Spotlight

Spotlight

Bro. Mike D. Kent
by Bro. Robert Howard

I sat with Bro. Mike and talked with him about salvation, his call to the ministry, what God has put him through, and how he has been blessed through the years.

Bro. Robert-
Where, when, & how did you get saved?

Bro. Mike-
I had gotten out of the Army in 1971. I had been out of the army about a year and a half, drinking to much, kind of had my life in a mess; no direction or anything. In June of 1973, a man started coming by my house wanting my kid’s to ride the bus. His name was John Abet. Later he became a very good friend of mine, and actually was a bus worker for me.

John kept coming by asking my wife if our kid’s could ride his bus. My wife would come to the back bed room, where I was, and ask me the question, and I would say no. John came by for the next three or four Sunday's asking the same question. So, on the fourth Sunday, Loretta told him they could go with him. Loretta came back to the bed room and told me. I told her just this one time will be alright, but we’re going to follow that bus, our children are too little to go alone. So, we followed the bus to church in our car.

That Sunday morning it was like the Pastor, Bro. Joe Moody, was reading my mail. It was like he was preaching just to me. God was dealing with me and I must have called upon Him to save me about twenty times. I was falling under real bad conviction. Of course at the end of the service when he gave the invitation, where people went down to the front altar, I went down to the altar and ask Him again to save me. I felt like He already had saved me, but, I just did what the preacher said. Anyway, I talked with the preacher about it after the service, and that night he baptized me.

Bro. Robert-
How did you know that the ministry was where God wanted you to be? Explain?

Bro. Mike-
About a week from the day I got saved, God was really dealing with me about doing something and I didn’t even know what it was. I was going to church every time the doors were open, but I felt like I should be doing more. So, the next Sunday night, I went down to the front of the church and prayed.

The following Sunday I got the same conviction about doing more for the Lord. So, I went down and told the preacher this time, and he prayed with me. The pastor asked me, “What do you think God wants you to do, Mike?” I said, “I don’t know, I just fell like He wants me to do more.” So, the pastor said, “Why don’t you come talk to me Monday”, and I did.

The pastor said, “Look, why don’t you take a bus route? It’s a good place to work, and you get your kid’s to church every Sunday. And you can ask the Lord what He wants you to do.”

About three week’s later I had it settled in my heart on what God wanted me to do. God wanted me to be in full time service and to be a preacher. So, I surrendered to preach, and the pastor told me that was what I needed to do. In doing that, I told the church why I was called to the ministry. The pastor told me to keep working on the bus routes. The pastor said, "We’ll see what God will do."

That December, Christmas Eve night, we had a big dinner that day. I went to the church to clean out my bus and got it ready for the next Sunday. Afterwards, while no one else was there, I was sitting in my car in the church parking lot praying about what God wanted me to do. Well, I no sooner got home, and the pastor was on the phone wanting to talk to me.

The pastor said, "Mike, I want you to pray about something, I want you to pray about coming to work on the church staff as a full time bus director. I have talked with the deacons, and they agreed, the church is prospering now and it can afford a bus director." The pastor said, "The pay won’t be much but we will help you. So, I would like you to pray about this, Mike."

Then I told him “Preacher I don't even have to pray about it because this is an answer to prayer. On the first of February I went on staff as the full time bus director. Four years later, my first church had called me to be pastor, and I have been serving the Lord ever since.

Bro. Robert-
What is the thing that God has pressed upon you the most?

Bro. Mike-
I think the biggest thing that God has dealt with me about, all along, and still does consistently is being patient, or being careful about what you preach. Because, you are going to give an account for what you preach when you get to Heaven.

When you get up in front of the congregation, you try to look at everybody, because you realize that in every life there is a need. You, yourself don't even know these need and couldn't even meet the needs if you did. But God can meet them all, and a lot of that through the preaching of the Word. God has chosen the foolishness of preaching to save folks. He uses his Word to build folks up, encourage folks when their down, correct folks, discipline folks, and all kinds of things.

So, in all things that God has for a pastor to do, whether it is the practical or unique, I say being careful with the preaching of His word is the most important thing.

Bro. Robert-
What has God put you through to become a better pastor?

Bro. Mike-
Like every Christian, I've had all kinds of trials. As a pastor a lot of the trials center on troubles or problems in the church. There are also the personal ones too. God uses those trials all in all to allow you to grow, to season and toughen you at times, and sometime just to give you experience. You don't even know what you're going to face down the line. All of us need to be hesitant, and have our faith increased that way.

To name a certain thing is impossible, because every week it is something else. In the past three years there has been something in the church or even with my family in the church. Certain trials sting real hard, I am still going through some of them, but in the long run I think you will get some of the biggest blessing. I know it will teach you that you have to trust the Lord, and that is it. That is what He wants you to do. There are all kinds of people you love but in the end you can't really depend on them. It's the Lord that you have to depend on, and I think He is trying to get us all to do that. I don't claim to be there, I just say He is working on me.

Bro. Robert-
Are you where you thought you would be when you got saved, and ten years ago?

Bro. Mike-
When I got saved, to put it plainly, no. Ten years ago, I think that God had already placed me just where He wanted me to be.

When you first get saved you have visions of sugar plums dancing in your head. You think you are going to be the next Billy Graham, with buses and eighteen wheelers going cross country with you in a crusade. Stopping at every major city to have millions of people hear you preach the Word of God. I know that I have seen some Revival groups that have all those things, and some of them even had jet airplanes. I think everyone when they start out thinks they are going to be the next one leading a big city crusades. I was involved with a few big crusades and I don’t think that was me.

It wasn’t to far down the line before I realized that I didn’t want the glamorous life quite like I thought I did. I thought that it would be pretty glamorous driving a Win-a-Bay-Go going down the road looking like you are having a big vacation, but how things change. Since then, I know at least two dozen evangelists with old broke down buses. They have come to my church and staid for two to three weeks trying to fix there buses. You see the preachers and they are all worn out, but God gives them the strength to go on. Seeing all of that, I am happy where God has put me.

I know that you are going to give an account for everything that you have done. There is a whole lot to account for just in pastoring a church or doing anything. You are going to account for EVERYTHING! Everyone saved or not, when there life ends is going to give an account.

Bro. Robert-
Has God blessed you in the ministry?

Bro. Mike-
God has blessed me in the ministry and through the ministry.

I have been a pastor right at three decades. I think some of the biggest blessings are when you are able to see the people that where once babies in your church, after they have grown up, still in your church and having children of there own. That is gratifying to know that it is really going to go on, perpetuates its self, the work does, the work of the Lord. If you should live to minister forty or fifty years you can see another generation in the same family doing the same thing. Adult's having babies that grow up to serve God, those children having babies that grow up to do the same, and so on. I think that is one of the most satisfying thing that comes from being a pastor. Another satisfying thing is, having a part in getting someone that is in a real mess come to the realization that they need the Lord. Letting God save them and seeing them grow from there. Those two things are the biggest blessings that God has given me.

Bro. Robert-
The interview that I had with Bro. Mike was about a preacher who has seen a lot threw his thirty years in the ministry. I just hope that I can see some of those things in not only my life, but in my child's as well.