Rod Mathews
Grew up in Bloomington, IN, so I’m a Hoosier through and through!! Today I love being a husband and dad. Have the most wonderful wife, Toni, to whom I’ve been married to for 30 years…I think. My son Ryan just recently gave up his job here in the states and is now in China teaching English in a HS of 13,000 students. We miss him. Our daughter Becca has been working at a camp in Estes Park, CO and loves it. Yes, I’m envious as I love the mountains! Rachel, my youngest is in her sophomore year at Huntington University down in IN where she’s studying lots…I hope! She plays for the ladies soccer team. This keeps Toni and I on the road a lot catching her games.
My Story
Kind of hard to put a short version of what the Lord has done in me and means to me, but here we go…lots of hardships as a teen, mostly brought on by me. Had a great family and my mom & dad did great job showing the me the truths and love of Jesus. But I decided to “go it my own” until I surrendered my heart and life over to Christ the last month of my senior year of high-school. By far the most important and best decision I’ve ever made! From there its just be an incredible journey of seeing God’s hand of providence at work in my life and my family. I don’t deserve his grace or mercy, I really don’t. Now He’s given me the opportunity to do what I love and to serve Him.
My Ministry Journey to SAFMC
I’ve been here at SAFMC for 17 years, so a lot of the journey has been right here in Spring Arbor. Before that I attended Greenville College in IL and there meet my beautiful wife. I struggled with what I wanted to do changing majors a number of times, but after I finally made a decision to go into the ministry, my then fiance, Toni, told me she had always known she would marry a pastor. If she would have told me that earlier in our dating I would have run as far and as fast as I could from her. =) After marrying Toni in college and graduating from Greenville we went to Davison, MI where I was a youth/assistant pastor for 6 wonderful years. After that we had the opportunity go back to IN and I became the youth pastor which eventually turned into the youth/music pastor for seven years. That leads me to SAFMC which has been a stretching and rewarding experience.
What I do at SAFMC
That’s a good question! I’ve carried some other responsibilities while I’ve been here over the years, but my focus is our ever growing outreach ministry to our community and overseeing our Family Center ministries. It has been a joy to watch our church step up over the past few years as roll up our sleeves and get involved in various ways in serving the community. We’ve built two Habitat Homes, helped numerous families with weatherization projects, etc. Our goal is to see ourselves of a church that’s “out serving” rather then “come in and sit”. I also oversee a children’s basketball league we run every year to nearly 300 children and families as well as some adult volleyball and basketball. It’s a great place to serve and it fits me and my lifestyle. My motto is lets do all we can to “show & share” the good news of Jesus. There’s nothing, nothing, that is worth my time and efforts then to pass on what I have been so fortunate to receive, God’s love!
