Joe D. Schubert (1935–2004)

Dr. Joe David Schubert, well-known preacher in the Church of Christ for many years and Oklahoma native went to be with the Lord after a long battle with Parkinson's disease. He died at his home in Tahlequah.

Joe spent his childhood and teenage years in Davenport and Muskogee and graduating from Muskogee High School, he attended Abilene Christian University where he earned a bachelor's and master's degree of Bible in 1958. While in college, he was active in intercollegiate debate and represented Abilene Christian University in the national college debate tournament at West Point, N.Y. He also served as president of the Alpha Chi scholastic fraternity and Blue Key Men's Leadership Society. He received the Rockefeller Theological Fellowship to study one year at the Divinity School at Vanderbilt University in Nashville, Tenn. He went on to earn an Ed. D. from the University of Southern California at Los Angeles.

Dr. Schubert served as the pulpit minister for the San Fernando Church of Christ in San Fernando, Calif., and then returned to Oklahoma with his young family in 1966, serving as the pulpit minister for the Stillwater Church of Christ. He then became the Dean of Students at Oklahoma Christian College, while continuing to preach at churches in Oklahoma City. In 1969, Dr. Schubert moved to Jacksonville, Fla., with his family, where he served as pulpit minister of the San Jose Church of Christ until 1973. In 1973, he relocated to Houston, Texas, where he became the first pulpit minister for the Bammel Road Church of Christ in Houston, Texas, which at the time had less than 100 members. In 1983, upon his retirement from preaching, the Bammel Road Church had grown to over 1500 members. Among his many accomplishments, Dr. Schubert is recognized as leading the Bammel Road Church to become the first Church of Christ to contribute over $1 million in a single Sunday contribution in support of it's work at home and abroad.

Upon his retirement from full-time preaching in 1983, Dr. Schubert founded the Center for Church Growth in Houston, which continues to this day assisting Churches of Christ in reaching full growth potential. He later became Director of Development for the Vienna-, Austria, based Eastern European Mission, which printed and distributed bibles in the native languages of eastern European countries and the Soviet Union. In this capacity, Dr. Schubert made numerous mission related trips to eastern Europe and the Soviet Union. Eventually, his progressive Parkinson's disease brought him back to the family home in Tahlequah, where he lived with his parents until their deaths in 2000 and 2003, respectively. While in Tahlequah, he was an active member of the South College Church of Christ.