I was born into a Christian family on January 24, 1942. My Father, Price J. Ballew was a deacon and song leader in a Baptist Church. My Mother, Aline (Davis) Ballew was a member of the choir and a Sunday School teacher. Her father, Thomas M. Davis, was an old-fashion Baptist Preacher.
I was saved at the Boanerges Baptist Church in the rural section of Old Fort, Tennessee on August 16, 1951 at the age of nine years old. Many said that I was not old enough to know what I was doing, and that bothered me for some time. One day I learned that I was not the one doing the doing, but He that was doing the doing knew well what He was doing the night He saved my life from sin and my soul from hell.
I grew up all of my young life in Polk County Tennessee near Old Fort. I attended the Old Fort Elementary School four years, the Conasauga Elementary School four years, and Polk County High School four years, graduating from high school in May 1959. The following year, at the age of 18, God called me to preach. I surrendered to preach in September 1960, and preached my first message on Sunday night September 25, 1960. I immediately started preaching anywhere the Lord opened the door.
My home church, the Mountain Springs Baptist Church near Old Fort, Tennessee, ordained me on October 17, 1965. After preaching for five years, we set up a tent in the southern area of Bradley County, Tennessee and started a tent meeting. After four nights, with many people being saved and others getting right with God, the Lord sent a storm and destroyed the tent on Friday morning. That night we moved the meeting into the old Frazier’s Chapel Baptist Church building. The church there had been closed down for some time.
That revival lasted three weeks. Many of the folks that attended the revival and most of those that were saved or got right with the Lord in the meeting wanted me to start a church there in that old church building. After praying much about it, I felt that this was the will of God and agreed to do so. The Lord let me pastor there for four years and four months. Since there had not been a move of God in that community for many years, the Lord gave us a great harvest and ministry there.
I pastored a total of seventeen years, pastoring four different Independent Baptist Churches: the Frazier’s Chapel Baptist Church, the Bethlehem Baptist Church at Chickamauga, GA, the Castle Rock Baptist Church in Jasper, Tennessee and the Bethel Baptist Church in Jacksboro, Tennessee. While I was at Bethel, the Lord led me to start Bethel Christian School, and the Bread from Bethel Radio Broadcast. Bread from Bethel was a thirty-minute daily broadcast and I preached on it for over nine years, giving it up when I left the pastorate to enter into the field of Evangelism.
I left Bethel Baptist Church in October of 1982, moved my membership to the Concord Baptist Church near Fairmount, Georgia where Bro. Sammy Allen is the Pastor, and entered into Evangelism. The Lord blessed and I believe that I preached 38 meetings the first year. Over the next ten years, most of the meetings I preached were revivals, even though there was a continual growth of invitations to help churches develop a Scriptural Missions program. By the early nineties, most of my meetings were Faith Promise Missions Meetings, and by the mid-nineties, Faith Promise Missions Meetings were filling my schedule completely. Since 1995, the Lord has allowed me to preach an average of fifty-eight to sixty meetings a year, with forty-eight to fifty of them being missions meetings.
Since becoming a member of the Concord Baptist Church in 1982, I have had the privilege to assist my Pastor, Bro. Sammy Allen, in the camp meetings held at Faith Baptist Camp. We host three camp meetings a year. The first one begins on the fourth Sunday in June, the second meeting begins on the first Sunday of August, and the third meeting is Thanksgiving Week. All of these meetings run from Sunday Night through Friday Night with services in the morning, afternoon, and night. The Camp has dormitories to sleep over 1000 people, and is located on Highway 136, 3 miles East of Resaca, Georgia. Resaca is located about 75 miles north of Atlanta and about 45 miles South of Chattanooga, Tennessee, on Interstate 75. Let me give you a personal invitation to any of these camp meetings.
In January 1989, God directed Pastor Allen to begin Faith Baptist Institute. I have had the privilege of serving as Academic Dean since the school began. I also teach one or two courses each semester. At Faith Baptist Institute (FBI), we offer a theology degree (Thg) which requires 96 credit hours and a Bachelor of Theology degree (ThB) which requires 128 credit hours. We offer classes in the evening four nights a week. The Thg degree can be earned in three years and the ThB degree can be earned in four years. We do consider credit hours earned from other reputable Baptist Institutes and Colleges.
In 1979, with the encouragement of some preacher friends, I begin publishing some outline booklets. The Lord has allowed me to publish seven sermon outline booklets, entitled SIMPLE SERMON STRUCTURES, Numbers 1-7. I have also written four other booklets and several larger books. These books and a listing of messages recorded on
cassette tapes and cds are listed on my Book and Tape page. Please take a minute and review them.
On September 1, 2002 as I was closing a meeting in the Island Ford Baptist Church in Madisonville, Kentucky; Pastor Gary Hall announced to me and his church that the Lord wanted them to give me radio time on their radio station, WSOF FM, to preach and teach on missions. I immediately began saying no, I am already too busy. He asked me to pray about it and I agreed to do so.
The following week I was in a missions meeting at the people at Messenger Baptist Church in Flowery Branch, Georgia. I shared the thoughts about the radio broadcast with the Pastor one day during the meeting. A couple of nights later, he began raising money to buy recording equipment. I almost stopped him, because I just did
not feel that I had the time to do radio work along with all the other works that I am involved in. Just as I was about to stop him, the Holy Ghost spoke three things to my heart. He said,
(1) Let him alone,
(2) you do not know what I am doing, and
(3) you do not know the future.
With that word from the Lord, I began to seek the Lord’s will seriously about the broadcast and within two days, the Lord gave me direction to begin the HARVEST TIME RADIO BROADCAST. He also put the burden in my heart that I was not just to go with one radio station, but many. I promised the Lord that I would try to be faithful and walk through every door that he opened. I began the broadcast on 11 radio stations the first week of November 2002. Fundamental Broadcasting Network, which has 32 affiliate radio stations and two short wave radio stations, began airing the HARVEST TIME BROADCAST the first week of January 2003, and another station picked it up the second Monday in January 2003. I now have about 83 broadcast each week day and am talking with some others. The Harvest Time Broadcast now goes around the world about 30 times each day via internet, and the short wave radio stations cover most of the globe. (See Radio Log for a complete list of stations and the time of the broadcast.)
HARVEST TIME RADIO BROADCAST is a work of faith, and a labor of love. It is kept on the air by the praying and giving of God’s people. We have some churches and individuals that support us as a home mission project. The Lord has paid the bills every month thus far through his people, and I trust Him to continue to do so as long as He wants me on the air. If you know of a radio station in your area that would be interested in carrying the broadcast, please contact me by email at stinballew@juno.com.
If you wish to support HARVEST TIME RADIO BROADCAST, you may do so by
writing me at the address given on the home page, or you may do it electronically using your credit card and paypal. (See Home Page.)
HARVEST TIME RADIO BROADCAST operates as a ministry of, and under the
authority of the Concord Baptist Church, Fairmount, Georgia; Bro Sammy Allen Pastor. Please take a minute and pray for HARVEST TIME RADIO BROADCAST TODAY. God bless each of you.
On June 29, 1962, I married Edna Ghorley. God has blessed us with over 46 years together. He has blessed our union with two daughters and a son. Through them, God has blessed us with five grandchildren.