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Email Address: jerry.mccollough@agmd.org
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Thank you for visiting us today. I would like to give you a little background information regarding us and our ministry. We received our Bachelor's Degrees in Commercial Art from Woodbury University in Los Angeles, California, in 1963. Because of a scarcity of jobs in the advertising field at that time we began working for the Planning Department of the City of North Las Vegas, Nevada. After five years there Jerry was hired to establish a planning department for the City of Keene, New Hampshire. He was Director of City Planning there for the nearly 20 years. During this time he earned certificates in Management Practices for Small Cities, Local Planning Administration, and Public Works Construction Practices. He also completed a course in Land Use and Development Law at Harvard University. Having accepted Christ as our personal Savior in 1983, we entered missions as MAPS workers in 1987 assigned to International Correspondence Institute (now Global University) then located in Brussels, Belgium, to illustrate their teaching materials. There we also embarked on ICI's first full color Bible story comic book series, "Heroes of the Faith". Jerry was ordained by the Assemblies of God upon his completion of the Berean course of study, and we received full missions appointment in 1990. We entered Bulgaria as the first Assemblies of God missionaries in that country following the fall of the Iron Curtain. In Bulgaria we worked with the national church to re-establish a church structure after 75 years of communism. In two and a half years God used us to buy, build or renovate over twenty churches with the help of construction teams from the U.S., conduct training seminars for pastors and lay workers, and to establish the Bible School in the capitol city of Sofia. When our visas weren't renewed to remain in Bulgaria we relocated to the Slovak Republic. There we worked with the national church, taught in their Discipleship School, and evaluated building requirements for churches throughout the country. Again, using U.S. construction teams working with Slovaks we oversaw the building of two churches, one at either end of the country, anchoring the work in those regions. It was in Slovakia that God spoke to us about focusing on our primary gift of illustration. We felt an urgency to reach more people with the Gospel, and literature is the means to do that. Our time in Eastern Europe showed us that people would buy books when they could hardly afford bread, and that they wanted to know more about their history. This hunger coupled with their visual orientation influenced by their exposure to icons in the Eastern Orthodox Church led us to create our first book in what is now called the "Cultural Key" book series, using illustration and history to reveal Christ. This book is the true story of brothers, Cyril and Methodius, who were celebrated under communism as "literary heroes" for creating the Cyrillic alphabet. Actually they were Christians and they created this alphabet from the three languages on the cross of Christ to develop a single written language, making it possible for the Slavic people to read the Bible in their own language. This took place during the mid 840's AD. This was the beginning of God's new direction for our ministry. While completing the final artwork for the C & M book we relocated to Germany. There we also worked with Kosovar Muslim refugees. In addition, under the auspices of the U.S. Army Chaplain's office we pastored a congregation of military families and German nationals on the base in Giessen. While we were in Gemany God spoke to our hearts about reaching beyond our assigned area of Europe to people groups world wide with the "Cultural Key" concept. Jerry completed his Master's Degree in Biblical Literature from the Assemblies of God Theological Seminary in 2004. We are now working with Global University where we are creating Bible story comic books to continue the "Heroes of the Faith" series, and under Global's international covering we are now able to reach out to all nations with "Cultural Key" books. In creating these books we work together on research. Jerry writes the text, lays out the book and does the pen and ink drawings on illustration board. I, Faith, watercolor the illlustrations by hand, then lay out the text and do the prepress on computer. With modern technology it is relatively easy to have the text translated and printed in the languages of whichever country uses these books. We have two grown children and three grandchildren. Jenny, our daughter, with her husband, Brian, a computer programmer, live in Fort Worth, Texas, with Colin, 8 and Gracie, 3. Our son, Devon, a USAF U-2 pilot, lives with his wife, Traci and Nathan, 2, in Lincoln, California. In looking back we can see how God uses everything in our lives, both before and after we came to know Him. In God's economy nothing is ever wasted. We feel so blessed to be able to use the talents God gave us for His Kingdom, and for the faithfulness of individuals and churches who have partnered with us to make it possible. Thank you!
Web Address: jdalton
