02

Unlike a lot of preachers' kids, I enjoyed growing up in the church. Yeah. And the great experiences. My mom and dad were great folks, they're both in heaven now. But uh just a great example of what you ought to be. And uh my dad was a faithful pastor, and my mother was a faithful disciplinarian of our family. Yeah. I have uh two brothers and two sisters, so there were five of us, plus my mother and dad. Yeah. And uh grew up basically in two different churches growing up. My dad was a longtime pastor, and uh, we did not move around a whole lot. Yeah, and same thing with with us. I've been pastoring 46 years and pastored four churches.

SPEAKER_03 3:45

My goodness. So uh what a blessing. Just uh so let me go back and talk a little bit more about your dad. Okay. You did your dad bring church problems home?

SPEAKER_00 3:57

You know, he really didn't. Okay. He he uh I don't re ever remember that. Yeah. Matter of fact, when I started pastoring, uh the first funeral I had was the first funeral I ever attended. My goodness. Um my dad did not take us to funerals, that type thing. So early on in my ministry, I called my dad and said, I got a funeral, what do I what do I do? That's great.

SPEAKER_03 4:22

Yeah. You know, I think uh just as a minister myself, Ashley and I, we always wanted our kids to have a positive view of the church. And a full confession, I I feel very blessed. We we have had little problems like everywhere, right? But nothing significant, but still, we didn't talk about issues in front of our kids because we wanted them to grow up with a fondness for church. Sure. And like you, I'm blessed. You've got two boys in ministry, yes, and I've got two, three boys, two are in ministry on church staffs, and so I'm not I'm not attributing that success to you or me. I'm saying I think the Lord has been very kind that our kids were able to grow up and still love the church.

SPEAKER_00 5:07

Sure. Well, Jamie, I learned most of what I know about being a pastor from my dad. What a blessing. Just watching him, and yeah, and uh I was a kid in the family who was never gonna be a pastor.

SPEAKER_03 5:19

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 5:20

And uh told them that all the way through school, and I was the only one in the pastor in the family who was a pastor. Oh wow. But I learned a lot from my dad, and uh, he was an old school pastor. If uh somebody was sick, he went to visit them and spent a lot of time in the hospitals, that type of thing, and I've done that through the years too.

SPEAKER_03 5:39

Yeah, it actually works.

SPEAKER_00 5:41

It does work.

SPEAKER_03 5:42

My wife's dad uh is 90 today. Wow, and he spent um 30 plus years on the mission field, always wanted to pastor a little country church in South Alabama.

SPEAKER_00 5:54

Right.

SPEAKER_03 5:54

And when they retired, he came home, he pastored a little church in the country. He was at one for 18 years, and by then he's in his 80s. And we thought, well, I guess he'll retire. He's still he's pastoring another church, a family church, and uh they'll gather, they'll have 20 plus, but he's driving 45 minutes there, 45 minutes back. He's up there on Fridays and Saturdays going to visit people, sometimes door to door. Yeah, and uh most of the folks on this field now know him as Uncle Pete. You know, he's a he's a relative, but still he's in the home sharing the gospel, yeah. And uh those simple things they really do work. They do.

SPEAKER_00 6:33

And a lot a lot of it's about relationships for sure, which never goes out of style, does it?

SPEAKER_03 6:38

Building relationships. So you learn from your dad. Uh your dad had the challenge of being bivocational, and perhaps a blessing and a curse. True. But seeing him juggle that, yeah, what lessons did you learn in that?

SPEAKER_00 6:52

I learned uh I played ball a lot in school, and my dad was always working. He worked on the railroad and then got home, he did church work. So um I was in a tenth grade of high school before my dad ever saw me play ball. Wow. My my mom carried me everywhere I went to play ball. And uh uh so when he went full time, he took time to follow me around and support my ball playing, that type of thing. And uh but I learned uh as important as the church work is, my family came first. Yeah. And uh you can ask Jake if they were playing ball, I was there. Yeah, and uh and I still do that with our grandkids, you know. That's that's just part of to me if you lose your family, you've lost everything.

SPEAKER_01 7:40

Absolutely, absolutely. I do remember you always being there, definitely.

SPEAKER_03 7:45

What a blessing. I um that's one of the reasons I wanted to come back to the local church.

SPEAKER_04 7:50

Right.

SPEAKER_03 7:51

I had a season where I worked for our state convention and I didn't miss a lot, but I traveled a lot. I I was I was never with my family on Sunday. I was always preaching somewhere else. Right. And um a lot of weeknights I'd be on the road somewhere in Alabama or across the country if we were doing something. Um and I really missed that. And that's what family dynamic was an issue that brought me back to the local church.

SPEAKER_00 8:17

Right. Well, with us, we if we did anything at the church, we include our kids in it. Yeah. You know, we did a lot of mission stuff, and uh every one of my kids grew up doing mission work and uh going with us. Yeah, and uh some strange reason they're doing that today. How about that? You know, that's very important. But I learned that from my dad, and uh my dad was was a great pastor. He was to I I've said this to him, he's a better pastor than he was a preacher. Yeah. I mean he could preach, but he did not uh preach expositorily and uh you know the way I like to preach today. Yeah. Uh but you know, nothing unusual to see him sitting on somebody's front porch in the afternoon, yeah, talking to them and that type of thing, visiting and uh so I learned a lot from him.

SPEAKER_03 9:05

So you uh you finished high school there in Walker County. I finished high school. When did you surrender the ministry? Tell me again.

SPEAKER_00 9:12

Uh we got out of high school. Donna and I married. I've been dating Donna in high school. Yeah. And uh when I was 19 and she was 18, we got married. Yeah. And uh we decided both of decided we're not going to school. We're going to work. So uh I got married on Friday night, and I went to work in underground coal mines on Monday morning.

SPEAKER_03 9:33

Okay. Like you do.

SPEAKER_00 9:34

And I worked there for 10 years until the mine shut down. But after when I was about twenty, the Lord started dealing with me. She and I were doing youth work in a church. The Lord started dealing with me about preaching. So uh at one youth camp, I answered a call to preach. Really? And uh and then at at twenty one I made myself available, you know, to pastor somewhere. And I started pastoring my first church at twenty-two. Yeah. And uh was ordained at twenty two, and pastored a little church down between Jasper and and uh parish. And first Sunday we were there, there were 19 people there. So I stayed with them for about three years or so. Yeah. And uh and then my dad was pastoring a church over at Lynn, Alabama, and uh he had been full-time for several years, and he was getting retirement age, so he wrote the railroad and asked them, he still liked about five or six years finishing his retirement, could I come back to work and where I could finish my retirement? They hired him the next day. Really? And uh he was pastoring church at Lynn, so somehow I ended up at Lynn as pastor when he left. Yeah. So I followed him, and uh, they were church about probably about a hundred when we went there. I was there for four years, and uh and then a church across the county at Arley, Alabama, down on Smith Lake. Yeah, uh right across the lake from where I I finished school, called me, and uh and uh I stayed there 13 years. Really?

SPEAKER_03 11:10

That's where I was born. In Arle? Yeah. How wonderful.

SPEAKER_00 11:13

And and the church there, small, small town, right on Smith Lake. And uh when we went there, they were running about 90 people, and after 13 years they were running about 300 in Sunday school, so it really grew. And then uh the church where I am now called me and I went there and uh never dreaming I'd stay there 26 going on 27 years, but but that's was the Lord's plan.

SPEAKER_03 11:40

The important piece of this story that I did not address earlier, but this has come up. Tell me about your family. You married right out of high school, you met Donna.

SPEAKER_00 11:52

Right. We had after a couple of years of being married, we had Heather, who uh is our first child, and uh she is married to a pastor who's at a church in Albertville, okay, uh Patrick White. And uh and then not long after that, maybe a year and a half after that, Zach was born. Okay. And uh Zach is on staff at Enan Baptist over in Morris. Yeah, and uh he's associate pastor over there, staff and doing their mission, foreign mission work. And then uh uh Holly was born, and uh and then our baby Big Jake. Yeah, the baby, big Jake.

SPEAKER_03 12:33

Yeah, save the best for last, is what they say, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 12:37

They stopped trying after that. Well they just got it so right, man.

SPEAKER_00 12:42

What you talking about? Oh all of our kids, thank the Lord, all of our kids are living for the Lord and praise the Lord and working in the church, and uh Holly's uh story is kind of difficult. She she married a young man from Romania, yeah, and we met on a mission field, and uh and then they they got married here uh at Boaz. They he actually came here, they were married, and uh they were married about eight years, and he was tragically killed in a car wreck. And uh they had they had uh Katie who was five at the time, and uh they had Benjamin who was four, and Holly was expecting a third child. Oh my goodness. And uh she was almost nine months pregnant when Paul got killed in a car wreck. So um they stayed with us a few weeks after that happened, and uh seventeen days after that uh terrible accident, little Nadia was born. And uh that's been almost thirteen years ago. Really, and the Lord's been so faithful. She Holly's married again, her husband is the principal at Hartsell High School. Yes. And uh and Paul was uh great Christian, young man. He was just about to go to uh Brazil on a mission trip with with Zach, my oldest son, and a man from our church in in uh April, and uh he got killed before that time. So long story short, they they uh started a ministry out of our church called Amazon Hope. Okay, and uh we're starting to partner with them this year. Yeah, and they they uh they actually bought a boat in Brazil, a boat that's about 75 foot long and sleeps about thirty people. Yeah. And uh this last year they did 20 trips down the Amazon River to jungle villages. And uh the guy who was over that is Ty Harris, who used to coach football at Sardis, and he's retired now, but he's still doing Amazon Hope. And uh he named the boat after my son-in-law and Paul Marion because he was going. So now uh I guess it's okay to just tell you the rest of the story. Absolutely. Well uh Katie is uh freshman at Jackville State. Yeah, Benjamin is a senior in high school at Hartsville, he's uh just about to go to Alabama and hopefully be in a million dollar band.

SPEAKER_03 15:18

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 15:19

And little Nadia is about 12 years old now, and uh best little athletes you've ever seen. Really? He can play softball and volleyball. Anyway, that's that's part of the story. About three years ago, I took Benjamin and Katie with me on the Amazon River on a mission trip. I wanted them to go and go on missions in their dad on their dad's boat, named after him. Well, Katie was in high school, and you know, on the Amazon River you don't have Wi-Fi, you don't have a bunch of stuff. And so she didn't know whether she was supposed to go or not. But I I helped raise funds and took both of them, and I just said, Katie, you and Benjamin are going with me. We got on the boat and um we were going down the river, and there was a big barge that pulled up beside us. Now her name is Katie Marin, and on the side of this barge, there the name of the company was K, a big K Marin on the side of the barge. She comes running up on the front of the boat and says, they call me Pops. She said, Pops, look at that boat, it's got my name on it. It's going down the river. And just about that time there was a rainbow that came over the sky in front of that boat. And I said to her, Katie, what what other sign do you need to know you're supposed to be here? That's right. And uh she was there, and Benjamin was there. We went next year. I carried Benjamin back by himself, and we went to an indigenous tribe. We went 35 hours down the river and uh had to get permission from the Brazilian government, and went in there. No American had ever been there, nobody had ever been there to share the gospel. And uh, you know, it's one of those things. I'm the biggest guy on the trip, so I I've jokingly told our people I don't know if they're gonna listen to us or if they're gonna cook us when we go when we go in there, you know.

SPEAKER_03 17:07

But we went in a few days off of somebody our side of the room, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 17:12

That's the truth. Anyway, there were 3,000 people in the village. We went door to door, and uh in three days we we led 300 people to the Lord. Wow. And uh Benjamin shared a room with me, and uh uh it just set him on fire. I mean, it really set him on fire. One night uh I woke up about 11 o'clock. I'd been asleep a couple hours and and uh checked on him and he wasn't in the bed. So if you're going on the Amazon River, you think, where's my grandson?

SPEAKER_03 17:41

He had gotten up, wandered over the side.

SPEAKER_00 17:44

Well, I got up, got my flashlight, went in the back of the boat, out the room and out of the back of the boat, and there he sat at the table with his Bible and his flashlight reading the Bible. And uh anyway, we came home the next week, and after a week he called me and he said, Pops, I need to talk to you. And I said, Okay. And uh so I drove over to Hartzall where they live, and he said, I've been to youth camp this week, and I just want you to be the first to know I've answered the call to the ministry. And uh so he he's very faithful to do that, and uh he's a very talented musician. Yeah, he plays uh plays the snare drum, plays this year he played the quads in the band. Yeah, he plays a piano, plays a keyboard, plays a guitar. He's just very talented. And he said to me, I don't know whether the Lord wants me to preach or if the Lord wants me to do music, I don't know. But I want you to know my guess is on the table.

SPEAKER_03 18:39

That's great.

SPEAKER_00 18:40

So I don't know, still don't know what what he's doing, but I I know I know in Alabama he's he's been down there, he uh he's lined up to go, and he also went to Jack State to their date, and somehow two pastors from one from Tuscaloose and one from Jack State invited him to lunch. Really? And uh both of them ask him, if you come to college here, would you could we hire you to play the drums for our church?

SPEAKER_01 19:07

Okay, I'm sure it was Britain Latham. I think it was Church of the Oaks.

SPEAKER_00 19:12

Yeah, it's Church of the Oaks. That's probably where he's going. Well when it goes to it.

SPEAKER_03 19:16

We partner with him.

SPEAKER_00 19:17

Yeah, so his church, uh Central Baptist Indicator, also partners with him. So that's what's happening there.

SPEAKER_03 19:24

That's exciting. So that's three grandkids. There's a there's a difficult story there. I want to come back to that.

SPEAKER_00 19:31

And and then Zach, oldest son, has three girls and a boy.

SPEAKER_03 19:35

Okay, so that's uh I hate math. That's seven. That's seven.

SPEAKER_00 19:39

And then I know this one, and this one here went to Hungary and adopted three girls.

SPEAKER_03 19:44

And they're wonderful.

SPEAKER_00 19:46

They're wonderful.

SPEAKER_03 19:47

We love those girls. They're our granddaughters, without a doubt.

SPEAKER_00 19:51

So there's ten of us. So so my grandkids went from seven to ten in one day. What a blessing. Oh it's good.

SPEAKER_03 19:58

Lord's been good to you with your faith.

SPEAKER_00 19:59

No, no doubt.

SPEAKER_03 20:00

So we see in that um the just the legacy, yeah, the generational faithfulness, and um so so now with your dad and yourself and your kids, and now your grandson has said yes to ministry. So that's four generations. What a blessing.

SPEAKER_00 20:17

It's it's uh it's a blessing to me. And uh just something I'm humble mind is thank the Lord for.

SPEAKER_03 20:24

Let me go back and ask a question about uh that tragedy that your family endured. One of the things we often talk about in ministry is you know, we live in a fishbowl. Yeah. And so just living transparently in front of our people when hard seasons come. True. Tell me what was it like walking through the loss of uh son-in-law and and helping your daughter while you've got hundreds and multiplied thousands of people that are aware and watching. What's that like walking through a tragedy?

SPEAKER_00 20:59

Very very difficult. First Sunday, we uh, you know, Paul's parents lived in Romania, and uh so we have to get them here for the funeral. Yeah. His uh brother and his wife and his mama dad. First Sunday, we this happened on Friday, so we didn't go to church on Sunday, but we our church program is on the radio live each Sunday. So all of our family gathered around our kitchen table listening to the program. And uh Brother Dale Johnson, a lot of people would know him. He owns a drugstore, was also our chairman and deacons. He came on the radio in the service and talked about Paul and what Paul had meant to our church. And he had come here and become a deacon at Sardis, yeah, just faithful young man, and uh and then they prayed for us and then they took up an offering. Yeah, and they just a spur of the moment, they took up $16,000 to pay for his family to come here. So that that was you know heart helpful to us really. Uh but then we found out people were watching us. A couple of years after all this happened, I had one of our our families tell me, Brother Mike, the whole church was watching you to see how you would react when something bad happens to uh somebody in the ministry. And I never thought about that. You know, I just thought about we gotta make it through this. And uh, you know, we were at home and people were coming by the house very regularly those first few days, and uh and the Lord was just faithful. I mean, just very faithful and gave me things to preach, and we all as a church walked through that. You know, that was that was thirteen years ago. And I will just say this that event more than anything concreted us at the church at Sardis. We walked through that together and uh and that mission stuff came out of there. Plus Paul's church in Romania we we took 30 trips to Romania and started about 13 or 14 churches there and helped churches and uh so you know we have Romanian grandkids and we have family there, and we have churches we've helped there, and then to work to go to Brazil, and literally thousands of people have been saved through the ministry of Amazon Hope off the boat that's named after Paul. So what the Lord did was took some terrible, terrible days, worst thing ever happened to us, and made something beautiful out of it. Yeah. I mean, just just to this day, made something beautiful.

SPEAKER_03 23:56

The things he alone could do.

SPEAKER_00 23:58

That's true. And uh we we laugh about it because uh our oldest son and Ty were going with another church from Prattville. Zach was on staff of the church in Prattville at the time. Yeah, they were going with them on the Amazon River, and uh Ty came back to my office and said, We're having to pay a lot of money to go on these other trips. It was close to four thousand dollars at the time. Yeah. He said, I want to do something to make it available to people to go cheaper to go share the gospel. And he said, What do you think about me starting an organization and buying a boat? Now I'm I'm a pretty low-level guy. I said, Ty, I think you're crazy. That's what I told him. Pessimist, the word live for is pessimist. Yeah, yeah. Pessimist. That's what my kids say. Yes. I'm a realist, but they say I'm a pessimist. I got you.

SPEAKER_03 24:50

So I've got children in my life.

SPEAKER_00 24:52

He didn't listen, so we got him a board of directors, and they bought the boat, and it's going good.

SPEAKER_03 24:58

And the rest is his.

SPEAKER_01 24:59

What about the guy who started Tigers for Tomorrow? Yeah. He can't do anything small. Okay.

SPEAKER_00 25:04

So a couple years after that, after they bought the boat, still paying for the boat, he comes back in my office and he said, Brother Mike, didn't talk to you. Okay. And uh he said, I've been thinking about starting a thrift store in Boaz to help pay for Amazon Hope. And I said, Well, he said, What do you think about that? I said, Do you remember what I told you about that boat? Yeah, I remember. I said the same thing. Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 25:30

So uh Man, I'm grateful for that thrift store, but I go buy shoes over there.

SPEAKER_00 25:35

He went ahead and started a thrift store. More than one now. Then he came back and said, I'm thinking about starting another one at Gunnersville. And I said, Remember what I told you about that other one? That's the same thing. And then he went up into Kentucky. A church went with him on a mission trip on the boat, and they called him and said, We want to start a thrift store in Kentucky. Wow. And what we make off of it, we're gonna give to Amazon Hope.

SPEAKER_03 25:58

So I had not heard that.

SPEAKER_00 25:59

Now there's three stores supporting that things. And now now they're trying to raise money to have a new boat built. Okay. Talking about one and a half million dollars. Yeah. And uh what they're wanting to do, we do medical clinics and they're wanting to build a medical clinic on the boat. Yeah. We go now, we have to carry all that stuff, hand carry it into the villages, but he wants to have it on the boat. The people come to the boat, get on the boat, and go to the medical clinic, it's all set up. So that's that's where they are now. They have a full crew on the boat, you know, they have to pay the salary for all that. So uh even though it's not our church doing it, it's birthed out of our church, and we support it all a whole lot.

SPEAKER_03 26:46

That's great. Let's go back to um Walker County. Okay. You surrendered, you surrendered to the ministry there, having watched your dad. Yeah. And your first church take us back there.

SPEAKER_00 26:59

Okay. Went to a small church, and uh I was green as a gourd. I was twenty-two years old. I had two deacons there. Okay. One was 81, one was 82, and I was 22 years old.

SPEAKER_03 27:13

Did those two deacons have opinions about anything? About everything.

SPEAKER_00 27:19

And the church never did any missions. I mean, never. And uh while I was there, I went one time. Our state convention was was doing some revivals, simultaneous revivals up in Pennsylvania. Yeah. And uh they asked anybody that'd like to go, so I asked my church about going. They they actually flew me up first time I ever got on an airplane. How about that? Drove up there and preached, and uh that's about all the missions we did. Sure. The next church.

SPEAKER_03 27:45

Hang on. How long were you at that church? I was there three and a half years.

SPEAKER_00 27:48

Three and a half years. We grew we grew from 19 to we were on about 75. That's correct. When I left. And it was just we did start a van ministry, we were picking up kids and bringing them.

SPEAKER_03 27:58

But everything was new. Preaching was new, visiting was I know you'd seen your dad do it. Yeah. But now it's on you.

SPEAKER_00 28:05

It was, and the Lord placed me in Walker County in a coal mine with 900 men working there. Yeah. And uh about half the church people we reached were coal miners. What a blessed. So we were in that village, and they were, you know, I was seeing them at work and seeing them in the village, and uh and uh what were you what were you doing at this time?

SPEAKER_03 28:25

Because you were not full time at this church. I was working in the mines. You were in the mines, that's right. You told me that.

SPEAKER_00 28:30

I was working six days a week in the mines, and so you had pastoring.

SPEAKER_03 28:34

You had a mission field really I did work.

SPEAKER_00 28:37

Placed me right there. And uh, you know, I was working before we married, I was working putting in heat and air conditions. Oh, really? And uh making about three dollars an hour. Sure.

SPEAKER_03 28:48

And uh the Sunday before That used to be good money.

SPEAKER_00 28:50

I'm just yeah, I heard you chuckle, but the Sunday before before we got married, the superintendent of the mines went to church with us where my dad pastored. Yeah. So I went by him and said to him, if you have any openings in the mines, I sure would appreciate if you'd remember me. And it was hard. Nobody got on the mines. I mean, it's it's it's hard work, one thing, but it most of the time two years to get a job. Yeah. Before that week was out, he called me on the phone on Thursday night and he said, We had six guys going to work this weekend. One of them has failed as physical. Wow. If you want that job, if you'll be at the mines in the morning.

SPEAKER_03 29:27

Then you were saying, Well, I'm still on my honeymoon.

SPEAKER_00 29:30

No, I was getting married that night.

SPEAKER_03 29:33

Okay, all right.

SPEAKER_00 29:34

So I said, I'll be there.

SPEAKER_03 29:35

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 29:36

I went to the mines, went through the test, all that stuff, stayed there all day long, got home just in time to put on my suit and go get married.

SPEAKER_03 29:44

So you worked that Friday, did you guys?

SPEAKER_00 29:47

Well, I was at I did not work. I went there to fill out applications.

SPEAKER_03 29:51

But you were there all day long.

SPEAKER_00 29:54

And then and then uh we married, and uh, of course, we didn't, you know, we didn't go on a big trip anyway. We went to Decatur, Alabama, or it's a very popular honeymoon spot. We went there and I'll never I'll never forget it. A hotel room was $19 what it what it cost. We'd planned to stay a couple of nights. After the first night, we had an empty house where we were going to live. I told my wife, I said, Man, we can save that $19, let's just go home. That's right. So we went we went home, and uh the following Monday I went to work in the coal mines. My goodness. And uh and then not long after that, I answered a call to preach.

SPEAKER_03 30:31

So you're pastoring the church, you're working in the mines, everything's new. How did you begin to work into a rhythm that was sustainable for you? Preaching, visiting. How'd you do that? First church.

SPEAKER_00 30:43

Uh I was just flying by the seat of my pants. Sure. And uh, you know, I'd watch my dad, so I did what my dad did. And uh and he he taught me how to preach that type thing, you know, going over notes with me and that type thing. Yeah. And uh when he passed away, I inherited all his library, which is you know really good. Absolutely. And uh and then I went to pastor church that he was pastoring. Yes. So And you were there how long? I was there for five years, almost five years, four and a half years. Still by vocational. Still by vocational. While I was there, uh the mine shut down. Okay. All right, they it shut down on Friday, 900 men out of work in one day. Yeah. And uh so I went to church the next Sunday, met with my deacons, and jokingly said to them, I think the Lord's telling me I won't need to be full-time. Yeah. And uh they said, deal. Wow. So I went from working in the mine seat to working in the church full time.

SPEAKER_03 31:44

Now that listen, I commend you for your boldness, but now that was a step of faith for them. It was because they'd never had a full-time pastor. And it was at a time where many of their folks would have been out of work. True. So that was a step of faith in multiple ways.

SPEAKER_00 31:57

It it was, and they helped me go to seminary. Okay. I went to New Orleans Seminary in Huntsville. Okay. Me and three other guys drove up there for like four years and went to school, worked our way through, and uh, and then after after I'd been there five years, the church had Harley came to to do that. And then I I went ahead and and finished my bachelor's and and uh then I went to uh online school. Yeah. And I got a master's in uh pastoral counseling. Okay. And Brother Jamie, to be honest with you, the reason I chose that master's that was the weakest area I had. Okay. I said, I'm gonna if I'm gonna do it, I'm gonna make it do something, you know, it'll help me. And then when I got through with that, they had a doctorate program you could do at your own pace. Yeah. And um, I'll tell you how long ago it was, I was doing on cassette tape. Yeah. So uh I did my church work at the at the new church I went to, and I set up at at night till one or two o'clock in the morning. Wow. Working at while these kids were all small. Well pastoring church, going to school. I remember that. I don't know if you didn't realize, but I remember that.

SPEAKER_03 33:11

See him working at the kitchen table and dining room table.

SPEAKER_00 33:14

I'd see it in the and those two churches, those two churches I pastored paid for my education. Well, how the blessing.

SPEAKER_03 33:20

So uh now the transition from bivocational to full time was not really full time very long because you were still doing school. Right. That demanded a whole day traveling to Huntsville to finish your bachelor's. Uh, but did it get easier?

SPEAKER_00 33:38

It really didn't get easier until Say it again for those sitting in the back. Until I finished it.

SPEAKER_03 33:43

Yeah. Okay.

SPEAKER_00 33:45

I finished it. And when we were at at Arleigh over on Smith Lake, little little town, little 1A school, uh, I learned something about getting involved with the school. Yeah. Did a chaplaincy with the football team, yeah, and did a lot with fifth quarters at the church and that type of thing. And we reached a lot of kids. Sure. I mean a lot of teenagers.

SPEAKER_03 34:08

And uh and then Was the church excited about that? Yeah. Seeing that younger generation. No doubt. Absolutely. No doubt.

SPEAKER_00 34:15

Very, very good thing. And then the Lord, I I can look back on it and know the Lord was preparing me for where I am now. Because we're across the street from a 5A high school. Oh wow. And uh the principal's one of our members. The middle school's next door to that, that principal's our chairman of the deacons. Yeah. And uh uh the late, the the man who does Amazon Hope, his wife is a principal at one of the elementary schools. Okay. And then there's another elementary school there. So uh we have an open door in the schools. Yeah. And since I've been there, we are doing a uh we call it Bible 101. Yeah. We go on Thursdays to the middle school with our church vehicles, and uh they sign them up at the first school. It's all through school for an hour every Thursday. We teach middle schoolers the Bible. Really? They're on campus. And we transport them to our church.

SPEAKER_03 35:08

Okay, to your church, gotcha.

SPEAKER_00 35:09

We're we're a mile away from transport them there. Last year, first time we had 26 students. And uh the craziest thing, we thought it'd be a bunch of girls, all 26 of them were boys. Wow. And this year we've started it back that the parents have to sign off on it. This year we've got 46 students. Wow. And we're walking through the Bible with those kids, and we've had first year we had six kids come to know the Lord. This year we've had 15 out of that class. Oh exciting. And uh our youth guy, our youth guy's teaching it. Good. Uh it's funny. I I go as a mean old pastor and drive the bus for them and go packing. I've got my pistol in my pocket and uh protect them while we're on you know on the property. And uh, but it's a great thing. We've got about I think 12 or 13 of our people who volunteer to come be table monitors every Thursday. What a great ministry. And uh we found out there are seven counties in Alabama doing that through through Christians ministries. Yes. They provide the books and Bibles and uh so we're we're learning as we're going.

SPEAKER_03 36:14

That's great. How long were you at Arleigh again? Thirteen years?

SPEAKER_00 36:18

I was there thirteen years.

SPEAKER_03 36:20

Uh what was the biggest challenge? You have um you finished your bachelor's, you're you're doing your ongoing master's and doctoral work when you're there. Right. Um church is growing. What what's the biggest challenge you faced in those years?

SPEAKER_00 36:37

Biggest, biggest challenge, Brother Jamie, I had I was I was a single staff. Oh, yeah. I was a pastor and that that was all we had. So during those years, we I learned to uh I hired some staff who were all bivocational. Yeah. Had a children's minister, a youth minister, uh, senior adult minister, and a minister of music. They were all part-time. And looking back over all the years, probably the best staff I ever had. Really? And they were they were all doing it part-time. Yeah. Uh but the Lord just blessed it and everybody worked together. And we started from that experience at that church. I learned to do missions.

SPEAKER_03 37:19

Okay. Um what was the first trip?

SPEAKER_00 37:22

We had, we had, I went with my dad a couple of times on some home mission trips, but we had a guy named Rick Ingle, who's full-time evangelist, and uh he's been here at your church when Brother Max was here. He came, he came uh highly recommended to me, so I had him come. And at the end of the week, he said to me, next week, uh, no, next month, we've got I think he said 30 people going to Romania. And uh we've got six pastors, and one of them had to cancel out. I was carrying him back to the airport, and he said, uh, if you would go, I would talk to your church about sending you. That's why he's with me in revival. I'd never been out of the country. Yeah, and uh so he he uh told me that, and I said, Well, Brother Rick, if you can get them to pay for my trip, I'll go. So that's exactly what happened. I went with him with a couple from South Carolina was doing the trip. Yeah, and this couple was a very wealthy couple, they owned Quincy's restaurant chain all over the southeast.

SPEAKER_03 38:32

Big East Rose.

SPEAKER_00 38:34

Yeah, and and then they owned Ryan's restaurant chain, both of those. Wow. So I agreed to go with them, and we were lined up to go, and about a month before we went, the husband of that couple had heart surgery and passed away on the table. So it left his wife doing that trip. Well, we went ahead with her and did the trip. After that first year, she said to me, Brother Mike, I'd like to go again next year. Would you come and help me do the trip? And I thought about it, prayed about it. I said, Sure, I'll I'll do that. So went the next year. Yeah. And then after that, she said, they'd been going a long time. They had the ministry started. She said, I'm through through going. Would you take over the ministry? No, or so the next year I had 25 people go, nine pastors went, and uh, we started, and uh and then 30 trips later we I was gonna say, Mike, you started, you never stopped.

SPEAKER_03 39:31

Yeah, you have a wonderful reputation at doing missions and leading there.

SPEAKER_00 39:35

When we first went to Romania, it was early 90s, they had been under communism for 45 years, and when we went there, uh they had just overthrown their government over and and put the the uh dictator to death. Chautescu. You could take a Bible and stand on a street corner, start preaching with a translator, and a hundred people would come gather around you. Wow. And and uh just amazing things happened like that. First year I did the trip by myself. Um the communist government met in a large town up in Clues. They met in a building, and of course they're out of business now. Uh so the churches got together and rented that communist hall for us to have a meeting in. First night I stood to preach, there were 1,100 people in that communist hall, looking in the windows, looking in the doors, every seat full, people being saved. And then I got invited to come into the prisons and preach. And I preached in the ladies' prisons and the men's prisons all over Romania. And uh some of them were maximum security prisons. Yeah. And uh so the doors were open there, and uh and then I went a couple of trips too much and got a son-in-law out of the deal, and uh carried every one of my kids one at a time. Sure. And uh they can tell you that's that was uh uh a great thing for our family.

SPEAKER_03 41:02

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 41:03

And uh and then from that we came to Sardis, and uh Sardis brother Max was a pastor there, same guy that was here, Max Frodo. He preceded you. He was there, there was one guy, one guy in between us. Okay, uh he was there 14 years, and they were doing a little home mission stuff, but no foreign mission stuff. The first year I was there we had three people go, me and two men. And last year we had 140 people go on mission trips. Wow. Different trips. So the church has has uh bought into missions, yeah, and we have doubled in size over the years.

SPEAKER_03 41:40

What a blessing.

SPEAKER_00 41:41

And what I found out once a mission stuff got going on, that's the center of what we're doing. Yeah, it's not what color the walls, what color's carpet, and all that stuff.

SPEAKER_03 41:52

So 26 years you're just celebrated. So that's what we really we want to talk about, longevity and mission in uh ministry with you. How how do you stay at a church 26 years, brother? Well now you you touched on one factor, you keep the main thing, the main thing.

SPEAKER_00 42:05

Yeah, that's true. You get your people doing that keeps their eyes on the Lord instead of difficulties. Yeah. And plus the Lord taught me at at Sardis, the Lord taught me a great lesson, greatest lesson I've ever learned. He taught me, I am not in a hurry. You don't need to be in a hurry to get the work done. And uh everywhere I'd been, I'd say, let's do it, let's do it, let's do it, and we'd jump on it. Sardis is is known for taking their time. Yeah. I mean, we just we just today finished a bus building for our buses. We planned that for five years. Yeah. Just to build a garage. Sure. Um but the the Lord just shared with me, I'm not in a hurry, so you don't need to be in a hurry. Yeah. And uh, you know, in our convention, pastors move every couple of years, and I learned to know who the people were, and then the difficulty happened through the son-in-law dying, sure. And uh that tied us together, and then we walked together through some stuff. We built a new family life center and different things, and uh just uh I just learned there are certain things that aren't hills to die on. Sure. And uh just keep the main thing the main thing, and I've loved the people and they've loved me.

SPEAKER_03 43:26

And that's uh tell me uh whatever comes to your mind the best things about a long-term pasture.

SPEAKER_00 43:33

All right. That's easy.

SPEAKER_03 43:35

Okay.

SPEAKER_00 43:36

Um all through the years we do mission work, especially in the summertime, sure, where families go. Yeah. We encourage them to come and take your kids as home mission trips. Now those kids have grown up and they've been doing missions their whole life. We've got about I think it's twelve kids down in Auburn right now. Yeah. Who grew up doing missions. So they're going to church at Auburn, they're going to school at Auburn and they're going to church at different different churches. Well, guess what they're doing? They do missions. They're doing missions with their churches. And then they're coming back home, they're getting married, and they're having kids, and they want to know, Brother Mike, where are we going on mission this year? And to watch them grow up doing that, and to watch their kids grow up doing that, it's more, to me, it's more than just building a church. You're helping build families. Sure. Because those kids grow up, unlike a lot of other kids, who don't have a clue. They grow up knowing what they're going to be doing in their life. Wherever the Lord places them to work, they're just going to be doing missions for the Lord. Even though they're working somewhere else. That's correct. And now I'm there's a young man whose name is Drew Johnson. His dad is a doctor at Sardis, Evan Johnson. When I got to Sardis, the first week I was there, we got there on a weekend, on Tuesday night, he was born. Wow. At the hospital in Boaz. The first visit I made was to see his mama and him. My goodness. Last week, when we celebrated 26 years, I sent him a text message that said, Happy birthday. I know it's your birthday because I've been here the whole time. And he said, Well, I'm glad you're here as my pastor. You're the only pastor I've ever had. My word. And uh the Lord just shared with me, there are a lot of kids grown up. And your preaching has been the thing they've heard week after week after week. Yeah. And that's a blessing. It is a blessing. And now they're getting married and having kids of their own. I love that. That's really good. And you know, you see them, and now some of them are becoming deacons who were babies when I was there, and you see them grow, and that's a great thing.

SPEAKER_03 45:51

That is good.

SPEAKER_00 45:51

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 45:52

Tell me about a challenge. Is it hard to stay somewhere 26 years? Now I know churches have personalities. I know seasons of our own lives, but when we first went there, yeah, uh the church was not good.

SPEAKER_00 46:06

Okay. First went there, they'd had they'd had a young pastor who that ended up bad. He had to leave. And uh nothing he did bad. He just pushed them too quick.

SPEAKER_03 46:18

And uh I hear they like to move slowly on the ball. They do like to move slowly. That's the rumor.

SPEAKER_00 46:23

Yeah. After I was there about ten years, I guess, one of the guys who was a friend with a young pastor came in and uh he opened his Bible and he said, I want to ask you something. I said, Okay, he said, here's a list this pastor had of things he wanted to do. And uh he said, We got crossways with some of this stuff. And he said, Brother Mike, since you've been here out of those ten things, we've done nine of them. He said, Tell me how you did nine things that we couldn't do. Yeah. And I said, Well, uh, you just said it it's taking ten years. Yeah. That's the key to it. Sure. So the challenge for me was learn to wait. Yeah. And and wait on the Lord. And uh and I learned something from that. You know, you just you you do what the Lord calls you to do, what he leads you to do, but it's not gonna happen overnight.

SPEAKER_03 47:14

Sure.

SPEAKER_00 47:15

And uh which is which is good.

SPEAKER_03 47:18

Uh Jake and I did a podcast earlier, and uh the topic of speaking to young ministers was a part of that. Uh our state convention in Alabama. Craig Carlyle's been our president of this convention the last couple of years, and he's really trying to uh put focus on calling out the called. Right. Because I'm 56, you're a year or two older than me. Sixty-seven. Okay, and so our generation is the one that we see will be passing off the stage, so to speak. Right. You know, in time. Uh there's a lack of ministers, pastors coming along. Churches are struggling to find them. Right. So we want to say a few things. Sure. To young ministers that may hear. Is this okay? Of course. Um, so you uh what a wonder I mean, I I'm amazed to sit here and think about four generations of ministers, and then you've seen your bivocational dad, you've been bivocational, uh, you've got uh long tenures, thirteen is a long tenure, and then twenty-six is unheard of. Right. What are some advice? Uh what are some things you would say? What is some advice you would give to a young minister coming along? Can you think of three, four, or five things?

SPEAKER_00 48:39

Yeah, uh I have a new youth guy who's been with me almost a year. He's he is today, as a matter of fact, he's in New Orleans, yeah, graduating in the morning from New Orleans Seminary. Oh wonderful. He's with a master's in preaching. Okay. And uh he uh this semester when he came this year, uh he the class he was in, Rob Jackson was teaching his ink his uh evangelism class. Yeah, everything they covered in class, he asked me if I would meet with him an hour that week, and we went we had to he had to make notes off of what I said about what they'd studied. Yeah. So I was his mentor. Gotcha. And um they were talking about evangelism in the church, they were talking about baptism, funerals, a whole deal. Yeah. And he was wondering how do you do that? You know, how do you do that? So now in January he's starting on his doctorate. Same thing. I'm gonna mentor him in his doctorate. And uh also this this week, next next week, we're voting to call a young man as as an in intern. Okay. Just six-month intern, not a staff physician, just an intern. And uh he's gonna be helping us. He's gonna learn our media stuff while he's there, and plus our youth guy and me are gonna be meeting with him about how to do notes, how to do sermons, how to those type things. And that's that's a lot of the stuff I've done over the years with young guys. I've got a lot of young guys that have that have come along behind me and uh and take them on visits with me, and and uh the biggest thing I'd like to do with them is take them on mission trips and teach them how to share the gospel. Yeah, you know that's uh we we had a a young guy from New Orleans Seminary. We we carried Ken Davis. I don't know if you know him, but I know the name, yeah. He was he was at uh New Orleans as a missions guy. Isn't that his name? Ken Taylor. Ken Taylor. That's all right. I'm sorry, it's Ken Taylor.

SPEAKER_03 50:39

Well, Ken Davis was a comedian or something. Yeah, Ken Taylor. He taught missions at New Orleans. Never had him.

SPEAKER_00 50:45

Well, he brought about 15 guys on the boat with us. Really? And we carried them, they were mission students, we carried them door to door to teach them how to share the gospel. Well, there's one, uh his name is Irv, and uh he he and Dr. Taylor were with me on the first visit we made. So we went to this house and a mama and two teenage girls came out on the porch. And uh it was my time that we took turns sharing. So I shared with them the gospel and and uh used a little Evangelic cube to share the gospel. Well, a mama and both girls got saved. And as we were leaving, Irv walking down the road, he said, Brother Mike, do you believe people can be saved like that? That easy? I said, I shared the gospel. They said yes to the Lord. That's yeah, that's what it is. Well, the next day, Erv's walking down the road in one of those villages, seven Brazilian boys came up and joined him. He had a translator with him. Well, he decided he was gonna share the gospel with those seven teenage boys. All seven of them prayed to receive Christ. Wow. He came and got back on the boat. Er's so fired up he won't believe what happened. And I've got a weird sense of humor. I said, Irv, do you believe kids can get saved like that? He did that next day, if we didn't the day before. You know, you teach them to share like that. And that's to me, that's that's the biggest thing. It's it's it's something that's caught more than taught. Yeah. And uh my grandson that goes with me, he can share the gospel as good as I can. Absolutely. And we've got another guy that's a that's a junior at uh Boas High School, same thing. He went with us and he he uh he's leading the FCA at Boas High School in uh so you just to me they just catch it from you more than you teach them about it.

SPEAKER_03 52:36

Well, you're to be commended to be willing to mentor. I I've often said, I can't imagine what an effective minister I'd be if I'd had a mentor. I mean, you know, the Lord could have done something with me, so that's exciting. So by staying there that long, you're able to build relationships, you're able to pour yourself out into individual lives. What are some other things that can be?

SPEAKER_00 53:02

The negative, the negative probably over a period of time, people have a tendency to take you for granted. Okay. You know, you just you're always there. Sure. Whenever something happens, you're always there, and they just don't think anything about it. But but that's that's the way I see ministry. If there's something going on with my people, I want to I want to be there with them.

SPEAKER_02 53:22

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 53:23

Um we just and a lot of it has to do with us growing together. Absolutely. You know, just uh being fun being patient with people and and letting them know, hey, I mess up too. You know, that's that's for sure.

SPEAKER_03 53:38

The uh the pastor under whose preaching I was saved was not my pastor. Yeah. His name was Doug Sager. I don't know if you ever met him. I don't know. So um Doug used to always talk about going to a new church and just this is how you pastor people. You preach the gospel and you love people and just smile. And the the there's a lot of truth in that simplicity. If you'll just love your people.

SPEAKER_00 54:07

Yeah, I I've tell I've had several guys start pastoring that have come up in our ministry, and and I tell 'em, you go to a new church, you love the people, you preach the word two years before you ever do anything to change anything. Right. And you'll gain the people's respect and they'll they'll listen to what you have to say.

SPEAKER_03 54:30

I've loved everything we've talked about, but now I don't know if there's something specific that I need to hit on.

SPEAKER_01 54:36

I think you covered all the topics I thought about. I did want to add something you don't realize is you made that connection with New Orleans Seminary to go to Brazil. I just had a conversation with somebody at New Orleans about going to Italy, going to Sicily. Oh wow. Like I don't think he realized the ripples of what your ministry has caused and you know what led us to the field for ten years. Sure. And and you know, Pawpaw's ministry too. He had a he had a huge impact on my life. Absolutely. And just you know, I remember when I was called, he was moved. He was emotional about it, yeah. You know, so it's just the ripples of what you what the Lord's done through you and through our family, I think.

SPEAKER_03 55:22

I I doubt pastors like you ever think about those ripples. You know, we really can't fully expect, but in my opinion, this is one man's opinion, but they gave me a microphone and you a microphone. Um those simple decisions of faithfulness, those simple decisions to love people, it it does have an impact. Yeah. And and it pays dividends in time that you would not be aware of. So that's a great reminder of that.

SPEAKER_00 55:53

Well, I'm just I'm just blessed and thankful for what God's done through our family and through our ministry through the years. Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 56:01

Well, you're well respected in our association.

SPEAKER_00 56:03

Well, I am old enough to retire, but I can't find a place to get off the rails.

SPEAKER_03 56:08

I understand, brother. That's a that's something out there that I think about, but I I can't really devote a lot of attention to it just yet. But my advice is you've got too much to offer. Yeah. You gotta retire to something.

SPEAKER_00 56:25

Yeah. Well, I've I've thought through the years, uh, Jamie, if I retired from the pastorate, yeah, I might want to do a missions pastor somewhere or something along those lines. Absolutely. You know, right now I know if I retired, I think I know that I would probably be preaching somewhere about every Sunday. Listen. You know, because but the Lord just sort of said to me, if you're gonna preach every Sunday, why don't you preach where you are? Mm-hmm.

SPEAKER_03 56:52

And that's you could stay as busy as you want. I learned that at the state convention.

SPEAKER_00 56:58

But I but I really want to do something in missions and or or helping churches, that type thing. I don't I don't ever want to just quit, but yeah, you know, I I can see the day when the pastor part of it should sort of lay aside because sometimes that's stressful, you know. You know. And uh plus I don't want to I don't want to keep on going until I can enjoy what I've worked hard for. Exactly. You know, on the ball.

SPEAKER_03 57:21

I'll pray the Lord give you wisdom.

SPEAKER_00 57:23

Yeah. I've just told the Lord, you show me when it's time.

SPEAKER_03 57:26

Yeah. That's that's what I want to do. I want to say thank you. Uh you are, I mean, I'm the direct beneficiary now of your faithful parenting. This guy is a huge blessing to our church. I mean, this whole thing, this is his baby. Yeah. And uh makes us look good. And you talk about elevating our mission's ministry just in a matter of weeks. Uh he he was making improvements and uh the buy-in already with training that he's doing, so I'm the beneficiary of your faithfulness. Well, yeah. But you are much loved in our association. You're looked to for your wisdom, you're looked to for your encouragement uh for the Great Commission. So I want to say thank you. And I know you serve at our state uh on State Board of Missions.

SPEAKER_00 58:15

And I've enjoyed all those times. Sure. You know, that's uh that's just a blessing that the Lord lets you do that kind of stuff.

SPEAKER_03 58:22

Well, I'm grateful for your investing and whoever's gonna listen to this podcast. So, with that, let me just say to everybody that's listening I hope you've enjoyed this episode sitting down. Uh with Brother Mike. That is how you're known, right? And so, Mike, go forth a faithful ministry.