The Secret Place of R. W. Schambach

Robert William Schambach was born on April 3, 1926 in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, to Harry Ellsworth and Ann Moyer Schambach. He grew up in a working family that knew long hours and little ease, and as a boy he learned the worth of prayer and the Word in ordinary life. As a young man he served in the United States Navy during the Second World War, a season that sobered him and sharpened his sense that only the power of God can steady a human heart in the face of death. After the war he sought Bible training and entered full time ministry, carrying a burden for street level evangelism and for the great tent meetings that were stirring faith across America.

His public ministry took shape under an older evangelist who would mark him for life. In the late nineteen fifties he apprenticed with A. A. Allen, serving on the crusade team and learning how to carry a big Gospel into broken places without trimming it down to polite religion. Those years on the road became a school of faith and a school of prayer. Under the canvas he learned to pray through until the atmosphere changed, to preach Christ with unashamed boldness, and to minister to the poor with compassion. When he launched out on his own he carried the same burdensome joy into cities and small towns, lifting a voice that could fill a tent and reach a weary heart at the back row.

Through the decades he became known across America for soul winning crusades and for the sound of his voice on radio. His program, first known as Voice of Power and later carried in television formats, brought the Gospel in simple language and strong mercy. He settled his base in Texas, raised a family with his wife Mary, and kept the road hot with meetings that combined altar calls, prayer for the sick, and a practical invitation to follow Jesus with all the heart. When he went to be with the Lord on January 17, 2012 in Tyler, Texas, he left behind not a monument of stone but a trail of changed lives and a ministry that continued through the work of his family and foundation.