Stories of Faith

The year was 1997 and Ron had an upper-management position with one of the most prestigious Tulsa-based companies in this region of the country.

The happy couple were empty-nesters, with their children grown up and out of the house, and retirement on the horizon in the next decade. Their plan was set.

However, that plan wasn’t God’s plan.

At age 51 and the Vice President of Sales for QuikTrip Corporation, Ron and Cynthia were heading into the most crucial years of retirement gaining when their local church pastor gave Ron a book to read titled, “The Second Half”.

The book spoke to Ron with a clear message … “no matter what you have been doing in your life, whatever you have accomplished, there is still a second half and you could use that second half for betterment.”

In Ron’s case it was simple, it meant working for the Lord. He had accepted Jesus Christ as his Lord and Savior at the young age of 8, but his Christian walk was far from normal.

“It happened in Bristow when I was staying with my grandparents,” Ron said. “I stayed with them off and on and a lot in the summer time. My granddad was a Christian, but my grandmother was not. My granddad would go to church every Sunday and Wednesday, so when I was with them, I had the choice to either go to church with him or go to the movie theatre with my grandmother. I spent more time with him at the church.

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“We were at a revival at a park in Bristow and God was clearly calling me to be His child. I remember it very well. I remember the change in my heart and in my feelings. I was now God’s son.”

When he was a boy, Ron and his family lived near Tulsa. His father worked for a company called Standard Magnesium, which melted strips of magnesium in a big pot, dipped and poured it into mold. When Ron was 12, his dad was working with one of those pots when it exploded and covered his entire upper body in hot magnesium, including his eyes, which permanently blinded him.

“The first year after that happened, he just sat around and moped and felt sorry for himself,” Ron said. “Then all of the sudden he just came to life and from that point forward he did anything and everything. He overhauled a car and he wired a house for a friend. Best of all, he found the Lord shortly after he made the decision to change his life.”

Following the accident, Ron’s family moved to the Wewoka, Oklahoma area where his parents purchased and owned a small grocery store. Despite his handicap, Ron’s father had a business-oriented mind and was able to lead in the operations and decision for the store along with his mom.

Ron worked at the grocery store for several years until he graduated from high school. He decided to join the National Guard and the day after graduation he left for active duty for six months. Following active duty, Ron was back in Oklahoma looking for work, when he met Cynthia. Six months later, the young couple decided to tie the knot in June of 1964, both at the age of 18.

“When we were first married, we struggled to find a church,” Ron said. “We didn’t find one for a while and for the first couple of years, I wasn’t walking very close with the Lord. Cynthia was, but I wasn’t. I had started working at QuikTrip in April of 1964, which moved us to Tulsa. For the first five years, I worked in the stores, but was then moved up to Supervisory Personnel Manager and into upper-management.”

Ron and Cynthia Males have always lived in Oklahoma since they have been married except for the seven years from 1974-1981. QuikTrip was starting a division in Iowa and asked Ron to lead the charge. It was during their time in Iowa where the couple started to rely more on each other and were able to find a church.

They moved back to Tulsa in 1981 where Ron began overseeing the Oklahoma Division. After they moved back, friends they knew from QuikTrip invited them to come try First Baptist Jenks. After attending several Sundays, they decided to become members. The church was going through an interim period and they had just voted to hire a new pastor on the day they joined.

For the next 16 years, Ron and Cynthia developed deep-rooted relationships and got plugged in at FBC Jenks. Then, Ron heard God’s calling again.

“I was 51, had a great position in a great company that I had been with for 33 years, but God was telling me there was something else. We struggled with it for six months, but it just became more apparent that I was supposed to retire and go work for our church.”

Ron had many conversations with Cynthia and Glenn Plum, who was the lead pastor at that time for FBC Jenks. Pastor Glenn encouraged Ron to think about what he really wanted to do and told him he felt there was a need for him in the church.

Ron’s response to Pastor Glenn was short and simple … “I told him I don’t care what it is, I just know I’m supposed to be here and supposed to be available.”