Carl Jeffrey Wright’s In Search of Heroes Interview
Ralph Zuranski: Hi. This is Ralph Zuranski and I am on the phone with Jeff Wright. He is the president of Urban Ministries and also co-creator of the new comic book series called the Guardian Line.
How are you doing today, Jeff?
Jeff Wright: I’m doing very well, thank you.
Ralph Zuranski: Would you be able to tell me a little bit about your company Urban Ministries Inc. and also the Guardian Line comic book series that you guys are working together on?
Jeff Wright: Sure. Urban Ministries Inc. was founded by Dr. Melvin Banks in 1970. He had attended Moody Bible Institute, which is how he originally got to the Chicago area, and later he went to Wheaton College and graduated. He was actually one of the first African Americans to finish both those institutions.
Jeff Wright: While working for another Christian publishing company he got the idea that some specific, unique media targeting African American teens needed to be introduced. So in 1970 in the basement of his home he launched a magazine called InTeen and Urban Ministries Inc. was born.
Jeff Wright: that by the time the full line was complete a church could use the Urban Ministries curriculum as their Christian education or Sunday school curriculum. The product began to be introduced in many, many churches, primarily African American churches around the country.
Jeff Wright: The company went on in the 1980s to develop a Vacation Bible School course to re-introduce the use of video products. I’m talking dramatic stories in videos in Christian education and the African American church. It was upon seeing one of those videos in the mid-80s that I learned of the company.
Jeff Wright: The Guardian Line, which is the newest product line from Urban Ministries, then continues a tradition of the use of innovative media products to reach audiences with the message of the Gospel of Jesus Christ.
Jeff Wright: By teaming up with Michael Davis who was already in the comic world and bringing the many years of church ministry and Christian education product resources developed by Urban Ministries we believe that we are going to do an incredible thing to extend the Gospel into even newer audiences.
Ralph Zuranski: I was talking to you earlier and I was very impressed with your concept of how the black culture basically needs the impact on youth of all ages worldwide. Can you tell me a little bit about that?
Jeff Wright: Sure. I think that it’s fair to say today that global youth culture is rooted in urban culture. When we think about the hip hop movement, the style of dress, rap music, all of these youth cultural icons have come out and are driving the culture globally. It almost doesn’t matter what nation you go to today, whether it’s Japan or Russia or even in Latin America. Young people all look pretty urban and hip hop.
Jeff Wright: One of the reasons for that of course is that we have six giant global media companies that are propagating these cultural icons through their music and video shows and through the sale, of course, and distribution of rap and hip hop music. But most of this originates, or has originated, out of the African American community.
Jeff Wright: Now the thing that is startling, of course, is that there is just not enough African American teenagers in America to sustain that kind of a global or even national business in and of themselves and so we find that upwards of 80% of rap and hip hop music is bought by suburban white teens.
Jeff Wright: The same is true when you get out of the U.S. Many people who don’t look like African Americans are consuming and thriving and pushing forward hip hop culture.
Ralph Zuranski: Isn’t there a problem with the message that the hip hop culture is perpetuating? Isn’t it sort of life-destroying, calling women “hoes” and killing the police and just the images that are created from that particular genre?
Jeff Wright: Like so many things, something that started off good gets turned bad. In the beginning in the origins of rap and hip hop, there were political messages.
Jeff Wright: There were messages of social justice and economic justice and even the earliest rap; most people will go back to Public Enemy and Chuck D and these groups. But way before those rappers and hip hop artists, spoken word, which is a part of African historical oral tradition, had messages of social redemption.
Jeff Wright: I think of artists such as Gill Scott-Heron or even before him, the Last Poets, who did use a fair amount of what might be considered profanity in their work, were delivering socially positive messages. In fact, one acronym used for rap in the early days was Rhythm And Poetry, RAP.
Jeff Wright: Now today what has happened in order to turn this into the commercial global phenomenon that we see, the most negative, misogynistic authority-defying, women-hating, God-hating lyrics, images, and artists have been promoted on a global scale by companies who clearly have no concern whatsoever either of the impact on society or the culture but rather just how extreme can we go in order to make money.
Jeff Wright: Then of course all of this is painted with a black face which is a pernicious evil in my view that is being foisted not just on the global community but in particular on the African American community.
Ralph Zuranski: Don’t you think that sort of abuses African American people, where people that are in the general media and just people all around the world, they associate that type of evilness with black people?
Jeff Wright: Yeah, it is true and it does associate perhaps the most negative images that we have ever seen in media with black people whether it’s a foul-mouthed rapper or Little Kim demeaning women. All of that, of course, is not only a disservice to black people and in particular black youth but all youth in all society. We know that that’s not the reality of what black youth are about and what they look like.
Jeff Wright: We serve many, many young people through the resources that we create for the thousands of churches that use UMI curriculum and we’ve done the research. We can tell you that a far greater representation of African American young people are sitting up in Sunday school every week than are participating in any hip hop or rap video.
Jeff Wright: The unfortunate part about it is that major media entities that are promoting these negative images are painting a picture of African American young people, or just black young people generally and globally that is far different from what the reality is.
Jeff Wright: It’s something that African Americans are very, very concerned about. We joke and we say we want “raparations” because there has been such a tremendous exploitation of some of the most negative elements of our culture. Some of those have actually been created by media conglomerates to essentially create a picture that is just far from reality.
Jeff Wright: No one wants their child to grow up to be a girl starring in a booty video. No one.
Ralph Zuranski: Yeah, I understand that. That’s one of the reasons why I created the Heroes program, to shine the light on those people who are true heroes like yourself and Michael Davis that are making a positive difference in the world and are concerned about our youth coming up. Not just black youth, Asian youth or white youth, but all youth and to give them a good, positive message.
Ralph Zuranski: So I wanted to ask you a couple of these questions so people can really discern what real heroes are and what they believe.
Ralph Zuranski: Jeff, what do you want out of life in ten words or less?
Jeff Wright: I like to continue to have the opportunity to make a God-transforming difference in the world.
Ralph Zuranski: That is my belief also. What is the dream or vision that sets the course of your life?
Jeff Wright: As the CEO of UMI I have an unusual opportunity to create transforming messages, messages that are rooted in a Biblical worldview. We are trusted to teach the Bible in over 10,000 churches weekly and as leader of this organization I have an incredible responsibility to make sure that our content is Biblically sound, is technically accurate, is going to be empowering and cast a vision that can make a difference in the lives of many people.
Jeff Wright: My goal is to do that, not just in print media but also in open word, in music, as well as in visual media and we are striving to achieve that and to grow to a level of influence that will meet or exceed the influence currently being exerted by the big five media companies.
Jeff Wright: When the giant media companies took over hip hop and it became more violent and more misogynistic and irresponsible, their bottom line was money. Your and my bottom line is the betterment of our community and our world.
Ralph Zuranski: I think a lot of people don’t know what misogynistic means. Could you explain that, please?
Jeff Wright: Sure. Misogyny just means the hating of women and this is rooted in the Biblical story, really, of the fall of man. The enemy of our souls, Satan, the devil, and yes, I do believe in a very real, personal, individual devil as well as many demons, hates the creative potential of women.
Jeff Wright: The idea that women bring life into this world is something that is a special target for forces of evil and the more that the enemy can make women the subject of ridicule, the subject of being demeaned or referred to as a female animal or drive in any way the degradation of women, then the more points in the column of the enemy and the less in the column of those who stand for righteousness and justice, peace, and the joy that God really wants all of us to live out in our lives.
Ralph Zuranski: How important is it to stay focused on your primary goal?
Jeff Wright: It’s critically important. I think that the story of my life or the life of Michael Davis or many, many others on your Heroes site is the function of focusing on a primary goal and a goal being tied to life-purpose.
Jeff Wright: What is it that God is trying to get out of your life? And that usually is something that you are very good at; that you enjoy doing that makes a difference, a positive difference, in the lives of other people. And once you have identified what that is, keeping it central in your life and not being distracted is critical.
Jeff Wright: I believe that one of the greatest weapons of Satan is the use of distractions, the use of deceptions as well as outright destruction to prevent people from accomplishing their God-given purposes. So staying focused and being clear of the distractions of life that can get you off target is a skill, really, that must be developed early in the life of a person who would be a hero, a person who would be successful and could be effectively used by God.
Ralph Zuranski: Boy, that’s so true. Do you follow your hunches and intuition? I know because you are a man of God you might consider that question, do you follow the guiding of the Holy Spirit that dwells in you?
Jeff Wright: I would say that the older I get the more I realize that what we might call hunches or intuition or that feeling inside really is in fact the Holy Spirit speaking to us. We have to learn how to recognize the difference between that and just the pizza we had last night because inevitably the outcomes that we intuitively come to, that we come to through hunch, intuition or just a strong feeling or urge, if it’s lined up with the Word of God, that’s the way God wants us to go.
Jeff Wright: I’ve had many, many instances where I went the other way and it turns out that I should have taken my first impulse and gone with that “hunch” or intuition that I had. The older I get the more I’m likely to just follow the leading of the Spirit in that way.
Jeff Wright: That doesn’t mean that I’m not thinking or that I’m operating in superstition or anything. It’s just more a matter of allowing God to guide my thoughts toward an outcome that He sees as the most appropriate one.
Ralph Zuranski: What specific philosophy or philosophies guide your life and your decisions?
Jeff Wright: I’m a Christian. I’m a disciple of Jesus Christ and the philosophy or philosophies that guide my life are the principles of Biblical worldview. Understanding that life is about abiding in the life of Christ and abiding in His Word and living in line with a past, a present and a future that points to a world that God wants to see on earth as it is in heaven.
Ralph Zuranski: What is your perspective on goodness, ethics and moral behavior?
Jeff Wright: Again my perspective is one of a Biblical worldview. I believe that God has laid out in His Word, the Bible, the complete perspective that anyone should have on goodness, ethics and moral behavior. That is what is right and what is wrong. It’s all there in the 613 commandments.
Jeff Wright: There is the model of Jesus Christ who summed it up so well in the greatest commandment, “To love God with all your heart and with all your soul and all your mind and to love your neighbor as yourself.”
Jeff Wright: That’s the summation of the law. But the specifics of the law also count and are important. And I believe, like the ultra-orthodox Jews, we should be seeking as much as possible to adhere to those things, those principles, those precepts that are laid out in God’s Word, the Bible. And I believe that with all my heart. And I believe that it’s possible to do it though the help of God.
Jeff Wright: Are we going to always be there? Of course not. But those should be the principles and the guidelines that we strive to adhere to.
Ralph Zuranski: What place does the power of prayer have in your life?
Jeff Wright: Prayer is very important in my life. I am a person of prayer. I am of the belief that praying without ceasing and trying to make certain that with as much of your day as you can keep in conscious inner dialog with God, the more our lives will be led by the Spirit.
Jeff Wright: I was very fortunate to grow up in a Christian home so some of my earliest memories are praying at the bedside of my parents. I had six brothers and the seven of us would pray at night with our parents. They taught us prayers and they taught us to pray and I have a tremendous legacy of prayer in my family that has helped me to this day.
Jeff Wright: Not just showing me by example and through experience that prayer works, and of course it does, but also just the benefit of other people praying for me. So I pray and I encourage my children to pray and I depend on the prayers of my family members and friends and I don’t make a single key decision without some directed time in prayer.
Ralph Zuranski: Wasn’t your mother a real prayer warrior? Didn’t she lose an arm and a leg by being run over by a train and almost died and bled to death when she was younger?
Jeff Wright: Yes, that’s true. That is true. My mother is a tremendous prayer warrior. She’ll be 86 years old next month and it is true, she did lose an arm and a leg when she was eight years old and she lived. That happened in the South, in Northeast Arkansas where she grew up.
Jeff Wright: Of course, obviously a preacher’s daughter in a small community, there was a lot of prayer that brought her through that. But her life is in and of itself a testimony. She has gone on, obviously, to have seven children, all boys.
Jeff Wright: She raised us. She finished her master’s degree in Library Science when she was pregnant with my youngest brother and then went on and had another career, really. I mean, after a career as a mom with seven children she went on to a 20-year career as a librarian in the public library system and in the university libraries in Washington, DC, where we grew up. And she still remains very active in her church.
Jeff Wright: She is an active person and a volunteer in the mentoring world. She was one of the board members of the literacy program “Reading is Fundamental” for many years and just a tremendous example of the power of prayer. And, of course, she was a great mom.
Ralph Zuranski: What principles are you willing to sacrifice your life for?
Jeff Wright: That’s a great question. I am convinced that just understanding that there are principles that are worth sacrificing your life for is a place that many of us need to get to and just really soberly ask the questions about what I would call convictions, those things that you wouldn’t live without.
Jeff Wright: I have many convictions but most of them are summed up in the principles of God’s Word. I would sacrifice my life for the name of Jesus Christ. I’m not going to sacrifice my belief and my commitment to live a Christ-centered life for anything because I understand that to live is Christ and to die is gain.
Jeff Wright: Of course, many things sound like they should be more important than that: your family, your resources or corporate America, but I mean, many of those kinds of things that we somehow feel are important aren’t really worth a life.
Jeff Wright: I’ve already sacrificed my life, in a sense, when I left my position in corporate America and came into really what is the ministry responsibility of shepherding UMI.
Jeff Wright: I had been working in corporate America, and for many people this is a life’s dream, to be a vice president in a Fortune 50 company. Successful, having had Ivy League degrees and attended Georgetown and Harvard and Colombia and so forth, and the Wharton School to be successful in corporate America. But I sacrificed that. I sacrificed that life in order to be able to contribute those skills and the experiences that I had gained to do something that would be of greater benefit both to the African American community and to the world.
Jeff Wright: I essentially got to a point of saying, “Okay, is my life about making rich people richer or is it going to be about doing something that will count for the kingdom of God?” So I sacrificed that life in order to take on this life, which is a life I live for Christ.
Ralph Zuranski: Are your actions and goals consistent with your beliefs?
Jeff Wright: I certainly hope so. Obviously God will be the judge of that. I try my best to make certain that I’m living a life that would be God-honoring. I pray for my friends, for my wife and even for myself that, as Paul prayed in the book of Colossians, my walk would be worthy of the name of Jesus Christ.
Ralph Zuranski: Is it valuable to have highly charged emotions about achieving your goals?
Jeff Wright: I think so. I think that highly charged emotions, I would translate that into passion, into enthusiasm and that word derives from a Greek word which means to breathe out.
Jeff Wright: I think when you really understand what it is that God wants you to do, what it is that is your life’s passion, that you will operate with a sense of energy and flow. There’s a kind of psychological term for it, finding flow, from a gentleman who is not really a Christian but he spent a lot of time studying this.
Jeff Wright: When you get to that point where your enthusiasm and your passion for a purpose is so intent and so fixed, time sort of seems to disappear for you. It stops. You could do it for days. And that’s exactly where I am in what I’m doing.
Ralph Zuranski: Is it useful to take a positive view of setbacks, misfortunes and mistakes?
Jeff Wright: I think sometimes mistakes and setbacks and misfortunes can be just that. They can be devastating. Things happen in our lives that are often unpleasant, unfortunate. We don’t want to go through them and it can be very, very hard.
Jeff Wright: Sometimes it’s not real easy to say, “Okay, let me find the good in this.” I think of the story of Joseph in the Bible. In the end he said, “You meant it for evil, God meant it for good.” But I’m not sure he was that happy to be in jail all those years or to be thrown into a pit.
Jeff Wright: So I’m not suggesting that we shouldn’t try to find a way to look on the bright side and to be as positive as we can but I think it’s also important to operate in reality. And the reality is sometimes life is very hard and we need comforting. We need to take care of ourselves.
Jeff Wright: I don’t advocate going into pity parties and so on, but at the same time there is a certain unrealism that says that you have to always be positive and always look for the best because sometimes things aren’t real good.
Jeff Wright: At the same time I believe, and I kind of live by, one of my favorite expressions and that is there is a reason why the windshield is bigger than the review mirror. There really is a reason. We need to know what is behind us and it’s important to glance up there every now and then, but we have to go forward.
Ralph Zuranski: Do you think that optimism is valuable?
Jeff Wright: Absolutely. I just refer you to my comment I just made about looking ahead and not behind. We need to have a forward look.
Ralph Zuranski: Do you maintain your sense of humor in the face of serious problems?
Jeff Wright: I try to be as lighthearted as I can and to bring levity in many, many situations. I think humor is very therapeutic. Again I think the example of Christ is great. I think if we could have a laugh track to the New Testament we would find that there was a lot more laughter and humor coming in those words of Christ than we ever imagined.
Jeff Wright: I think God has a great sense of humor and I try to have a great sense of humor. It is just therapeutic. It’s a positive thing. At the same time I believe we need to balance that.
Jeff Wright: Sometimes people try to find humor in situations that just really are not funny. It’s an escape mechanism. So as much as I might try to be as positive and as humorous as I can, there are some situations that we are faced with, and particularly today, that really don’t need humor at all and in fact it’s probably inappropriate.
Ralph Zuranski: Do you take time out of your day to feed your subconscious positive thoughts about you, your goals and your dreams?
Jeff Wright: I keep continuing an inner dialog of positive commentary going on. Scripture talks about how David encouraged himself in the Lord and I have to encourage myself.
Jeff Wright: I have to, as an ongoing practice of being a leader of an organization, make sure that I’m setting as positive of a tone as I can, often in the face of very difficult and complex problems that require a lot of intense thoughts.
Jeff Wright: So this is a habit, this is a practice, that I believe is an important one for anyone in leadership and it’s particularly important today because there is such a continuing drone of negative information that flows.
Jeff Wright: In fact, you can try this test any time you are in public or standing in line in a grocery store where people always tend to go towards the negative. The only thing we want to talk about in this society is what happened that was negative.
Jeff Wright: I’ve never been standing in a line in a public place and some stranger says, “Hey, guess what happened yesterday? My kid got all A’s.” Usually it’s, “Did you hear about what happened to the Crocodile Hunter man” or did you hear about this negative event or that negative event.
Jeff Wright: One of the things that I believe is a challenge to all of us living here in our media-saturated American society is to find our way to the positive. Find a way to think on and ultimately speak on those things that are good and honest and as Paul laid out, those things that are of good report.
Jeff Wright: It’s very easy for Christians to omit and to forget about the obligation that we have to be bearers of good news and not repeaters of the negativity that so pervades this society.
Ralph Zuranski: Well, you know that is so true, “the bleed that leads” seems to be the mantra of the media that is in control of TV and radio. My goal with the Heroes program is to help spread good news about heroes in the local community doing good things at a grass roots level.
I don’t think that the media that we have today will ever change their way if they can make a cent off of somebody’s suffering.
Jeff Wright: I agree with that and I think that one of the things that we have to do as people of faith is to make a personal commitment that we will not feed into that frenzy of negativity. We won’t repeat a bad story.
Jeff Wright: Most of us need to limit the amount of consumption of that negative media content anyway. I wrote a book, God’s Vision of Television and really my point in that book was to limit your diet of negative media content and you will have a better life.
Jeff Wright: It’s an addiction and it does have an impact. There are just countless studies on the consequences of negative media consumption and negative behavior, whether it’s violence in children or sedentary lifestyle and overeating in adults which leads to so many conditions: diabetes and heart disease to arthritis complications. All of these ultimately are rooted in what you are feeding your mind.
Jeff Wright: Then the other point is, most people kind of go through life as if they have an infinite supply of thoughts when in fact it’s really finite. So if you have a finite number of thoughts, and you know you have a finite number of thoughts because you are only going to live so long and you don’t know how long that is, why spend those thoughts on so much negative?
Jeff Wright: All of our lives would be enriched if we would think on some other things.
Ralph Zuranski: That is so true. Do you think that it takes courage to pursue new ideas? So many people get caught up in that negativity and caught up in their own social peer group and it’s hard to make a change sometimes and get those negative people out of your life?
Jeff Wright: There’s an old saying that “nobody likes change but a wet baby and even they cry”. I like to think that the people who are going to make a difference in this world have to begin with understanding that it will take courage and it is also going to take boldness to stand alone, to stand for something new, positive and different and that is redemptive.
Jeff Wright: That’s got to be one of the core principles of your behavior if you are a person who is an innovator, who is trying to make a difference and to go in a different direction.
Ralph Zuranski: Are you willing to experience discomfort in the pursuit of your dream?
Jeff Wright: Absolutely. I had to make a pretty significant sacrifice leaving my position in corporate America to come to Urban Ministries. There was a financial sacrifice.
Jeff Wright: There were a number of personal sacrifices. But it was uncomfortable because let’s face it, making more money has its advantages. But at the same time I got a tremendous unexpected reward from having a life that was synthesized, I think, for the first time with the purposes and aims that God had for me. And there’s no price you can put on that.
Jeff Wright: So in that sense the sacrifice was worth it. Sort of like a mother sacrifices her figure and some pain in order to bring a child into the world. There’s just simply no comparison.
Ralph Zuranski: Is it beneficial to make decisions quickly?
Jeff Wright: Sometimes it is and sometimes not. Some people don’t move forward in their lives because they can’t get to a point of decision. They take forever. They are looking for a sign. They want more confirmation.
Jeff Wright: Finding the pace of decision-making that fits the problem that you are trying to solve and the situation that you are in, there is actually a skill that has to be developed over time. Knowing when to act quickly and knowing when to say, “You know what, I think I better think about that one for another day,” is an important skill to develop.
Jeff Wright: There are times in my leadership of this organization when I do need to decide and decide right away. And then there are other times when I need to know that something needs a little more prayer, a little more contemplation, or maybe just some additional information.
Ralph Zuranski: Are you slow to revise or reverse an important decision?
Jeff Wright: Again, I would bring the same set of considerations in. Sometimes a decision has been made, you’ve committed to a path and information comes that suggests that you should go in a different direction.
Jeff Wright: When you get to a point of critical mass where it’s really clear that something has to happen, I think it can be very, very devastating to not make that decision timely. Money can be lost and maybe lives or other consequences if an important decision that requires a change of direction isn’t made promptly.
Jeff Wright: On the other hand, depending on the consequences and the number of people and resources that are involved, you do need to take your time in making the decision.
Jeff Wright: Timing is everything and execution, whether it’s done quickly or slowly, needs to happen with enough consideration, enough prayer, and enough information so that when you make the decision, whether you did it quickly or did it over a period of time, you can be comfortable that you moved with the hand of God in that.
Ralph Zuranski: How are you able to overcome your doubts and fears? I think that’s probably one of the greatest tools of Satan is to have us doubt what we are doing and just fear so many different things.
Jeff Wright: I believe that the closer you walk with God the more you can, from Scripture, from prayer, from the counsel of elders and friends who you know are leading lives that are God-directed, Spirit-led, Biblically worldview oriented, the easier it is to overcome doubts and fears.
Jeff Wright: Will they come? Yes, they will. Will you overcome them? If you operate from the perspective of faith and trust that God has your best at heart, which he does, you can overcome.
Jeff Wright: I’ve had many situations in my life where I’ve had to really, really rethink, “Did I make the right decision? Is something very negative going to happen?” Again, I think about coming here, at UMI, to Urban Ministries.
Jeff Wright: There were times when I thought this was a tremendous mistake because it came at great financial sacrifice, it came with sacrifice to my family and to many other things that I was doing that looked like they were solved problems suddenly became problems and I really began to doubt God.
Jeff Wright: But through prayer, through the continuing meditation on the Word of God, through the support and encouragement of others around me and when I think about the kind of feedback that we get from people and places, Africa, Nigeria, and in Southern Africa. We’ve given away literally hundreds of thousands of pieces of Christian education literature.
Jeff Wright: We’ll get a letter every now and then and someone will say, “This really changed our village or our life.” Or people in churches who have given us testimony about how drug addicted and substance abusing individuals have had their lives changed because of the work we are doing, that becomes a tremendous encouragement and a confirmation that what I was doubting, what I was concerned about in terms of the wisdom of the decision was totally, totally something that didn’t need to be thought about because God was with it.
Ralph Zuranski: Do you readily forgive those who upset, offend and oppose you?
Jeff Wright: I wish I could say I do that all the time but no, I don’t. Sometimes I get mad and I stay mad for a couple of days. But I’m working on it. I’m working on being angry and sinning not. But you know what; I think that when you are in any position of leadership there are going to be people who will offend you, people who are going to do things intentionally to upset you. And if you are involved in any kind of Christian leadership as I am, there’s going to be continuing opposition.
Jeff Wright: I have learned to forgive. I’ve learned the power of forgiveness is one of the most important lessons of life. Understanding that forgiveness is what allows us to continue in relationship and also to let loose the burdens that lack of forgiveness will put on you.
Jeff Wright: It takes a lot of energy to operate without a forgiving spirit. It really does. It is a very, very hard burden. It’s sort of a ghost in your head that you won’t let go.
Jeff Wright: So I believe that we should forgive and I try to forgive so as not to carry around the past.
Ralph Zuranski: Do you experience service to others as a source of joy?
Jeff Wright: One of my greatest sources of joy is to know that here at UMI we get to serve the church leadership, Christian educators, pastors, teachers and the community by providing products and resources that will help them to do what God has called them to do in changing lives and to do it more effectively. That’s probably my greatest sense of joy.
Jeff Wright: To be a part of something that really God is doing. I didn’t start Urban Ministries as I mentioned earlier. It was begun by Melvin Banks. But I get to be a part of something that God started through him and who knows, maybe generations before that, to get to a place where we would have the ability to reach and touch and teach.
Jeff Wright: I can’t think of any greater joy than to know that leadership as service, which is the kind of leadership that I exercise, is something that I get to be a part of in seeing God work in the world today.
Ralph Zuranski: Jeff, when was the lowest point in your life and how did you change your life-path to one of victory over the obstacles you were facing at that time?
Jeff Wright: Probably the lowest point in my life was the destruction of my marriage. One of the problems that we perhaps don’t recognize as a problem in America, in addition to many of the things that have become put into law in our country, the area of no-fault divorce is unexamined and has caused tremendous devastation in our society.
Jeff Wright: When our laws move to a place where we said that the state’s interest in preserving the family is of lesser importance than one individual’s decision to end or destroy a marriage, particularly where there are children involved, we dealt with what may be a death blow to the more core underpinnings of our society and that is a strong family structure.
Jeff Wright: So I can say I was a victim of a no-fault divorce. I had no desire whatsoever, no intention, to become one of the (I suppose) more than 50% now of people who get married and get divorced.
Jeff Wright: That was a very, very low point for me. Now I had to go and get to a point of forgiveness, I had to get to a point of understanding that even some of the most negative things in your life can be used by God. And I had to recast my misfortune in the context of what God was doing in my life and what he was preparing me for.
Jeff Wright: So I began to look at that experience, which was certainly not one that I would wish on anyone and didn’t ever expect to see in my own case, as one that I could overcome and use as a part of my development as a better person and as a more understanding and more forgiving person going forward. And that’s exactly what happened.
Jeff Wright: All of that came through the guidance of Scripture and through prayer.
Ralph Zuranski: Was there anyone who helped you and gave you the willpower to change things in your life for the better at that time?
Jeff Wright: There were a number of people who poured into my life. It is amazing that when you are in the family of God, when you are a Christian, when you have friends and family members who are disciples of Jesus Christ, the ability of those people that God has put in your life for that purpose to become a source of strength and a place of refuge and a place of respite is just unlike anything you can imagine.
Jeff Wright: So many of my closest friends, Dr. Clarence Walker who is a marriage and family therapist who was just invaluable to me. My own mother who became a tremendous source of comfort and support for me, and many, many friends, all of whom had one thing in common: They understood the Word of God to be the guiding principles for life and they had well-developed and intimate relationships with God and were able to bring into my life the kind of support and encouragement that I needed to overcome.
Ralph Zuranski: How important is it to believe your financial dreams would eventually become reality?
Jeff Wright: The ability to vision properly, whether it’s in the area of finance or in other areas, I think it’s critical to getting from the place of dreaming to the place of reality.
Jeff Wright: I think that Andy Stanley’s definition of a vision is appropriate. He says, “A vision is a clear mental image of what could be, fueled by or powered by the passion that it should be.” And I believe that’s important.
Jeff Wright: I think that when you are looking at financial dreams they have to be about something. People who just want more money just so they can say they have more money, I don’t think that’s a dream. I think that’s just being caught up in the lust of the flesh, the lust of money and the things money can buy. And of course the media is fueling that.
Jeff Wright: I don’t think anyone should focus on financial dreams for the reasons that we see in mass media today. But at the same time I really believe it’s critical to have a clear vision of what it is that you are trying to achieve, to understand that vision empowered by your passion and to have enough clarity about that vision so that you can do what it is that that vision requires.
Jeff Wright: That’s just an important skill and I don’t believe there’s enough vision casting going on right now.
Ralph Zuranski: When you are vision casting a lot of people put money there and many other things. Do you think that it’s valuable to know exactly how much money or whatever your goal is that you want to have in whatever bank account, in your spiritual bank account, in your emotional bank account or just regular bank account and have a specific date for the accomplishment of that goal?
Jeff Wright: The more specific the goal, the more clear and definite the outcome that you seek, the better your chances of accomplishing it. And I would say that’s true whether it’s money or any other goal that you set. It has to be clear.
Jeff Wright: If you don’t know when, how much, exactly what it’s going to look like, okay, the exact denominations, the $20s, $50s, $100s and what you are going to have, you are less able to get there.
Jeff Wright: I just think that people who focus purely on the money, which is just a tool. Dennis Peacock says, “Money is nothing but foldable time.” It’s a resource for some other purpose and it shouldn’t be an end in and of itself.
Ralph Zuranski: What is your definition of heroism? Helping to create the Guardian Line, which talks about heroes in form of angels and people that intercede in the lives of humans, what is your definition of heroism?
Jeff Wright: A hero is one who has sacrificed his life to be used by God so that God can accomplish what God wants to accomplish in life.
Ralph Zuranski: Did you ever create a secret hero in your mind that helped you deal with life’s difficulties?
Jeff Wright: A secret hero I never had. I have to say that I tried to use as many examples from Scripture as I can in my life to help me overcome obstacles or to achieve the successes.
Jeff Wright: One of the things that has helped me is looking at individuals who have accomplished and knowing that a particular goal is achievable because someone has already done it. I tend to think that first and foremost, of course, having the mother and the father that I did and seeing their lives from poverty in the South to success in their careers and in my mother’s case in particular, overcoming obstacles like being handicapped, a word we never used in our home, that helped me tremendously.
Jeff Wright: So seeing these individuals who aren’t secret so much but just public examples helped me deal with difficulties in life and to just get to the accomplishments that I’ve accomplished.
Ralph Zuranski: What were the qualities and attributes of your real life heroes when you were growing up?
Jeff Wright: People who were focused. People who set goals and achieved them. People who overcame their fears. People who understood the discipline and perseverance and maintaining virtue and operating with the purity of Biblical worldview would bring about the results that all of us would want to be a part of or would like to achieve. Those are some of the qualities and the attributes.
Ralph Zuranski: Who are the heroes in your life now?
Jeff Wright: My wife is a tremendous hero in my life right now. Lakita Garth is doing and has done a tremendous amount of work mentoring and being an example to young people that you can live a virtuous life, that you can adhere to qualities that would make you a better person.
Jeff Wright: She’s poured her life out into millions of young people around the country and around the world and she is a tremendous hero to me. She’s done it at great personal sacrifice and I have the great blessing of being able to be married to her right now.
Jeff Wright: I also believe just tremendously in the work and the results that the life of Melvin Banks who founded Urban Ministries represents. I think that he is a great hero for all of us, both in terms of Christian entrepreneurship as well as pursuing a vision. One man leaving the comfort of a secure job and possibly a reasonable future to take care of his family, to sacrifice and create UMI, to create the company that today touches millions of individuals.
Jeff Wright: Then there are some people that we all know. I think Oprah is a hero. When I look at what she’s done in the area of bringing a positive voice in media. I wish she were more overt and explicit in her faith in Jesus Christ if it’s there, and I hope it is, but despite that I can’t help but celebrate the positive content that she brings to televised media.
Jeff Wright: I appreciate Dennis Peacock and the work that he has done in trying to develop and propagate a Biblical worldview that goes beyond simply getting people saved but getting to a point of transformation in life. And there are many, many others.
Ralph Zuranski: How important is it to have trusted friends or a mastermind group to bounce your ideas off?
Jeff Wright: I think that one of the things that stops a lot of people from accomplishing the goals and the dreams and the visions that they have is that they do not have trusted friends or a mastermind group or counselors and advisors to help guide them along the way.
Jeff Wright: There are no one-man shows on this planet. Not really. And I think it is very, very critical to have the wisdom that comes from counselors. Of course, this is a Biblical principle to have counselors, to have others around you who can bring you the perspective, or as my wife would put it, the last 10%.
Jeff Wright: We all need someone who can say, “Hey, you know what? You’ve got something right around your mouth that we need to pluck off.” Or, “There’s another way of looking at this. I know you feel convinced. I know you prayed. I understand that you’ve got a clear vision but here are two or three things that you haven’t thought about that you might want to consider.” And that only comes when you have counselors, when you have people around you who you trust, who can give you the kind of input that you are going to need to accomplish the things that God has set out.
Jeff Wright: These people obviously have to have some clarity about your vision and the track record that can allow you to comfortably take their advice and their wisdom and incorporate it into your program.
Ralph Zuranski: Who do you feel are the real heroes in our society today that are not getting the recognition and the reward they deserve?
Jeff Wright: This is a great question. I believe today because of the way media is managed and concentrated in so few outlets and all of the other negative trends that we talked about earlier in terms of media content, we are missing the stories of many, many real heroes.
Jeff Wright: I know, for example, that the teachers, particularly in the grade schools, have in their midst a number of heroes that we are probably not seeing. While there are some teacher-of-the-year awards and some other things like that, in my own life I can look back and think of several teachers who were tremendously influential in shaping my life to be what it is through their influence. They will go unheralded and unrecognized publicly but they have been tremendous in making a difference.
Jeff Wright: I’m sure that’s true for almost everyone. Almost all of us have had one or two teachers whether we went to private school or public school, or maybe even homeschooled and the teacher was our parent, who became a hero to us because they set out a path and they set themselves firmly in their commitment to bring the best out of each of us.
Jeff Wright: There are also another group of unrecognized heroes who are labeled teachers and those are Sunday school teachers and Bible study teachers, teachers who are outside of our public school or our family setting but who we encounter in the faith community and our churches who have made a difference in our lives.
Jeff Wright: I think that it’s very easy to discount the impact of individuals who, in a learning situation, are able to pour values and visions into our lives.
Ralph Zuranski: Why are heroes so important in the lives of young people?
Jeff Wright: I think heroes are important in the lives of young people because it’s very difficult to achieve something you haven’t seen. If you can’t see it, it’s very hard for you to achieve it. And heroes give vision.
Jeff Wright: The National Visionary Leadership project, which was begun by Dr. Camille Cosby, Bill Cosby’s wife, and Renee Poussaint, the former television newscaster, has put together a program which is designed to bring visions of heroes, bring visions of leaders who made significant accomplishments, primarily in the African American community, into the view of young people.
Jeff Wright: I think it’s important for people to see that they can be great, they can be successful, and that they can achieve things that for them, particularly for African Americans, might not appear to be possible just from the media that they are consuming on a regular basis.
Jeff Wright: If you looked at that web site or learn more about that project, at http://www.VisionaryProject.com, I think you can see the power of heroes in the lives of people.
Ralph Zuranski: What are the things that parents can do that will help their children realize they, too, can be heroes and make a positive impact on the lives of others?
Jeff Wright: I believe that parents today can do a number of very practical things. They can help their children realize their full potential as heroes and as people and as individuals who can be used by God.
Jeff Wright: Number one, limit the amount of television their children watch. I think television needs to be rationed for children. Why? Because it’s just too negative and it’s too hard to keep them on TVLand and the one or two positive channels that are there.
Jeff Wright: I believe more good could be done by simply measuring and monitoring the amount of media consumption, especially television, in our society than perhaps any single act.
Jeff Wright: I think parents should also be very actively involved in all of the information and media content that their children are consuming. It would be unthinkable, some of the lyrics and the music that any child can go into a Target or a Kmart or a music store today and buy and get ideas that are literally poisoning their future. Parents need to be engaged in that.
Jeff Wright: Parents need to make sure that their number one responsibility is to become a faith mentor to their children, to teach them to have a life of faith, a life of understanding, trust, and belief in God’s Word and Biblical worldview and to have a personal relationship with Jesus Christ. That is a critical part.
Jeff Wright: Jesus can be the greatest hero to those who accept Him and He should be. And I think that’s the role of the parents.
Jeff Wright: I also believe that it is very, very important as a parent to be deliberate, consistently deliberate, in bringing positive visions of what can be into the view of children. You do that by doing the ordinary things that aren’t so ordinary any more like taking children to museums and being actively involved with children in the social events of everyday life. You do that by being involved in their school and making sure that you are there as a parent to provide as many positive outcomes and experiences as negative that children will experience in the world today.
Ralph Zuranski: How do people become heroes?
Jeff Wright: It begins with a decision. You make a decision that you are going to go in a different direction or in a positive direction or that you are going to pursue a vision. It all starts with a decision.
Ralph Zuranski: How does it feel to be recognized as a hero?
Jeff Wright: This is a tremendous honor for me. I appreciate the work that you are doing in trying to identify heroes and I’m not sure as I look at the lives of some of the people that have been recognized as Internet heroes that I’m even worthy to be in the group. But I’m certainly honored and I appreciate that.
Jeff Wright: This is a credit really to what God has done in my life in allowing me to accomplish and to even have the mind to do some of the things that I’ve done. So I am humbled and appreciative.
Ralph Zuranski: How will being recognized as a hero change your life?
Jeff Wright: I’m going to be a little bit more careful about what I say and do because somebody may say, “Hey, I saw you on the Internet and there you are speeding down the highway.”
Ralph Zuranski: How are you making the world a better place?
Jeff Wright: I’m blessed to be a part of a ministry and a business that can do things like bring the Guardian Line, some positive characters to the comic universe, to be able to bring teaching resources to many thousands of churches around the country and to give away resources that particularly speak to people of African descent in the context of their culture.
Jeff Wright: I believe as we help to shape cultural and Biblical worldview in the lives of people through the teaching resources and the content resources that we develop at UMI, the world is becoming a better place. Transforming lives so that they can be used by God to His glory is making the world a better place.
Ralph Zuranski: Do you have any good solutions for the problems facing society, especially racism, child abuse and spousal abuse, and violence among young people?
Jeff Wright: Again, I believe that it is really important today, especially as Americans, that we limit our participation and our support of and our consumption of negative media content.
Jeff Wright: I may sound like a broken record on this but I think that is perhaps the single greatest problem that we face today. If we can begin to focus on more positive content and then take positive actions to do the things that we as a nation may be uniquely equipped to do, it can make a difference in the world.
Ralph Zuranski: If you had three wishes for your life and the world that would instantly come true what would they be?
Jeff Wright: I guess my first would be to end injustice and oppression and expose the evil that is so pervasive in our society today. The second thing would be to get us to a place where person to person, man to man, woman to woman, we come to a place where we are judging people by the content of their character and where we all begin to understand that this world, this life that we live, is one that should have an opportunity for everyone and that all people count. And I wish that were an understanding that we had and not the privileged few.
Jeff Wright: I have a third wish, right? Well, I’m not going to wish for world peace. And I can’t wish for more wishes.
(Laughter)
Jeff Wright: I have to say that I do think that there is a unique situation with such a small group of people, 5% of the world’s population here in the U.S., having nearly half of the wealth of this planet. If we could see a way that we could be used to make a difference in the lives of the billions of people who are food insecure, who have no clean water and inadequate housing, this country could take on the vision of using its great wealth to really make a difference in the areas of world hunger, disease, inadequate food and shelter, which is something I believe we could actually do. I would like to see that happen.
Ralph Zuranski: What do you think of the In Search of Heroes program and its impact on youth, parents and business people?
Jeff Wright: The In Search of Heroes program is a tremendous program in part because it is doing a good thing, but mostly because of its accessibility through the Internet, putting a positive message out globally through this resource will change lives. And I believe that positive visions disseminated widely may be perhaps the most important use of the Internet. And your work with this resource will certainly bear much fruit as we hear testimonies of people who perhaps aren’t even alive yet about how their lives have changed because of the content that they encountered in In Search of Heroes.
Ralph Zuranski: Jeff, I really appreciate your time and I thank you for answering the questions. I have to say that it is truly profound, the things that you had to say, and it’s something that every person would benefit from hearing. I just really appreciate what you are doing with Urban Ministries. It’s a great thing to bring positive images into the comic book industry.
I just congratulate you and Michael for what you are doing.
Jeff Wright: Thank you so much. Thank you for selecting us and for the opportunity to share. We really, really appreciate it.
Ralph Zuranski: Thanks again and God bless you and have a great day.
Jeff Wright: Thank you.