Death Row Chaplain
Earl Smith shares His Journey from San Quentin Prison Chaplain to Mentoring Steph Curry and Other Faith Driven Athletes
Earl Smith is the chaplain for the San Francisco 49ers and the Golden State Warriors. But his journey to arrive there is unlike anything you’ve ever heard before.
After being shot six times in a gang-related attack, Earl somehow survived, but then found himself in San Quentin prison—not as a prisoner, but as a chaplain. After spending twenty-three years that included playing chess with Charles Manson, negotiated truces between rival gangs, and bore witness to the final thoughts of many death row inmates, he now ministers to professional athletes.
As for the details of how this all happened, well, you’ll have to let him tell it. But trust us, it’s an incredible story you won’t want to miss…
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Episode Transcript
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Henry Kaestner: Henry, welcome back to the Faith Driven Athlete. We have Earl Smith in the house. This is a big deal for me. Now, I've got to acknowledge the fact that many of our listeners are not Golden State Warriors fans. As cool as I think the team is there are going to be some of you that do not think that. Part of that comes from the fact we moved our family out here five years ago, perfect time to jump on the bandwagon, I know. But there are some really neat faith driven athletes on that team. That's a real encouragement to me as a dad with three impressionable boys who are now 14, 16 and 18. Of course, five years ago, they were five years less than that. And really neat for them to be able to look up to folks like Steph Curry. And so today we have Earl Smith on the program who's got a great story of his own. I want to start off with Golden State Warriors. Talk to us a little bit about what it's like to be a chaplain on that team. What do the faiths of those players look like?
Earl Smith: First of all, I've been a chaplain with the Warriors for 34 years and have an assistant by the name of Walter Hoy. You know, we recently decided to switch positions. So Walter is going to be the lead. I'm going to be his assistant. And we did that based on I just felt like it was God's timing to move on. But to answer your question about players or athletes and what it looks like to be around the Warriors. I think you have to look at it as a group of young men that have similar ideas and goals and the center of that is their Christ relationship. And When they get in the room for chapel, that's important to them. That's the thing they want to discuss. We don't talk about basketball. I don't know anything about basketball, really. I'm not a basketball fan, so I'd be the wrong person even to try to tell them something about basketball. But we talk about life. We talk about the things that they may be encountering or going through. And we discuss it in such a way with a scriptural basis. So we do a hand out and it's just looking at those young guys and, you know, we've lost some other teams, and we get new guys. And it's always just really interesting to see what happens when the new kids come in. How will they become a part of this? And if the culture is strong, then they'll follow suit with the culture. And that's what I believe that has made the Warriors so great, is that they've set a culture from the top down. I mean, the general manager, Bob Myers, when he was assistant GM, he was kind of the Chapel GM is there. So it's not like he doesn't understand the value of a relationship and the players understand that. I believe that has a great emphasis also. It sort of trickles down.
Henry Kaestner: You talk about some of the players that have left, and I know that there's a faith story behind Harrison Barnes. And James Michael McAdoo and that may be because I'm a Carolina fan, too. But do you find that as you get to know some of these players in their lives, that you stay in touch with any of them, that they come back to you and let you know how they're doing?
Earl Smith: I went to Dallas and did chapel with HB when he was still with the Mavericks. I mean, over the years, what you do is you don't develop a relationship based on basketball. You develop a relationship based on the individual. Maybe that just so happens, they play the game of basketball. And as long as you remember, that's the basis for a relationship. Then even when they finish playing, you'll still have the relationship.
Henry Kaestner: Let's take it to the beginning. Tell us about your life growing up. You grew up in Stockton, California, and you had kind of a rough background. You know, before you were called to be a chaplain. You were shot six times but survived. How did that happen?
Earl Smith: Gang member, drug dealer, I was adverse to doing anything that people consider positive. In my particular case, I believe it was the positive because I was a leader. I've always been a leader. Just was leading in the wrong way. And I tell people this also, if you're seriously into something, it's almost like a guy says he was a member of the forty niners. I'm a forty niner. I played one year with him, but I'm a 49er. Same with gangs. With me, I got into something very early in my life and it took me down that path where I end up getting shot six times, I believe. And I tell people, especially kids, the best thing that happened was me being shot because it gave me an opportunity to process what was really important to me and what I thought, well, what I thought was that the gangs, the drugs, the violence was important. Those things weren't important.
Henry Kaestner: So, walk us through how that experiencing growing up, leading in the wrong way, getting shot, ending up in a hospital, transition to how you ended up entering a life of ministry.
Earl Smith: Well, get arrested when you're eight years old or picked up for stabbing someone and everyone thinks you're crazy. And all the prophets in the neighborhood, the old people say you're going to end up in San Quentin, you're doomed, you know, and they were prophets. They said I was going to end up in San Quentin and that was the worst place that anyone could ever end up. San Quentin used to have the executions on the radio so people would listen to and go, oh, my goodness. That was the place when you heard that name, you thought, OK, that's where they killed people. For me, it was a lot of anger growing up.
For me, it was a lot of mistrust, feelings of abandonment, loneliness. And I connected with something that I thought made me feel a part. What I connected with ended up making me a part, but also a leader. And I led a lot of people in the wrong direction. As a result of wanting to be a part. When I got shot, I was 19 years old and I remember the police asking me to tell them who did it. And the doctor looked at me and I'm like, they don't understand. You don't tell. And my father came in and he grabbed my hand and he tells the doctor, how bad is it? Doctor says he's gonna die. And I watch my dad grab that guy. He says, you better do what you do best. I'm going to do what I do best. And my dad went away to pray. And in the midst of that the doctor was gone, my dad was gone. I'm on this metal gurney. I'm by myself. I'm burning up because I felt like there's hot pokers all over my body. It was shot of my face the number of times and my chest and all of a sudden the pain just stopped.
And this voice says to me, You're not going to die. I have something for you to do. In a voice very clear, he says you're going to a chaplain in San Quentin prison. Now, when I tell people that, they say, oh, no, that's crazy, except for the fact that I told my dad about that. I told my pastor before I ever got to San Quentin. Once I got out of what I was into, I told everyone I could about that voice.
I went away to college, Bible College, graduated and went to a service club. A guy tells me, hey, didn't you say you want to be a chaplain? I said, yeah, but I don't remember telling you. He says, well, there's an opening in San Quentin. And I said, well, how? That's pretty weird. I said, okay. Three weeks later, he says, Did you apply? No. Sit down. He says, I didn't think so. Here's an application. Fill it out. Fill the application out. Long and short of it is I get a letter back. Dear Robert Smith, we're sorry that you do not meet the whole requirements. So now I've taken this paper, I throw it away, I throw it in the trash. And the Lord says, why don't you call him and ask him, what do you need to do? Once again, it was a test when I called. There was a silence on the other end. And the lady from the state personnel board says, Rev. Smith, we're sorry we sent you the wrong letter. You are qualified. So what the Lord said I would do as a result of the night of me getting shot and the prophets in a neighborhood said about me going to San Quentin all met at one place. And that's how I ended up there.
Justin Forman: So you're 27. I think if I remember in your book that you're walking into your first day as a prison chaplain, it sounds like by all accounts you're leading in life in the wrong direction where you could have been there on the other side. What was it like? What was going through your mind during those initial days and weeks when you're in there?
Earl Smith: Well, I knew about crime. I knew what it meant to commit crime, but I didn't know really what it meant to minister to that environment. And people can tell you they do. And the reality is, I didn't know what I got myself into other than to say that I knew the Lord told me that's where I would be. What I ended up having to do was refocus and readapt because the prison was on lockdown. The day I interviewed, two people were killed.
So when I got there for the job, it was just they were locked down. And whenever they got out of lockdown, something else would have to stand in our way. We just had a group of 10 guys get together that had been involved in the prison system with me and that I would minister to. And we had lunch on Saturday. We sort of talked about what those ties were like.
And they taught me how to be a chaplain. They taught me what their needs were and how I could address them and address them in such a way to help them and help their families. Chaplaincy is not just for the inmate. Chaplaincy is to the families. Chaplaincy is to the officers. Chaplaincy is to everyone. That is as part of that village. In that case, it was called San Quentin.
Justin Forman: So talk to us a little bit more about that when you talk about the first years you're learning, you're soaking all this up. You're trying to understand what it is to minister to somebody that you understand. It's about the community. It's about the village. It's about the whole person, the whole family, but specifically the guys that you're ministering to in there. Did you find people that are without hope and that you were trying to bring hope to them, or is it directing their hopes?
Earl Smith: Well, I believe that when you get to a place like San Quentin in the eighties, the term was Bastille by the Bay. And that was like the last stop. So in seminary I learned this term call radical futurelessness. And when I heard it, I said, wow, that's the guys in the prison. So many of them do not believe they have a future. So many of them believe because they have a life sentence that they are going to just die in prison. They see people die around them. And for me, it was asking the Lord, how can I minister people that don't believe there's a reason to be ministered to? And how do you do that when you go to prison, where there's maybe four or five people attending chapel? And you know that the Lord has sent you there.
And it once again, it was what do you guys need? Well, we like to have groups coming and we like to have people that come in and minister and share and such. So I started to look at what were the things that could get them to come in. I worked for the Boy Scouts before I went to work at the prison. And the thing I would tell the kids when I took them camping, these are all inner-city kids, I tell them always when we got out for a campfire, don't get close to the fire. So when we get too close and they start screaming that they're on fire. But, you know, they weren't in the fire. But heat travels out and I realize that same concept would work in prison, that the heat, the warmth of what the word can really do, it can travel out and it can touch the guys inside, no matter why they're there. If they're there long enough, I trusedt that the heat would touch them.
Justin Forman: You're there and you're experiencing this and God's moving. God's teaching you so much and then something kind of unexpected happens. You re-encounter maybe some of your past. The guy who shot you all those years ago is sitting in a prison cell. What was that experience like?
Earl Smith: Yeah, he's sitting there. He's on the same tier as my cousin Jerry and my cousin Jerry was in a prison gang, which is different than a street gang. And this guy's on the same tier as well as some other people that I knew, a guy that was crime partner. And I remember thinking, wow, I hadn't seen this guy but three times in my life. I saw the night he shot me, I saw him in court. I wouldn't testify against him. I wanted him on the streets so I could kill him. And now the third time he's in San Quentin and I thought I had it all together. Maybe you remember that what it feels like to feel like you finally have peace with God, that things are really working well, that you think you've figured it all out. And God says, no, you haven't figured it out yet. I'm going to bring this piece to you and see how you deal with this. And the piece he brought to me was the guy that shot me was in San Quentin. I'm giving out Christmas cards at times feels really joyous. And here I am, I give this guy, I look at his cell, I see who he is, and I'm like, wow.
And all of a sudden, again, this did not mean the same thing to me. I was not at that point because I realize I was still angry and I learned at that point that you have to confront that thing that's hurt you or harm you. In this particular case, it was this guy that shot me and he said, hey, I got shot, too. And, you know, he's telling me stuff I really didn't need to hear because him getting shot had nothing to do with me being shot. He was just a victim of another circumstance. And so I started to walk away from him. I just I started crying because I thought this was a curse. God, why would you bring me to prison? Made me feel like I was okay. That, you know, I'm a chaplain now and everything was well. And I don't want to look back on that crazy life I had. Yet here this guy is. And I realize I don't want to forgive him.
The thing that's really great about a relationship with the Lord is he gives you the opportunity to take a walk with you. He gives you an opportunity to travel the journey with him. In this particular case, the journey or the walk, was that to the end of the pier, to the end of the sailway. And when I got there, I had to pass back by a guy and then walk that I had with the Lord represented all the pain that I had endured. The days when I could not ever forget that I had been shot. It was like an anniversary date for me. I would just be in so much pain and anguish. And yet when I got back in front of that guy, I looked down. I said, I need to thank you because God, used you to get to me. And it was that journey that the Lord took me from seeing that guy to the end of the pier back in front of him that I believe changed my life.
It wasn't in the seminary. It wasn't all the books I read. It wasn't all the things that people said about me. It was that walk I took with the Lord from seeing that guy to having to see him again, That I actually understood more clearly what it meant to have relationships. And as I walked off that pier, went back to my office, I just sat down and just cried.
I realized that I wasn't as far as I thought I was. But the key to that whole story is this. The guy wrote the warden a letter saying you have to get me out of this prison. Chaplain's going to have me killed. And so they call me and they ask me, do I know the guy? Said, yeah, I just saw him. And I said, I will let you know something. He's in the safest place he'll ever be in his life. I said he is safer now then he would ever be. And they looked at me and they did something very unusual. They got a special transport during the Christmas week and sent him out of San Quentin so I could stay there. I was still on probation. They could've just told me to go home, never come back. And that was it. Yet, they transferred him. And I believe that the reason that they transferred him during that time when they don't normally transfer inmates was because of what I took with the Lord down a tier where he actually poured into me more than I could ever have afforded me in a seminary, Bible college or anything else. He poured into me his word and it became like it dwelled in me like never before.
Henry Kaestner: Earl, I want to take us to the world of sports because this is the faith driven athlete podcast. But before I get there, I can't move off of the fact that you spent some very meaningful time with people that were in really desperate straits. You spent time with people on death row that are really running face to face with their mortality. And that must have been a special invitation to be involved in that when somebody is their most vulnerable. What was that like? What was it like to be a death row chaplain? And what truth did you learn about God through it?
Earl Smith: I'll go back and tell you. You said hope. I learned that I wasn't just a champion of hope, but I was a person of finalities because hope meets finality when there's an execution. And no matter what you feel. Robert Harris was the first person executed. He was on my caseload for years. I walked him into the chamber. I watched as they strapped in. Then I prayed with them. And 16 minutes later, they take him out saying he had to stay. And I watched the officers and everyone excited. Well, the reason I say this is you're in a place where everyone is watching you and Robert Harris did something very interesting.
He told the guys that we're getting ready to strap him in and then execute him. This is nothing personal. I know you're only doing your job. He ministered to them. He told the warden, I hear you love to fish. I hope that you make it to heaven. You and I can go fishing together. And I listen to him in a moment when he was at his lowest. He was trying to figure out a way to make the people around him better. And for me, he told me the story and then we'll talk about sports. But he says, you know, Earl, if everything you said about this Jesus relationship is true and I believe that he is going to be a white hearse waiting for me outside after they kill me. I said, a white hearse?
Well, the story is like this. After they executed Robert. There was such a rush to get out of the chamber. People were cheering. I was the last one there. There was a camera still videoing him as he sat there motionless. He was dead. And when I walked out of the chamber, the first thing I saw was a white hearse. And the reason it was there was because the contractor that they had removed his body and ran out of hearses, he had to borrow one from someone else. And what he borrowed was a white mini ram van that he used for carrying. And so what Robert told me he would see on the other side is what I saw when I walked out that door. And so there is a time when we have to pay a cost for the things we do. And that's the decision God makes. And that's between God and man. I believe that the chaplain's position is you prepare the man to meet the God.
And whatever takes place from there is between the man and God. For me it's faith, for me, it's presenting and sharing what can happen, the realities of what it means to love the Lord, what it means to trust him, what it means to honor him, to sacrifice to present your body as a living sacrifice. What does that mean in this day and age? And so when you're on death row and you talk with people, but that is the difference, because those guys, they have days where they know where they're headed and they most of us, if we're sick, you know. OK. So we're going to get medication or whatever. And a lot of these guys cases, their element is going to lead to death and they know it. You just don't know when, but it's going to happen. And for a chaplain, you leave being the man of hope and become more of the man of finality. You have to be honest with them. You have to be truthful with them. And you have to lead them in a direction that at the end of the day you can say, I've done the best to make sure they knew who Christ was.
Henry Kaestner: I'm impressed by the fact of something you said earlier on, which is you're not really a basketball fan. I mean, you care about the men that you minister to. But it doesn't sound like you're impressed by the star power of a Klay Thompson or Steph Curry or somebody like that. You don't care about them as basketball players. You care about them as men. What does it look like to love men regardless of their circumstance? You're on death row or you're an NBA player and everybody wants a piece of you. It strikes me that they're two very, very different experiences. Somebody who is on death row at their bottom in their life and somebody who is at the top of the game. But how do you see the similarities and differences? Do you see that as being so completely different? Like I do. Or is it all the same to you?
Earl Smith: Well, I believe, first of all, you have to remember that I tell people, they say that it's too simple. They're all wearing numbers. And if you move outside of the brand, outside the name. And understand the number. The number can represents so many different things. If someone wants a number 30 jersey who you want to be like, Steph? Or whatever, forty like HB? Or, you know, you can go through all these numbers, but the guys have numbers. Guys in prison have numbers. For the athletes that we work with, if you are so focused on who they are as athletes and their star power, I believe you fail to adequately present the gospel. They need it as much as anyone. They need, whether they're football players, basketball players or baseball players. I've done three sports professionally, I can tell you that there is no difference in a man who needs the Lord. There's no difference in a man who comes to grips with the reality that whether I have nothing or I have a lot, absent Christ, you're still empty. And that's what you have to present.
Henry Kaestner: What's it look like for a young person who's coming in who doesn't know their brokenness? Presumably people going to prison have some level of understanding of their brokenness and maybe their need for a savior. How do you deal with a young man that the world has said is better than sliced bread and yet, you know that they're every bit as mortal and in creating the image of God as the person that you want to minister to on death row.
Earl Smith: Well, the thing that you do that's really different with these guys who are professional athletes, is there some guy that's going to be on the team that was just like them. They thought they had it all together and then they had this epiphany. They had this moment when they realize I really don't have it together. Really not what I thought I was going to be.
And so with that sort of happens in here, you start to feel like, whoa, what do you do with a kid like that? You allow the other guys that have been where he is to say, this is how we got through it. The only thing that you can actually do in life is be honest and transparent with yourself. A basketball game now is if you're really great. They do everything for you, so you don't really have to work with the trappings of relationship. I tell guys, I just spoke to a rookie class for the NFL. And what I told them is, you know, congratulations, you're professional now. And I pray one day you'll be a pro. And guy was like, what does that mean? I said, Well, when you got an agent, you became professional. You can't go back to college because you've signed with an agent. I said, the question is, how long will it take you to be a pro? And here's what pros do. How long will it take you to grasp that piece of it? Because it's not going to happen overnight. You're going to have some pitfalls. And as you have those, where do you start? What do you do? And those become the dialogs that you want to have with these kids earlier rather than later.
Henry Kaestner: All right. I want to take you back a couple years ago, warriors are in one of several playoff and championship runs. What's it look like when you've got a group of young men and do they get a sense that there's something special going on? Are they praising God or are they seeking him out? What's the dynamic like in a chapel for a team that's going through the playoffs?
Earl Smith: Well, first of all, basketball is really great because we have both teams togethe. So we're in the championships we're playing the. Cavaliers, we have Richard Jefferson and James Charles and some of the other Cavaliers and Mike Miller. And so they're there also. So it's not just a Warrior chaplain. And so we're both in that room together. But I mean, I've known them so long that it was like, you know, it's just an extended family. So it's family times ten. And so it's the faith relationship that we talked about. It's like so we play the Cavaliers all these years. There's Richard Jefferson. But Richard had played for us. So I asked for prayer requests. And one of the guys would say, they look at Richard, start laughing and say, humility, because that's always what Richard prays for. And so even though he wasn't with the Warriors, the warrior players answered for him because that's the relationship. And that's the thing that's people don't know outside the door about relationship. Yeah. They're going to be very competitive. They're going to go out. They've got a battle to fight each other. Yet there's a space and time when they can put some things aside and focus on one thing in this relationship.
Henry Kaestner: We found ourselves in this crazy time currently with COVID, but we've gone from one challenge and culture in society to another. And you're uniquely equipped to be able to comment on race relations in professional sports, in a culture. You're a black man leading and serving other black men and white men and seen the races come together. We'd love to hear just your thoughts right now. And most importantly, of course, against that backdrop is your man of God. And I just your observations, as you see God at work, where you see the fullness and the depravity of man, you see professional athletes that are looked up to as cultural change agents and heroes. And just I'd love to get any perspective you have that you feel that God is speaking to you in a time such as this.
Earl Smith: Well, I think the biggest perspectiev for us right now that I share with people is I can't tell you how many times I've gone back and read Second Chronicles, seven and six leading into seven. And just sort of to understand what was the dynamics, what was the dynamics of a young man following in the footsteps of his father and carrying on a legacy and doing what God had instructed him to do. And at the end of it, in the midst of this cloud, is a list of everything that was going on. This voice, as if by people who are called by my name, will humble themselves and pray and seek my face. And so if you read that, what you have to understand is, I believe the day God is saying this is a time of reckoning. This is a time when people are going to have to humble themselves. People are going to have to pray the most divided time in the nation. It's the worship hour, the most divided time in our country. And this nation is drawn to worship. Yet now you have people that are African-Americans. They're listening to Charles Stanley. They're listening to these other people and they're not in their church. They're able to listen to see other things. So I believe that what we saw as a negative God is in the process of turning around into a positive because people that would normally not even entertain what another minister was saying from a different faith perspective, or race, are now at least taking the opportunity. I'm at home. Why don't at least let me see what's going on? Let me look at it.
Now race relationship has to start with God relationship. And for some reason, we try to move the God out of the relationship. There's been unjust situations in this country and there still remains unjustice situations. And you can say whatever you want to say, you can say, well, it's not true. It's not happening. I'll say this. And you weren't even asking this. I remember being in San Diego where Colin Kaepernick and Eric Reid and I remember having lunch with Eric and we're getting ready talk to Cap. And Eric says, I think I want to I want to be with Cap.
He says, I just don't know what that means. And I said, why? And he says, Because I believe that we should be praying for this country. I said, Well, that's what you're saying, if you want to be on your knees. I mean, how do you pray? You pray by kneeling. And the thought process has gone so far away from the simple notion that I'm going to kneel and I'm going to pray. And that's sort of where Eric and I were at. That was a preseason game in San Diego. There was a lot of controversy around that. Yeah. For me, I said, if that's something you're going to do, do it in a way that you're going to honor the relationship you have and don't just do it for the sake of doing anything. And I believe today I would say the same thing to anyone they would ask. And whatever it is you're saying, you're going to do it for the sake of the relationship now and not just for the sake of doing something. So you can say you are part of the deal because you've been led by God to do it.
And in terms of reconciliation, I believe that athletes are leaders. Your gave me the ages of your sons, you tell me how old they were when you came out. Now, five years later, you say it was 18 ones, like 16 or another. Well, when you sort of talked about these ages and you're thinking, OK, well, where was Steph and his wife and Klay? They were all saying, what can we do? Give us an opportunity. Give us a voice. Let us know what you're saying. Let us know what you're thinking. Because we have a platform to share your thoughts. And at a time in this country when athletes are starting to step up and do that is a time when we start to become closer as a nation. And it's not black athletes. It's not white athletes, Hispanic athletes. It's athletes, leaders. It's people that have been viewed as leaders by others for a long time that are now saying, guess what? What can I do to help you? You encourage me when I'm on the court. You encourage me when I'm on the football field. You encourage me when I'm on the baseball field. Now, what can I do to help you?
Justin Forman: Earl, you're giving us such a great perspective and the impact that you've had on so many players and athletes lives over the years and preparing them for these conversations. But it seems like chaplaincy is something that's maybe for the players. Is there a point where chaplaincy needs to crossover more into the organizations themselves, the front offices, and have this same kind of care and conversation? I know it's there in some places, but maybe it's not as mainstream as it is in the locker room.
Earl Smith: Yeah, you know what? I would tell you just for me, the thing that for chaplaincy, it wasn't just the warriors. I make program and handouts and I go and I give them to the ushers. I give them to the police officers, the fire department staff that are there, the cheerleaders. I give them to the officials that are going to officiate today because everyone is involved in this process together. And I believe that's what has to happen. I believe that you cannot isolate and say only these guys get it. When I did the Giants, I did the Giants like 12, 13 years. And you do the visiting team. You do the whole team. Did you do the umpires? I think some of my joy was the umpires, because those are the people that, you know, really don't understand the trials that they go through. You see all the big time players, what their influence is, young players and their influence. So how do you get people that are influencers to understand the power and the bandwidth that they have?
And so for us, if chaplaincy is simply in the building, then at San Quentin, when we start a baseball team and we took gang members from different gangs that would normally not even associate with each other, and we gave them a uniform because Dusty Baker made it possible for us to get a donation to get uniforms. And now you're the Giants. And you go and play this game together and your racial differences, your gang affiliations mean nothing because the game is bigger than all of that. Then I say that same principle with life. You have more things in common than you have differences. If you really look at it.
Justin Forman: Earl, we're incredibly blessed and grateful for the time that you spent with us and guiding us through some of the life experiences, what God's taught you and how he's prepared you for the conversations that you have today. We'd like to finish each episode just rooted in God's truth. And you've already done some of that. But could you point to us maybe a scripture that's come alive to you here this morning or this week or something that God's teaching you and that you could share with our listeners?
Earl Smith: You know, the word says be not weary in well-doing for in due season you shall reap if you faint not. And that is in Galatians. And I would say at a time when people are becoming tired and depression is setting in, do not allow that to hold you hostage. Do not allow that situation to somehow burden you down. My son has a program called the Catcher's Forum. And he coaches catchers, but that's also his ministry. And he went through a long period when there were no kids to coach. He was really down about it. And that was the scripture, that I used to say, son, don't allow the situation to rob you of the joy that God is giving you.
And I would say the same thing. Be not wearing in well-doing. In due season, you're going to reap. This thing is going to turn around. And when it turns around, where will you be? I ask guys in prison all the time. Where will you be when you get where you're going? And I ask the same thing about those of us that have faith.
When this thing turns around, are you going to be behind it in front of it? Are you going be on the sidelines looking ahead? Are you going to be in the game playing? It's really up to you.
Justin Forman: Earl, such great wisdom. Thank you so much for being with us. Thank you for blessing our listeners with your words and for sharing and stewarding what God has entrusted to you and so many experiences.
Earl Smith: Sorry we didn't talk more about sports stars, but I appreciate the conversation. Thank you guys so much. It is pretty awesome. The work you guys are doing ministry that God has led you to. I applaud you for it. This is really a work of God. So God bless you. Continue to work.