Yes, our Hometown Hero’s real name is Bubba. Bubba Jennings. He was born and raised in Oklahoma but has lived in Seattle since the late 90s. Bubba moved to the Pacific Northwest to play rock and roll. As he says: “I went out to Seattle to make it big and learned that making it big doesn’t always happen, at least not in the ways you might think.”
He tells this story: “I got involved with a group of people who were running an all-ages music venue in Seattle. It was an exciting time because there was this whole scene of people just basically creating art and making music and trying to build and shape culture. We would do 200 plus shows a year with metal, hardcore punk, rock ‘n’ roll, anything like that. It was really fun, being a part of that scene.”
He continues: “as time went on, though, my life started to change. I started to ask questions. I had been a Christian for a few years, and I really felt like God was wanting me to focus on what produced fruit for his kingdom. So I started asking myself what’s producing fruit? And that led to starting to question what I was doing, why I was doing it, why am I playing music? Why am I doing these shows? What is this all about? We had launched a nonprofit designed to help artists and we were putting out records and magazines and doing concerts all over the city. And it was exciting. But God called me out of that because I just didn’t feel like it was producing the kind of kingdom fruit that God wanted. I ended up eventually doing a non-paid internship at a church. And though I wanted to open up a rock and roll club, God called me to become a pastor.”
Bubba did become a pastor, which was a very different direction for him and for his family. He says, “my wife was like, what happened? I thought I married a rocker, and now I’m married to some pastor guy! How did that happen? I got tricked, I got duped. But, it was a wonderful, accidental, yet providential and sovereign directional change.”
Bubba has now been a pastor for over 20 years and still leads a church. But over the years, he also became a real estate investor and joined a group of people who had a business in real estate. He says “we were doing new construction and flips and had a real estate portfolio and started to get really interested in business. That led to me having a desire to be a part of all different kinds of businesses. I eventually launched an independent sponsor firm where we buy and build businesses. And so I’m co-vocational. I’m still pastoring a church, but then I’m also buying businesses and I’m a part of a number of different businesses in different industries and sectors.”
Bubba learned to weave all of that together in a unique way. Typically the world thinks in compartments. You’re either, or. You’re either a pastor or you’re something else. But there is kingdom fruit in a variety of different vocational pathways. And you could even be on more than one pathway at the same time.
Through it all, God taught Bubba how to weave his Sunday faith into his Monday work. He comments, “I really started to realize that everything we do, whatever it is, it doesn’t matter. It’s all unto the Lord. You know, as Scripture says, whatever you do, work heartily for the Lord and not for men. That became a verse that was in many ways a life verse for me. So it didn’t matter what I was doing: if I was playing music or I was running a show or I was teaching a class at the church or if I was involved in some kind of business endeavor, whatever it is, whatever I’m doing, it is unto the Lord. I really believe that every Christian is a minister, every Christian is a missionary, and all of life is ministry.”
