Dr. Gary Hedrick has been president of CJF Ministries (CJFM) in San Antonio, Texas, since August of 1988. Prior to that time, he was on the ministry’s board of directors and served as a part-time CJFM field representative. In the early to mid-1970s, Gary had been a minister of youth and music in two Atlanta-area Baptist churches. He later moved to Illinois, where he became associate pastor of the 1,500-member Bayview Baptist Church in Washington, Illinois (1976-78) and met his bride-to-be, Marcia Lee Goldsmith (they were married in 1977). After a term of service as a church planter with the home missions board of the Evangelical Mennonite Conference (1978-80), Gary became the founding pastor of Liberty Bible Church (IFCA) in Eureka, Illinois (1980-88).
Gary is a graduate of Bob Jones University in Greenville, South Carolina (BA in Bible; minor concentrations in speech and Koine Greek) and was awarded an honorary doctor of divinity degree (DD) in May of 2003 from Antioch Baptist Bible College and Seminary in Marietta, Georgia—the same school that bestowed this degree on a young Jewish Christian evangelist named Charles Halff 35 years earlier (almost to the day). Gary is a member of the American Schools of Oriental Research (ASOR) at Boston University, the Evangelical Theological Society (ETS), and IFCA International. He is currently serving a four-year term as North American Coordinator for the Lausanne Consultation on Jewish Evangelism (LCJE), a worldwide network of ministries specializing in reaching Jewish people with the Good News of Jesus the Messiah.
Gary and Marcia make their home in San Antonio. Their older daughter, Elizabeth, is married to Brian Nowotny and they have three children, Emily, Owen, and Samuel. The Hedricks’ son, Michael, is an M.Div. student at Trinity Seminary in Deerfield, IL. Their younger daughter, Sarah, is a graduate of Baylor University and enjoys (among other things) pursuing her hobby of raising and breeding Great Danes. All three of the Hedricks’ children are actively involved in the ministry.