Within a few months God allowed him to win a young man who was in the neighborhood to Christ. Soul-winning soon became his favorite activity, within a year of getting saved, he became a 15-year-old bus captain, bringing children, teens and adults to church each Sunday. Having heard some great preaching by some of the greats like John R. Rice, Jack Hyles, Jim Vineyard and Lester Rolloff he felt the call of God on his life to spend the rest of his days reaching people with the Gospel of Jesus Christ.
Still a teenager he enrolled in Bible College under the leadership of Dr. Jack Hyles, Dr. Wendell Evans, Melvin Meister, Maurice Paulson, Carl Laurent and other great soul-winners. Within 1 year of enrolling Dr. Ray Young made him a bus captain in the greater Chicago area. Though still a teenager he built the route he was given from 12 to a high day of 217. There are dozens of riders from those days who still attend and are actively involved in independent Baptist Churches, some of which serve God to this day as full-time Christian servants.
In 1981 he married the girl of his dreams and they have been blessed by God with 3 children who are now adults who faithfully attend Independent Baptist churches in their respective cities.
Early in the 1980’s having completed his college training he became a Bus Director and Youth Pastor in southern Minnesota. He taught Bible and Physical Education in the Christian School. In 1985 he felt God’s call to start a church in far northern Minnesota. The following year he yielded to that call and took his wife and his two small children to Moorhead, Minnesota to start a church because of God’s call. For 17 years he labored to do what pastors in that part of the country call “carving a church out of granite.” This eludes to the difficulty of starting a New Testament Local Church in the north amongst the Norwegian Lutheran culture. Snow cover can start as early as September and remain until April. The church started in a rented office space which cost $175 per month, by the time he left that church, they owned 4 acres, 18,000 ft2 of buildings, 2 buses and a van appraised at nearly $300,000. As of this day that church started in September of 1986 still believes the King James Bible is the Word of God and stands for soul-winning and separation.
Over the years Rick had to make some “tents;” (Acts 18:1-3.) He has worked on a 5,000-acre farm as a harvester operator, held an ASE Master Technician Certificate and also earned a Commercial, multi – engine, Instrument rated pilot’s license and has logged 1,000+ hours of flight time. He started and ran retail stores in 3 different states with over 20 employees.
In 2003 while on vacation with his wife, he attended the church pastored by Dr. Jeff Owens in the Washington D.C. area. As Rick and his wife left a Wednesday night service, they turned to each other and agreed that God was leading them to leave the ministry God allowed them to birth in northern Minnesota and move to the Washington D.C area to work with Dr. Owens. Once the decision to move was made, it took 6 months to set things in order back in Minnesota, but the Young family, packed up and moved from northern Minnesota to the East Coast to be part of that ministry.
Dr. Jeff Owens hired Rick to be an assistant pastor and to teach in the Christian school. He taught multiple classes and various grades for Dr. Owens over the years; 5th grade, 6th grade, Jr. High and Sr. High courses. Bible, Geography, English, Math, Economics, Physics and Computer courses were all part of that decade of his life spent in the shadow of Washington D.C. While there he started two adult Sunday school classes, oversaw the Men’s ministry which had activities for men with attendances that surpassed the 200 mark. He organized a prayer breakfast which met every Saturday for nearly 10 years. He served the church as the General Contractor for a new 3-story educational building that was approximately 25,000 ft2. In 2011, he was asked to serve as C.F.O. and organize the financial office which had an annual budget of over 2.5 million dollars.
In 2013 he moved to North Carolina to once again work with Dr. Jeff Owens at the Twin Rivers Baptist Church. God blessed in an amazing way and the church began to grow; numerically, financially and spiritually. Dr. Owens asked Rick to start an adult Sunday school class and to serve as the C.F.O. in the financial office of the church. The auditorium was overflowing so Dr. Owens asked him to start a children’s church ministry. There was no room anywhere for the children’s church so it was agreed it would begin on a bus, now that ministry has its own rooms to meet in and has grown to an attendance of over 100 children and 40 workers. In 2018 God lead Dr. Owens to start the Practical Bible Baptist College, he asked Rick to become the Vice President in addition to his other duties.
Rick truly believes that to be used by God is the greatest thing that any person could ever be allowed to do. He loves to do the “work of the Lord!”