Pastor Bobby Lewis has been immersed in music since he was a boy. But one day he heard something that changed the course of his career and his life.

“I was on tour with Immature. And we were in the Houston Astrodome or Superdome — one of those domes down there," Lewis recalled. "We were playing with Parliament-Funkadelic, New Edition and Brandy. We were doing soundcheck. And, clear as day, I could hear God telling me that this wasn’t it.”

Lewis is the son of famous jazz pianist Ramsey Lewis, who instructed him on faith and music. Ramsey Lewis died Sept. 12 at 87.

Bobby Lewis is currently combining music with his ministry at the Joy Life Center in Chicago, in large part because of that voice he heard more than a quarter-century ago.

“When I was 15 years old. I declared I just wanted to tour and be a touring drummer. I wanted to play drums professionally,” Lewis recalled for Southland Marquee. “Fast-forward exactly 10 years later at 25 years old. I'm a professional drummer, making great money and I'm not satisfied. 

"Fast forward another 20 years when I'm sitting with my dad and I realize that this chase that I had made for what I thought I wanted, I hadn’t really paid enough attention to what God was creating for me to be,” he added.

He had worked as a professional musician, playing drums and singing, and also sold ads for Clear Channel Communications, sold shoes for Marshall Field’s, started his own company, Urban Access Media Group, and worked for Rev. Jesse Jackson.

But Lewis, 52, knew there was something else. He was ordained in the African Methodist Episcopal Church in October 2021, and soon founded Joy Life Center.

“'The joy of the Lord is my strength,' from Nehemiah 8:10, is the watchword to his ministry," Lewis said. "Joy Life Center offers salvation, preservation or deliverance from harm, ruin or loss. It provides healing while freeing the mind, body and spirit, encourages empowerment and advocates for social and economic justice."

Joy Life Center hosts a Sunday service at 9 a.m. All are invited to take part at the Clissold Elementary School auditorium, 2350 W. 110th Place, or virtually on Joy Life Center’s YouTube channel and Facebook page.

A Tuesday Bible study is available on YouTube or Facebook. Joy Life Center has a children and youth ministry as well as ways for locals to join their community through volunteering, hosting and attending center events, and giving back through the Givlify program.

According to its website, the mission of Joy Life Center is “to minister to the social, spiritual and physical development of all people through worship and Christian education experience by creating and sharing relevant content that assists in finding the Joy of the Lord in our journey.”

Lewis said everyone is special and has strengths and gifts they can share with others. That is something he realized about himself.

“I think that everybody has this unique thumbprint,” he said. “What God had done over my life is, no matter what I was doing, I was always the same guy. I was always really into interacting with people, encouraging people, building people up. And it really resonated with my spirit."

He understands that well after his journey through life.

Bobby’s brother Kevin, who died in 2015, also was in the music business. He managed the famed Death Row Records Studio, rubbing elbows with such legends as Dr. Dre and Snoop Dogg. Bobby Lewis met and worked with the top people in the business, but he knew he was destined for another path.

Pastor Lewis and his wife Crystal have been married for seven years. He has a son, Jordan, 28, from his first marriage. While Bobby Lewis is a Chicago native, he named him son for the River Jordan in the Bible, not the Chicago Bulls legend.

He and his wife also have “two beautiful daughters,” Niya, 9, and Asia, 8. Family is very important to him.

“I’m the youngest of seven children. Music has always played an influential role in all of our lives,” Lewis said. “My relationship with my father grew when I began to understand his spiritual journey. This was not a major factor in my decision to become a minister, but it is part of my journey as well."

On Dec. 5, 2019, Ramsey Lewis recorded a Facebook message urging people to get his son’s album “I’m a Worshipper.” He relayed some family history with music and faith, and said Bobby had come by his talent naturally — and that was evident on the record.

“Do yourself a favor and pick it up,” Ramsey Lewis said.

Lewis said in the last five or six years, he had deep, meaningful discussions with his father. They centered around the idea of 

God working through people.

“You see many different entertainers approaching their craft different ways,” he said. “So no way talking about anybody else, I’m just talking about my dad. And what I began to understand about him is his approach to his life, and his success. Anybody who knew him, this would add texture and color to it because he was not boastful, he was very humble. 

"He did not want people to come to see him play, but to hear him play because he knew that it was a gift, that what he was playing was a gift from God," Lewis added. "He was very deliberate in separating, I'm not the star here. He didn't even want to be treated like that and was very humble in his ways is he just wanted to make sure that the music was presented properly because he knew it was a gift.”

His father’s second wife, whom Pastor Lewis also called his mom, gave him his father’s journals recently. Reading through them, he was struck by the fact that the famous musician did not write about his concerts or the practice he did on a regular basis to remain sharp even in his 80s.

“It is all about his meditations with God,” he said.

That was one final lesson the father had for his son.