Welcome to the God's Goodness podcast, where our mission is to encourage as well as highlight
God's Goodness and modern-day miracles. We are your hosts, Josh and Shelly Hankins.
Today we have with us a very special guest and his name is Randy Henderson. He is one
of the guests that my husband actually knows better than I do. I know Randy's wife, but
I don't know Randy as well. Randy has been instrumental in our journey through this
church and he was just such an encouragement to my husband. The Holy Spirit led me to ask
him to be on this podcast so he can share whatever the Holy Spirit led him to share.
With that, we'll ask him to open us up with an opening prayer and then we'll get into
it. Alright, thank you Heavenly Father. We do thank you for this time. We thank you
that you are Lord of all and we thank you that we have this time here together that
we can share. We just ask that you would guide our words, guide our thoughts and may
this be a blessing to all those out there. Amen. Amen. Thank you. So where would you
like to start Randy? Well, I was born in a small town. I don't remember it because I
was very tiny. As I mentioned just briefly beforehand is that I had thought of doing
one thing and now I'm just not going to do that because we got other things we can talk
about. Absolutely. And men's ministry is one of those things that has always been on my
heart because guys just don't do things, especially church guys. And everything is
sports related in any, anything. If we would do a men's breakfast and we would have a sports
guy come and talk, we'll get 50 guys show up. John Colby. John Colby. And if we have
a men's breakfast and Randy's gonna talk, we'll get 20 guys. So guys like sports and
that's cool. But there are a lot of guys that don't like sports. I like sports, but I've
grown up and I don't have to watch football anymore if I don't want to. I made somebody
happy and I made somebody mad. But men like to get together with other men and men as
Christians are better when we're with other men. When we have that level of accountability
with other guys, when we know that we're going to see other guys on a regular basis, especially
outside of church, that makes us more thoughtful. It makes us think more about boy, what am
I going to say when they ask me this or what am I going to say when they ask me that? If
I was, you know, driving down the road and somebody cuts me off and I'm leaning out my
window yelling, swearing and giving them the one finger salute and somebody from the church
drives by like, oh, okay, there's Randy. Hey, Randy, how you doing? I'm like, hang out the
window. Oh, yeah. Hi, how are you guys?
Sure. Yeah, yeah, I was giving them thumbs up, giving them thumbs up. But having knowing
that, you know, there's other guys going to help hold you accountable is a good thing
for guys. And many, many years ago, when I was older than when I was first born, there
was a group of guys that we got together with on a regular basis. And back in the nineties,
there was a thing called Promise Keepers. And Promise Keepers was basically by guys getting
together and being accountable with other guys. And there was a lot of controversy back then.
It was belittling to women and things like that. But that was not the case. Could it have
been for some guys? Yeah, maybe, because there are a lot of misconceptions.
How would it be belittling to women to have a bunch of men holding each other accountable?
They do a lot of different things. But there were people saying in the news and the media
that it was men being overbearing, men belittling women and putting them in their place. You're
the woman, stay in the kitchen, barefoot and pregnant, that kind of stuff. And without
realizing that as men of God, you know, we need to treat our wives like Christ treats
us. And Christ died for us. So we need to die for our lives. And we need to die to ourselves
for our lives. And that's a very hard thing to do because we're all selfish. We all want
to do what we want to do. So to be a guy where you're going to go home and you're going to
yell and scream at your wife and know that these other guys that are friends of yours
are going to see her. And they're going to say to her, hey, how's Randy doing? Is he
treating you well? Is he doing this? Is he doing that? And she's going to say, no, he
was yelling and screaming at me. And then they'll come back to me and they'll say,
Randy, what are you doing? You can't yell and scream at your wife. And they can help
you to not yell and scream at your wife. Iron, sharpens iron. Iron does sharpen iron. And
please, you ask these was our big, our big verse. And oh, look, I just so happen to have
it on this piece of paper here because I always forget it. But the two are better than one
because they have a good return for the labor. If either one of them falls down, they can
help the other one up. But pity the anyone who falls and has no one to help them up.
Also if two lie down together, they will keep warm. But how will one keep warm alone? And
though one may be overpowered, two can defend themselves and a cord of three strands is not
quickly broken. So to have a group of guys and I'm not talking like 20 guys, I'm talking
like a small group of guys, five guys, four guys, six guys, where you can talk about these
kinds of things, talk about your struggles, talk about your daily grind, things that maybe
you don't think they can talk to your wife about. You can talk to your guy friends about.
And you know, there's a lot of things that girls talk about with other girls that they
probably wouldn't talk about with their husbands or with other guys around. So they wouldn't
be able to relate as well. Correct. Yeah, the struggles aren't the same.
Yeah, they're very, they're very different. There are struggles for both sides. They're
not, they're not, I don't want to say that one side is easier. You really don't have
problems like you guys do. Instead of we, they're just different problems. And so it
seems really easy to trivialize somebody else's problem from a standpoint of misunderstanding.
Yes. Yes. And to know that the gods always got your back. And with these guys being godly
men, they've got your back. And then taking that from that small group, we took it out
to the larger church. And then we helped other guys meet with other guys. We had other groups
to start and to get those going. And as guys, we think, oh man, I'm the only one that's
struggling with this. I'm the only one that has these problems. And the more guys we talked
with and the more guys that we got together with, the more we realized, oh wait, everyone
has the same problem. And there's two or three problems. And it's every guy's problem.
You know, sex, pornography, that's a big problem. Talking to your wife, being able to communication
with your wife. That's those are the two biggest problems for men being able to communicate
with your wife and getting enough sex. And those are pretty much boils down to anything
else. Any other problems you have, you know, people say finances. Well, yeah, but if you're
happy at home, your finances don't really matter. You'll get by, you'll find a way,
you know,
God always makes a way.
He does. He does. And there's some stories we can share next time, but he always has always
provided for my family and I have a powerful, powerful wife. And it's, it's, yeah, it matter.
I'd be scared to power you.
Is she gonna listen to this? Oh, I hope so.
Probably, probably, probably.
You better watch what you say. Yeah.
Better be careful.
It's hard for us to think about how we do things or how, how we are seen by other people,
especially the world. How does the world see, you know, angry, angry men, you know, the
guys beating on doors here and there and kicking things down and stuff like that. Those are
all things that people see in the world that attribute to us. So we need to have other
guys around us to help us through all these things in life. So our work life, our church
life. And when I came to South Hills Assembly, oh my gosh, it's pushing, I think 30 years
ago. And there were guys here that I looked up to and there were guys here that were very
welcoming to me as a new guy in a church. I remember two in particular, Joe Burke and
Jim Loises and these guys would be in the lobby every Sunday morning. And Joe Burke
was a big guy and he would, anybody would come in, Josh, like you to shake hands, hit
wrap his arms around him, give him a big bear hug every guy. He wouldn't even know the guy
and he'd give him a big bear hug. Hey, come on, we're having a breakfast, you know, come
on over here. And they actively pursued other men to get involved with the men's ministry.
And I was involved with a couple other groups here at the church, but the men's ministry
was great because they like doing men stuff, you know, and yeah, sure, we'd get together
and watch them on the night football game. That was always fun, but the breakfasts were
always really good too. Yeah, not everybody likes sports, but every man likes breakfast.
Yeah. Women do too. I'm a little jealous of the men's breakfast. Well, they're good.
You should have some sometimes. I do stickers on that. Okay. So you know this. The bacon
is excellent. You know I do. You see me leave the pocket hole. But without, without other
guys, you know, we couldn't do that. You know, if we didn't have guys that would help to
do that and you know shout out to Joey. Oh, yes. He does all the cooking for the men's
breakfast. Sean does most of the shopping for the men's breakfasts. Mike Mendea makes
sure we have everything, anything last minute. Mike's got that covered. So if we didn't have
a group of guys that did these things, we couldn't survive. You know, we had a small
get together just last night and we have a root beer hot dogs and game night. And so
we got together, we played games, we drank root beers and we ate hot dogs. I mean, that's
what guys do. Now they get together, they hang out and they do stuff like that. And
we had blast. It was snowy out and there's a lot of guys that didn't make because of
the snow. Yeah, I'm one of them. Yeah, I'm one of them. It's a big sissy. I don't want
to go out in it. I'm not gonna laugh. I, yeah, total sissy. I was a little girl yesterday.
You wanted to stay cozy at the home. Well, I didn't want to go drive. You know, I have
that nice rear wheel drive vehicle and I was like, them snows get punky on them. I don't
want to be spinning everywhere in it. So I wasn't born here. I was born in the desert.
We didn't have this. And so I'm not totally comfortable. Even though I've been driving
it for 30 years, you know, I'm still not comfortable in snow. I don't like it. Yeah,
I don't like anything about it except seeing it from my kitchen window while drinking a
hot coffee and hot coffee is always good too. If you can't have root beer, you got to have
hot coffee, right? If you can't have hot coffee, you got to have root beer. So wisdom. You can
write that down and quote me on that if you really want to. A thing with guys that I feel
more prevalent than with women where we identify as who we are by what we do. Like, hey, Josh,
I'm a painter. How are you? I paint things, you know, and Josh, you'd be like, I'm an
AMT things. Yeah. And I stopped people from dying. They're trying to that successful.
Well, I hope you're more successful from there. They're dying. Well, no, I mean, honestly,
my skill set is, you know, basic life support. And I tease the paramedics I work with and
I say I'm not a life saver. I'm a death prolonger. When you're doing CPR, the person is literally
already dead. And I'm just prolonging their death long enough for someone with advanced
life saving skills to do something and intervene. So I just how much is the death prolonger?
I don't really save lives. I just keep them dead longer so someone can save their life.
So they're not dead dead. They're just mostly dead. So men tend to identify as their occupation.
And what we really need to start and look at is that it's not about that. It's not about
what we do. It's about who we are and who we follow. And when we look in the mirror,
we see a reflection of us. And I see Randy the painter when I look in the mirror, when
we should see, we should see Josh the Christian in the mirror, we should see Randy the Christian
in the mirror. And we should identify ourselves as Christians first. And what we do doesn't
matter. And as Christians, as Christian men, we need to be welcoming to other men. We need
to be the ones that are slow to anger. We need to be the ones that are slow to judge.
We need to be the ones that are not flying off the handle because something in the world
happened. We should be the ones that are concoined and collected. We should be the ones that
people look at and say, wow, he's not all been out of shape over this thing. How does
he do that? And then we can say, well, that's because Jesus Christ was within us.
You're saying we should be the ones to set the example.
We shouldn't be. And more often than not, the example that we set as Christian men is
poor. Yeah. And the world looks at us and they say, well, if that's what Jesus Christ
has to offer, I don't want that.
Yeah. Oh, we'll hardly agree with that message. You know, there's like Muslim countries, they
are very religiously political, right? They're they're they're theologian or theocracies,
right? And so a lot of their culture is based solely on their religion being the government.
And they look at our country the same way, right? That's how they see it through their
worldview. And then they see that we're a so-called Christian nation, but then we have movies
that glorify acts of violence against women, movies that glorify crime, movies that glorify
murder, movies that glorify stealing cars and driving fast. And if they look at that,
and this is what our Christian nation is all about. So this is what they equate Christianity
to. So they already have it at all is just because of a poor worldview. And we're not
making a good example as a Christian nation, because we're not one anymore. Let's be honest.
We're not a Christian nation any longer. But we should be. And we can get there again,
if we adhere to what you're speaking about, if men lead by example again, if men take
up the armor of God and put on their helmet of salvation, the sword of truth, right? And
they stand the line as an example of what a man should be in America, which is a Christian
godly man who doesn't speak out, who doesn't lash out, who doesn't judge, who doesn't react
on emotion, but solely upon the spirit moving in him. And I know that you are the only person
that I've met that actively is involved in a men's ministry in any church I've ever
been to since coming to Christ 17 years ago. And I've been to many different churches,
guests and some of them, but a member and others. And I've never seen a men's ministry
ever, not once. And you're not even the first person to do it here. You said there was a
couple of guys and they were they did outreach. And so there is an atmosphere of a men's ministry
in this church to start with. And you've taken that mantle, which is an awesome responsibility.
Right? How much do they pay you for this? Oh, I get paid the big bucks. Yeah, zero. Okay,
perfect. And so you clearly, you know, wow, that's pretty good. You clearly have a heart
for this. Otherwise, you wouldn't do it. You clearly have an obedience to Christ in this
manner. Otherwise, you wouldn't do it. I've met you. And I know that you are aloof at
times. You're a lot like me. Whereas if you have certain constant reminders, you'll forget
something. You bet. And somehow you do this with a fervor. It's almost like spiritually
you have the know that this is such an important thing for men, such an important outlet that
I've never encountered it before that you are the first person I've ever met at this
church that openly greeted me, right? I didn't know who you were then. I didn't know what
you were the men's ministry master, right? I didn't I didn't know anything about you
and you welcomed me and then you invited me to adventure fest. And then there was never
a time where I did not feel welcome and warmed because of you. I mentioned that a men's
breakfast that this was this was a church that I could tell was full of the Holy Spirit,
just because of the interactions of the few people I'd met just coming in that you know,
a pastor Pete didn't know me and he welcomed me in. Randy didn't know me and he's he's
welcomed me to a place that to go out in the woods and camp with him without knowing if
I'm a serial killer or or what, you know, he knew nothing about me. Randy's up for that
adventure. He's up for it. He's you know, quality or caliber of a Christian I was. You didn't
know where my faith was. You didn't know where my relationship with Jesus was. You didn't
know where I was in my relationship with my wife or my family. And none of that mattered
to you. Right? The only thing it mattered about is here in front of you in that moment
and that you shared the love of Jesus with me through the way that he has blessed you
in the men's ministry. And I really appreciated it. I know a lot of people hate getting accolades
and things like that, especially Christian men because we want God to have the glory
and not the people. So you know, praise God that he put you in this position and that
you dutifully answered that. It has been such a blessing that you know, I didn't even why
would you even ask me to speak at the men's breakfast, you know, and I don't like sports.
Yeah, you did. Man, you and that was a pretty big turnout for me. Not maybe maybe they didn't
know I wasn't a sports person. You know, he's built like a linebacker. So maybe that was
it. We told him Terry Bradshaw was going to be there. Oh yeah, I got I have a little bit
more hair than Terry and no shade on poor Terry branch. I was a great guy, a funny guy.
But you know, I really appreciate the way you reached out and as a direct result of
that first adventures fest where I got to sit and you guys all went up to their little
lodge or whatever it was to listen to something. I said, Hey, I just want to stay back here
and I just want to I just want to have a conversation with God and the quiet and the peace and
the stars. And nobody really gave me any flak about it. Like, OK, have a good time, right?
Nobody forced me to do anything I didn't want to do. And I appreciated that too. And as
a result of that, I was able to reconnect with God in a way that I hadn't been connected
with him in almost a year and lay hands on my son within two days and God removed OCD
from him. And so I just want to reiterate that that is the impactful part of the men's
ministry is that through the love through the acceptance and through the bonding with
other men, I was able to connect with God again in a way that allowed my son to be healed
of OCD. That to me speaks volumes for how important the men's ministry is in a church
and a boggle of my mind for more churches to do it.
It just takes somebody to stand up and say, we need to eat bacon together and get the
ball rolling. And every every man is equipped differently. You know, we're all all built
a certain way. We all do certain things. And for me to to be the guy that just blabs a lot
and says, hey, come and eat food with us. That's the way God made me. And he's made
Joey a great cook. So so Joey, thanks for the bacon again.
You're awesome. You're your Browns fan. So yeah, well, everybody has their faults and
we all have to work through them. I actually like a Browns fan. It shouldn't matter whether
we're Browns fans or Steelers fans. It shouldn't matter whether we're we're a Christian or
we're a non Christian. It shouldn't matter whether whatever or black or white, whatever.
It shouldn't matter. You know, we're people. We're all people. And if we can't see people
for being people and we can't be welcoming to those people, you know, it's always interesting
to be there in the lobby and and look and see somebody stand there with their with the
glazed look on their eyes and they're like, what's going on here? And you're like, I don't
think they've ever been here before. So you go over and you're like, hey, how you doing?
Come on in. Let's where do you looking for? What do you need? And again, some people are
equipped to do that kind of stuff. And some people aren't. My wife is not the one to be
out there and say, you know, to be that that vocal out front, I'm not the one that's going
to plan a huge event and have all my ducks in the room. I would be the guy out. And that's
why I'm here with a microphone because I'm just black, black, black, black.
But you show up and you get it done with a team. We do. We do. And it is a team, but
it does take somebody to just say, hey, we need to do this. I'm tempted to do that for
the ladies because we don't they say, oh, we have all these events, but I would disagree
a little bit. Yes, she's mad and jealous. And literally, until they came here, I was
always jealous because churches had events for women, but it's the same frequency as
it is here. Like it's not like for the men. The men's are every every is as often as we
can make it. Like I think if we could afford it, it'd be one every week. And well, March
will be a big month. I think there's three men's events in March. So and again, the
conversation with the leadership group was, well, can we have three events in a month?
And so we have a breakfast. There's a conference at another church. And then there's a bowling
night. And the guys that want to go for a bowling night are probably not the guys that
want to go for a conference. Some of the guys that are going for the conference might be
more of a guys that want to just have breakfast. And if we have one event, we'll get a third
of the guys. If we have three events, we'll get different guys going to each different
event. And and that gives them a choice to do something that they would like to do with
other guys that are from here at the church and get to know each other guys better. I
know Josh, the one thing you didn't really like the van ride, but the van ride out to
adventure fast or the van ride to a conference or something like that. I think sometimes
is better than the actual conference or the thing you're going to do because you're in
a van talking with a bunch of guys and I mean, all kinds of topics come up, you know, whether
you want them to or not sometimes. Well, to be fair, I wasn't a big fan of the van ride
because I just got off a 24 hour shift and I was tired. And I literally just wanted everyone
to be quiet.
And you know, I had the guy next to me playing a harmonica and I was like, Oh, Jesus, help
me. And the other guy in front of him, it was older and could barely hear and he's like,
what, what a lot. And I'm, and I'm, you know, I'm just me. No, no, you were afraid. You
were oblivious. You had the radio on you just did, did, did, did, did. And I just wanted
to bury my head under my sleeping bag. It was rough. So I drove the next year. There
you go. Problem solved. Problem solved.
But it was afforded, right? And there was a ride and I didn't have to drive. And that's
another detail that you added to make it easier for people. It's just not my cup. But he doesn't
mean it isn't good for everybody. And you were just, I think you're outstanding in what
you do for the church. You're outstanding for you do the men of the church. You are
a very, very recognizable face of South Hills assembly.
Sometimes that's scary.
It is. Yeah. No crimes for you because they'll, everyone knows who you are.
For better or for worse, I guess. Yeah. Absolutely. And, and everybody knows who your wife is.
So you got to be in your best behavior because she will find out immediately.
Yes. Yes, she will. Yes, she will. But I wouldn't have anybody else. So apparently she wouldn't
either. Well, maybe every now and then. But God has said that we have to love each other.
We don't have to like each other every day, but we do have to love each other every day.
It's commitment that makes that work. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And there are days where she doesn't
like me today. She doesn't like me today. So, but she loves me and that's okay.
Two days. My wife doesn't like me. I'm actually almost certain it's 50 50.
I think some days it's 70 30 one direction and 70 30 the other direction. So, but as
guys we need to find out and that's that's the hard part. That's the hard part.
You know, when we're we're equipped certain ways to do ministry and that's completely
different than, than a marriage. Yeah. No, no. When you're when you're ministering
to a group of men, it is completely different because women do not speak the same language
as men. They don't hear the same language as men. They don't see the things that we
see and vice versa. No. And that's why we why we look like idiots to our wives and we
don't understand why our wives don't understand us because we could say the exact same thing
and hear two different things. And I think it's important for us to realize that never
do we mean something horrible. Right. We don't wake up thinking, hmm, how can I stick it
to my wife today? Well, I know I won't undo. I won't wipe the snow off her car.
I'm a learner. Right. Nobody wakes up with those thoughts. I don't say nobody. I bet
there is somebody out there. But for the most part, a good, willed Christian man and a good,
willed Christian woman do not wake up with thoughts of vengeance in their mind about
how they're going to get their spouse. That's a little off topic for the men's. And again,
I want to reiterate that the men's ministry that you do here is phenomenal that it exists
at all is phenomenal. Again, you don't I don't know if you realize how many churches you've
been around and gone to, but this is a rare breed to have a men's ministry to be so consistent.
The women's ministry that I've seen here is about consistent to every church I've been
to where they do something like once every two or three months. And I know my wife has
stressed that she would she's even making a little face right now, but she gets a little
jelly about the every every month thing with the men, you know, and well, there was a guy
pastor, Pastor Greg Nass, and he's the guy that started adventure men ministries. And
that's where adventure fest came out of. Adventure fest is a is a one year annual event. It's
a weekend of camping and and fun and fellowship and doing all kind of man stuff, mountain
biking, kayaking, hiking, climbing, throwing bicycles, the Huffy toss is a standard event
there. So that's always a fun one who can throw the Huffy bike the furthest potato,
canons, archery. I mean, there's there are all kinds of things that go on adventure fest,
but Greg Nass told tell a group of guys when he would be speaking, he'd be like, what is
your passion? What do you like to do? Make that your ministry? And if you do that, then
you'll you'll you'll love ministry. And we do have a good church here. And you know,
I can give kudos to South of the assembly. It has its faults. Every church does. There's
people in it. You know, that's one of the faults. People are people are flawed. Yeah.
There are churches that they'll let you do things and they'll let you try things. And
at the time I'm one of those guys I like to do model building. And I was like, I'd like
to do a class to show guys or other people, anybody how to build models. And they're like,
sure. So they let me have a class on how to build models. So I had a class of six people,
old young men, women, and taught them how to build a little house. So we all built little
houses and it was fun. You know, it was it was great that a church let me do that. And
from that, I got to meet a couple guys and we're friends of this day because of that
kind of stuff. So find something you like to do. Find a guy or two that like to do that
too and do that. And then Josh, if there's something you like to do, come to Randy and
say, Randy, I like to do this thing. I'm like, okay, well, how can we make an event out of
that? You know, and we can we can make an evening out of it. You know, we I like to play games.
My family likes to play games. My son-in-law and daughter, they probably got a hundred
games in their closet, you know, and they're always buying more Christmas between my three
kids and their significant others and us. We got nine new games. So let's play games.
I'm like, hey, guys, you know what, let's play games here at the church. So we played
games here at the church, you know, and was it the games that was the most fun? They were
fun games. Yeah. But hanging out with the other guys laughing, joking and and just sharing
with each other was great because I like said, iron sharpens iron and you can't be stodgy
and you can't be down when you're having hot dogs and root beers with a group of guys.
It is tough. Now, Josh mentioned that you have an amazing
testimony. So can you give us like a brief little testimony because I have not heard
it yet. And on my listeners have any there, I'm sure. Wow. I could probably I guess I
could share that with you. I was a good Catholic boy out here in in in Western Pennsylvania.
We've had a lot of Catholics, you know, in the church, including Pastor Rick. Yeah. Pastor
Pete Watson. Well, Pastor Pete's Italian. So that's a given. Yeah. I wasn't odd Catholic.
I will say that I read my Bible. I asked questions. I once asked the priest, what why do I have
to confess to you? It says here in my Bible that I could confess to the Lord. And he's like,
three hill marries, go get going, you know, get out of here. So I was an abnormality even
then. Trouble maker is a troublemaker. Yeah. My wife would agree with that too. Trouble
maker. So confession was one of those things. I was like, this just doesn't make sense.
And then there was a situation where my brother was getting married and the girl was not of
the Catholic faith. And they wanted the priest to be there with her pastor so they could get
married with both of them being there. So that was pretty good. That's pretty cool. But the
priest wouldn't be there. He said he wouldn't be there. And then he said that, well, you
needed to get a letter from the cardinal or the pope to say that you're allowed to do
this because you're married inside of the faith. And I'm thinking, well, God's a bigger guy
than these guys. And if he's okay with it, then they should be okay with it. But you
know, they've got their reasons. So they've been doing it for 1000 years. So I guess they
have some good reasons somewhere along the way there. But that was another one of those
things to me that's like, hmm, that's interesting. So then I was able to, when I went out to
the art institute, I left my little town of South Bay up there, which was very small at
the time. It's much larger now. And I went off and got to meet people that weren't from
my school that weren't from around. And I met a guy named Tim Walker. Tim Walker introduced
me to Petra, which was an early, early Christian band, which was pretty cool. So I got to know
Tim Walker and he was one of the first guys that told me about Jesus Christ. And I was
like, well, this is, this is pretty cool. And it was one thing led to another. And I met
this girl of the art institute then after Tim Walker. And she read her Bible all the
time. And she was cute. And I was like, this girl's pretty nice. And eventually, I wound
up chatting with her and trying to get to go out with her. And she wouldn't go out with
me because I was not a Christian. And I was like, well, wait a minute, I'm Catholic. Isn't
that right? And this is kind of getting into our story. And maybe she should be here for
this. But but to face it to say, she wouldn't go out with me. But she gave me her Bible.
And she told me to read that Bible and that Christ loved me. And that impacted me because
I saw her reading her Bible from time to time. And before classes, after classes, I would
see her reading that Bible. So I knew it meant something to her. And I know I had a Bible
that my mom gave me. And that meant something to me as good as that was. And I said, huh,
there's supposed to be something, something to this. But if you if you have any questions
or if you want to go to church with me, you know, and I'm thinking, what's a chance for
me to get with this girl? So yeah, I've got a church for you. And we went to a little
place called Wildwood Chapel up in Alequipa, PA. It was a true Pentecostal church dancing
in the Isles kind of church. So I was like, huh, but that was different. That was different
from being Catholic. It was very different. Yeah, it was kind of neat. I'm okay. This
is very interesting. So things proceeded. And I asked more questions. And and I was
starting to think myself, hmm, there's something to this. And when it came down to which I
was going to go to church with her again on a Wednesday night, I'm thinking, you know,
Lord, all right, I've read stuff in this book of yours. And we've talked. So how do I get
to know you better? If I want this relationship with you, how do I get to know you better?
So I picked up Sherry, we went to this little church and the pastor gets up there and he's
all right and blah, blah, blah. And we start singing songs and and the songs are about
getting to know him better, getting to know Jesus better, getting to know God better,
getting to be a I'm like, wait a minute, wait, hold on a minute. So then the pastor gets
up after the worship and he's like, you know, my sermon is about getting to know Jesus better.
And speaking of that, there's somebody here that's thinking to themselves, I need to know
Jesus better. And I'm like, well, yeah, that's me. And before my cherry knew this, I was standing
up going, hey, that's me. And I will come on down. So I went on down and and that was
all there was to it. So I got set up by God. And Jesus was like, oh, we're going to get
this one today. And he set me up good. He said it was it was without a doubt. I mean, the
words that I had in my head, I mean, came out of three different people at that at that
church on that night. And as soon as they said, who is that? I was like, it was obvious.
I mean, I was like, I don't see anybody else here. It must be me. And then from there,
that girl was smart. And she's like, well, you still can't see me, you know, because
you got to have a relationship with him before you have a relationship with me. And I got
that. And I got that. But I convinced her eventually, because we've been married now
for over 30 years. So I think I might have proven my case. And again, I love her and
I love her every day. We don't like each other every day. But loving each other every day
is the key.
Mm hmm. Yeah, no, I mean, it's ridiculous to compare love on a daily basis, because yesterday
I'm pretty sure I made her mad. And today she might love me more than she ever has in
her life. There you go. And so I'm not saying she does. You know, she might, I don't know,
I didn't ask. I'm really bad at interpreting her moods. And that's why she gets mad at
me. And then men are like, well, this girl at work, though, she she's always nice to
me. And this girl at work, she's she always looks nice. And my wife, she was all ready.
And I went home the other day, and she had on one slipper. She had one red slipper on.
I think, where's the other slipper at? And you think to yourself, well, this girl's got
high heels on. She's got nice clothes. Now, okay, I'm going back. I'm dating myself because
when I was in work in offices, everybody dressed up. So it's a little different these days.
But you know, guys who are suits or ties, shirt and tie, you know, girls wore skirts
or dresses. And that's the way society was back then. And so you think to yourself, well,
that girl always looks good. And she's always nice to me. But you only see her for part
of the day, you're not living with her, you're not doing things for her. And then you compare
to your wife at home. And then you're like, well, this one's better. And then you maybe
have lunch with them. And then they all I understand. And again, it can happen the other way around
to with women and men. But I think it happens more often that men are the other culprits,
because they get drawn into this imagination, this fantasy that this girl is somehow better
than this one. And your wife has little kids hanging off her and she smells like baby formula
and her hair is a mess. And she's got one red slipper on, you know, and you think, well,
this girl over here is great. But then then you go like, well, I'll go be with this girl
then because this girl is great. And then you go with that girl and you get rid of that
one. And then you got all kinds of problems with kids and you got all kinds of problems
with this and that. But this other girl, she's nice, right? So then then you get together
with her and then she has a kid and then then she starts not getting her hair done because
you're with her more often, you're with her in the morning now. And then you come home
one day and she's got one red slipper on. So you got your back to where you started.
But with heartache in between with heartache in between. And now you've disrupted the lives
of children, you've disrupted the lives of other people. My heart goes out to people
that that have problems that have a husband, wife, wives that have husbands that abuse
them and stuff like that. That's there's no call for that anywhere, anyhow. But to leave
a relationship for reasons that are not that drastic. And hopefully I'm saying this right
on the radio here, but guys need to be accountable for what they're doing. And if you're abusive
to your wife, there's there's no place for that. That can't be tolerated. But women,
if the guys just ignoring you and the guys just being a guy, then you guys need to work
on that. Just because you're not getting along one day doesn't mean we got to end this.
Oh, absolutely. Today's culture is I'm not happy now. Therefore, everything is over now.
And nobody plays a long game. You know, you started the conversation with us talking about
promise keepers and men holding men accountable. And it looks like we keep drifting back into
that that area. So is there anything on your heart that wants to bring something like the
promise keepers or the Randy facsimile or the South Hills Assembly facsimile of a promise
keepers like, you know, like where you pair off the accountability or whatever for a man.
And I'm not opposed to obviously women doing it for women, but we're talking about you
and men for starting a program up again, where a man can hold man accountable and iron can
sharpen iron again, other than just this men's breakfast, because those are like feel good
moments, right? We're talking about what about like talking to a man like, Hey, Randy, I've
been struggling lately and had these dark thoughts about doing something that I shouldn't
do. And he was like, well, man, I'm glad you came to me. Let's read some scripture. Or
you know, I'm not really sure how he was even structured. But is there any plans on on that
coming back or resurface? Because I think that's also very important, especially considering
that it seems to be very heavy on your heart. Yes. I mean, Pastor Peter, he'd love to have
our own men's retreat, which hopefully someday we can get that get that going. I think that
would be a lot of fun. But ultimately, we think that small groups of men where we can
get and you know, when having a game night, having breakfasts, having bowling nights,
those are all to get met acquainted with each other to the point where they like, well,
this guy has some similarities. I could hang out with this guy. And then you get to know
him better. And then that's what small groups would be for. And you can't have more than
five guys in a small group, because then there's just there's not enough time. And when we
did promise keepers, we were an abnormal group. And that most groups would meet for an hour
and a half or so. And once a week. And that was it. We would meet after eight o'clock,
because that's when two of us had kids and our kids would go to bed at eight o'clock.
So once the kids were in bed, we would head out the door and we would go to our promise
keepers group. And there were nights where we were there until after midnight, we would
praise and worship together, we would pray together, we would, we would talk and we got
to know each other. It's funny because there's still, there was one guy there who didn't
talk as much as all the rest of us. And it wasn't for, I think it was two years that
we were together before I found out that he had been married before. He didn't tell anybody
this. And it took him two years of meeting with us on a regular basis. And we all went
to church together. We all met with in our group. And we would do, you know, advance
at the church together. And we would also hang out with our families sometimes. So we
would see each other two to three times a week. So we got to know each other fairly
well. And it still took him two years to open up enough to say that, well, you know, I
guys, I was married before massive trust issues. Yeah. But guys are very guarded and guys are
very quiet and guys don't use as nearly as many words as girls do. And if they've talked
at work on the phone a little bit, they're done by the time evening comes, you know,
and the wife, if, if she was not at an office or not with other people talking, she's got
a lot of words that she wants to use up yet. Oh, I'm aware. Yeah. Yeah. So we became very
well acquainted with each other. We became very kindable to each other. We're in different
parts of the world now. You know, our first group, one of the guys is still close by.
We still do things together. Another one's over in India. Another one's on the other
side of the country. So, so we've, we've kind of spread out a little bit, but we'll always
be brothers of Christ. That's awesome. Yeah. I would be interested in something to that
nature just because I need help as we all do, Josh. I don't just need help being accountable,
but I need, like I've said before, I have a hard time keeping friends because I forget
to call people just because of the nature of my neurodivergence. And so somebody else
needs to be the bigger person and call me first or I'll never communicate. But if I
have a set day that I can plug into my calendar that I can do every week, then eventually
it becomes a pattern for me. It's not as hard to forget. It's very easy to remember once
it's established as a pattern, but it just takes a little bit for that pattern to root
hold. And it would be very beneficial to people like me who need been to sharpen him, right?
Not just coming to church on a Sunday, you know, and then I only do three Sundays with
the men and then I have to sharpen little kids on what, which sounds dangerous to make
these little kids pointy objects for their homes, right? And obviously I don't need that
money, but, you know, receiving in three of these days and you're pouring out a lot of
those days and I'm not receiving what I need to all the time. I might receive a good message.
I might receive a good word. I might receive something that's beneficial, but it's not
something that is inherently beneficial as me as a man that benefits me as a man that
furthers me along in my manhood and to be more intelligent with how I represent myself
emotionally and physically. And so I could be a better husband. I could be a better father.
I could be a better son to my parents, right? And so I'm curious mostly for me, right? I'm
asking these questions for me because I would like to be plugged in. And so I was just curious
if you did make those plans, if you had those plans available. And if so, is there any mention
or any way that you would want to, because I think this ministry is great to reach out
to other churches and encourage them to do the same things because we're not just the
South Hills Assembly. We're all Christians. We're all brothers in Christ. We're all sisters
in Christ. We're all underneath the umbrella of Christ, right? And, you know, a lot of
people get messed up when they want to consider the, you know, hey, we're all the body of
Christ. We want the mouth of Christ, you know, we're evangelical. Oh, we're the, we're the
either Christ or the Baptist. Oh, we're the feet of Christ, you know, and none of that
matters to Christ, right? None of that matters. And so we're all in this together. And I was
just asking if you're the guy that would be willing to hook up with other guys and other
churches even to just get a Western Pennsylvania going in revival from in.
Well, the mouth can't go anywhere without feet to take it there. I think we would probably
know. Well, to answer the question bluntly, no, I hadn't gotten that far yet. I think
if we can get a couple of groups go and that would be a great, you know, and then we could,
we could go from there. But, you know, if that's what God wants, and that's Lord's will,
and he's going to bring that to pass and he'll bring a few feet here that will come into
the men's ministry and we'll be like, Hey, we can take these, we can walk these over
here and we can walk these over there. And if they want to walk me over there and make
me blabber, then I can do that. I'm willing to do that. If they want to walk me over to
this place and say, Welcome to these guys, you know, I can do that. I can be available
for that because that's what God has made me to do. So just pray for feet and wisdom
and wisdom. Yes. Yes. But again, we have, we have a good leadership here at the church
and anything that is, is outreach related, anything that is related to getting anyone
at the church more involved and help them grow closer in the relationship to Christ.
They're open to that. They're open to that. And if anybody has any questions, they can
just say, Hey, Randy, because I'll be running around the lobby blabbing every Sunday morning.
Every single one. Well, except for when I'm not here, then I'm blabbing somewhere else,
you know, blabbing somewhere else. Thank you so much for being with us today. That was
good. Thanks for having me. We need strong men and to lead us. You can't just go around
all willy nilly. Well, of course, the Holy Spirit guiding everybody, but anyway, if you've
enjoyed this episode, we ask that you pass it along to someone else so it can be an encouragement
to them. And if you'd like to come alongside us and help with our audio editing expenses,
we have a fundraising campaign in GibsonGo.com and just look up God's goodness podcast and
you'll be able to give there. And then we'll talk to you next time.