(By Ron Putnam) In 1987, while attending the University of Northern Colorado, I met a Christian who said, “Ron, I think you are a nice person, but I don’t believe that you are going to heaven.” After two-weeks of processing that statement, I made the personal decision to accept Jesus as my Lord and Savior when I prayed the sinner’s prayer of salvation.
My conversion was very inspirational in that it felt like a heavy weight was released from my shoulders and went directly up in the air. Immediately after my conversion, I began reading my Bible and became interested in maturing as a Christian. The Lord eventually led me to Cherry Creek Evangelical Presbyterian Church, where I became grounded in the Word, and was involved in the life and practice of the church over the next eight years.
After sensing a call to ministry, growing in the basics of Christianity for many years, and choosing to give my vocational life to Christian ministry, I entered Denver Seminary and completed a Masters of Divinity June 1999.
From June 1998 (the year before my graduation) to May 2001, God opened the door for me to minister at Faith Evangelical Presbyterian Church, primarily as the director of discipleship. After serving for three years, the Lord called me to be a missionary to the former Soviet Union. By a few miraculous events, I was able to incorporate Slavic Christian Ministries as a 501(c) (3) corporation, where I have served since 2001.
This call allowed me to assist in the areas of administration, marketing, leadership, preaching, evangelism, discipleship, publishing, and coordinating short-term mission efforts in Eastern Ukraine. Since this ministry’s inception, over 11,000 have been ministered to, with over 830 people accepting Jesus through 175+ different outreaches. From 2001-2002, I also taught at Donetsk Christian University on a one-year teaching assignment.
From January 2011 – September 2014, I was a senior pastor that has consistently preached, taught, discipled, vision-cast, shepherded, encouraged, and counselled my congregation. I merged my church with Highlands Baptist Church in September 2014 and was the interim discipleship pastor during this merger, which was completed on June 30th, 2015. I am currently A Member Services Manager at Christian Care Ministry/Medi-Care, a Christian medical bill sharing ministry with almost 350,000 Christian members.
I am also an international author of three theology books, with 23,000 copies distributed to pastors, students, and individuals within Ukraine, Russia, Myanmar, and the United States. I believe my past experience and fruit reflects God’s calling upon my life and ministry.
If you also have a testimony that you would like to share, please feel free to send it to us at themostimportantnews@mail.com. Our testimonies are very powerful witnessing tools, and we want to win as many souls for the Lord as we can while there is still time to do so.