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Pastor's Ministry Is Taking It To The Streets

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By DEREK MAUL

Tribune correspondent

Published: November 19, 2008

Terry Wallace may be a Christian minister, but he also is a work in progress.

"In 2001, I was leaving the ministry," he said. "I'd had it. I'd been here 13 years, and we were going nowhere. These people didn't even like each other. I'd done everything I knew to do.

"Then I heard author Steve Sjogren. He said, 'For years, we've been a come-and-see church. Now, it's time to be a go-and-do church.'"

Wallace knew the words came from God. "I heard it, and it exploded in me," he said. "It changed my whole life. God gave me a vision and a heart for Seffner that night. God began to deal with me about grace, and I began to preach a different message."

It was a message that would lead him into some unique relationships, a ministry to the biker community, prayer meetings in rough bars and a whole new congregation.

"God is reaching this community," Wallace said. "We're not trying to be like anyone else; we're actively seeking to build a church for people who hate church. I want to be Jesus with skin on, and I'm having more fun in ministry than I've ever had before."

At the front end of his life, the Assemblies of God pastor resisted ministry for years. "I grew up in a minister's home, and I hated it," he said. "Everything was a sin and about what you couldn't do. I'd preached since I was a boy - but I was running from it."

After high school, he joined the Army. "It was the first time I'd been free in my life," he said. "I went absolutely nuts. I traveled to Japan, Taiwan, Thailand, Korea and the Philippines."

He returned home and sold shoes until he was offered a job at a Plant City phosphate plant in 1967.

"My dad was pastor at Pleasant Grove Assembly of God on Turkey Creek Road," he said. "We moved our trailer down here, and I went to work with sulfuric acid and phosphate dust."

Before long, he was hired by GTE, a move that changed his life. "They said 'Son, you're far too intelligent to work outside.' It was the first time I hadn't been told I was too slow, too dumb, or too stupid - that I'd never amount to anything."

He took correspondence classes in Bible and worked weekends as youth pastor at Pleasant Grove, then led First Assembly of God in Temple Terrace. In 1976, he took a full-time pastoral call in Hartford, Ala.

"Talk about a unique place," he said. "In Hartford, they roll up the streets at five o'clock. I was a city boy - used to malls and such. It was the longest 20 months of my life. God sent me there as a training exercise."

In 1977, Wallace moved to Arcadia, where he built the Sonrise Worship Center and stayed for a decade.

"We grew from 32 to over 300 on a regular basis," he said. "Miracle after miracle."

In 1988, after a short stint building houses on Boca Grande Island, he came to Seffner.

"Seffner was an open door," he said. "But I didn't really hear from God until 2001. I didn't have a passion, and I didn't have a call for this place."

All that changed when God spoke to his spirit in 2001. "Since then, we've had new people and guests all the time," he said. "The church is growing again."

The congregation's profile began to change, but then Wallace asked God to help him reach the whole community. Out of the blue, he was asked to do a memorial for a man who died in a motorcycle accident. He felt an instant connection and was asked to speak at a memorial gathering at Billy Bob's Beach Bar on U.S. 92.

"The biker community feels outcast," he said, "like nobody wants anything to do with them. They opened their hearts to me, and I'd never been so wired in my life. I preached to about 250 bikers. It's been about two years now, God redirected me big-time."

As a result, bikers started coming to church, and the pastor went to the bars to hang out with them.

"That's when God began to deal with me about grace," he said. "God showed me things I'd never seen before. My wife Nadine comes with me; she's fallen in love with motorcycles."

At church, the music has changed - heavy rock at first, but now more contemporary. The theme song is "Taking it to the streets" by the Doobie Brothers. Wallace also instituted a smoking break just before the sermon. "We started taking it to the streets, and God has done some radical things," Wallace said. "But miracles don't change people's lives. Jesus changes people's lives."

MEET TERRY WALLACE
Pastor, Quest@Kingsway

BORN: Pensacola, 1945

EDUCATION: Pensacola High School, 1963; Faith Theological Seminary and Christian College, Tampa, 1995

MARRIED: Nadine Williams, 1964

CHILDREN: Anthony, 34

MOVED TO SEFFNER: 1988

CONTACT: (813) 684-3560

Derek Maul can be reached at derekmaul@gmail.com.

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