The Rev. Randy Westbrook says church was important to his family when he was growing up, but he didn’t plan to be a preacher.
In fact, if someone had told him he would follow that path, “I would have told them, ‘No, not me,’” he said, laughing.
But an aunt, Helen Person, predicted that he would go into ministry, and she turned out to be right. “I didn’t feel like I was worthy, but she could see something in me that I guess I didn’t see in myself,” Westbrook said.
Westbrook, 56, was born and raised in Money, where he attended Wilkes Elementary School.
He enjoyed playing sports, including football, baseball and basketball, and going fishing.
He grew up attending Mount Calvary Missionary Baptist Church in Money, and “our parents really made sure that we attended church on a regular basis,” he said.
After graduating from Amanda Elzy High School in 1981, he took a year off and did farm work before entering the Gulfport Job Corps program. He studied there from 1983 to 1985 and graduated with a degree in welding. Then he returned home and worked at S&N Sprayer and other places over the years.
He said he was called to preach in 2005, although God had been nudging him for a while. “One day it just became evident as I was riding from Jackson, Mississippi, and the voice of God just spoke to me and said, ‘It’s time for you to preach,’” he recalled.
He first served as assistant pastor at Good Hope Missionary Baptist Church in Webb, where his brother, Kelly, was pastor. That was also where Randy Westbrook delivered his first sermon. Having been more accustomed to working behind the scenes, he was nervous at first, but he grew more comfortable with it.
“It took a little time to get used to, but I kept preaching, kept ministering, kept praying and kept just believing,” he said. “And it just made it easier and easier every time that I preached.”
Next, he became assistant pastor at Holly Grove M.B. Church in Sidon, where he was ordained into ministry, and then pastor at St. John M.B. Church in Sidon.
He started his own ministry at Pillow Chapel after the membership there left to form another church, New Pillow Chapel. His church now has between 20 and 30 members, and it holds services every Sunday and Bible study every Wednesday.
His assistant pastor is his wife, Rosa, and they say they have a great working relationship. A couple for 35 years and married for 28, they have three sons and two daughters.
Randy Westbrook said he learned a lot about preaching and administration from pastors over his career.
“As you minister and pastor, you run into a lot of different people, different attitudes, different personalities and everything, and sometimes it can be a little trying,” he said. “But I always felt like I would be here for the long haul, though, no matter what happened. I knew that God had my back, and I knew that he was going to always keep us protected.”
He also has exchanged ideas with his brother, who is now pastor of New Direction Church in Minter City.
“In ministry it gets difficult at times, lonely sometimes,” he said. “A lot of people think that just because we’re ministers, we’re supermen — that we can handle anything and do anything. But there are times when we need help, or we need someone to speak into our life. So we kind of encourage each other.”
He said he and his wife also benefited from the Ministers Training School, a program founded and led by Marilyn Jones. They graduated from the program last week, and Westbrook said Jones has given them valuable advice on teaching, Bible study and administration.
“We owe a lot to her,” he said. “She’s the one that’s kind of trained us in the business part of ministry.”
During the week, Westbrook works in psychosocial rehabilitation for Life Help, where he also has duties in transportation.
He said his work involves teaching the mentally ill how to deal with their conditions and manage their day-to-day lives, including finances, medication and other responsibilities. He has worked there about six years and said the work can be challenging, but “for the most part, as long as they’re taking their medication and things like that, most of the time you don’t have any problems.”
Now residing near Sidon, he said he plans to continue living in this area unless God calls him elsewhere.
He spends much of his spare time studying the Bible and praying.
“I’m like a sponge. I’m always absorbing, trying to get as much knowledge as possible,” he said. “The more knowledge that I have, the more I can teach others.”
•Contact David Monroe at 581-7236 or dmonroe@gwcommonwealth.com.
