The Power of Godly People | Luke Smallbone Interview

Greg, Lori, and Harvest Ministries would like to send you the movie Unsung Hero, the back story of the music group for King and Country. It's a story of a mom and a dad and their seven kids putting their faith into action. You're going to be deeply moved by this story of the amazing small-bone family that have gone on to impact so many through their music, and we are offering this film to you for your gift of any size. Get the DVD and digital download of Unsung Hero at harvest.org. Well it's our privilege to talk with Luke Smallbone today. He is one half of For King and Country, and he's also part of the family that's discussed in a brand new movie that we're excited about. Maybe you've already seen it.

It's called Unsung Hero. And Luke, it's such a privilege to have you here. The first thing I wanted to ask you is describe what it's like to see your family's story lighting up the big screen.

What's that experience like? Well, first of all, thanks for taking the time to chat with me. I joked with Greg off air that it's very difficult to acquire new old friends, and you guys have become old friends to us, so it's always a joy to catch up and chat.

You know, look, here's the deal. I called a producer friend of mine in 2020 in LA, and he had been saying for years, hey, you got any film projects? You got any film projects? And I had this hunch one day where I walked out of the studio actually, and I called this producer friend, Steve, and just said, hey man, I got this idea about a film. My parents' story coming from Australia to America, I've told from stages for many, many years, and people have said that we should write a book.

And I said, Steve, the truth is I was homeschooled, so I don't read or write very well. And so I would love to make a movie instead. And you know, when you're talking about, you know, you guys are based out in California, so you know a little bit more about this, but when you go pitch a project to film producers, usually it's like, yeah, maybe, hey, let's catch up in a little while or, you know, whatever.

He basically just on the phone goes, sounds good. Let's do it. And I was like, huh? And so that was the beginning of this process. And look, I never thought that, you know, I mean, obviously my fantasy is more about my parents than it is about, you know, my brother and I, or even our siblings at some level. And I never thought that I could live a life that was interesting enough to ever be a movie. But when I've reflected back on our story, I've just seen the trail of God's faithfulness. And I think when you see the trail of God's faithfulness and things, those are stories worthy to be told. And it's a very human story and it's a very touching story.

I remember when I first thought I was really moved by it. And it's a story of the Smallbone family living in Australia. The dad, David Smallbone, is a concert promoter. And basically he has the rug pulled out from under him and he thinks that he has a job opportunity in America, specifically in Tennessee. And he arrives and that opportunity isn't really there at all. So it's a story of a mom and a dad and their seven kids with little to no money or resources, putting their faith into action and trusting God. You're going to be deeply moved by this story, but you're especially going to be moved by the unsung hero. That's a title of the film. And the unsung hero of this film is actually not David Smallbone as wonderful of a guy as he is.

It's not even one of the kids. They all really apply themselves and do so much, but it's really Helen Smallbone, the mother. Talk to us a little bit about your mom and why the real thrust of this movie is on the faithfulness and the consistency of a woman of God. Yeah, I think that if I was to reflect back on the people that have shaped me the most in life, obviously later on since I've been married, it's been my wife, but before that it was my mom. And I think that there's a lot of mothers out there that do extraordinary things that are invisible.

And I think at times they think that the invisible things don't matter. And I would just say that my mom, she did the invisible things incredibly well. Man, when I needed discipline, she disciplined me. When I needed love, she loved me. When I needed compassion, she was compassionate. And those are the things that matter in life.

Literally it's all the things that people see and don't give as much clout to those things as you naturally want to. Check out what they're doing when nobody else is looking. And my mom just did that extremely well. She was... I said this to someone the other day about my mom. They were asking about, well, what was she like?

And I said, no, it's funny. My mom is still a sinful person. She wasn't a perfect mother, but in the big moments where I needed a mother, I don't remember her ever missing.

I don't remember her ever striking out. She was the right amount of strength when I needed strength and the right amount of empathy when I needed empathy. It was an extraordinary thing. And that's probably the reason why I wanted to tell a story is because I think that mothers change the world. Mother Teresa says, if you want to change the world, go home and love your family. And I think my mom loved the family really well. Wow. We have a lot of moms that listen to A New Beginning and let this be a word of encouragement to you from Luke Smallbone.

His mother, Helen, did the invisible things well. Luke, let me ask you, your family, as people will see in the movie, your family went from a very comfortable life in Australia to poverty almost overnight, but poverty in a new, unfamiliar country very far away from home on the other side of the planet. Speak to the value of tough times. Yeah, it's funny. I look at my own life, in some cases, as my brother and I are in a band called Fikine Country.

We've been doing it for about 12 years. And in some cases, the moment that I started music, my life got really complex. I got really, really sick really early on. We nearly lost our son. At one point, my wife and I had walked through some of our own journey of just trying to navigate what it means to raise four kids in this crazy world that we're living in. There's been immense struggle. And it's funny, I've had a lot of people come up to me and just say, Mary Luke, you've gone through a thing or two. What do you have to say to people that when you're walking through these difficult things, what's the perspective? And I've gotten to experience the goodness of God when I'm at my low. And so in some cases, struggle produces something miraculous in people's lives. Obviously, we know scripturally it says that it produces character, perseverance, it ultimately ends with hope.

Well, then why would I ever not want to experience the character and the perseverance that comes with struggle and then ultimately leads to hope? I find that ironic that in the Western world that we have this thing called insurance. I'm not saying that we should not have insurance, but insurance is basically saying if something catastrophic happens, it's not going to be that bad.

That's basically the purpose of insurance. But it's the struggle that has changed my life. And in some cases, I've even argued that when God is loving me, at times he's probably allowing me to struggle. And so for us, it's difficult for me to ever go back and look at what we walked through as a family and not say it was God's great gift that we were left with nothing because it shaped me. It impacted my life. I have a perspective.

I have a faith journey because I got to see faith in action. And I think that that's the gift that struggle produces. Do you ever feel like everyone now knows all your family secrets?

Failure as well as successes, times when you weren't the Luke Smallbone of the popular band for King and Country. Is that a weird experience? Maybe it's because it's been, roughly 30 years ago is when most of this film was, the story it's telling was about 30 years ago. And maybe because I've told the story for so long that it doesn't feel like it's anything that the people don't know.

But I will say this. I think that there's been a temptation for particularly the Western world for people to have extraordinary stories that they just put a blanket over it. And I remember my mom and dad kind of talking a little bit about this story and I remember them kind of, my dad was the one who really, it's probably the most, I don't want to say humiliating, but it's not an easy story for my dad. And yet he kind of came to the conclusion and was like, man, if someone can be built up by my story, wouldn't it be the opposite of following Jesus to actually close it up, lock it up in a closet, just never tell it. And I think that what you realize is music, I've often said, it's a poet's job to articulate what another cannot. And I think that's what art does for a lot of people. It's articulating what people don't really know. But if you don't tell the story, the people aren't built up or encouraged.

I think that's what community is. You think about, you read in the early church and they would read in these tiny little house churches and there's probably 10, 15, 20, 30 people in them. Do you think that they had great theology at the time? No, they probably just told the stories of what God was doing in their life. And they got to see miracles. They got to see unbelievable faithfulness of who God was. I think that's what we should be doing as Christians. We just tell the stories that happened in our life and people are built up by them. I think that's the extraordinary thing that takes place in the local community that we're given to. You know, Luke, I've heard it said success builds walls, but failure builds bridges. And the idea of that is, you know, if you have a great success story, you've never had adversity, you've never had setbacks, you've never had a single doubt. First of all, that's not true. But just for the sake of a point, let's say that's what you say to people.

No one can connect to that. That builds a wall. But when you talk about failure, you talk about struggle, you talk about lapses of faith, all that builds a bridge because we can all relate to that. I was really impressed by the fact that your father, David, was willing to tell his story honestly, and to expose that weakness that you talked about. And yet at the same time, we saw the faith of your mother shine and grow stronger.

And they were great for each other. And I'm sure there's been moments when Helen said her doubts and David has been the hero of the story. We all have those moments, but it's a powerful story and it's called Unsung Hero. And you're going to be deeply moved by this story, by this film. You're going to laugh out loud, you're going to shed a tear or two, you're going to connect to it, you're going to relate to it, and you're going to love it. And this is truly a family-friendly film.

You know, sometimes we use that phrase to describe a film that is what we might call clean, no profanity or violence. That's not why I'm saying this is family-friendly. I'm saying this is family-friendly because it tells a story of a real family with real struggles and how God came through for them. Right? So I'm sure your family is facing struggles.

I'm sure you're having hardships. And you're going to be inspired by this film, Unsung Hero. And we will send it to you as a DVD or as a digital download for your gift of any size.

And whatever you send, we'll take those resources and use them to help us continue to teach God's Word as we do here on A New Beginning and also proclaim the gospel. I just watched the movie again last night for the second time, and I cried in all the same spots, by the way. I got to ask you, Luke, what was the most emotional scene in the movie for you?

Yeah. Yeah, so there's a scene about two-thirds of the way through the film where my mom takes us all to a park. And she plays all the kids, and then she gives this speech. And the reason why I would tell you about this scene is because I remember reading this scene in the script. And obviously we have a song called Burn the Ships.

And my mom has this charge, like, we've got to go burn the ships. And I remember reading the script and going, this is cliché. This is cheesy.

This is not going to work. But I thought, you know what, though? We've got obviously tons of scenes in here. Most people know this, but you overshoot 30, 40 pages of script. And I was like, you know what, let's film it.

And if it doesn't work, we'll just cut it. So I'm sitting there for the first time watching it all the way through. And I get to that scene. And my eyes are sweating. You know what I'm saying?

I mean, I'm super emotional. And I got to the end of the movie and I said, that is my favorite scene in the movie. Isn't that something? And so who would have, it literally was the first thought I had watching it.

Oh, we'll just cut it if need be. And it ended up becoming my favorite scene in the movie. Wow. So what scene moved you the most? You know, it's a funny thing. Having been a part of a film about my life, my wife's life and the Jesus movement called Jesus Revolution, I've been through the same experience. And things that moved me in the film and still move me are sometimes experiences that I had exactly. And sometimes it's somebody else capturing your experience in it and interpreting it. It's funny, when I was working on Jesus Revolution, I said to the director, John Irwin, I think I like your version of my life better than my version.

Because, you know, he had an objectivity and he could see things. And I think in the same way, when I was watching Unsung Hero, obviously, I didn't live this, but I'm watching the story of this family. And it's such a human story. It's such a real story. And one of the parts I really liked was at the end, when they showed the real people and you see the real story. And that's very moving to me because when it is a biography, I always want to know, A, how accurate is it to the real story? And B, what are these people doing now?

Like what happened after that? And so I think that when you get a copy of Unsung Hero, you're going to be very moved because you might relate to it. It might be your story. Maybe you're a family that's struggling right now. You're trying to make ends meet. You don't have enough money to get groceries to feed your children.

Or maybe you don't know where your next paycheck is coming from. You're going to see how God came through for the Small Bone family. And you'll be reminded of how God can come through for you as well.

Get your copy immediately. Now, I can imagine if I'd gone to my mom and dad and said, Dad, Mom, I'm going to make a movie about your life. They would have said, Oh no, you're not. What was your mom and dad's reaction to saying, yeah, we're going to put you in a movie, Mom, Dad?

Yeah. Well, I think we've been saying to Mom particularly, Hey Mom, you should write a book for a long time. And she actually did that.

It's a book called Behind the Lights. And it's from her perspective of what we walked through. And I think it was in that process that she actually got to see the value of telling the story. And so when it did come to, Hey Mom, Mom, Dad, we're thinking of doing this, that I don't think that there was really any pushback at all. We actually said, this is a funny story. We sent them the script about six weeks before we're going to start filming. And so we can make alterations if there was some things that they saw. And so both mom and dad said, Hey, here's a couple of thoughts, but for the most part, it was like, Hey, this is great.

Go shoot it. And so we had thought, obviously both mom and dad fully on board, all those types of things. And we get to probably about three months ago, we're marketing the film and we go to dad and we go, Hey, so when you read the script versus what you saw on screen here, how similar was it? And he goes, I never read the script. And I'm like, what? You never read the script?

I mean, this is your story. And he just said, and it was very wise. He said, boys, I think if I read it, it's so personal.

It's it's so, um, close that I don't think I could be objective. And I just realized that I was going to let mom read it. So you could have her perspective and I just, I was never going to read it. So literally we only found out that dad never read the script three or three months ago, if you could believe it. Oh my goodness.

That is funny. You know, I think that family is more potent and powerful today than it ever has been in the history of the world, but we don't value it as such. And so my hope was just to tell a story that infused the power of family because here's the one thing I love about family. Everyone's got one. You come from family and look, it might be credibly dysfunctional. It might be, you might have estrangement, you might not know your mother or your father, but we all come from a family.

And I think for a lot of people, especially people my age, we're trying to figure out how do we do it well. And so one of the things that I was so hopeful for was this film is to actually tell, you know, I recently went to St. Augustine in Florida and there's this old fort down there and it's built with this material. It's basically only found in that area and it's this kind of shell, it's this mortar, it's kind of soft, but it's one of the only forts in America that was never defeated. And what they realized was when the cannons would hit this material, it could absorb the impact and it wouldn't break, it wouldn't crumble. My belief is that we need to have families that are fortified. And what I think that happens in families is if you want to have a fortified family, you actually have to be able to teach and practice forgiveness because the truth is you're going to annoy each other, you're going to fail one another, you're going to get really, really frustrated and they're going to let you down. But if we practice forgiveness in our family, that becomes that 30, 40, 50 years down the way and you will still be intact. But if you do not learn the power of becoming a fortified family, which is really the walls are forgiveness, that's where your family starts to break away. And my hope was that this film was telling the story of a family that is by far not perfect.

You go watch the film, you'll realize that. But we love each other. We care for each other. And you know what we do?

We do our best to forgive one another. Wow. Great word from Luke Smallbone about family, a fortified family. I remember a key line in the film from your grandfather. Yeah.

Where he was speaking to your father on the phone and saying, your family is not in the way. Your family is the way. Yeah.

And that's kind of the message you're delivering. It's family is what it's all about. Oh, man. Yeah.

I mean, look, this may be right, wrong or indifferent. My dad is kind of the third silent member of Key & Country. My oldest brother, Daniel, is our lighting director. My brother, Ben, has worked with us on most of the film projects that we've ever done. My little brother, Josh, kind of manages us.

Our little sister came up with the crest that is for Key & Country. We toured with our older sister, Rebecca St. James, growing up. That's just a snapshot of my life, right? That's how much family has impacted me, that I actually choose and prefer to do business with them, to be in their presence. I get the privilege of loving that day in and day out.

And look, that doesn't mean it doesn't have those complications. We still got to do Thanksgiving and Christmas together, so we've got to figure out ways to resolve our conflict. But what a great gift, in some cases, to work with people that you love, our family, that you're forced to resolve the conflict. That's one of the things I love about working with the ones. That's how much they mean to me.

Let me ask you to get very personal with somebody listening. Maybe there's a lack of money or maybe there are health problems, but they're behind the eight ball on every level. They just don't know how they can make it another day. What will they learn from this movie? How can you encourage them that this isn't evidence that God has forgotten about them, that this is evidence that God is about to work in their lives? Complete that story for them.

Yeah. Look, I heard it said some day, a little while back, that it's very difficult to see a miracle if you don't need one. And I think that when we're going through struggles, a man that's really impacted me and passed away not that long ago, his name was Tim Keller. Someone asked him in an interview and they said, hey, your health isn't well. I'm guessing you want to get well, right? And he paused and he goes, but my prayer life is so good right now. Maybe I don't know if I want to give that up.

My point is this. When you're going through really hard times, your faith in God becomes real in really, really tangible, really, really brilliant ways. And when things are going well, there's places for God to show up and do extraordinary things. And if you're a parent out there and you're going through these hard things, I think there's sometimes a lot of guilt for us as parents when things aren't, maybe you can't give your child that extra little thing this summer that they're hoping for or for their birthday or for Christmas.

And there's a lot of shame that is attached to that. Well, there's no reason why you can't go to God and ask for those things and pray for those things. Because if you actually really want your kids to follow Jesus, they need to see evidence that he is real in your life as the parent. And sometimes, look, my mom in the film, Christmas was always really important and she was telling us that she was going to have to go to the dollar, Santa was going to have to go to the dollar store this year for many, many years ago, obviously, for Christmas.

And unbeknownst to her, a church got involved and a school got involved and gave us the most lavish Christmas still to this day that I had ever experienced. You never know the way that God can show up. And some of the prayers that we pray that we think that God doesn't care about that fact.

Let me tell you something. He does. My son said yesterday, he was praying for his friends to come over. And he kept asking me, are the trends coming over? And I said, no, I haven't heard from him.

I haven't heard from him. And eventually they said, oh, they're coming. And he said this, he said, isn't it amazing? I prayed for this dad. And he said, God provides us just what we need at just the right time.

He's six years old. It's crazy. Luke, what has been the most rewarding part of producing this film for you personally? I'll never forget one of the first people that we played this movie to is a guy that we've known for many, many years works in the film industry. And we had a rough cut of the film and Greg would know about this, but when you get a rough cut of the film, it's a very scary process because you've kind of got, you kind of know a little bit what you got and you also want to be very careful who you show it to because those are not finished. And so there's this weird quagmire that you get stuck in and you got to find the right people to show it to. Anyway, this friend of ours came to us and said, I really want to see this movie.

And we're like, well, it's not quite ready yet. And he works in the film industry. So we don't want him starting to spread bad words about our film or whatever. He goes, I really want, I really want to see this movie. Well, anyway, this friend of ours, I wouldn't say is the happiest individual.

I would venture to say that he's a little crusty. And so it was a little bit of a risk to play it to him. But anyway, we kind of relented and we're like, Hey, we'll show you the movie. So we get in the theater and he sits through the movie. And what do you do when any movie, if you try to ever go see the theater, what do you say to the people when you're walking out, you look to the people you went to the movie with and you say, what did you think? It doesn't matter what movie it is. That's the discussion with people walking out of the theater. And so the film finishes and I looked over at this friend of mine and I said, what did you think? And he wiped a tear from his eye and he said, I want to be a better dad.

And I think that that story, you know, we, we, we get a lot of emails and different things, but that story has been reiterated hundreds and hundreds, maybe thousands of times. And maybe it's cause I'm a dad, man. I believe that the power of being a good dad, we have lost the art of being good fathers and it takes attention. It takes diligence. It takes strength. And I think that was one of the most satisfying parts of this whole film is people just leave and saying, I want to be a better dad and they're going home and they're going to start putting things into place to be a better father.

Wow. So if you want to be a better dad, a better mom, you want to watch unsung hero. It's an honest, heartfelt, true story of the small bone family, their struggles, their victories, their defeats. It's all there in the screen, but overall you're going to be inspired and we want to send you this new film unsung hero on DVD or digital download for your gift of any size and whatever you send will help us continue to teach the word of God and proclaim the gospel. Strengthen your family. Order a copy of unsung hero.

Yeah, yeah, that's right. We have a DVD waiting for you. So get in touch by calling 1-800-821-3300. We'll send the movie to thank you for your partnership with us. Again, dial 1-800-821-3300 or write A New Beginning, Box 4000, Riverside, CA 92514 or go online to harvest.org.