Jon-Michael Schweigert’s life changed over 20 years ago when his father’s girlfriend began taking him and his family to church.

  Prior to this, Schweigert had not been exposed to church at all and was beginning to lose faith in those around him.

  “I was not a Christian until I was a teenager and became very disappointed with everybody. My

family life sucked, my parents were not great and therefore, I had learned to depend on myself

and that everyone else would let me down.” 

  Schweigert said that when his dad started dating again, his new girlfriend would make sure that they were in church on Sunday. 

  “From there I discovered the overwhelming love of God and Christ Jesus and that completely changed everything for me, and so now I do this so that I can help others,” Schweigert said.

  Schweigert is a Lutheran Church Missouri Synod pastor at Faith Lutheran Church in Knob Noster, Mo., as well as the pastor at the Lutheran Student Center of the University of Central Missouri. This sense of self-dependence, though, has not only been felt by Schweigert.

  “I was alone in a dorm room,” Matthew Rudowske said. “The closest person I had was a suitemate. We didn’t really talk so it was very, very lonely… and the LSC provided an escape, somewhere that I could go and be a part of a group.” 

  Rudowske, a UCM senior, has been a member of the Lutheran Student Center for three and a half years, and has even held some leadership roles during his time there. 

  As the pastor of the Lutheran Student Center, Schweigert has played a role in the life of Rudowske.

  “I really struggled with anger issues and he was able to [help] because he’s a cognitive

behavioral therapist. [He was] able to help me develop skills to combat my anger, and to redirect

it into more positive emotions so that I can live my life fuller without getting angry at the people

I love. It makes it pretty easy to exist,” Rudowske said. 

  Along with helping Rudowske, Schweigert has played a role in students’ lives who have only been on campus for a couple of weeks.

  “He’s just helped me realize that I can [grow],” Kaleb Virus said. “Since we’re adults now, we can make our own decisions, and whether they be good or bad decisions, they are our decisions and we do need to take full responsibility for them.” 

  Virus, a UCM freshman, is in his first year at the Lutheran Student Center. 

  Even though he is a freshman, Virus said he has already experienced enough to share with others about Schweigert’s help and the Lutheran Student Center’s resources.

  “I’ve told several people it’s a great place to be. It’s just a great community and I look forward to going there every week if I can,” Virus said. 

   “His teachings are profoundly unique in that they touch on subjects that I’ve never heard,” Rudowske said. 

  Along with the uniqueness, students have pointed out other traits that Schweigert shows. Virus noted that Schweigert is chill, forgiving, and nice to be around. This sense of personability leads to more opportunities for students to grow.

  “He’s really someone who can see, read the Bible, understand it, and tell others about it,” Rudowske said. 

  Watching students put faith into practice isn’t a new thing for Schweigert, but he said it feels special every time he sees it.

    “[My] favorite thing about being a pastor here specifically is watching you all grow in faith,

and then go put the faith into practice in your own lives,” Schweigert said. “I’m at the point now eight years in where my first crop of students have graduated and have been graduated now, and so I get to see what they’re doing with their life and it’s pretty cool.”