I was so on fire for the Lord, and I just could not get enough of it. I would sit in church and listen to the sermons that these ministers were preaching and wanting more and more and more, and crying because I felt so guilty for being 21-years-old, and I felt like I’d wasted so many years of my life. But those pastors really just helped me become a Christian and to get saved.
CL: Should the church be an important part of people’s lives today?
Ainsley: Trey Gowdy, who’s one of our anchors at Fox, interviewed me about the dying church—why are fewer Millennials going to church? In preparation, I started going on YouTube and listening to all these young pastors talk about why that is and they said we they interviewed these young kids who had left the church, and they said it’s because church isn’t relatable. Leaders in the church all act perfect, and they never share their their downfalls, or when they backslide, they never share their stories.
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The church that I go to in South Carolina is called Seacoast. And what I love about the church is that when the pastors preach, they talk about hope and the love of Jesus, but they also tell stories about how they have been weak in the past. Because no one is perfect. That’s why we need Jesus. That’s why we go to church. And so the messages are just messages that I take with me on a daily basis and helps remind me to forgive myself when I do something wrong or when I feel guilty about not spending as much time in the Word or in prayer. I go to these church services and I see people who are real, and I think that why some of these churches are growing by leaps and bounds. Because they’re current, but they also address the tough issues by digging into the Word to find out what God says about certain situations.
CL: Do you have any advice for parents raising their kids in such a divided environment?
Ainsley: I’m in New York City, and it’s a tough city to raise children, because children grow up a little bit faster. There are a lot of distractions here, and it can be scary. But I know that God told me in my heart and put me in a job in New York City, where I can talk about him on the air, because I work at a network that allows me to do that at Fox News. My daughter and I love it living in this great city where she attends a Christian school.
I feel like we’re almost on the mission field here in New York City, because New York needs God. So I look at it as such a privilege that yes, it’s not going to be as easy as it would be if I raised her in South Carolina where I grew up, because she’s going to be pulled in different directions and we’re going to have to raise her in a godly home with a lot of prayer, and a lot of conversations about the Lord that include memorizing Scripture and telling her it’s okay to be different than than everybody else and not to give in to peer pressure and those kinds of things—which we’ll deal with that as she gets a little bit older.
I see it as the mission field and I hope no matter where you are in your life that you look at your life as a mission field and that you know that God has planted you there for a reason. In my Bible study, we talked about that if it weren’t for Christians in our communities, then our communities would be dead spiritually and they would be completely secular. So in New York, we pray circles literally around our schools. We’ll walk for sidewalks around our schools. We will pray for our children and and for each other. Part of the reason I love New York so much is because of the Bible study I’m in and the women that I get to connect with.
It’s easy to get caught up in the divisions of the world and, yes, it is hard and those divisions make me sad. Do I wake up sometimes and think, “I’m going to work and I’m talking about the news every day?” And even though I love my job, it is stressful? It is hard? Because, I know deep down all of the people we’re talking about are probably good people and are probably good parents, and although we might disagree politically it doesn’t change my love for them. It doesn’t change my prayers for them. The Bible talks about praying for our leaders. And even if it’s someone I might not have voted for, I will still pray for them and respect them. I might not like their opinions and their teachings, but they’re still God’s child.
