Kemp family discusses faith, leadership at 39th Cobb Prayer Breakfast

May 4—CUMBERLAND — At the 39th Cobb Prayer Breakfast, family was the focus as Gov. Brian Kemp, his wife, first lady Marty Kemp, and their three daughters discussed faith and leadership.

The event coincides with the congressionally-designated National Day of Prayer, held on the first Thursday in May each year.

Much of the Kemp family's discussion before hundreds gathered at the Cobb Galleria Centre touched on the power of prayer to get them through challenges, both from before Kemp's ascendancy to the governorship and during his time leading the state.

The structure of the talk itself fit the family theme of the breakfast: The governor and his wife were interviewed by their daughters Jarrett, Lucy and Amy Porter.

"I can assure you, I would've never agreed to doing this before I got reelected," he said to plenty of laughs.

Praying as a family

The Kemp family discussion began with Brian Kemp answering Jarrett's question about maintaining strength in difficult times through prayer.

He noted his prayers now look a lot different than they did 10 or 15 years ago, when he and Marty were small business owners unsure of how they would fare coming out of the Great Recession.

Nonetheless, prayer is a constant in their lives that helped them get through hard times, he said. It was how he and his wife were raised, and it's how they've sought to raise their children.

Kemp said he believes God has a plan for everyone, and he and his family were reminded of that as they decided together whether he would run for governor.

Looking back, the governor acknowledged that faith was maintained through a tumultuous first term as governor.

"During the pandemic and civil unrest and the 2020 election, I wasn't sure what that plan was, but I knew he had one for me, and I was just trying to be a faithful servant in that regard," he said.

It's belief in a higher power, he added, that has made difficult decisions easier to make, especially decisions that may not prove popular politically.

Marty Kemp said people on the campaign would tell the family they were praying for them, and she would pray "before my feet hit the ground" — for her husband, her daughters and the strength to do what's right both in the spotlight and away from the noise and attention.

Lucy Kemp said she would lead the family in prayer before big events on the campaign trail like debates, and she asked her parents how they thought those prayers impacted her father's performances.

"For me, that just gives me a lot of peace, again, just to try to stay calm in the moment, even those moments, sometimes, it's hard to stay very calm," Brian Kemp said.

He reflected on the day of his first inauguration in 2019, noting an hour-long service at St. Philip's Cathedral was the highlight of the day, a calming moment as the gravity of his new position set in.

"Just like Lucy's prayers, it to me made that whole day so calm and comforting," Brian Kemp said, even as the nervousness was palpable after a contentious election that drew the attention of the entire country.

Amy Porter Kemp asked her parents about their specific prayers, and her father delivered another crowd-pleaser before getting serious once again.

"I said a prayer of thanks this morning that we left the mansion on time at 6:45," Brian Kemp said, "with three daughters and a wife."

(He snuck in that it was Marty Kemp's birthday, and the crowd sang her "Happy Birthday" following the family's chat.)

Brian Kemp prays for wisdom and his family. He also prays for the president, vice president, the cabinet, his fellow governors and all other elected officials.

COVID-19 also changed his approach to prayer in significant ways.

"The number of people that I pray for now is a lot bigger than it used to be because, mainly, of the pandemic," he said.

From healthcare workers and law enforcement officers to other first responders and members of the Georgia National Guard, Brian Kemp's list of people to pray for grew with the spread of the virus and civil unrest, he noted.

"I am constantly praying for people that serve us, I have a greater appreciation of that now," he said.

Praying after tragedy

Before he and his family spoke, the governor made an unscheduled appearance on stage at the start of the program to acknowledge Wednesday's mass shooting in Midtown Atlanta that left one person dead and four more in critical condition.

Kemp offered prayers for the family of the woman who lost her life, as well as prayers for the four people injured in the shooting and the alleged shooter.

"We should pray for him and his family as well," Kemp said. "We continue to pray for our great men and women in law enforcement. Yesterday, as tragic as it was, could have been a lot worse, and it wasn't, thanks to our first responders."

During the talk with his wife and daughters, Kemp said the shooting was affirmation of the need to continue praying for law enforcement and first responders.

He also offered praise to the Cobb County Police Department and its chief, Stuart VanHoozer, for their response to the shooting.

"There will be a lot said, and I'm sure a lot of positioning after what happened yesterday, but one thing the citizens of our state can note, is the local, state response yesterday has never been better," Kemp said before asking the crowd to pray for law enforcement and first responders.

Lisa Cupid, chair of the Cobb Board of Commissioners, gave the closing benediction during the service, though it was less of a blessing than a speech focused on the shooting and its ramifications.

"We've got to, I think, ask ourselves, what can we be doing to ensure that there are no more victims of senseless violence," Cupid said.

It started with a prayer

Looking back on the first Cobb Prayer Breakfast in 1985, David McGinnis, one of its founding members, gave credit to late Cobb Commissioner Bill Askea and retired banker Joe Daniell for coming up with the idea for the event.

It was out of their experiences with the Cobb Chamber of Commerce Breakfast the men hatched the plan, McGinnis said, and they brought him, other business leaders and faith leaders on board to make it happen.

But first, the men prayed.

"We prayed and asked God for direction, and we had our first prayer breakfast," McGinnis said. "39 years later, God has blessed us with a tremendous opportunity, and the thing that excites me more than anything is to see the rank-and-file, the people in the community, the leaders of the community, here celebrating a breakfast for worship and prayer.

"And that gives me hope, and with hope, you can move forward," he added.

Daniell said the first breakfast in 1985 attracted about 500 people to the Cobb Civic Center, where former Gov. Roy Barnes, then an aide to Gov. Joe Frank Harris, introduced his boss as the speaker.

Since then, an array of leaders in Georgia politics, religion and sports have spoken at the event. Last year's speaker was former UGA football coach Mark Richt, though he was not the first coach of the Bulldogs to speak at a Cobb Prayer Breakfast — that honor goes to Ray Goff, who spoke at the 1989 event and who was in attendance Thursday morning.

Truett Cathy, the founder of Chick-fil-A, spoke at the 1987 breakfast, former U.N. Ambassador Andrew Young spoke at the 2015 breakfast and Margaret Thatcher, who was prime minister of the United Kingdom from 1979-1990, was the featured speaker at the 1999 breakfast.

Daniell recalled how Thatcher said at the start of her speech she had just met Barnes, who was governor of Georgia at the time and wasn't able to stay for the whole breakfast but had stopped in just to meet her.

"The first thing she did when she came out and talked to about 1,700 people ... she said, 'I just met your governor and we have something in common,'" Daniell said. "And I thought, what in the world do you have in common with Roy Barnes? And she said, 'Our fathers were grocers, and you learn a lot in the grocery store.'"

For Daniell, the breakfast is about bringing people of faith together, no matter where they fall on the political spectrum.

The Rev. Dr. Nelson Price, another founding member of the breakfast and a longtime MDJ columnist, expressed appreciation to the Kemp family for expressing their faith at the event. He added the breakfast was a great cause to bring the community together.

"It's a cohesive influence in the county, and to see the representative leadership of the county in attendance is encouraging," Price said.

Embracing community

There was a table of first-time attendees of the Cobb Prayer Breakfast on Thursday who were moved throughout the morning to stand and raise their hands in praise.

Members of Linked UP Church in Powder Springs were dancing, singing and swaying as the band Freedom Worship played songs like "Firm Foundation" and "The Blessing."

"This is our first time at this event, but I think it's wonderful for like-minded believers in all facets and religious, political and business environments to come together because we have the same principle," said Kimberley Savage, a staff minister at Linked UP Church. "That is, in whatever we do, that we will bring God glory and be a benefit to his kingdom and his community."

Being at the breakfast was important for seeing God at work, inspiring people to embrace their connection to prayer.

"Praise and worship and acknowledging who God is in our lives and in the room reminds us that we don't have to be ashamed of the Gospel of Christ, and that we have more that joins us or unites us than that separates us when we keep God at the center," Savage said.