Joel McGraw is a pastor at heart with a yen for writing. He writes from more than theory, but as a living "practitioner." He was born the youngest of 13 children on a farm in Conecuh County, Alabama, during the Great Depression. He did not wait until college for Cooperative Education. He began "co-oping" in pre-school and continued through grade school, college, and grad school where he earned his Master of Ministry Degree. Pastor Joel's writing is punctuated with gutsy life-workables. He believes a "disappointing" detour in his academic education early in his ministry proved to be a valuable God-send. During that "interruption" he worked gathering, writing, and reporting news and feature stories to help "support my preaching habit." He did corresponding for Associated Press and United Press International, and a couple of dailies, Mobile Press-Register and Montgomery Advertiser. His employers at the local radio station and newspaper in Evergreen, Alabama, were his competent instructors. This writer sees the "body of Christ" as multi-national, multi-denominational, and multi-racial. He is founding pastor of Faith Chapel, an International Pentecostal Holiness Church, in Huntsville, Alabama, where he has pastored and "pastured" for more than 40 years. He has been involved in and led in worship and people-care across many denominations, has assisted in hospital chaplaincy, led in city wide prayer gatherings, and served in leadership in various ministerial groups. For more than 20 years McGraw was a daily radio voice sharing God's Word, practical life helps, and interviews with other pastors and life-care professionals. He and his wife, Janelle Barbee McGraw, have three children - Steven McGraw, David McGraw, and LaNita McGraw Eby - who with their families are all committed Christians. josmc@juno.com
