Rick & Val McGough both felt called into full-time ministry at an early age. When they were married in 1979 Rick was already serving as a youth pastor in Rockford, Illinois. Rick then felt called to pastor a church, believing that he was being led by the Lord to go to a community and stay for life, or at least for a long period of time. Rick & Val moved to Moline, Illinois in January of 1982 to pastor New Life Fellowship Assembly of God church. They pastored the church in Moline for 34 years until January of 2016 and Rick served as a Presbyter in Illinois District of the Assemblies of God for approximately 8 of those years. During those 34 years of pastoring Rick saw the tremendous need for believers of all ages, especially young people, to know why they believe what they believe, as they live in a culture that has been growing increasingly hostile to the Christian faith. Seeing this great need created a burden in Rick’s heart to learn apologetic materials and respond to the need within the body of Christ. That burden grew to the point that Rick began to sense that God was calling him to step down from pastoring in order to spend the remainder of his life pursuing a ministry in apologetics. In January of 2015 New Life Fellowship voted to accept a transition plan that designated 2015 as Rick’s last year as Senior/Lead Pastor of the church and January of 2016 as the moment that long time Associate Pastor, Brad Swartout would become the next pastor of the church. Rick & Val are now moving forward in faith into a ministry they believe the Lord has called them to in apologetics.