Building a Family Legacy God’s Way with Pam Nichols
The guys welcome Pam Nichols as she shares her journey through faith, family, and ministry and discover how her experiences with hardship, marriage, and motherhood have shaped her approach to helping other families build a lasting legacy.
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How does God build a family legacy out of hard beginnings? Pam Nichols, who has led 121 Community Church’s children’s ministry, Creation Land, for more than two decades, says it starts when you stop trying to fix everything yourself and go to God first. Pam joins Mike Mobley and Chris Howard to share how God brought her out of an abusive first marriage, gave her a rescuer in her husband, Randy, and turned a hastily blended family into one family once they put Christ at the center. She also shares how she chooses joy without grumbling, how the church carried them through Randy’s near-fatal accident, the gift of watching babies she dedicated grow up to follow Jesus, and what she would tell her younger self. Plus her bodybuilding past, AdvoCare Spark, and voicemails from her kids. Below: the key takeaways, the Scripture discussed, and the full episode transcript.
God Used Her Hardest Season
Pam married young, didn’t seek the Lord, and thought she could change her husband. After an abusive marriage and a divorce at 24, she was a single mom, sure she had made all the wrong choices. But her daughter, Sunday, was the biggest blessing of her life. “I consider Jesus my Savior and Randy my rescuer,” she says. Looking back, those years let her minister to women who have survived abuse, grown up with alcoholic parents, or are trying to blend a family.
From Blended to One Family
Pam and Randy married after three months, which she doesn’t recommend. They went to church without really being the church, and they both carried hurts. When their son Josh was born, they made a pact that the Lord would be the center of their home. Randy raised Sunday as his own, Joey called Pam his other mother, and the three kids grew up as brothers and sisters. Blending a family is like beating block cream cheese instead of whipped: it takes a whole lot longer. You also can’t fix your spouse. Each person has to seek the Lord for themselves.
Do All Things Without Grumbling
Pam’s joy is famous in the hallways at 121. She learned it from her dad, a meat cutter and recovering alcoholic who came to Christ later in life, shared the gospel with his buddies at the VFW, and answered every “How are you?” with “Happy and blessed.” He loved Philippians 2:14. “You can always find something to grumble about, but you can always find five times as many things to be happy about,” Pam says. When her job changed in ways she didn’t like, God kept sending encouragement until she saw that He knew best.
Learning to Receive
In 2012, Randy was critically injured in a four-wheeler accident and was given little chance of surviving. Pam saw God’s hand at every turn: a trauma nurse happened to be next door, a brain surgeon stayed instead of catching his flight, and about 70 people filled the waiting room within two hours. Holding on to the promise “I know the plans I have for you,” she prayed that whatever else Randy forgot, he would know the Lord. He did. He relearned everything and was back at work within six months. For a natural servant, the hardest part was letting the church serve her family.
Watching the Next Generation Grow
One of Pam’s greatest joys is dedicating babies and then watching them grow taller than her, get baptized, and come back to dedicate their own children. Seeing parents excited for their kids to learn about Jesus means the next generation is growing up in the faith. And as a grandmother of eight, she gets to watch her own kids parent kids just like themselves. Her advice: enjoy it. Grandkids never roll their eyes at you.
What She Would Tell Her Younger Self
Go to God first. Pam calls herself a fixer and a recovering control freak. She once believed her house had to be spotless before anyone came over, and she sometimes chose chores over trips to the park. Now she’d say: let things go, don’t sweat the small stuff, care more about the inside than the outside, and be a God pleaser before a people pleaser. In voicemails, her kids, Josh and Sunday, describe a Proverbs 31 woman who carries herself with strength and dignity from the Lord.
Scriptures From This Episode
Philippians 2:14 (“Do all things without grumbling or disputing”)
Philippians 4:4 (“Rejoice in the Lord always; again I will say, rejoice”)
Jeremiah 29:11 (“I know the plans I have for you”)
Proverbs 31:25 (a woman clothed with strength and dignity)
Go deeper: How To Leave A Godly Legacy For Your Children · Bible Verses About Joy · Theft-Proof Joy · Why Is It So Hard To Receive A Compliment Or A Gift? · Finding Freedom in Lack of Control · Scripture on Marriage
Full Transcript, Not Quite There, Episode 72: Building a Family Legacy God’s Way with Pam Nichols
Chris: We have the great Pam Nichols with us.
Mike: Pam Nichols. She is here with us in the studio. So, big news for car fans everywhere. Someone potentially might be the owner of a new truck.
Chris: Who?
Mike: And it’s not me. Who could it be? It’s this guy. Silverado and everything.
Chris: A white Chevy Silverado. There’s a song right now called “White Chevy Silverado.” Did you know that?
Mike: There are probably multiple country songs that have a white Chevy Silverado.
Chris: There are songs that have Silverado in them, but this one is distinctly white.
Mike: Isn’t that the rule of a country song? You have to have a truck, a horse, a bar, a dog, a cowboy, a saddle…
Chris: Maybe an ex or something like that too.
Mike: I don’t know. You know a white car is going to get dirty a lot.
Chris: It is. And it’s definitely not electric.
Mike: Oh, wow. Shots fired.
Chris: No, I’m just saying it’s not. If you’re looking for electric, you’re not going to find it.
Mike: You’re more of a man than I am, because I have a Tesla.
Chris: Who said that I’m more of a man than you?
Mike: If we had a video feed, people would see. I’m more of a burly-looking guy, with strength and size… But I didn’t say that. You know, there’s probably no good segue to go from big burly guy to our guest today.
Chris: I don’t think so.
Mike: We’re going to give you a shot at turning the corner, a 90-degree turn, to introduce who we have today.
Chris: Okay. I’m looking forward to this, because this particular guest, I’ve known for quite a while. 20-plus years or so.
Mike: Multiple decades.
Chris: Multiple decades. In fact, many have known our guest because they’ve either been here as young parents, or they were the babies, and those babies have grown to be teenagers and adults. We have the great Pam Nichols with us.
Mike: Pam Nichols is here with us in the studio today. We don’t have that many different sound effects.
Chris: No, but we have the right ones.
Mike: Do you think she recognizes this one? Do you have any idea what show it’s from?
Pam: No, I don’t.
Mike: What about this one? “Oh, it’s a guy thing.” Pam, does that sound familiar at all? Pam Nichols in the house, here in the studio. Thank you for being here.
Pam: Thank you, the great Mike and the great Chris.
Mike: Don’t know who those guys are, but we’re here. So, Chris, who is Pam Nichols, for our audience?
Chris: Well, Pam Nichols has been part of the 121 church staff for quite a long time. That’s how we see each other quite often. She serves in the role of helping our childcare be completely top-notch.
Mike: You call it childcare? Or is it a ministry of the local church, my friend? Do you view her ministry as just a childcare babysitting situation? Wait, wrong sound effect. There it is. Let’s start over again.
Chris: Why don’t you just introduce Pam, Mike?
Mike: Pam has been leading a ministry within the local church for multiple decades, my friend, ministering to people from babies to adults. You just call it childcare. I’m going to call it a real ministry. I’m sorry.
Pam: Chris just knows that I care for children.
Chris: Children are important, and care is important.
Mike: He just thinks you’re a glorified babysitter. That’s what I heard. All right, we’ll see you later, Chris. And he’s gone. Finally, Pam, we can have a great conversation.
Chris: I’m back. I want to be part of this.
Pam: I’m so glad you’re back now.
Mike: We wanted to bring Pam into the studio to hear her story…
Chris: Actually, who invited her?
Mike: Both of us did. We’re going off on a tangent here.
Chris: We’re bringing it back.
Mike: Here we go. Okay, listen, we’re going to throw some quick questions at you. Ready for this? These are very important. We ask these questions of all our guests. They’re standard. It kind of helps warm up before we get to the meat of the interview.
Chris: Think of it like appetizers. Like Chili’s.
Pam: Or Bennigan’s. Is Bennigan’s still around?
Mike: Oh, no.
Chris: There’s the word “childcare.”
Mike: Remember, regular standard questions.
Chris: Regular standard questions for our ministry. Here we go, friend. Who is your favorite child?
Mike: Don’t answer that, Pam.
Pam: Baby Jesus.
Mike: That face she just gave you, for the record. “How dare you ask me that question.”
Chris: I’m on a roll here with our friend Pam of 20-plus years. Okay, we’ll make it easier. How many grandchildren do you have?
Pam: I have eight grandchildren.
Chris: And who is your favorite grandkid?
Pam: I always say my favorite firstborn is Caleb, my favorite second-born is Cason, on down the line.
Chris: Definitely kryptonite to our question here. All right, next one. What pumps you up in the morning? What gets you going? Because when we see Pam going down the hallways, she’s scooting.
Mike: You are scooting.
Chris: We’re like, “What is she having?”
Mike: Because we might need some. You do have a lot of energy.
Pam: It’s called AdvoCare Spark.
Mike: I knew that was coming. This episode brought to you by…
Pam: You need a Spark. You too can have energy.
Mike: Contact our guest if you’re interested in AdvoCare. Is Spark really the magic?
Pam: Well, that, and a little bit of Jesus in the morning. And I am married to Randy. That keeps the energy going.
Mike: That’ll do. Have you tried Spark, by the way?
Chris: I have not tried Spark.
Mike: You’ve never tried Spark? You’re missing out.
Chris: Is it a ministry thing?
Mike: No, man. It’s just a regular thing. You seem to be really tight. Just because you bombed earlier.
Pam: You’re good, Chris.
Mike: What is something you can do that would surprise people, that not a lot of people know about?
Pam: I can’t do a whole lot as much as I used to.
Mike: But do you have a special gift, a skill, something that’s different? Like cat juggling or fire breathing?
Pam: I used to be a weightlifter. I was a bodybuilder a long time ago. In college.
Chris: That’s exactly what we’re looking for.
Mike: Really?
Chris: Did you do squats and bench press?
Pam: The oil, the tanning booth, all those things.
Mike: You did full-scale bodybuilding? Did you enter competitions?
Pam: That was before videos could capture things, because that was in the ’70s. Weightlifting was a lot different in the ’70s.
Chris: That’s when Arnold Schwarzenegger came on the scene, so that would have been really big.
Mike: So you two were probably really good friends. He was Mr. Olympia. You were Miss Olympia.
Pam: I was Kid Olympia.
Chris: Was there any AdvoCare Spark back then?
Pam: No.
Mike: So when’s the last time you used a bunch of weights? Has it been a while?
Pam: Oh, yeah. When I started working at 121, there was no time for weights. I just live kids now.
Mike: Real, full-scale bodybuilding. Interesting. I did not know that.
Pam: And then I was a cheerleader from sixth grade through college.
Chris: Those two probably go well together.
Pam: They went well together.
Chris: You ever just lift one of the grandkids and surprise them?
Mike: Like a clean and jerk kind of thing?
Pam: I haven’t done the old bodybuilding in a very long time.
Mike: We did bring in a big dumbbell. We wanted to see you lift.
Chris: Why are you looking at me? Stop looking at me.
Pam: I can pick Chris up right now and put him on my shoulder.
Mike: That would be great. Oh! Oh!
Chris: Oh, yes. That was scary.
Pam: Thank you for that hernia.
Mike: Normally, bodybuilding is traditionally kind of a guy thing. “Oh, Pam, it’s a guy thing.” No, Chris, I told you, it’s not just a guy thing. Men and women. It’s Women’s History Month. She’s not just a babysitter. She’s more than that.
Chris: I’m learning. I’m growing. I’m sorry.
Mike: Sorry for the random sound effects, Pam. We’re just going to throw them in at random times during this episode.
Pam: That’s quite all right.
Mike: Okay, why don’t we get down to brass tacks?
Chris: Down to the nitty gritty. Do you know what brass tacks are?
Mike: I actually don’t know. I know it’s a phrase, but now that you’re calling me out on it, why do people say, “Let’s get down to brass tacks”? Let’s ask Pam.
Pam: You know, I’ve actually never heard “let’s get down to brass tacks.”
Mike: Like, “Let’s get down to business.” Is it taxes, T-A-X, or tacks, T-A-C-K-S?
Pam: Or Brass Tacks, as in the restaurant.
Mike: That would be another conversation. Are you Googling? I’m going to look it up for a second while you talk to her.
Chris: Let me just talk to Pam. So, Pam, what would I need to lift if I were going to enter a bodybuilding competition? What would my program need to look like?
Pam: I don’t know what your program would need to look like. Maybe start with 10 or 15.
Chris: 10 or 15. Just to make sure you don’t blow out the elbows or the knees. Keep those hinges working.
Mike: So while you guys are having those terrible sidebar conversations: this is actually fitting for the phrase “let’s get down to brass tacks.” It is T-A-C-K-S. So you’re right. It means to focus on the essential facts or the most important details of something. Back in 19th-century shops, brass tacks were used as measurement markers on counters to measure cloth, so you were getting down to the real measurements.
Pam: Thank you, Mike. That was very interesting.
Mike: I’m just going to see myself out. Here we are. Brass tacks. Here we go. Lead the way for us.
Chris: Okay, we just had appetizers.
Pam: The appetizers were good.
Chris: We’re still a little bit hungry for information.
Pam: Thank you for the chips and salsa.
Mike: Bottomless.
Chris: Bottomless chicken…
Mike: What are you…
Chris: Did I say bottomless chicken? That’s a terrible idea.
Mike: I don’t know what you just said.
Chris: Do you think somewhere there’s a place serving bottomless chicken?
Pam: Have you seen a bottomless chicken?
Mike: Across the road. Fair question. Have you ever seen a bottomless chicken?
Chris: I’m sure there’s a chicken out there without feet.
Mike: This rails off right now. What a shocker that we would go off the rails in this conversation.
Chris: A bucket of bottomless chicken. That would be a terrible idea.
Mike: Are you still going to talk about that?
Chris: No, we’re moving on. Okay, here we are. First main course question for you: what has God used in your life that at the time you thought, “Why this?” but that you understand better now?
Pam: What has He not used? I think the biggest thing in my life that really changed the trajectory of who I was going to be, who God had made me, was making the mistake of marrying the first time and not seeking God in that marriage, thinking I could change this man. Clearly, I couldn’t. It was an emotionally, spiritually and physically abusive relationship, and it went on longer than it should have. But then I wouldn’t have gotten the biggest blessing I had received at that time. When you’re in an abusive relationship like that, you think, “I got myself into this. It’s not anybody’s fault but my own. I didn’t seek the Lord as I should have.” So you think you need to stay in it, because that’s what you’re supposed to do. And then two years into that relationship, I’m pregnant with Sunday, and here I am bringing a child into this awful situation, but she was the biggest blessing of my life. A year and a half later, after counseling and lots of things, I realized I’m not here to change this man. Only God can change the man. But God has given me a big blessing that I need to take care of, and I do not need to raise her in this environment. So she and I, after lots of hiding and running, were able to break away. And I thought, “Why am I going through a divorce at 24? I made all the wrong choices. I was raised better than this, and I just didn’t listen, and I didn’t seek the Lord in it at all.” So now I’m a single mom with a child, and she and I had the best relationship ever. I was perfectly fine with just me and Sunday. But we still had a little bit of her dad hovering. He would still show up every now and then, and we would have to go into hiding, or be scared of what was going to happen. That was a scary part, too. Five years later, a man entered my life that I didn’t think I was ready for at the time. I consider Jesus my Savior and Randy my rescuer. I met Randy, and he became my and Sunday’s rock. He brought a son, and I had a daughter, and we thought everything was just hunky-dory. Three months after knowing this man, I again didn’t really seek the Lord. I just thought, “This is great. He loves his kid. I love my kid. Let’s just get married, because we’re not going to live together. That’s wrong.” So we got married in three months, which I don’t recommend to anyone. But a year later, we found out we were expecting a son, and that son blended our family well. When Josh was born, Randy and I made a commitment right then: this is a marriage God intended for both of us. We’d both been through hardship and broken relationships, and we’d both been looking, as they say in the country world, for love in all the wrong places. There’s a song by that name. So we had done everything wrong up to that point, and we made a pact with each other that the Lord was going to be the center of our lives, and we were going to raise our kids in a safe, healthy home. And Randy had a little talk with Sunday’s dad, on the back of a Chevrolet truck. It wasn’t a Silverado, but it was the back of a truck in a field. And they came to a decision that he was not going to be a threat to us anymore. He was going to learn to be a dad to Sunday, and Randy was in the picture now, and he was going to take care of us. There was going to be no more slicing tires and being a threat to us. And Sunday’s dad said, “Okay.” They had a rapport, and he knew that Randy was not going to try to take his place, but was there as Sunday’s protector. He had a little bit of a change of heart. I think he might have been a little intimidated by Randy at the time. Randy was younger, and he was a weightlifter too, so he looked a whole lot different than he does now.
Mike: With the oil and the tanning?
Pam: No, not the oil. Just a tank top.
Mike: Just a tank top. That’s all it takes.
Pam: A tank top and a motorcycle. But anyway, Randy and I got married, and we have Sunday and Josh and Joey. And looking back, I see that the Lord brought me through alcoholic parents, who came to know the Lord way later in life. I was raised by them, and then I married a man who was exactly like my dad was before he became a Christian, and then I married a man like my dad was after he became a Christian. So really, I fell in love with two men who were just like my father, in two different seasons of his life. I didn’t know it at the time, when I was 24 and 25, thinking, “How in the world did I get myself into this? How do I get out?” But looking back at the trajectory of the things laid out in my life, and having been through the things I’ve been through, it has helped me so much to be real with people I can minister to, besides children: other adult women who’ve gone through abusive situations, or have been raised by alcoholic parents, or who have blended families. Blended families aren’t easy at all. They were very hard for Randy and me. But the thing that turned the corner was when we both made a commitment to the Lord that we were going to be a Christian household.
Mike: What was it? Was it the birth of Josh? With the situations and history you both had, what made the two of you say, “Okay, we’re making this commitment now”?
Pam: When we first met, we both talked about how we wanted a Christian relationship. That’s one of the reasons we didn’t just move in together. We both knew that if we wanted a family, we needed to have Christ in the middle of it. We knew all this. But instead, we hastily got married, and then we got into a church. “Gotta go to church.” But there wasn’t the relationship of being involved in a church. We just went to church. And it was hard. He had Joey, who he thought could do no wrong. I had Sunday, who had slept with me for eight years. And then all of a sudden, this man comes in, we get married in three months, and, “Oh, Sunday, you’ve got your own room. And by the way, your stepdad’s not going to let you watch TV all night like your mom did.” And then I’ve got this little boy who’s waking me up at five o’clock in the morning saying he wants breakfast, and I’m thinking, “Sunday slept till 10. What is this? Your dad’s on the other side of the bed. Go tell him you want breakfast at this time of day.” So there was a lot of difference, trying to blend these two families together when we both had so many hurts. He didn’t trust me any more than the man in the moon, because he’d been hurt before, too. And I never asked him for help, because I was used to taking out my own trash and fixing my own car. So it was really hard. We didn’t have the roles we should have had as a godly man, a godly woman and a godly couple. We didn’t really know, and neither of us had experience from watching our parents. I knew how to divorce well. My parents divorced really well. Randy lost his parents when he was 16, so he didn’t really have parents to show him how to parent. We both knew we needed to be in church. And so when Josh was born, it was like, “Well, I guess there’s no turning back from this marriage. God really wants this marriage to happen.” I wasn’t going to be divorced again, and Randy didn’t want to be divorced again. So we both started seeking the Lord even more, me for me and him for him. And then we both came to the same point at the same time: “Hey, we’ve got to make this real. We’ve got to come together. We are not going to be a stepdad, a stepmom, a stepbrother. We are going to be a family.” So Randy raised Sunday just like a dad would, and she saw him as her dad and role model in our home. And Joey considered me his other mother. So there was no “blending.” All three of our kids are like brothers and sisters. It’s not “my stepdad, my stepmom, my stepbrother.” But it’s not an easy thing to blend a family. It’s kind of like when you buy the cream cheese in the block instead of the whipped cream cheese. You can use that whipped cream cheese so much easier. But if you try to use the block cream cheese, it’s just yucky and hard to beat. You’ve got to beat it a whole lot longer.
Mike: I was thinking exactly cream cheese. Chris, I don’t know if you were thinking that, but it’s definitely cream cheese.
Chris: Let’s talk about cream cheese being solid. If you see your family together, which we have plenty of times, everybody all together, it’s tight. You look at it and you say, “That is a group of people that really loves each other.” And you love other people well, too, as a family. That’s one of the things we’ve had the privilege of seeing over the years. Here you had this incomplete picture of what this was supposed to look like when you and Randy were talking about these things, and yet you had the bigger picture of what you wanted it to be. It’s amazing that you had that in place to help guide everything else that had to come together.
Pam: Well, we would not be together if we had not had that. I mean, we might have been, but we would have been miserable.
Mike: And by this time, you’ve been able to minister to people almost more effectively, because you can connect with all these struggles from your own experience. Have you noticed a trend, where people go through some type of hardship or trial like that, and then, almost like your story, the Lord redeems something in their story and brings about blessings they wouldn’t have seen otherwise? Have you seen a theme like that when you’re ministering to people?
Pam: Sometimes. Sometimes not, because sometimes people don’t want to change. They want to stay on the hamster wheel. They don’t want to do the work it’s going to take to make it right. Some women come to me thinking they need their husband fixed. They don’t realize they need their heart fixed first. Randy and I wouldn’t have been able to fix things if we hadn’t fixed ourselves first. He wasn’t any more flawed than I was. I think the hard thing sometimes for people to understand is that you have to seek your own relationship with the Lord. As much of a control freak as I am, I couldn’t control Randy and make him seek the Lord. He had to seek Him on his own. But when people are willing to do their work and they really are seeking the Lord, I’ve met with women whose husbands have had affairs, but they’ve come back to redemption. Their husband’s been redeemed, they’ve been redeemed, they’ve seen the light, and they’re still married. The couple I’m thinking of has been married 40 years now. And I’ve seen wayward kids who have gone away because there’s been a break in the mother-daughter relationship, but the kid knew how things should be and just wasn’t living the right way. And the more the mom prayed, the kid came back. It’s between the people and the Lord, and how they view their relationship with God. It’s not anything I’ve ever done for them. I just help people understand that it’s their relationship with the Lord.
Chris: And you’re there for them. One of the privileged parts of your position, your ministry here, is that you get to meet people in a vulnerable place, because we’re very vulnerable about our kids. That opens up a lot of conversations, and it seems like that’s a place where you can really connect with parents and walk through some of life’s harder things, all with the underpinning of the most precious things that are within your care. That’s a unique position. How do you set the tone for that? Because you have to be positive and have that energy about you. And I know, AdvoCare Spark…
Mike: This episode brought to you by…
Chris: But there’s a much deeper joy that comes out of you all the time. So how do you set that tone?
Pam: Well, I think of Philippians 2:14. My dad used to say this a lot, teasing me, after he became a Christian. We would talk about grumbling people, and he would say, “Do all things without grumbling or disputing.” That’s really our thing. If you grumble, you’re going to feel grumbly. Have you ever seen anybody whose face looks like it has a permanent frown, and you think, “Have they ever smiled? How can they be so unhappy with life?” You can always find something to grumble about, but you can always find five times as many things to be happy about. My dad had a hard job after he became a Christian. He was a meat cutter. People were very particular about how they wanted their steak cut, and they grumbled a lot. And he was a little man like me, very short, but he was so happy and joyful all the time. He was a recovering alcoholic, and he did as much battling with Satan in the VFW before he became a Christian as he did after, because he would go in and kick Satan in the teeth and share the gospel with all those old buddies at the VFW and bring them to Christ. People would say, “How are you today, Gordon?” “Happy and blessed.” He was always happy, always blessed. If we have the Lord in us, no matter what kind of bad day we’re having, the Lord helped us get up that morning. The Lord gave me knees to squat and talk to children and get on their level. And He made me short, which is really nice, because I don’t have as far to squat. It’s a lot easier for me to squat than for y’all.
Chris: It’s good with your bodybuilding, too.
Mike: A little bodybuilding squat.
Pam: So until parents have to help me up, I’m good to go. And when I have to say, “Can you please help me?” don’t grumble about it. But Philippians 4:4 also says, “Rejoice in the Lord always; again I will say, rejoice.” Sometimes we have to remind ourselves to be joyful. If I come to work with a grumble on my face, how can I expect my volunteers, who are so great in Creation Land, to be happy to be there? If I’m not happy, I can’t spread happiness. And what kid wants to be ministered to by an unhappy old lady?
Mike: Have you found that when you’re walking through the halls, even when your hair’s on fire, because ministry can be a mess with a lot of things going on, you choose, “You know what? Here’s this kid. I’m going to be joyful in this moment”? And have you noticed that when you’re joyful, your attitude almost follows? It’s profound to hear you say anyone can grumble, but often a grumbling spirit comes attached.
Pam: I’m so blessed by the job I do. A few years ago, I thought I knew how things should look in my job, and some things got changed. I was unhappy about it because I thought I knew best. But obviously I didn’t have the big picture, and I didn’t know best. The Lord did. I went through a sad period for a while, but anytime I was sad, God would send some parent to me with an encouraging email, or a kid would come up to me and say, “I love you, Ms. Pam.” And it became so totally different. I thought, “God, You knew what was best for me.” Now I cannot imagine things any different than they are today in my job. I love what I get to do. And if I am sad or hurt, like with the loss of my dad a year ago this February… On a Sunday here, it was a year since my dad had passed, and I was a little sad. But I came in and saw these happy faces, and there is nothing happier than seeing a kid worship Jesus. If y’all have never seen a kid worship, y’all need to come back there. They come up and they hug you. I never want a parent to say, “Oh, hug Ms. Pam,” if a kid doesn’t want to. But I’ve been hugged so hard sometimes that I’ve been tackled and had to get up off the ground.
Chris: And you’re glad you’re close to the floor.
Pam: Luckily I am close to the floor, so it’s not a far way up. That’s why I wear tennis shoes 99% of the time now. But the Lord has just shined on me so much. I don’t deserve what He has done for me, and I don’t deserve to be this gratified and this happy in the position I have here at 121. But He allows me to do what I love to do, and He gives me the strength to do it, the knees and the stamina and the Spark.
Mike: And the Dum Dums.
Pam: There’s nothing so exciting as seeing those kids be so serious over which Dum Dum they’re going to pick that day.
Mike: Oh, it’s a big deal.
Pam: Dum Dums are a very big deal. G-Pop asked his grandson how he liked the sucker, and Miles quickly said, “It’s not a sucker. It’s a lollipop.” G-Pop did not know. G-Pop, that’s his name.
Mike: I forgot about G-Pop.
Pam: So, God is just… I can’t expect to be anything but happy. Sometimes you do want to be grumbly. And when you look in the mirror and realize you are this old, it does make you grumble. But luckily, God is so good that He makes your eyesight go, so you don’t see the wrinkles as much as other people do.
Mike: I know you’re talking about Chris. It’s hard to see from the angle right there, the amount of wrinkles.
Chris: I’ve got another one here that I’m nourishing.
Pam: Guys don’t have to worry about that so much.
Chris: Maybe a receding hairline.
Mike: You’re so marked by being someone who out-serves and out-does for others all the time. Probably because of your knees from your bodybuilding days. Your life is marked by that. And like you were saying, you feel you don’t deserve it. What’s a way someone has served you, when you’ve been on the receiving end?
Pam: That was hard for me, being on the receiving end. You guys know the story, but it’s been about 14 years ago, in 2012, on a nice Sunday afternoon. I came home from work to take a quick nap, and Randy was moving his four-wheeler off the trailer. The neighbor shouted hi at him, and he looked back. He didn’t have his helmet on, because all he was doing was moving it off the trailer. When he looked back at the neighbor, his four-wheeler jumped the curb, he overcompensated, his head hit the curb, and the four-wheeler fell on top of him, crushing his head against the curb. The remarkable thing at that exact time was that my neighbor’s friend, who he hadn’t seen in a year and had just invited over for lunch after church, was an ER trauma nurse. This ER trauma nurse knew to run to Randy and what to do to help save his life, and paramedics were called. Someone hollered at me, “Randy’s hurt,” and I’m thinking, “Oh my gosh, what has that man done now? I’ve got things to do.” And then I see him lying there, badly hurt and unconscious. Fast forward to the ambulance. We go to Harris Methodist, and another God thing: the renowned brain surgeon was there, about to leave, when he heard on the radio, “Non-responsive male coming in with head trauma.” He didn’t take his flight. He decided to stay, met Randy at the door, and got him inside. Within two hours, no less than 70 people were in that waiting room with me, praying over Randy, who we’d been told may not make it through the night. It was touch and go. He had a 10% chance of living, and hardly any chance of coming out of it beyond that. Six hours later, he had brain surgery. He was non-responsive and in a coma. And so many people were there. Lloyd Sawyers had bought out Dickey’s Barbecue, and it was spread all over the waiting room at Harris Methodist to feed all the people there. Many people were there praying, and people were just taking care of us. For those 16 days, we didn’t know if Randy was even going to pull through, and he hadn’t spoken yet. I was getting scriptures day by day. People were in my house cleaning for me, taking care of things, taking care of our dog. But it was so hard. I was never alone at the hospital, not one time. And there were so many other people on that fourth floor who were hurting, people who weren’t as fortunate as us, who had lost somebody. People from 121 were ministering to other people and ministering to me, and we were able to talk with other people and share God with them. People were just praying for my husband. The doctor told us, “If he comes out of it, he’s going to be in a long-term care facility. He may not know you. He may not know how to do anything. We may have to make arrangements for him.” They couldn’t do any testing, because he was still in a coma. They didn’t know if his spine was broken, or what all damage had been done, because they were focused on stopping the brain bleed. And one morning, when I was told we didn’t know what was going to happen, I’d gotten a scripture: “I know the plans I have for you, plans to heal you, plans to prosper you.” And in the fetal position in the shower, I just wept and cried and said, “Lord, if Randy does not know me, I got him to fall in love with me in three months, so I can get him to know me again really quick. But I want him to know You. I want him to remember that You are the one who saved him, that You are his rock. When he wakes up, help him to know You. And as he’s sleeping, help him to feel Your presence.” When they brought him out of the coma, they told me, “Come over here. He may not know you, but we’re going to see.” They had me stand over him, and I could hardly recognize him. They said, “Do you know this woman? Blink once for yes, twice for no.” And he blinked for a really long time, then opened his eyes, and his eyes lit up. And I said, “Thank You, Jesus. He does know who I am.” Even then, he still couldn’t speak. He had to learn how to speak, how to walk, how to eat, how to do everything. They said, “He’s going to be like this for maybe a year. We don’t really know. He’s going to inpatient rehab for at least six months.” We were at Baylor for three months, and in those three months he shared Jesus with so many people. He learned to talk, he learned to walk, he learned to eat. He learned his colors, his squares, his triangles. He learned everything all over again from scratch. In three months, he walked out of there on his own, and three months after that, he was back at work full time. He looks the same on the outside, but there’s a little bit of difference on the inside. I said, “Okay, God, if You’re going to rewire him, this is how I want him rewired.” But God did not listen to me very well.
Mike: He rewired him His best.
Pam: He’s still the best. His exuberant personality is just a little bit different than it used to be. He’s a little shyer and a little more reserved, which he never was, if you knew him before. But his heart is still the same. He loves his family unconditionally, and he loves his God. And they were there every single night. My kids are the busiest kids in the world. Josh and Sunday both had lives outside of the hospital, but every night they were there, just to be there for their dad and for their mom. My 121 family was there. Creation Land did not fall apart. My volunteers kept it going, and the church rallied behind us. So many prayers went out for Randy, and so much love and care. But it was so hard for me in the beginning to receive that. I thought, “I need to be entertaining these people. I need to be talking to them, visiting them, serving them.” I’d go over to make somebody’s plate, and they’d make me sit down. It was so humbling to have somebody like Charlotte Roberts come to my house and clean my bathrooms and clean my house for me while Randy was in the hospital. And to have somebody like Beth Sawyers, who was such a rock, come to the hospital, and Randy whispered to her, “Beth, I need to get out of this cage bed. I’ll give you $100 if you’ll go get the car, bring it around back, and help me escape.” And Beth said, “Yes, I will. I’ll be there, Randy. We’ll park it out back.” The rocks, the pillars, the people past and present at 121, will never be forgotten.
Mike: Yeah, it’s amazing.
Chris: I think we’re both a little bit teary here.
Mike: I’m lacking the words. It’s just incredible. Through a crazy trial like that, words won’t even describe all of that.
Pam: It put us on a different trajectory, because we thought I’d retire, he’d retire, we would travel, and we would get to go see our grandkids all the time. Randy retired five years ago, after 35 years at the same company. So I get to work, but God knew I would need a job where I could stay for a long time, with flexibility, so I can still be involved with my grandkids without a punch-the-clock, nine-to-five kind of job. No, we aren’t traveling around the world. We don’t get to take exotic vacations. We’ve never been to Hawaii, which is on our bucket list. But we’ll camp at vineyards, or we’ll camp at Ray Roberts. We still do the things we love to do. We get to be close to our grandkids, and we get to have Randy with us. That’s the main thing.
Chris: Thinking about longevity, too, and maybe this will make us a little more teary: you’ve seen a lot of babies grow to be adults here. One of the greatest parts of your ministry is also probably one of the hardest, which is that you get to see these kids grow. You’ve definitely seen ours. They’re not quite out of the nest yet, but they’re getting there. What is that like, to be such an important part of this journey?
Pam: The fun thing about watching them grow is that they outgrow me. They go on to 121 Kids, and they all love to come back. They stand up really tall next to me, because by then they’re an inch taller than me. And I’m like, “Oh my gosh, you’re so tall. You’re taller than me,” like that’s some big achievement.
Mike: They all remember the day. They’re so excited about it.
Pam: We have baby dedication, and one of the parents who’s dedicating his baby this next week was in our ministry as a kid. Now I get to dedicate his baby. And just a few weeks ago, a student was baptized at 16. I dedicated her, changed her diapers, and watched her grow up, and we have prayed for her for so long. At 16, she was baptized, and she opened the letter I give to my kids when we dedicate them. We got the privilege of walking with her on her spiritual journey. My greatest joy is seeing these parents come and bring their kids and be excited for their kids to learn about Jesus. Looking at those children, I know they aren’t first-generation Christians, because their parents are Christians. Even if their parents are first-generation Christians, they’re second-generation Christians. And on the personal side, watching my kids be parents is so phenomenal. You guys are going to get there quicker than you think, because your kids are going to grow up and have kids of their own. So I hope you’ve had “the talk” with them, because that’s very important.
Mike: Chris, hopefully you have. Not with yours, but…
Chris: Not with each other’s.
Mike: Thank you. I appreciate that.
Pam: It happens so fast. Sunday or Josh will call me sometimes, exasperated with something their kids are doing, and I just kind of laugh. “You are paying for your raising, because your kids are identical to you. They’re not doing anything you didn’t do.” Your kids don’t think you’re very smart now, but they learn to think you might have had it together a little bit. Josh would leave me notes about what to do when he brought his kids over, like I’d never been there before. He was very diligent, because he’s a control freak like I am. Yes, he is.
Mike: Josh, the control freak, if you’re listening.
Pam: Josh, if you’re listening. But I guess Sunday trusted me a little bit better, because she would give me instructions, but I think she thought I could handle it.
Chris: Back to question one: who’s your favorite child?
Mike: So basically, Sunday trusts you. Josh, in theory, if Josh is listening, does not trust you.
Pam: He does trust me. I’m just kidding. He does trust me.
Mike: Is it bad that I’m looking forward to the day, if there are grandkids in our family, when I can spoil them and just hand them right back?
Pam: That’s the funnest thing. It is so fun. You get to have all the fun with them, and then you go, “Okay, see you later.” I think that’s the beauty of grandparenting.
Mike: I’m assuming so. I’m not there.
Pam: And I don’t think your grandkids ever think you’re dumb, like your kids do. They think you don’t know a lot, and they do a lot of eye rolling. I’ve never gotten an eye roll from a grandkid. And I’ve got eight of them. Sixteen eyes, and not one of them has rolled at me.
Chris: They’re good judges of character, too. So they know.
Mike: Even the thought of Peyton or Matthew calling me frustrated about something in their parenting, I’m like, “Yay!”
Pam: But the beauty of it, too, is watching them in action, seeing them bring their kids to church and seeing them love the Lord. And then your grandkids… Cason will send Randy scripture and worship songs. You just beam so much. I just want to have a brag day on every one of my grandkids, because they are phenomenal, and my kids are phenomenal.
Mike: Except for Josh. We love you, Josh. We do.
Chris: No matter what Mike says.
Pam: It’s the Lord. A hundred percent. And it’s cool to see three generations. There are a lot of three generations here at 121, and that’s really cool to see, because I think I was about the oldest one at 121 for a long time, me and Dwayne Brewer. And then seasoned people started coming, and it’s really great. This church is so multi-aged now. It’s just really phenomenal.
Mike: That’s great. And going off multiple generations, let’s do a more serious last question. You’ve had these experiences. You’ve gone through these tremendous stories, and you’re giving God all the glory. Your joy is contagious. Chris and I, our joy is lifted up, no joke, because of your trust in the Lord and your gratefulness. Who wouldn’t be impacted by that? So if you could go back, what would the Pam of today tell the Pam of back then?
Pam: For one thing, I would definitely say, be better at going to God first. I was not very good at going to God. Even though I considered myself a Christian, and I didn’t do all bad things, I didn’t have that relationship with Him as my heavenly Father. I depended on me a lot, because of the way I grew up, and there just wasn’t that dependence. I think that’s part of my controlling personality. I can fix it. I’m a fixer. And another thing: I would try not to control things as much as I do. When I was younger, I was a housewife with another full-time job and three kids, but I thought my house had to look perfect every time anybody came over. “Don’t let anybody find dust. Don’t let anybody find dirty dishes in the sink. Don’t let anybody see you haven’t done your laundry.” So on Saturdays I would clean, clean, clean, and Saturday night I’d be preparing for what we were going to do the next day at church. We fed 30 people after church on Sunday, so I’d start meals. I was always doing, doing, doing. And I think I missed out on a lot of park days, a lot of just hanging out with my kids. We did things together, and we always ate together as a family, so there was always family time at night. But the clothes had to be folded before I did something with Sunday, or the bathrooms had to be cleaned before I took Josh to the park. So I’d say, let things go, and don’t sweat the small stuff. I would have been a lot less concerned about how I looked on the outside and more concerned about how I looked on the inside, and what I was conveying to people. I’ve always been a people pleaser, but I needed to be a God pleaser first. So just don’t sweat the small stuff, and God is your number one.
Chris: That’s a great word, especially in our culture today, where people are going, going, going, and things have to look perfect. They have to look Instagram-ready.
Pam: Everybody looks perfect on Facebook. And we didn’t even have Facebook back in that day. We only had pagers. I could only find Sunday by pager. I didn’t have a tracker on her. Y’all have trackers on your kids now? I had no idea where Sunday was. I had to trust her.
Mike: The Wild West of being a kid back then.
Chris: Did we have a special message for Pam?
Mike: Well, thank you for sharing all that, and for being so vulnerable and transparent. I can’t remember how long I’ve known you. Let’s call it 15 or 16 years.
Pam: Back in the little bitty days.
Mike: Yes, the tiny days, before getting married. So 15, 17 years. I don’t have as many years as you guys. I know y’all have like 40 years.
Chris: We did a lot of Trunk or Treats together.
Mike: You’ve always brought about a joy in me, literally anytime we’ve interacted, and you’ve played a role in my marriage and with our kids. And receiving is hard, even if it’s a good word and a good message. So we had a couple of voicemails come in for you for this episode, and we’re going to play them now.
Pam: Goodness.
Josh: I’m proud to admit that I’m a mama’s boy through and through, hands down. I love my mom so very much. She is one of the most generous people I know. I don’t know how her heart fits in her chest, because it’s so big. Right now I’m heading to get Levi, because she’s helped with him today. It’s amazing that I have not just an amazing mom, leaving such a wonderful legacy in our family, but an amazing Nana too. She has such a big heart and loves my kids and my nieces and nephews so much. She really is the glue that holds this whole family together. Whoever knows Pam knows she is just incredible and so loving. So, I love my mom.
Pam: I love you, Josh.
Mike: That was the non-preferred kid. Now let’s go to number one, the one who really came through.
Sunday: Hello to some of my very favorite people: Mike, Chris, my amazing mom, and all the NQT listeners. Any chance I get to brag on my incredible mom is such a joy. She is truly the best. She gives so sacrificially of herself all of the time, especially when it comes to her family and her church family. She’s a picture-perfect example of a Proverbs 31 woman. My mom has been through a lot of pain and hard times in her years, but you would never know it, because she’s always carried herself with strength and dignity that come from the Lord. She has an unwavering trust in Jesus and leads our family to do the same. Her love for her kids and her grandkids is unmatched, and they think she hung the moon. She will literally drop everything to do anything for them. They love to be with her, have sleepovers and play games with her, even the oldest ones. We all joke about how we’ll all be fighting to have her come live with us when she gets older, but we all know my little brother Josh will win out, because he’s a mama’s boy and the self-proclaimed favorite. Just kidding. We all know it’s the grandkids who are her real favorites. Her kids in Creation Land are also special to her. She not only knows every single one of them by name, as well as their families, but at 70 she still squats down to their eye level and greets them by name. Her wisdom, which comes from years of experience in ministry, is more valuable than even the best of resources. She loves Jesus, her family and others so fiercely that it is contagious, and I’m proud to call her Mom. Thank you for giving me the opportunity to brag on the best lady there is. Love you, Mom.
Pam: Love you, Sunday.
Chris: Nothing can top that.
Pam: No. That fills my heart. My heart’s going to explode.
Chris: That coming from the kids has to be pretty special.
Pam: It is. How much did y’all pay them?
Mike: We’ll talk about that later. That’s confidential. There’s an NDA about that.
Chris: One of the core memories I have: when you think of people, certain memories come to mind. I remember when Clara was little, she had run into somebody in Creation Land and had a bruise on her nose. It was a pretty hard hit. And of course we got that dreaded message up on the screen, “Parents of…” So I came out, and as soon as I walked around the corner, I saw her sitting there with you, and you were holding her like she was your own.
Pam: She is mine.
Chris: That was just something very special. Thank you.
Mike: It’s very cool. Well, before you get out of here, thank you for letting us pepper you with a bunch of questions. And your kids wanted to send in some messages and speak life into you. We didn’t pay them at all. We really didn’t.
Pam: They’re pretty good kids.
Mike: Josh, it’s okay. So before we end here, we do this with all our guests. We’re going to move really quick to the super intense lightning round. The rules of the lightning round are very, very important. We’re going to ask you a quick smattering of questions. We’re going to go back and forth. Try not to overthink it. Really.
Pam: Can I say pass?
Mike: That is not an answer. There is no pass. It’s a serious situation. So prepare yourself. Ready? Here it comes. Question number one.
Chris: Beach or mountains?
Pam: Beach.
Mike: Dream vacation?
Pam: Oh, anywhere with a beach, I think. Hawaii would be a dream vacation.
Mike: Hawaii. I was thinking that.
Chris: Truck or Tesla?
Pam: Oh, Tesla. Sorry, Chris. I would love to have a car drive me.
Mike: Whoa! I was not expecting that. That’s why we do this.
Pam: I have to have a ladder to get into a truck.
Mike: That’s great. Lightning round greatness. Congratulations. Garth Brooks or George Strait?
Pam: What’d you say? Garth Brooks? Oh, George Strait. George Strait is my man. Nobody wears a hat and jeans like George Strait does.
Mike: In your face, Garth. Way to go, George. Except Randy. We love you, Randy.
Chris: Night on the town or night at home?
Pam: Night at home.
Mike: Okay, last question. Here we go. If someone were to narrate your life story, who would that be?
Pam: Oh, gosh. I’d have you both narrating my life story. Y’all could narrate my life, 50/50. Y’all can draw straws for that.
Mike: And, you know, Chris, you’re looking great in those jeans, I will say.
Pam: Stand up, turn around.
Mike: That’s got to be cut out.
Outro: Thanks so much for joining us. Please consider rating and reviewing our podcast and hitting subscribe on whichever platform you prefer. Remember to keep moving forward, because we’re not quite there.
