Our Passion
After graduation from Tennessee Temple University in 1971, the Lord led us to begin a new church in Madison Heights, Virginia. God blessed there in amazing ways. Today the Temple Baptist Church continues to reach many souls for Christ in their area and around the world through their Faith Promise missions.
For the next 18 years we had the privilege to serving several other churches. In 1989 I became pastor of Southside Baptist Church, Waycross, Georgia. It was there my heart was impressed of the Lord to reach into the Soviet Union with the Word of God. God helping us, we were able to obtain the first public newspaper advertisement for Christ in that country.
As a result of the overwhelming response to the advertisement, we began to ship Bibles throughout Russia and the Soviet countries. Lithuania, a Soviet ruled nation was yearning for freedom. In 1991 one of their newspapers ran our advertisement in 2 languages. As a result, over 8000 people wrote us asking for a Bible!
In 1991 we went to Lithuania to preach the gospel and to follow up on those who had written for Bibles.
In the city of Kaunas we were able to rent a meeting place and held gospel meetings every evening for 10 days.
We had invited a Lithuanian-American named Arnold Cibas to go with us to help with the language. We paid for his ticket to go and we were to meet in Latvia. As a result of our work with Mr Cibas, a church was established from the hundreds of people who professed their faith in Christ.
Soon afterward, my family and I moved to Lithuania to serve as missionaries.
During the early 1990s, Lithuanians were hungry for the gospel. They had been oppressed by Communist government for 60 years. It was a strategic time to reach them for Christ. As the Lord saved young men, some of them were called to preach. Some of those men became Christ to the Nations missionaries.
Through many wonderful blessings as well as great difficulties we experienced in Lithuania, the Lord stood with us through it all.
In late 1997 my wife Georgia was diagnosed with cancer. Her treatments in the US lasted for 4 years. The oncologist believed the cancer to be terminal, but God was at work. The Lord answered prayer and in His mercy, healed Georgia.
In 2001 we went to preach in the Bahamas. We arrived to hold the meeting, but the missionary who had invited us had returned to the United States. The people asked that we would conduct the scheduled missions conference anyway. In the two weeks we were there, the Lord impressed us and the church that we should stay. God blessed us in our work in Abaco, Bahamas for the next four years.
During that time we were able to continue serve as director of Christ To The Nations mission and others came to serve with us as missionaries.
Today, Christ To The Nations mission focuses on our first vision of reaching the lost for Christ, freely giving God's Word to all who need it and to establish Bible believing churches.
In addition, for 20 years our mission’s Christ's College Graduate School enabled missionaries, pastors, teachers and other servants of the Lord to obtain their academic degrees and to strengthen their local churches. Those programs are no longer available, but CTTN Continues to offer free Bible Courses to Christians in 14 countries. Those completing these Courses receive a diploma in Biblical Studies. Contact CTTN@icloud.com
50+ Years in Ministry
I was ordained by Dr. Lee Roberson and the Highland Park Baptist Church January 7, 1970. My prayer then as it is now, that God and his mercy would use me to glorify him and to the lead the Lost to Christ.
Through the years of ministry I have learned more about the grace of God and how in His wisdom, He uses only vessels of clay to serve Him. That he indeed "hath chosen the foolish things of the world to confound the mighty".
The journey has been a long one but it is not over. There is much to be done for Christ.In our recent trip to Lithuania others came to Christ and one lady who had been prayed for by her daughter for 25 years! We also met dear friends who had come to know the Lord when we first went there to preach the gospel 25 years ago. We reminded of the promise of the Lord Jesus, ‘..ye shall bear much fruit and your fruit shall remain.'
The world is more in need of the gospel today than it has ever been. We want to be true to His calling for our lives and to reach as many for Christ as possible until He calls us Home.
That is our mission and the purpose of our life.
-David and Georgia Ralston