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Reverend Chris Gilger
Executive Director
The LORD is my sheperd; I shall not want.
He maketh me to lie down in green pastures:
He leadeth me beside the still waters.
He restoreth my soul:
He leadeth me in the paths of righteousness
for His name's sake.
Yea, though I walk through the valley of the
shadow of death, I will fear no evil: for thou art with me;
thy rod and thy staff they comfort me.
Thou preparest a table before me in the presence
of mine enemies:
thou anointest my head with oil; my cup runneth over.
Surely goodness and mercy shall follow me all the
days of my life:
and I will dwell in the house of the LORD for ever.PSALM 23 KJV
Reverend Chris Gilger was born in Warren, Ohio in 1954 and as a youngster was raised in a tough neighborhood on the West side in the West-lawn area. His father worked at Delphi Packard, mother worked part-time, and he had three brothers and one sister. When he was around three years old, his mother had an accidental fall and broke her back and it caused her to be disabled and have a lifetime of pain. Chris had a great-grandmother to help raise him and he learned very early in life about people in chronic pain who had afflictions and illnesses. He had a great-grandmother who had very strong faith. She told Chris that he would end up a man of God when he was very young. When he was six years old, his great-grandmother died and he had his first experience with feeling the presence of the Holy Spirit. Chris was trying his best not to cry, because he knew his father would be unhappy about it if he did, so he just kept reading the 23rd Psalm in the funeral bulletin over and over again. He explained that a peace and warmth came over him and it was his first encounter with God’s loving and peaceful presence.
His family eventually moved to Champion, and one of his next-door neighbors was a Christian woman who attended the Nazarene Church. Even though she had a husband who was very contentious, she always seemed to be so full of joy, and it fascinated him. When Chris was around fifteen years old, he decided to attend church services with her and after hearing the salvation message, he felt the Lord’s presence and became a born again Christian. After becoming very involved with the church youth group, it seemed he was one of the few in the group who took the faith serious, and it wore on him. In the course of a year or so he drifted away from the faith, and spent the last few years of high school being rebellious. He remembered there being what he described as a “Jesus movement” going on at the school with some of the students and it sort of embittered him toward them. There just seemed to be way too many who talked the talk, but did not walk the walk (“for they do not practice what they preach” Mt. 23:3). He also had an older brother who was an extremely bad influence. Chris became involved with alcohol, drugs, and many of the evil pitfalls of the world and satan that so many of us as teens and adults easily fall into. His mother convinced him to join the Marine Corps when he was seventeen years old, but that only brought more problems and he was given a general discharge after ten months. So it was back to school, and this brought even more trouble, fighting, rebellion, although he did finally get his GED.
For a period of time after that Chris feels as though he was a lost soul. He became active in the nightlife and bar hopping scene, and did his share of substance abuse of all kinds. He also had fallen in love with a young lady, and she abandoned him for another, and it just added depression to his many other problems at that time. During this time a young man and a young woman who were friends of his had become born again Christians and showed Chris the real transformation of the spirit that can happen when one makes the personal decision to truly follow Christ and let Him and the all-powerful Holy Spirit have control. Since he was already familiar with the faith, Christ was calling him home, and he told his friends that he must recommit to our Lord and that he wanted to be transformed also and he wanted true 100% faith. Another friend of his actually bet Chris that he could not do it, which made him even more determined to go to our Lord and repent and be transformed.
His recommitment to Jesus Christ happened shortly thereafter at Pleasant Valley Church in Niles in 1974. He was overwhelmed by the Lord’s presence during the service and when he did the alter call, he bowed his head to our Lord and began crying, feeling the strongest presence of the Holy Spirit he had ever encountered. The Lord showed him that He had been watching over him all along even though he didn’t even realize it. Chris finally had his “Damascus Road” experience, when Christ decides to take over our lives and bring us home for good through the power of the Holt Spirit. Not long after the transformation he went to the park in Warren and began to witness and minister to the homeless people there. The Lord was guiding him and instructing him that this was to be his calling, to minister to the homeless and those who were not wanted by society. Chris found out, as do so many of us who eventually turn to Christ, the only true way to peace of mind is when we are on our way home to Him and deny ourselves. Only when we give Christ His place in us will the things in our lives take their proper place.
A Bible study group was started at a friend’s house, and many were witnessed to and many were saved as the group became larger and larger. Chris met and was drawn by the Lord to his wife Margaret during these meetings. They were married in 1976 and now have seven children, four boys and three girls (all home birthed). His father-in-law had a cleaning business, and Chris went to work for him and was well trained on all aspects of the business. Eventually he started his own business, and obtained a huge contract from RMI in Niles to do their work. He never truly felt comfortable with the business, and the Holy Spirit was pulling him back toward his calling to minister to the homeless and unwanted. During this time he met Richard Wurmbrandt, a Christian writer who wrote “Tortured for Christ,” and he helped him to understand Christ’s desire for us all to love the unlovable, and even love those who hate us or who are our enemies. Around this time a local rescue mission in Youngstown asked if they could borrow his steam cleaner to clean their carpets. He was deeply affected by the ministering going on at the mission and ended up volunteering his services at times and scaling back his own business. Eventually he went to work fulltime for the rescue mission, and became an ordained minister while working there. During this time period a minister who was carrying a cross throughout the country made a trip through the Youngstown area, and prophesied to Chris that the Lord is “calling you to be a repairer of the breach, and the restorer of the old waste places to dwell in.” It was during this time that he met his current friend and co-worker at the Warren Family Mission, Outreach Pastor Tom Weaver. After seven years working at the rescue mission in Youngstown, Chris decided it was time to move on. He was getting very strong urgings from the Lord to start a much needed rescue mission in Trumbull County, but did not have the resources at that time to do it, so he took a job as an instructor at the CCA Prison in Youngstown for one year.
Finally a series of events occurred and gave Reverend Gilger the opening to begin his ministry in Trumbull County to help the homeless. He decided that Open Door Mission on Rt-169 in Warren would be an ideal place to start his own rescue mission. At first the owners wanted too much money and there was no way Chris was going to be able to procure the property, but after much prayer, the property owner called him and decided to give him the property and quit claimed him the title. He named the new mission Warren City Rescue Mission, and after giving a testimony on the radio he met Pete Rommel, a local businessman with an electrical business who was a huge help to the mission in many ways and was his first board member. Chris also finally had settled a claim over a car accident from years before and this helped to also keep the mission going along with some more general donations from businesses and individuals. His first homeless man to stay there, who had been living in the woods for two years, also ended up being a very big asset to the mission. After a couple years it was obvious to Chris that he was going to have to find a bigger building and property. There just wasn’t enough room for the amount of people he was trying to minister to and care for at the current location. He and his board members decided it was time to try and make a move.
With the Holy Spirit’s guidance, Chris found what he was looking for, but had no idea how he was going to purchase the property and buildings that were currently a part of Compassionate Ministries being run by the Reverend Butch Sprague. Chris prayed over the property and let it in the Lord’s Hands. Within a week or so Butch came to him and turned over the property to him. It is truly amazing how both of the properties that got Chris started in helping the homeless became available due to prayer and Spirit Power, and it reminds one of the Holy Scripture “He hears the prayer of the righteous” (Proverbs 15:29). When the Warren Family Mission first started in 2001, the donations were very minimal. It was operating on a “wing and a prayer,” so to speak. Once they became more established and were able to put out flyers and get some recognition, things began to get better and at the current time they are helping approximately 70 clients and also do a variety of other general services to a very needy public. The amount of meals and clothing alone that the mission donates to the poor is astounding. A house next to the property that was also obtained by the mission is currently under rehabilitation and will hopefully be finished soon so that needy families can be housed also. Donations of any size are always needed and there is much work to be done for Christ’s glory at the mission. Chris explained that one of the most touching donations ever given at the mission was by a husband and wife during the first Christmas season at the mission. Their son had just died in a car accident and they brought the presents and a card with money in it they had planned on giving him for Christmas and donated it to the mission. The largest single donation the mission has received is $50,000.00 and was given by a local industrialist who wanted to remain anonymous.
When asked to give some testimonies about some of the events that have happened at the mission, Chris said he would not know where to begin. He said that amazing things happen all the time thanks to the Lord and the power of the Holy Spirit, although it is spiritual warfare at times trying to stop Satan’s plan of ruining people and bringing individuals back from his grasp. Reverend Gilger is a Spirit warrior for Jesus Christ and “Blessed is the man who perseveres under trial, because when he has stood the test, he will receive the crown of life that God has promised to those who love him.” (James 1:12). He and the rest of the workers and volunteers at the mission are on the front lines fighting a battle against evil in its purest form every day. A person has to literally deny themselves to do what they do. Many people in our world think that their own self and existence is the most important thing and fall into the trap without even knowing it, because this is what the kingdom of earth teaches us apart from God’s Word and His will for us. If we want to truly follow Jesus Christ, we have to forget that we even exist and look to Him and the Holy Spirit. Chris is literally spending his life to save others from the grasp of evil, and it was obvious in talking to him that he is willing to endure just about any hardship in order to do what the Holy Spirit has instructed him to do in helping the unwanted and homeless. One can see strength and compassion in Reverend Chris Gilger that you do not find in most ordinary men, and in order to withstand the attacks he has to “Put on the full armor of God so that you can take your stand against the devil’s schemes.” (Ephesians 6:11). Besides withstanding constant attacks from the enemy in doing his calling as a Christian, he also endures daily chronic back pain from degenerative disc disease in his low back. Toward the end of the interview he told a story about a doctor from India who he had met during a church service. The doctor had received Christ’s message of salvation and was led to give all he had to the poor. While working for nothing at a leper colony the doctor could not believe that the people were not more appreciative and were actually very mean spirited toward him at times when he was only trying to help. He had asked the Lord in prayer why did you call me to give up all and do this work if this was all there is to it? He said the Lord helped him to understand that if we are truly led by the Holy Spirit, we are not led to make the sacrifice for our own glory, it is all to the glory of God.Jesus said to them all, “If anyone would come after me, he must deny himself and take up his cross daily and follow me. For whoever wants to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for me will save it. What good is it for a man to gain the whole world, and yet lose or forfeit his very self? If anyone is ashamed of me and my words, the Son of Man is ashamed of him when he comes in his glory and the glory of his Father and of the holy angels. I tell you the truth, some who are standing here will not taste death before they see the kingdom of God.”
Luke 9 verses 23-27
