David Reagan - The Need For Faith with Mike Mossburg
Many years ago, I discovered that it is one thing to teach and preach about faith and quite another to actually live by faith. Taking a step of faith can be downright scary, but the payoff is always absolutely exhilarating. Stay tuned for an interview with a person who knows what it is like to take a major step of faith.
David Reagan: Greetings in the name of Jesus, our Blessed Hope, and welcome to Christ in Prophecy. My colleague, Nathan Jones, and I have a very special guest with us today who I know is going to be a special blessing to all of you. His name is Mike Mossburg. And Mike is the Executive Pastor at the church where Nathan and I are members, the Brookhaven Church in McKinney, Texas. He is also a very gifted Bible teacher. In fact, Mike is my Sunday School teacher. Mike, welcome to Christ in Prophecy.
Mike Mossburg: Thank you. Glad to be here.
Nathan Jones: So, good to have you on, Mike.
Mike Mossburg: Thank you. Thank you.
Nathan Jones: Well, Mike this episode is all about faith. So, I want to know about your faith journey. How did you come to faith in Jesus? Were you born into a family of faith, or did you come to know the Lord later in life?
Mike Mossburg: Well, I was born into a family that loved me, and provided everything that I ever needed, but they weren’t church goers.
Nathan Jones: Okay.
Mike Mossburg: But we lived across the street from a Baptist church. And the folks at that Baptist church were continually going into the neighborhoods and inviting people to come be a part. My parents wouldn’t go, so, they asked if I could. And at a very early age, I can remember going to church and sitting on the carpet in the pre-school area. Standing and singing those songs where you acted out, I may never march in the infantry.
David Reagan: Where is this all taking place? What state?
Mike Mossburg: It’s happening in Huntington, West Virginia.
David Reagan: Okay, go ahead.
Mike Mossburg: And if I didn’t show up for a couple of weeks they would come get me.
Nathan Jones: You are just right across the street.
Mike Mossburg: It is right across the street. It was real easy.
David Reagan: How old were you at this time?
Mike Mossburg: Probably five, six to start. And I often wondered if my parents didn’t send just to get some peace and quiet on a Sunday morning. But as a result of that I came to faith in Christ at a very early age, and the teachers discipled me. And virtually every time the door was open at that church I would be there. So, I went through elementary school in their programming. I went to their camps. I went to Junior High School and their camps. Felt God’s call on my life, and I dedicated my life to Him. At an early age I wanted to be a pastor.
Nathan Jones: Okay, did your example help lead your parents to know the Lord?
Mike Mossburg: Many times we talked about it. I believe my father came to faith before he passed.
Nathan Jones: Praise the Lord.
Mike Mossburg: I don’t know about my mother, but I know my grandmother did.
Nathan Jones: Praise the Lord, it is amazing what a Sunday School teacher can do. The ripples that go through families and reach other people’s lives.
Mike Mossburg: Well, what is amazing is how God directed that little boy next to a church in West Virginia and got me over there. Everything about my life is due to His mercy and grace. And as I grew up I went from elementary, to junior high, to high school and we had a wonderful high school teacher and leader, and he discipled me. And as a result of that I came out of high school with a desire to go to Moody Bible Institute and get on the pathway to become a pastor.
David Reagan: Okay, so you went to Moody Bible in Chicago, and one of the outstanding Bible colleges in America. And you majored in accounting. Went into the business world. Primarily first of all as a salesman. Right?
Mike Mossburg: That’s right.
David Reagan: Yeah, and then you rose up in the world of business to Chief Executive Officer of a major glass company in the United States. And you had achieved the American Dream; I mean everything that people dream of. And then God put a decision in front of your life that changed everything. Tell us about it.
Mike Mossburg: Well, in 2000 I was President and General Manager of Vitro Packaging, which was a glass container packaging sales company in the United States. We represented Vitro and Envases which was the largest glass company in Mexico. And this was an export arm, our sales were approaching $200 million. And it was the highest income level I had. And at that time, I received an offer from a company to go back east into the New York area and consolidate three manufacturing companies to sell into the cosmetic and fragrance industry. That was going to be an advancement that would allow me to retire probably in five years.
David Reagan: And where were you living when you got that offer?
Mike Mossburg: I was living right here in Dallas.
David Reagan: In Dallas, okay.
Nathan Jones: How old were you then?
Mike Mossburg: About 55.
Nathan Jones: So, you are about to retire in your 50’s.
Mike Mossburg: Well, I was about 55 and I was planning to work about 5 years and retire.
David Reagan: Were you going to church at that time?
Mike Mossburg: We were going to Brookhaven Church, but at that time it was Mid-Way Road.
David Reagan: Okay.
Mike Mossburg: And Joanne and I had been praying about it. We had moved a number of times, and I didn’t want to make a move at that point in my life that would be a wrong move. And so, I went to our pastor, Glenn Meredith, after church one Sunday and I asked him, I said, “Will you please pray with us about this, that I would be moving back to the New York area. And I wanted to be sure it was God’s will.” And he said he would pray with me about it. Also, at that time I put some feelers out in the Dallas area hoping that I might be able to stay here, and not have to move. And I had several interviews, but the income was nowhere near what I was making. So, I decided I was probably going to go back to New York. So, I asked Glenn to pray. He said he would. The next Sunday after church Glenn stopped me and asked me, said, “Just a question. Have you ever thought about being an executive pastor?” And I said–
Nathan Jones: What’s that?
Mike Mossburg: Well, yeah, what’s that? And I said, “What would I do?” And he said, “We really don’t have a job description yet, we are working on it.”
David Reagan: Did you ask him how much it paid?
Mike Mossburg: That was the next question. And I said, “Well, what does it pay. How much?” And gave me a range that was shocking.
David Reagan: It didn’t amount to much, right?
Mike Mossburg: It was about a fifth of what I was making. And I said, “Well, I’ll think about it.” What he didn’t know is that God had touched my heart 30 years before, and because of some decisions that I had made after Moody I wasn’t going to be able to be a pastor in a Baptist church. And that is what took me into the business world. And so, 30 years later that desire that God had laid on my heart was kindled a little bit. And so, I remember going home and talking to my wife, Joanne, we’ll celebrate 44 years here in August.
David Reagan: Hey, congratulations!
Nathan Jones: Praise the Lord!
Mike Mossburg: And I told her what Glenn had said, and she looked at me and said, “How can you not take it?”
Nathan Jones: Wow, wives know better don’t they?
Mike Mossburg: I remember looking at her and saying, “Really easy?” I just say, “No, we can’t do that.” And I said, “Do you realize what it will cost us?” We won’t be able to afford the home we couldn’t pay the taxes on the home. So, we couldn’t afford the home. We were in a country club and played golf, and we traveled around the world and did things like that. I said, “All of that goes.” And she looked at me and she said, “Well, you really have to consider it?” She said, “I can go back to work.”
Nathan Jones: Wow.
Mike Mossburg: And I’m going wow. And our youngest daughter was living with us at that time and I told her about it, and she looked at me and she said, “How can you not take it?”
Nathan Jones: Wow.
Mike Mossburg: And I’m thinking.
Nathan Jones: What are they seeing that you’re not?
Mike Mossburg: Yes. Well, during this I was going through the interview process. I had the job offer to go back east. I was going to go back and meet the board and I remember I was sitting by our pool and I was noodling it, thinking about it, the pluses, and minuses. And Joanne walked out to the pool next to the chair. And she said, “One question for you.” She said, “If you were going to make the same thing working for the church that you are making today, what would your decision be?” And she just turned around and walked back in.
David Reagan: Wow, that is really putting it to you.
Mike Mossburg: It did.
David Reagan: And I bet there was no doubt in your mind what you would do if it was the same salary.
Mike Mossburg: No, that’s true. And it dawned on me the Holy Spirit revealed to me at that point I was letting money be my God. And that was going to be the factor that made the decision. Up until then money had not been the deciding factor in any of our decision, we wanted to do what God wanted us to do. I remember getting up from that, going in and saying, “We are going to do it.”
David Reagan: And all your friends must of thought you had lost your mind.
Mike Mossburg: Well, the folks at the company thought I had lost my mind.
David Reagan: I’ve been there. I’ve experienced that.
Mike Mossburg: I had a number of people tell me they thought I had gone middle age crazy. And you know looking back on it, the Bible says that we are saved by faith, and that not of yourselves, it is a gift from God. And I was so fortunate that God gave me the gift of enough faith to take that first step.
Nathan Jones: And so young too, I mean that he led you to the Lord, and set you on a path, put ministry in your heart, it just took 30 years before finally He gave you that calling. Most people expect they are going to get a calling like straight out of college, like I felt I did, and keep going. But the Lord waited until you got all this experience first that you could bring it into the ministry, that just boggles the mind.
Mike Mossburg: Well, I know in the staff meeting there was a devotion today that Moses led the children of God the long way.
David Reagan: That’s right.
Mike Mossburg: And as we were talking about that I just thought that is exactly what God did with me. He led me the long way and prepared me for this job.
David Reagan: Well, I’ve been exactly where you were because I was called into the ministry when I was 20 years old, and I said, “Here am I Lord, send anybody but me. And I’ve got my own plans.” And I pursued my own plans for 20 years in the world of academia, and accomplished a lot but always felt empty, because no matter what I accomplished it didn’t satisfy me because I wasn’t in the center of God’s will. And finally, after 20 years I decided I was just miserable and I had to do what God wanted me to do, so I gave up my academic career and stepped out in faith scared literally to death. And all my friends said, “You’re nuts. You’re crazy. You are giving up your career to become an evangelist and you don’t even know where you are going to preach?” And I said, “No, I don’t.” But I never regretted taking that step of faith, but it sure was scary.
Mike Mossburg: I’ve never regretted it. It has been such a wonderful experience to see the miracles that God did. God performed a number just to get me to place to go to the church.
David Reagan: Well, the reason we are having you on this program today, and we are going to talk about this more in the second segment of the program, is because we have finished a year that has been horrific. Queen Elizabeth II said in 1992 that that year was “anus horribilis” which is Latin for a horrible year, because Windsor Castle had burned, and three royal marriages had tanked, and just everything had gone wrong. We had a pandemic, an 8,000 point drop in the stock market, we had the collapse of businesses all across America. Record unemployment since the Depression. Looting and rioting. The stress of the election. A lot of people right now are feeling very depressed. And people are needing hope, and they are needing faith. And so, when we come back from this break I want you to talk about how people, where can they find hope today? Okay.
Mike Mossburg: I know exactly where it is.
David Reagan: Okay.
Part 2
Nathan Jones: Welcome back to Christ in Prophecy and our interview with Mike Mossburg about living in faith. Mike, faith in Jesus generates a hope, something that Americans desperately need. Can you tell us why? And here let me define faith here in Hebrews 11:1, “Now faith is the substance of things hoped for, and evidence of things not seen.” How does faith generate hope?
Mike Mossburg: Okay. Faith is the substance. Another translation for substance there is foundation.
Nathan Jones: Okay.
Mike Mossburg: So, faith is the foundation for hope. Then faith is not an ideal. Faith is not a wish. Sometimes you hear people say, “Only believe.” Well, if there are no promises from credible sources about what you have faith in, your faith is worthless.
Nathan Jones: Because it seems like Americans today have faith in faith. There is not something bigger that puts the foundation on faith.
David Reagan: Or many Christians have faith in politics.
Nathan Jones: Yeah.
Mike Mossburg: Let me tell you. If faith is the foundation. In another place in Romans it says, “Faith comes through hearing, and hearing through the Word of God.” So, we have the Word of God that is absolute truth, that is full of all kinds of promises for believers if their faith is in Jesus Christ.
Nathan Jones: Amen.
Mike Mossburg: So, I think if you find your hope wavering, then you have to wonder: Where is my faith? Because it can’t be in science. And it can’t be in politics. And it can’t be in your IRA.
David Reagan: It can’t be in feelings.
Nathan Jones: No.
Mike Mossburg: It can’t be in feelings. The only place, it has to be in the Word of God, and it has to be based upon Christ, and Christ alone. He is the rock. He is our foundation. And I look back to all the promises that He has given us. I know when I took the step of faith He had already told me that He would be with me every step of the way. He had already told me that I could join in yolk with Him and He would pull the load. And I look back to all the things that had happened in my life before that as I went from company to company, He blessed me in such a wonderful way that folks thought I was doing it, even though I would tell them many times this was just a divine appointment from God. So, faith that is based in God, and based upon God’s Word, and God’s promises are something that should give us a tremendous amount of hope.
Nathan Jones: It also seems like the more you walk with the Lord in faith, the stronger your faith gains, and that increased your hope as well.
Mike Mossburg: Well, I think so. I think He takes us along this road, and He strengthens our faith, and then He brings us to a fork where we can exercise that faith.
David Reagan: Yes.
Mike Mossburg: Which is really great. And one of the things that I learned is that our reward is not in this life. And if you read Hebrews 11 all those folks that had faith, it was for a future with God.
David Reagan: And so many churches today are teaching though that the reward is in this life. You know what we tell you to do, God will make you rich.
Nathan Jones: Best life now.
David Reagan: Prosperous, famous, whatever. Those are the churches they can’t even seat all the people who want to get in.
Mike Mossburg: Well, that is true. I think in these days there is some thought that we maybe moving into a culture that is going to be 180 degrees from biblical principles.
David Reagan: Yes.
Mike Mossburg: And if that is true, then God just maybe blessing us with the ability to be light in this world today.
David Reagan: Yes. Well, we are called to be light and salt. Just as Daniel was when he lived in a very pagan society.
Mike Mossburg: I was going to be teaching on a controversial subject. And I remember going to our pastor, Glenn, and I said, “I’m going to teach on this. You may get some blowback.” And he said, “Well, is it biblical?” And I said, “Absolutely.” He said, “I know it would be.” He said, “Well, then go ahead.” He said, “If we get blowback then we’ll have the privilege of suffering for Jesus.”
David Reagan: Okay, now you are talking about faith produces hope. So, tell us what is your hope?
Mike Mossburg: My hope is that one day I get to be with Christ. My hope is that when I trusted Him as my Savior, I believe in Him, I received Him, asked Him to come into my life and He said that He saved me when I did that. My hope is that I will spend an eternity with Him because that is His promise.
David Reagan: Are you hoping in the Rapture of the Church?
Mike Mossburg: I believe He’s going to come back. He is coming back.
Nathan Jones: He promised.
Mike Mossburg: When I was in elementary school I was so moved by the teaching on the Rapture. I didn’t understand it completely. I thought we were all going to float up in the air like balloons. That was my dream. And I was afraid I was going to be left behind.
Nathan Jones: Wow.
Mike Mossburg: But I know today that when I see Jesus, He is going to be happy to see me, because He has given me His righteousness.
David Reagan: You know I interviewed Tim LaHaye one time, several times in fact, but one time when I interviewed him he said that his life changing event occurred when his father died when he was about 12 years old. And he cried nonstop for two days. And they had the funeral, they went out to the gravesite and the pastor read from 1 Thessalonians about the Rapture of the Church. And he said it was a very grey day, but as he started reading this the clouds parted, and the sun came through and he said, “He realized that there was a promise of the Rapture and that became his great hope in his life that one day He would be raptured and reunited with His father. He spent the rest of his life teaching about the Rapture. That’s hope.
Mike Mossburg: Well, that’s wonderful. And that’s sort of the beginning for us. Either we die and we go to be with the Lord, and we return at the Rapture, or we are raptured with the Lord seven years later, we come back, and we get to rule and reign with Christ, that’s His promise for 1,000 years on this planet.
Nathan Jones: Isn’t it amazing when you have the eternal perspective. You are not here worrying about, like you said, your IRA or what you are eating next, or what you are wearing, or what your job is. But when you see that your ultimate goal is an eternity in Heaven and this life is like this, it changes your whole perspective.
David Reagan: Absolutely.
Nathan Jones: It makes you live differently. It makes you show Christ’s joy, and that is infectious with other people and it leads people to Christ.
Mike Mossburg: Well, it gives you contentment.
David Reagan: That’s right.
Nathan Jones: Yes.
David Reagan: Well, you know, Mike you are well aware of the fact that my wife died recently. And she was sick for 18 years, and 9 years of that, the last 9 years were dementia where she just seemed to be going down in a dark hole and losing contact with everything. And everyday I would go and feed to her. And everyday I would read to her out of the scriptures and read a devotional. I’m not sure she understood. I know she understood scripture spiritually because it has that impact. But I always ended every day by quoting Romans 8:18, that was our verse, and it is on the tombstone that we have erected. And it says, “The sufferings of this present time are nothing compared to the glory that is yet to be revealed to us.” That’s hope.
Mike Mossburg: That is a tremendous hope. Some folks when they hear my story, and it’s really not my story, and it’s not Joanne and my story, it is really Christ’s story. And they say, “Well, you sacrificed a lot.” And we look at them and we say, “We haven’t sacrificed anything.”
Nathan Jones: It’s just money, right?
Mike Mossburg: It is. But what we received in being able to serve the Lord, here, is more than replaced anything that we ever gave up.
David Reagan: You know for many years I was heavily involved in politics, particularly before I went into the ministry, and I was always watching the news and getting upset. In fact, my wife one time said, “You know, honey, you could have a great reality TV show.” I said, “How?” “All they have to do is just put a camera on you while you are watching the evening news on TV, and you are shouting and screaming.”
Nathan Jones: I think a lot of us are like that.
Mike Mossburg: That sounds like my house.
David Reagan: But you know what? One day all that stopped because I read Psalm 2. And Psalm 2 says, “That while all of the political leaders of the world are conspiring against God, shaking their fists at God and saying, ‘Who are you to tell us what to do? We will do what we please’ God sits in the heavens and laughs.”
Mike Mossburg: Laughs at them.
David Reagan: Not because He isn’t concerned, but because He has it all under control. He has the wisdom and the power to orchestrate all the evil of mankind to the triumph of Jesus Christ, and that gives me hope.
Mike Mossburg: It gives me hope. I know even as we go through this COVID crisis, the Bible gives me a promise that all of my days were appointed before I ever had one. And I’m careful.
David Reagan: You are bulletproof until then.
Mike Mossburg: I do as best I can. But I know that all of my days were appointed. It tells me in another place in Ephesians that He has appointed good works for me to do, all my days of my life. And the great news is that one of these days I will get to serve Him forever, and never grow tired, and never grow weary.
David Reagan: Well, you know the Bible says in Hebrews that Jesus came to deliver people from the lifelong fear of death. And so many people live with that fear of death. And in the pandemic we have seen this greatly multiplied, a fear of death. But the Christian looks upon death as a door to an incredible life.
Mike Mossburg: That’s right. This is really the tip of the iceberg, and I think that is one of the reasons that our hope has to be in the future. What we do today is going to impact all of eternity.
Nathan Jones: And when you think that no mind has conceived what God has prepared for us. We can come up with what the Bible teaches, I think the Bible just gives us like 1% of what the afterlife is going to be. I mean it is beyond anything we can understand, and it gets you excited about what is coming ahead.
David Reagan: Well, the main thing that even believers need is tough faith because it is easy to have faith when everything is going okay. But when things start falling apart, and you lose the job or your wife dies, or whatever you need tough faith. The kind of faith that Jeremiah for example exhibited when he was walking through the city of Jerusalem and everything was destroyed. The temple was destroyed. The city was destroyed. He saw evidence of cannibalism where people had eaten their children because they had been under siege for several years by Nebuchadnezzar. And everything that he loved was gone. And suddenly right in the middle of walking through he is writing this lament called Lamentations, it’s like the sun breaks through and he says, “But this I remember and therefore I have hope. The steadfast love of the Lord never ceases, His mercies never come to an end. They are new every morning, great is your faithfulness. “The Lord is my portion,” says my soul.” That is tough faith.
Mike Mossburg: Amen.
David Reagan: And the Lord did the same thing with Habakkuk. Our expert on the Minor Prophets. Tell them.
Nathan Jones: Habakkuk 2:4, “The just shall live by faith.” Habakkuk couldn’t understand why evil was flourishing but God just said, “The just will live by faith.” Live by faith and everything is handled by God.
David Reagan: God said, “Don’t worry, I’m going to send the Chaldeans to destroy your nation. He said, “How can you punish those who are evil with those who are more evil? You are a just God.” And God said.
Nathan Jones: “The just shall live by faith.”
David Reagan: And that is quoted in the New Testament over and over.
Nathan Jones: It is, yes.
Mike Mossburg: Well, we have to think that the Bible when it tells us that without faith it is impossible to please Him. Then He is going to give us plenty of opportunities to please Him.
David Reagan: Okay. Well, Mike we have so appreciated you being on the program today. And folks, we are come back in just a moment.
Closing
Nathan Jones: Mike you have been such a blessing. Thank you so much for teaching us how to have tough faith. If people have questions about faith and they want to reach you how can they get in touch with you? Can you look in that camera and tell us.
Mike Mossburg: You can contact me at: brookhavenchurch.com, and I’ll get back to you quickly.
David Reagan: Well, Mike, I too want to thank you for being with us today. You’ve been a real blessing. And I pray the Lord will continue to bless your ministry, and that of your wife. Well, folks, that is our program for this week. I pray, the Lord willing, you will be back with us again next week. And until then, this is Dave Reagan speaking for Lamb & Lion Ministries saying, Look up, be watchful, for our redemption is drawing near.”