great he was. Money had no impact on him.” From
my conversations with
him, I think exactly the
opposite is true. I think he recognized that money
could get him.
I think he thought, “You know what, this is something
that can take my heart away from God. I need
to put these boundaries on myself to protect my
soul.” For me, that’s even better than, “It doesn’t
even impact me.” So it’s things like that and his
humility I think playing in jeans and a white v-neck
t-shirt kind of became
his uniform, but it also
kind of became, “You know what, this is just who I
am,” which is a lot of how we were raised.
One of the things I think my parents did really well
was teach us, “You are who you are. Be that. Don’t
put on airs. Don’t say, ‘Who do you want me to be?
I’ll be that.’” They very much raised us to know
who we are and do whatever we have to do to
get ourselves to where we’re alright with that. I
think that’s what you see a lot in that piece of
Rich. We grew up very blue collar and this is who
we are.
Faith Filled Family: Do you happen to know what
that “average” salary was that Rich lived on?
David Mullins: You know what, I don’t know what
it was. I think that happened – I’m guessing in the
late ‘80’s or early ‘90’s. I don’t really have any idea
what that ended up being. But I do know this,
when he was killed, he had built a Hogan which is
a traditional Navajo home on the reservation. It’s
an eight-sided one room house and his business
manager went down to get all of his stuff. He had
the smallest U-Haul
truck you could get
and everything fit in it, even the hard top to the
jeep, and there was still a lot of extra room. All of
the things that he did life with fit into that.
things that God
took him through in life. I’ve
said a number of times in interviews that Paul said
in Phillppians 1:6 “Being confident in this very
thing, that he which hath begun a good work in
you will perform it until the day of Jesus Christ.”
(KJV). For me Rich’s life and my dad’s life was
kind of a picture of that and I’m glad I got to see
that.
Faith Filled Family: There’s a scene in the movie
where Rich is standing near the fence talking to
your mother and he tells her he, “doesn’t belong
anywhere.” What was Rich’s departure from the
family like when he left the home for college?
Were there parting words or tears?
David Mullins: I’m not really sure. I think there
may have been a little bit of both. We lived about
an hour and a half away from the Bible college and
from what I’ve heard from his friends and people
who were close to him, he always sort of acted
and felt like he was an outsider, and didn’t belong.
We grew up in Indiana and basketball is nearly
everything in sports, especially for kids growing
up. He was awful in sports. He was this little wiry
guy that played piano, and he never quite fit. I
think part of that was that in his own eyes he didn’t
fit. So I think he always felt like he didn’t quite fit
anywhere.
Faith Filled Family: Who ended up being groomed
to take over the farm in Rich’s place since Rich
was the eldest and not very good at it?
David Mullins: Actually nobody did. My dad
hoped that my brother Lloyd and I would, and
Lloyd went into the Air Force and made a career
out of the Air Force, and I went into the ministry.
At the time I was growing up we had a tree farm.
Dad had transitioned it from a traditional farm to
Faith Filled Family: Rich never married or had a tree farm. When he died we had some people
children. Did you and your siblings have children? that helped for a little while just taking care of the
David Mullins: Yeah. All of the other four of us stock that we had. My brother Lloyd now owns that
were married and have kids. Mom and Dad had
part of the farm. He rents out the land, but nobody
11 grandkids.
really took it over a little bit to my dad’s sadness.
Faith Filled Family: Was your father’s behavior
different towards his grandchildren?
David Mullins: Yeah. He could still get mad, but
with the grandkids, he was much gentler. One of
the cool things for me being younger and one of
the things we weren’t able to show in the movie
was a lot of the growth and the transitions and
Faith Filled Family: In viewing photos of Rich I
was struck by how much he looks like he could be
of Native American descent. I was really amazed
at that. What is the family ancestry?
David Mullins: We’re mutts. Mullins is an Irish
name, my two brothers and I claim Ireland as our
heritage, but I think we’ve got most of the European