Jeff DeWees - In Search of a Closer Walk with Jesus
Exploring faith journeys and inspiring ministries that embody the good news of God. This is the Cumberland Road. I'm your host TJ Malinoski. Today, Jeff DeWees joins us. So Jeff is the minister at Beech Cumberland Presbyterian Church in Hendersonville, Tennessee. His background includes environmental and chemical engineering, and he's a lifelong Cumberland Presbyterian. Jeff has been married to Stacy for seventeen years, and they have two teenage children, Annabelle and Andrew. Jeff, it's good to see you.
Jeff:Man, it's good to see you too, TJ.
T.J.:So I have a question, and I didn't ask it before we started recording, but I think you can fill in the blanks. Early to mid eighties, your family and my family and another family, the Anderson family out of the West Nashville Cumberland Presbyterian Church. We go out to this farm or a house or a retreat and spend the weekend together. And that is the first time that I had met you and your family and we're talking about elementary school.
Jeff:Yeah. Wow. Congratulations, TJ. It's not very often that somebody pulls out a memory that I don't have. But I actually do not remember that event.
Jeff:So, man, I think you you might be a couple of years older than me. Yeah. Yeah. So yeah. Because Becky and I are the same age, right?
Jeff:Yeah. Your little sister, but yeah, I mean, we go we go back. I remember, so, so my family moved away from West Nashville CP in '86, I think. My brother and sister were getting into the youth age range and mom and dad realized that with an hour drive, that might be a little much for being able to allow them to be engaged in church activities and youth and whatnot. And so, so we moved to a small Methodist church about five minutes from our house.
Jeff:So, unfortunately, we yeah, the the memories that I have of West Nashville are more snippets and whatnot. So wow. Believe it or not, I actually do have some memories all the way back to two years old, but that they're like just blips on the radar. So good job, TJ. Thank you.
T.J.:Thank you. Okay. We didn't do a real good job of like trying to put a collection of memories together from early childhood. But since we're talking of the past, can you, Jeff, recall your earliest encounter with God?
Jeff:So, you know, I was listening to your podcast with Maddie Taylor and sorry to just borrow from other people, but, you know, she mentioned that it was, she didn't remember a specific instance, if I remember correctly. And I'm much the same way. So mine is a journey of little steps, if you will, not a dynamic, dramatic transformation that I know many people have had. Mine's just been sort of a slow progression, where I mean, was blessed to be raised in a home where mom and dad raised us to know Jesus. Some of my memories of the walk through faith, if you will, go back to '83.
Jeff:So you know, this is one of those things where I have those blips of memory. And this is not just a picture, this is an actual memory of things that were taking place. My mom, okay, so my dad, whenever I was younger, he worked nights, he worked second shift for a trucking company where he was a mechanic. And so one evening, probably six, 07:00 at night, of course I wasn't in bed yet. If I was three, my brother would have been eight, my sister would have been nine.
Jeff:And my mom's got us sitting there in the kitchen floor. And she's trying to teach us the books of the Bible. And you probably know where I'm going to with this, I don't know. But anyway, she starts up Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, Deuteronomy, and she's expecting Herbie and Wendy only to be responding or repeating after her. Well, I'm back there playing with, I don't know, GI Joe's, transformers, Hot Wheels, something.
Jeff:I remember playing with a toy and as she's having them do it, I'm right along with them. Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, Deuteronomy. And she's like, what, what did you just say? And she runs over, grabs the phone and dials up my dad who obviously is out in the shop. They have to go get him out of the shop, bring him up to the front.
Jeff:And he's like hello and she's like Herb you gotta hear this and so she goes say it again Jeff and so I go through the first five books of the bible. So she winds up teaching all of us the books of the bible but I caught onto it. Like I had them all down, which as an aside, real quickly, my sister actually does this to this day with her kids that are three, four, five years old, something like that in her Sunday school class that she teaches at Dixon CP. And annually they will, if I remember correctly, they will march her class up to the front of the church and they will recite the books of the Bible, which sort of goes back to my story. Mom talked to Denny Shepherd, who was our pastor at that time.
Jeff:And she got Denny to let me stand up on the steps to the West Nashville church. And I remember actually going through the books of the Bible and then he had his lapel mic and he was trying to hold it underneath my mouth and most likely Uncle Ronnie was running sound in the back, him and his dad. And they were probably like dying trying to keep me like from overpowering the church because I thought you had to have your mouth down on that microphone. And Jenny was trying to hold it down and so mom says to this day that she was convinced that I was gonna flip off of those steps as I was trying to make it through the 66 books of the Bible. Sorry.
Jeff:So as far as my faith journey, you know, that's one of the first memories I have of not necessarily of an encounter with something God was doing, but rather the way that He made me for memory and for a desire for knowing Him more. And it started out with knowing the books of the Bible. I don't know if that answers your question or not, but there you go.
T.J.:Besides your mom and dad, and your sister and your brother, who else has had a great impact on on your faith?
Jeff:Oh, man. To to ask that kind of question is
T.J.:I know. I've eliminated I've eliminated, like, the four people that have been very formative in your faith.
Jeff:But but see, you you say that, but, you know, my family, oh, man, they've had such a tremendous impact. But I I would say there have been so many people. I mean, you remember my grandmother, Margaret Stephens. She was a formidable lady in and of herself, but she had a huge impact on me. Oh man, I could list off a number of people if you were to go back to West Nashville.
Jeff:I was talking about Karen Atacary just a few minutes ago and I want to say that Barbara Lauder, if I remember correctly, was one of my teachers maybe back then. Ms. Fluff, of course my aunt and uncle, Elaine and Ronnie, they had a huge impact on me. I remember as we were going through the books of the Bible, mom went to Anna Lane and said, how do you pronounce this book? And it was Philemon or Philemon.
Jeff:And so I think Anna Lane was like, it's Philemon. So anyway, you know, that's just, you know, a minor tiny example of the learning, the education that I've got. But I mean, wow, there are so many people that have plugged into me as a part of my faith journey. I could list off half of the Dixon CP church. Whenever I started going there at 15 years old, I remember standing in.
Jeff:So if people that are listening have not been to Dixon, as you're coming up the sidewalk in the front of the church from the main parking lot, there are two glass doors that you like there's one set of glass doors and then you're in like this foyer area and then you got to go through another set of glass doors to get down and get into the church at the bottom of steps. I remember standing, I can't remember if it was inside of that foyer area or just on the outside talking to K Street about faith and about moving from Nickel United Methodist to Dixon CP and that God had everything in his timing and whatnot. Rick and Kay Moss, Mary and Bob Taylor, Sid Nance. And I'm gonna miss a lot of people at Dixon because there were so many there that had an influence on me. My wife, I mean, Stacy has had a huge impact on my faith and the things that I've learned.
Jeff:Dave and Debbie Swindell, who were youth directors whenever I was at Dixon, which brings me to actually a memory of you, believe it or not. I don't know if you remember this or not, but I very distinctly remember talking to Debbie about this afterwards. But at Sonata Camp, whenever I was in tenth grade, we had this massive thunderstorm come through. And we were, I don't remember what we were doing, but Debbie was overwhelmed and impressed by the fact that, and I'm pretty sure it was whenever I was in tenth grade. Anyway, she was impressed by the fact that you got on your knees.
Jeff:And if I remember correctly, you raised your hands to heaven and said, God, we need no rain and we need this thunderstorm to stop in our area. And it ended like there was no no more thunder or lightning over the top of us that day. TJ, even you've had had an impact on my faith journey.
T.J.:I don't remember that. I didn't
Jeff:I got one for you. Yeah. Got one on. I
T.J.:didn't know I had that kind of connection to to God to to move the move the winds and the rain. Oh,
Jeff:wow. You have
T.J.:the rain confusing that was this. Surely me with someone else.
Jeff:You know, I I really don't think so. I mean, it's possible, but I'm pretty sure that it was you. And at that one, let's see, if I remember correctly, Billy Fly and Jason Heidl were, think Billy was there as one of the counselors. But I'm like 99% sure that it was actually you that did that. But yeah, mean, hold on, I'm not done with people that have impacted my faith journey.
Jeff:Okay, you know what, I will narrow it down to this. There have been people that God has allowed or placed in my life, that may not have even had a walk of faith with Him, they were agnostics and atheists, that would still challenge my belief that impacted my faith with God, through Jesus Christ, that may caused me to dig deeper on why I believed what I believed. So to minimize it, I mean, I could tell you about all the pastors that I'm friends with that I've gone through seminary with that Rob Truett at Dixon was pastor for him and Neil Spence were my two pastors out there. And they both had a huge impact on me. So you know, I could just keep on rolling about the various individuals and how they've had such a dynamic effect on who I am today, and why I believe, truly that Jesus is our Savior.
Jeff:And the fact that I get the opportunity to interact with this holy God, who I don't deserve, as John the Baptist would say, to loosen his sandal straps, let alone be able to speak with. So there you go.
T.J.:So taking that faith and talking about holy God and Jesus Christ as our savior. What does that look like in terms of your life purpose? It's one thing to say it and ministers are really good at articulating the faith, but from day to day, what does that purpose look like? Your faith.
Jeff:Oh, that's good. So faith, I was talking about that in Bible study about how faith is, it's not just a mental ascent, it's an action. Faith moves us to doing something. You know, James makes the statement, you say you believe, that's great, the demons believe and tremble. But faith without works is dead, right?
Jeff:And so, where does it put me? I would say on a day to day basis, what it winds up doing is it faith in Jesus causes me to want, first, this relationship more deeply. I want so desperately to have a deeper walk with Jesus. Doesn't mean that I do everything perfectly because boy, I am about as far off from that as possible. I mean, you talk to my wife or kids and you'll, then they'll be able to give you a list.
Jeff:But what it likewise does is causes me to think about how I should respond in various situations and the interactions with people in the way that I care about people. I would say that my faith is what drives me to, it drives me to care about people in my life, whether it's an individual that just walks in from, from off the street, you know, and try to, to learn more about them and try to be empathetic with them. It also drives me to want to see what I can do to minister to the physical and spiritual needs of individuals the best that I can. That doesn't mean that, well, I mean, there are a host of people that do a much better job of caring for the needs of the needy. I mean, going back to people that have impacted my faith, just seeing some of the things that individuals do.
Jeff:You know, Lisa Anderson at the Colonial Church, she does a phenomenal job of ministering to the needs of the homeless. And Jason Michael out at Jenkins down in Nolansville. I may not fully agree with them on some theological points, but I look at the things that they do for ministering to the needs of the needy. And I'll have to say they do a phenomenal job of it. And I don't do near the job that they do of ministering to those needs.
Jeff:But I genuinely have a desire to care about those who are in my life, have entered my life, maybe I should put it like that. Again, whether it means that it's somebody that's here at church, or, you know, getting to know Dave at Kroger. And yes, that's one of the guys, that's the guy that stocks the produce, him or Miss Minerva, who's one of the customer service people there at Kroger, you know, my faith drives me to have a desire to serve and love other people through word and action, wherever I am.
T.J.:We've talked about the past and encounters that you've had with God and people that have been placed in your life and even examples of people that we know who are doing great ministries. I wanna ask you, where do you see God working in your life today?
Jeff:Oh, man. That's a a really good question.
T.J.:Yeah. Because it's it's easy to look in the past and be able to go, okay. Here. Here. Because we have perspective and and reflection and but today, it's really important when people are asking about God and Mhmm.
T.J.:Who Jesus is and why are we followers. We can't always live in the past. People are looking for direction and input and guidance presently.
Jeff:Mhmm.
T.J.:So I always find this question challenging. It's one that I ask myself every day, just in terms of reflection. So I'm challenging you. Where do you see God working in your life today?
Jeff:So, so that's a very complex question. And you're right. It's something that, that we should engage in asking ourselves more. So let me, let me step back to the past.
T.J.:Sure.
Jeff:So I was on a prayer call with some friends just a little while ago. And one of them in the midst of his prayer talked about the intertestamental period, the 400 of silence, right? And so we don't see a lot of activity or or we don't see writings necessarily within those four hundred years between the end of the old testament, beginning and the new. But in the midst of there, so two weeks ago, I think it was, I was preaching on Luke chapter six verses six through 11, which is where Jesus goes into the synagogue and he heals the man with the withered hand. And he makes a statement, is it right to do evil or to do good to heal or destroy life on the Sabbath.
Jeff:And I got to thinking about that, and I don't know if this is right or not, but I had to wonder, and you're like, where are you going to with this? But hey, I'm a preacher, that's what we do, right? Sometimes we have to bring things together. I got to wondering if his statement didn't actually come out of what took place during the Maccabean revolt. And for those of you that are listening that don't know what the Maccabean revolt is, there was a period during that four hundred year span where there was a leader that came to power named Antiochus IV, he went by Antiochus Epiphanes.
Jeff:And he tried to get the Jews to do the abominable thing of sacrificing pigs. And there was a guy, a priest named Matthias who led a revolt and he and his sons were sort of the leaders in this. And ultimately they wound up winning against the governmental power, right? And in the midst of reading through this event, they were constantly giving God glory saying, God was the one that provided for this event to take place. God was the one that gave us the victory.
Jeff:And so, still, how does that apply? I'm looking in the past, right? So let me fast forward to you. And this is just a portion of my life today. Eighteen years ago, almost nineteen, in fact, it'll be about nineteen years ago in one month from today, I started up, at the environmental engineering firm known as EnSafe, which actually is a Memphis, based company.
Jeff:And but I was in the Nashville branch. And n safe was a company well, the people at n safe were a group of people that I was moderately familiar with because, my brother and sister had both worked for a company called environmental management planning and engineering or EMPI for short. Neither of them in environmental engineering. My sister was in accounting, my brother was in computer or in the IT side. And so anyway, EMPI got bought out by Ensafe.
Jeff:My direct boss a good friend or became a good friend through the journey of me working there. But he was not a believer at the time. So I got the opportunity to chat with him about faith. And he was one of the ones that I was I was referring to earlier whenever I said agnostic and atheist. And one of the ones that has had a huge impact on my faith.
Jeff:Well, March, he came to faith in Christ. And I got to see an answer to my prayer and I'm sure many other people praying for him as well. I got to see an answer to my prayer there. And I got to see an answer to a continued prayer of honestly, whole family coming to faith in Christ. He was the second or third one to come to faith in Christ this year.
Jeff:And so I look at it and I just go, you know, so often we're constrained by our watches. We look at it and say, all right, God, in ten seconds, I want you to do this. Not really, but well, some of us might have that kind of prayer, but God's the God of eternity. I remember hearing a story about a lady in China who prayed for her husband for fifty five years And, or maybe it was just fifty, either way, she would bring his shoes to church and set them down next to her, when she would sit down in the pew and she would pray, God fill his shoes. And after fifty years or fifty five years, he finally comes to church with her.
Jeff:And so what I see is that, how is God working in my life today? He's answering prayers that I've had for decades almost. And it's not what I'm doing, it's what he's doing. And I just get the opportunity to join into it. To borrow Henry Blackaby's words, I get to join into his work, which, you know, that sort of goes back to my faith journey.
Jeff:I have been a lifelong Cumberland Presbyterian, but in the midst of my college years, I got the opportunity to visit Church of Christ and Baptist and Assemblies of God. And the one that has the longest name, the International Church of the Foursquare Gospel of Jesus Christ. That's a mouthful. But Cumberland is the one that I find I identify with most theologically speaking. So there you go.
Jeff:Sorry for the very long winded answer.
T.J.:An answer about God working in your life today includes the Maccabeans.
Jeff:Hey, you know, you gotta do what you gotta do. So I love to teach. I would not be a good college professor. I don't even know that I'm a good preacher, but I love to teach in the process of as I speak. And and so I'm hoping that, you know, the people that that are listening to this actually will have learned something.
Jeff:They're probably mostly preachers. And so they're like, I already knew about all that. Come on.
T.J.:Well, as somebody who has spent his whole life in the church, what are your hopes and dreams for the church today and in the future? And that can be, you know, the universal church, that can be the Cumberland Presbyterian Church.
Jeff:Yeah, I love that question, TJ. And let me offer again, going to the past so that I can come to the present and then look to the future. So if we were to go all the way back, the church started as one. And then throughout the course of history, has begun, it's continued to have splinters, if you will. There have been various pockets and parts and whatnot.
Jeff:And I remember I used to be a youth director at Dixon for a period of time. And one of our youth actually made the statement to me, as we were on our way back from some kind of youth event, was driving and they were in the car with me. And he said, you know, some of my friends won't come because we are a denominational church and they only go to non denominational churches. And I said, you know, what is the denomination anyway? And he was like, I'm a little lost on what you're meaning there, Jeff.
Jeff:I go, okay, let's let's look at this. So I'm a math guy. By by nature, I am a math and science guy. So if I look at math, the word denomination actually comes very to the four, if you will, in the word denominator, which is a part of a fraction. Right?
Jeff:And so the there's the in a fraction, there's the numerator and the denominator. The denominator is the bottom number that represents the number of pieces in the whole, if you will. So pies that I eat, generally, I would rather that number on the bottom be one, but unfortunately, it's oftentimes eight. Right? So I'd rather eat the whole pie instead of an eighth of it but you know it is what it is.
Jeff:But I told him, I said look in if I have a fraction, if I've got a pie and I divided into eight slices, that bottom one is the eight. And so what it means is a denomination is just a representation of the whole. It's not that it is the whole, as some groups would assert. And so, for someone to say that they go to a non denominational church, they just don't recognize that they're still going to a denomination because it's just a representative of the whole church. Now, fast forward from there to my early years of full time ministry as a pastor, whenever So this is the second church that I've had the joy of serving.
Jeff:The first church that I served was a small, amazing little church called, Mount Vernon Cumberland Presbyterian, they're in Raymer, Tennessee. And whenever I was going to seminary, I would always tell people that Raymer had more cornfields, cotton fields and soy fields than people. Stacy did the demographic search and there were six sixty one people in Raymer property. So, it was small. Anyway, whenever I went there, I was, I didn't really have the thought in mind, I want to see this community all come together and be one church, if you will.
Jeff:But what I had the opportunity to do is be a community pastor that I don't know that a lot of other pastors in that area have seen the opportunity that I did. I got to preach in three different Baptist churches, four different Baptist churches. Now, granted one of those, maybe two, were due to our community Thanksgiving and Easter services. We actually would have an Easter sunrise service together. And then we would have a Thanksgiving, on the Sunday night before Thanksgiving, we would have a community service as well.
Jeff:And so, but outside of that, I actually had two Baptist pastors that were like, Hey, will you preach for me on this Sunday night? I'm not gonna be able to be here or for one of them, I am gonna be here, but I'd love for you to come and bring the message. And he did that two or three times. In fact, he's sort of left a standing engagement anytime. I love this, by the way, that pastor whenever I was first, when he was first introducing me to his congregation, which most of them knew me already because of community involvement and whatnot being a small area.
Jeff:But introducing me to his congregation, he was like, I can't say his last name. Know, Deweese is super hard. He was like, I can't say his last name. So I'm just gonna call him Pastor Bitterweed. Anytime that I or his daughter wind up chatting with him about me at some point, Like his daughter was, is one of Stacy's friends from, from Romer.
Jeff:She was a co teacher. And we went down a year or two after we had moved up here and we were at her house and he called up and she said, I'm here talking to Jeff DeWees and he goes, who? And she goes, you know, Pastor Bitterweed. And he's like, Oh yeah, yeah, yeah, I remember. And so that invitation is still sort of standing.
Jeff:Anytime you come back, Jeff, you're always welcome to, I want you to do a sermon. And so all of that to say, what is my hope for the church? My hope for the church is to see a connection take place. Here in the Hendersonville area, I can't say that I've got the same kind of report with as many pastors as I did down there. Life is different here.
Jeff:I mean, even though Beach is set in a community set, or I'm sorry, a rural setting of Hendersonville. Hendersonville is not really that rural, but Beach is in the Shackle Island community. And so it has this very rural feel to it. But a mile down the road, have a Baptist church that has 7,000 people that attended on a Sunday, whether it be in person or online. Of course, are pre COVID numbers, but you know, it's still a pretty high attendance.
Jeff:I'm pretty good pastor, pretty good pastors, pretty good friends with the head pastor over there. And so what I see my desire as being is for the church is being the church, being the body of Christ coming together for the glory of God, doing His work. For the Cumberland Presbyterian Church, I would say that my desire is much the same, is to have the view that we are in the words of Jesus, and I can't remember which, I think this is from the Gospel of Luke, one of Jesus's parables. I'd love for us to be able to say, we're worthless servants, you're the one to the master, you're the one that does it all. And, I mean, that's what I am.
Jeff:I'm just an unprofitable servant that he chooses to use for his glory. So, there you go.
T.J.:Alright. Thank you, Jeff. Your journey is gonna continue on and on. And, folks be interested to know how God is working in your life. Where can we continue to follow you on your journey?
Jeff:So I'll be honest, I am like the world's worst social media person. I don't do it. I don't do it well. However, I thankfully have some really good people on my team here at beach that, that do have a very strong understanding for the need for social media. So we stream our services online both on YouTube and, and Facebook, at beach Cumberland Presbyterian Church.
Jeff:And, so that, yeah, I've got a Facebook page, but again, so the stuff that is on my page, speaking are either shares, likes, or more than anything, just people tagging me in pictures and stuff. But any if anybody ever wants to contact me, I'm pastorjeff@bcp.com. So
T.J.:Jeff, it's good to see you. It's been a long time. And, you know, our past crossed really early on, and you've got this huge gap of decades.
Jeff:Yeah.
T.J.:And here we are again serving the same church that we love, the same denomination that we love. Thank you for listening to today's podcast. Grab a friend and travel with us on our next journey down Cumberland Road.
