After graduating from Indiana State University with a B.S. in Education, RevC was a school teacher in the Fort Wayne Community Schools (FWCS) for three years. Though he loved his work, God had other plans.
On a Sunday morning, during the third year of his position with the FWCS, he was attending church with his family, as a young man was being ordained into the ministry. During that ceremony, the Lord spoke to his heart and said, "I want you to do this."
Though no one else heard Him speak there was no mistaking the origin of the message or its meaning. God had a much different plan for RevC’s life.
Unfortunately, though knowing he had heard from God, like known biblical characters such as Moses, Gideon, and Jeremiah, he was not quick to agree with God. For nearly a year he argued with God until he became very ill. Each morning when he would shower in preparation for his day, he would find himself unable to draw breath almost to the point of passing out.
Naturally, he was very much alarmed and went to several doctors who performed many tests without a confirmed diagnosis. It was then, he decided that he should go to the Mayo Clinic in Minnesota, where another set of doctors put him through many of the same tests before telling him that he had a rare infection in one of his lungs and faced two alternatives.
One was to have a portion of his lung removed, and the other was to take an experimental drug. Having been a runner in high school and college, this was not welcomed news, but was the catalyst God used to bring him to the point of a decision that would change the course of his life.
He was to tell the doctors the next day of his decision, so that night he got very serious with the Lord. He knew that the scriptures declared that God held his breath in His hands. So that night he made a covenant with the Lord.
He told the Lord that if He would give him back his breath, he would serve Him. RevC knew that someday he would stand before God at the Judgment Seat of Christ and give account of his life’s service, and perhaps, what he feared even more than his health issue was the possibility of seeing what could have been, if he had chosen to serve the Lord instead of himself.
The next day he told the doctors that he would take the experimental drug, but knew if he was healed that it would be God who did so. Since then, the problem has never resurfaced and he continues to run and for many years competitively in local 5K races.
But another problem existed, and that was he had already signed his fourth year contract with the FWCS. Once he knew his health was restored, he spoke with his wife about what he was feeling to see if she would entertain the idea of him quitting his job, with no certainty of what lied ahead other than that they would totally be in God’s hands.
He moved his family from Fort Wayne to Chalmers, Indiana, a small farming community with only a flashing caution light on the main highway that divided the town. There, he taught released time for religious education, to all the 5th and 6th grade children in the White County school system, even though he had no formal Bible training. In addition, he drove a school bus for handicapped children, worked part time for a veterinarian, and was a pastoral assistant to the pastor of the Chalmers Community Church.
When the school year ended, his family spent the summer working at a Christian summer camp where they were the cooks, grounds keepers, and he also served as the lifeguard. That fall, both his wife and he enrolled in Christian Training Center, a two-year Bible training program with a third year for Pastoral training called the Paul & Timothy program.
The program was run by a large non-denominational church in Fort Wayne, Indiana, called Calvary Temple (the church no longer exists). With his educational background, it was not long before he began to offer some suggestions to the Pastor as to how they might improve the program. With their desire to see the program expand, they offered to allow him to serve his Paul & Timothy requirement, while he was attending the two years of the classroom phase.
Thus both he and his wife graduated at the top of their class, and he was ordained in the same service as their graduation.
RevC still had no desire to be a pastor, evangelist, or missionary, and had only confirmed during his schooling that he couldn’t sing, so the future was still a ministry. He was very relieved when a few days later the Pastor of the church offered him a position on the church staff as director of the CTC program.
The next ten years he served on the staff of Calvary Temple running the CTC program, acquiring his Master’s of Education degree from Indiana University, and eventually, he started a Christian day school for children called Calvary Christian School (CCS). The CTC program grew with many pastors and leaders being trained for service in the ministry.
As the responsibilities for the elementary and junior high school program grew, he gave more of his time and energy to CCS which eventually led to a union between Calvary Christian School and the Fort Wayne Christian School, wherein he became the high school principal.
This too was not without significance, as his goal when working in the FWCS system was to one day be a school principal; a desire God fulfilled, but in a Christian rather than secular setting.
After two years as the high school administrator, he accepted a position at Countryside Christian Center (CCC) in Clearwater, FL. Pastor Lloyd had been one of his teachers at CTC in Fort Wayne, and was ready to start a training center program. It was during his tenure at CCC, as director of Countryside Christian Training Center (CCTC) that God began to do a work in his heart. A few years into the CCTC program, Pastor Lloyd asked him if he would also help train and lead short-term mission teams. This responsibility he accepted more out of an interest in traveling than any desire for missions.
But little did he know what God had in mind for the future. After a few years, he was asked if he would accept the position as the head of their missions program.
It was a position he was not eager to accept as the current director possessed a tremendous heart for missions, but unfortunately, in the eyes of the senior staff, was not seen as someone who knew how to manage finances. RevC had earned a reputation as being a good steward and knew that overseeing a mission’s budget that exceeded a million dollars a year would allow him the opportunity to make a difference.
It was during a short-term trip to Nicaragua, where RevC was assisting a medical team that was providing medical help to people who literally lived in the dump, that God broke his heart and gave him a greater compassion for people than he ever thought possible. It was not long before he knew God had something new in store for him.
In 1997, the church went through a split as the Pastor’s wife filed for divorce and 11 of the 13 staff pastors moved on to other endeavors. RevC realized that this meant it was time for him to take what he knew how to do to where there were men and women sensing the call of God on their lives, but lacking either the opportunity or financial means to receive the training they needed.
However, he was encouraged to help Pastor Lloyd rebuild his staff, and remained for an additional six months before going full-time into missions in February 1998, with Missionary Ventures International (MVI) of Orlando, FL .
The work began in Vietnam, where he began training 12 young Vietnamese Christians. During the next 2.5 years of traveling back and forth from the USA, to complete their training, he was compiling and writing the Christian Training Center (CTC) curriculum, acquiring copyright permissions for borrowed materials, raising funding for their training, the personal support that was needed, and the travel funding necessary to offer assistance to those requesting help in The Philippines and India. Most of the funding came through churches and individuals who were acquainted with him and his history in ministry.
Upon their graduation, he challenged the young Vietnamese to go and teach their countrymen as he had taught them. The curriculum had been translated into Vietnamese and though reluctant at first, with a little help and encouragement they were soon running their own CTC program in as many as 4 underground locations across Vietnam.
New requests continued to present themselves, and God continued to supply as the number of CTC programs grew, and the curriculum was translated into new languages. Most recently, he responded to a call for help in the Arab nations, and they are in the process of translating the curriculum into Arabic. It is his prayer, what has taken place in China will eventually happen among the Arab nations where there are Christians requesting training.
He first entered China helping local government officials, in rural mountainous areas of the Yunnan province, to build elementary schools where they lacked the resources to build the schools they needed. He raised half of the funding and the government put up the rest, and in exchange for what he supplied, he was allowed to bring short-term teams from the USA, to do what was called a "cross cultural " presentation that in actuality presented the gospel to all the parents and children in the area.
Thus, literally thousands of minority Chinese heard the gospel for the first time. This continued through 8 building projects until he was finally arrested when one of the teams was caught distributing New Testaments to new believers. The officials threatened to kick him out of China, but knowing if they did, he could not help them build any more schools, so he was allowed to remain.
Fortunately, during the three years this was going on, he had contracted several Chinese English speaking Christians to help translate the curriculum into Mandarin. RevC believed that once the curriculum was ready, God would open a door for it to be used, and that is exactly what has taken place.
Through a series of events designed by the Lord, a portion of the curriculum made its way to the President of a Theological Seminary in Malaysia; a fully accredited program who is also helping to train Chinese leaders within the underground house church movement in China.
The President asked RevC to come to Malaysia, where he indicated their desire to use the CTC curriculum in the training of indigenous house church leaders in China. It was his suggestion that they begin by training leaders who have had some ministry experience to use the CTC curriculum, so they can become the trainers of others all across China. They just recently completed the printing and distributing of 2200 sets (4 manuals per set) of the second edition of the CTC curriculum in Chinese, making nearly 3000 sets now available to help graduates train their countrymen. Already, one mother/daughter team who graduated in May of 2011have started CTC programs in four locations training 264 students.
From the beginning of his mission’s ministry, he has been solely responsible for all phases of development, planning, and raising all personal, travel, and project support. He recently established Indigenous Training Ministries, Inc. (ITM) as his base of operation, and is currently involved in several restricted access countries.
The work has grown to more than 25 locations in 20 different countries. Training indigenous Christian leaders is, in his opinion, the best investment we can make with our mission dollars next to taking the gospel where it has yet to be heard.
Many of those being trained through ITM take the gospel to areas that have yet to hear, thus accomplishing both ministry goals. You are invited to partner with him in the advancement of the Kingdom of God to the glory and honor of our Savior Jesus Christ.
