Ordained House Church Minister
CLI has provided this student with the training he needs to be an ordained house church minister. He has gone from prison to becoming an ordained house church minister in his local area.
Read his testimony below:
I was born in Quezon City Philippines and migrated to Simi Valley California on May 1982. I have a Bachelor of Science in Accounting and an MBA concentrating in Project Management. I have been married (Jaylene) for almost 24 years with a 22 years old daughter (Larissa) and an 18 years old son (Ryan).
When I was 3 years old, my parents separated and I grew up mainly with my grandmother. I barely saw my father for he is a merchant marine who is always out of town so I never really know who he is. I didn’t know my mom very well either although we migrated to the US in May of 1982 both of which a regret – I should have been matured enough to find the time to get to know them and this is something that I wished I could change.
Since I never really have a father figure, I got in many trouble although not until when I was over 18 years of age. I was in and out of jail for a day or 2 and one day, there was a rumble that I was not even a part of and my sworn enemies pointed fingers at me as part of that rumble and I was sentenced to 6 months of jail time. It was then that I was first introduced to the Bible and there was one inside my cell. I read the entire bible twice although it was very confusing. I was also introduced to this person who prayed for me in tongue and that really scared me for I have no clue what he was saying. This was in 1990.
While in jail, I have all the time to evaluate my life and it was not looking good so I decided that I need to go to college and make something of myself. I also knew that I needed to leave California in order to get out of trouble and that I needed to find a woman from out of town. So after getting out, my sister took me in and I went and get my bachelor degree in DeVry University and that is where I met my wife of 24 years. I could see now that Romans 8:28 and Jeremiah 29:11 is so real as this happened to me.
It was not until July 2007 that I accepted the Lord Jesus to be my Lord and Savior and although I have many ups and down, I am so glad that He never gave up on me. I have served many positions in churches – Administrator, Bible teacher, Men’s Ministry President, a church deacon. I have the desire to continue on and advance to serve Him more and more.
I searched for a long time to find a school for free and after a year or so of searching, I found CLI and started studying daily since Dec of 2016. CLI courses are well written and very detailed. The quizzes are challenging as well that is why I found it really good and really recommend it. Being ordained by CLI will help me with church planting, house churches as well as to be a pastor if God is willing for me to do so.
I have been praying that God will allow me to plant a church but I was not certain where and during our house hunting, we made many offers to many houses all over the place and none of them went through except for where we are right now in Rahway NJ. I asked God to allow me to plant a church here and in April 2017, my church split up because of a different view of buying a building and now I have no church. This is where I need CLI to help me out.
I do have about 4 or 5 families now to plant a church. We do small group (house church) but not every week as many are on vacation but intend to make this to a weekly basis. We need all the prayer we can get. Please pray for us, ask the CLI people to pray for us.
I am deeply thankful that God allowed me to find CLI and able to study and I only have about 3 courses to get my bachelor degree in divinity but I intend to take many more classes outside the requirement to further my knowledge of Greek and so on.
May the good Lord and Savior, Christ Jesus continue to bless CLI.
Become an ordained house church minister at CLI today!
High-Quality Seminary Training
CLI Student Chase went from believing in the Baha’i faith where all religions have essential worth, to being saved and pursuing high-quality seminary training at CLI.
Read about how Chase discovered his passion for Christianity and high-quality seminary training below:
My name is Chase and I am from the United States. Let me just start by saying I love the Lord Jesus Christ with all my heart! I am fortunate to live in the United States with how much freedom of religion there is! I can preach whichever denomination of Christianity I want. And I know this is not the case for many countries, so I feel so blessed and that I should take advantage of my opportunity!
I had been raised all my life as a member of the Baha’i faith. It got to a certain point though where I started going down a dark sin filled path. However, my amazing and incredible wife showed me the love of Jesus Christ and brought me out of the darkness and into the light. It wasn’t until last Easter that I was baptized along with our daughter, that I was suddenly filled with an intense fiery passion and desire for more spiritual knowledge, and to make the gospel more well known. I prayed to God asking for enough money to send me to seminary school. And then a light bulb went off when God answered me and I googled “Free Seminary School”. God answered my prayers with CLI! Now I have the means necessary to study a high-quality Divinity Bachelors program and become proficient in Gods word so that I can be the best biblical husband and father as possible for my family and then the best pastor as possible for our brothers and sisters!
This class helped me greatly to confirm my walk with God and only strengthened my desire to pursue ministry training. My eventual dream is to become a pastor, vocational and then maybe vocational depending on Gods plan. I want to be able to make my brothers feel good by guiding them spiritually and being able to marry Gods children and comfort others when friends and family pass to the kingdom of God. I feel God calling me to fulfill his will this way. Most recently my family and I were facing a personal difficulty that could have gone horribly wrong. But we had faith in the Lord and prayed for his grace and prayed for his will to be done. And our situation was resolved! I know it was God telling me to do something big in the name of Jesus Christ.
Reading the Bible opens one’s eyes to a whole new spiritual world. It is Gods word, so we should treat it as such a cherish is every day and listen to God with us every day. It is all one needs to be happy in life. This world is only material and with Jesus Christ, as our Lord and Savior, we have eternal spiritual life in His kingdom on high. Gods word, the Bible, tells us this repeatedly. I am now much more confident, positive, happy, and I feel great! I am sharing my fiery passion with my family so we can all show the world through our words and actions Jesus Christ’s love! CLI has made it possible for me to fulfill Gods plan for me, and to be the best biblical man for my family and best pastor for our brothers and sisters. I ask that you pray for my continued spiritual growth, and for God to guide me through this ministry training and beyond. Thank you CLI, and thank you, God!
Obtain high-quality seminary training at CLI today!
Kentucky Free Biblical Training
CLI Student, Carla Knowlton, is a talented writer who has a passion for men, women, and child ministry she is receiving Kentucky free biblical training at Christian Leaders Institute.
Read about how she is receiving Kentucky free biblical training at CLI below:
My name is Carla Knowlton. I live in Kentucky in the United States. I have been married for 22 years, and we have two adult children. My husband has been ordained as a minister, and we prayerfully wait for the Lord to open doors of opportunity for him.
I was raised in an environment where Christianity was the right thing to do, although it was only occasionally practiced. As a young adult, I followed the same pattern – I believed in God and wanted to live for Him. I would attend church for a time and strive to do good, then fall away and end up in the “world”, living only for myself. In time I began to believe that Christianity wasn’t for me – that I couldn’t do it. I always failed. I always disappointed God. I then determined to never have anything to do with Him again. It wasn’t worth it. After a couple of years, I had an experience in which God absolutely invaded my heart. He broke down in a moment every wall I had built and filled me with such a love that I had never thought possible. In time, as I grew in the Lord, I came to understand that my past “failures” was because I had been trying to live according to “works”. When I messed up, I allowed myself to believe that I was failing God and that He couldn’t/wouldn’t love me anymore, because I was too messed up.
It has been 10 years since that day that the Spirit of God invaded my life, and although I am far from perfect and sometimes still struggle to see myself as He does rather than by my “merit”, He has been faithful to keep me all these years. He has never let go, even when I have been too weak to hold onto Him.
During the years, I have been used in many varied ways. I do not know exactly where the Lord will lead me, or what “title” one could give to the ministry that He has called me to. He speaks to me of so many things – writing books (I do have one published); writing songs; praise & worship service; I hear sermons in my mind; I have so many ideas for men’s ministries, women’s ministries, youth ministries… My former pastor said that the Lord speaks to me as He does a pastor’s wife, as the pastors must have a hand in every part of the church. I have laid up his council in my heart, while I wait for the Lord to confirm or deny and to lead as He desires. I only know that the greatest passions of my heart are (1) being a pillar – a strong, upholding support – for pastors, for they are the servants of the entire congregation and are often without encouragement or support, and (2) writing for the glory of God.
For many years, I have desired a higher education in my spiritual walk. I have researched colleges, seminaries, etc. too many times to count. My husband is on disability due to a back injury, my adult son has autism and lives at home, and I am a homemaker. We could not afford the cost of a quality education when my husband and I both worked; now with one small income, it is completely impossible. But with God, all things are possible! While doing yet another internet search, I came across Christian Leaders Institute. I am pleasantly surprised with the quality of education provided by CLI, and the availability to those who cannot afford it but who still feel the call of God on their lives astounds me. I am so thrilled and thankful to God for providing this opportunity to me, and to all involved with CLI for allowing God to use them in this manner and for following this call on their own lives. I believe that my education at Christian Leaders Institute will strengthen my own walk with the Lord, enable me to effectively speak to others about Christ and His Gospel, and equip me to be a viable leader in whatever capacity He chooses to place me in.
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