History of IPHC Military Chaplains
The International Pentecostal Holiness Church (IPHC) has been recommending for endorsement or directly endorsing ordained ministers to the Armed Forces for seventy-eight years. In 1941, the IPHC pledged its support of the United States government in war times, while “decrying the evils of war.” Our general officials created a National Servicemen’s Commission with a National Service Pastor by the name of Samuel J. Todd, a young evangelist from Georgia.
In 1943, a Chaplains Examining Committee composed of J. A. Synan, G. H. Montgomery, and H. T. Spence endorsed John Vinson Ellenberg (deceased) to be our first chaplain to represent the IPHC in the U.S. Army. Other distinguished men followed and served in World War II and the Korean Conflict like; Thomas Eugene Myers (deceased), Ervin L. Shirey, Sr. (deceased), Freeman Mashburn (deceased), Julius Green (deceased), and Jacob E. Till (deceased).
The Vietnam War brought a new breed of chaplains like Hugh H. Morgan, Raymond Caulder (deceased), Richard S. Yi, Russell Gunter, and Rodney Callahan.
The Department of Defense requires all military chaplains be endorsed by an endorsing agency. In the early years of IPHC ministers seeking endorsement to be a military chaplain, IPHC ministers were endorsed by the National Association of Evangelicals Chaplains Commission. In the early 1980s, the IPHC became its own endorsing agent under the direction of Chaplain (COL) E. L. Shirey. Succeeding directors have been Chaplain (COL) Ray Caulder (deceased), Chaplain (COL) Freeman Mashburn Chaplain (LTC) Hugh Morgan (retired), and currently Chaplain (COL) Jerry L. Jones (retired).
Other endorsed IPHC chaplains include: Joseph Brookshire (deceased), Michael W. Haynes, David C. Sessions, Ervin L. Shirey, Jr., Ron Hilburn, Jerry O. Henderson, Wayne Priest, Danny Paul, Bob Lynch, Harvey A. Hennington, Vince Arnold, A. D. (Doug) Beacham, Jr., Roger Heath, Jerry L. Jones, Xuan Ngoc Tran, Phillip Chandler, Eva Christine Beatty Sorrow (our first female chaplain in the Air Force), Lonnie Dean Brooks, Victor E. Brown, James Workman, Mark Perkins, Timothy Baer, Greg Lewis, Kenneth Godfrey, Stanton Trotter, Terry Kesling, Suk Kim, Marc McDowell, Timothy Moore, Randy Sellers, William Jamie Braswell, Chad Bellamy, Sarah Tarpley (our first female chaplain in the Army), Timothy Sessions, Shane Marley, John Kwon, Kendall Taylor, Adam Erwin, Christopher Browder, James Paul Ward, Jr., Jonathan M. Lampley, Matthew Brown, Carmen Martinez-Perez, Jamil A. Khan, Peter J. Cooper, Shawn Earles, Randy Wilson, Jeremiah Wilson, Chris Browder, and deceased).
The IPHC and the Congregational Holiness Church have an agreement that IPHC Chaplain Ministries would endorse their chaplains. The first is Chaplain Matthew Rutledge.
IPHC chaplains have served during, and some actually in the theatre of conflict, in all world crises and wars beginning with World War II to include the Berlin Crisis, Vietnam, Grenada, Panama, Desert Shield/Storm, Somalia, Haiti, Bosnia, Kosovo, Uzbekistan, Kyrgyzstan, Afghanistan (Operation Enduring Freedom), and Iraq (Operation Iraqi Freedom), and currently the Israel/Gaza conflict. Many have served in several countries around the world.
It was Dr. Ronald W. Carpenter, Sr. who had a vision for a memorial to the chaplains. He called it, “The Corridor of Courage.” It was carefully designed and constructed. Bishop James D. Leggett presided over the dedication ceremony of this memorial in July of 1999 at the Resource Development Center in Oklahoma City, now called the Global Ministry Center. The Corridor of Courage is second to none. It honors active duty, guard, reserve, retired, and deceased military chaplains.
The IPHC Chaplain Ministries Directorate is comprised of a board to which the director is accountable and is advised. It currently consists of the bishop/director of EVUSA serving as chairman, the director, one senior active-duty chaplain, one junior active-duty chaplain, one retired chaplain, one bishop, one pastor or bishop, one layman, and one institutional chaplain. In the 1999 General Conference, under Presiding Bishop Carpenter’s leadership, the institutional chaplains in the IPHC were placed within Chaplain Ministries. At that same conference, Chaplain Rodney Callahan introduced a motion that was passed that an institutional chaplain be included on the Chaplain Ministries board. The main mission of the board is to vet IPHC ministers, men and women, to be endorsed as a military chaplain to the Department of Defense.
(Information submitted by directors Chaplain (LTC) Hugh H. Morgan (retired) and Chaplain (COL) Jerry L. Jones (retired). Updated May 28th, 2024)