By Marv Knox

Carrie Jarrell-Tuning followed God’s prompting and Google’s pointing to become the Cooperative Baptist Fellowship’s first Black female church starter.

She had been sensing God’s guidance to leave the staff of Mount Zion Baptist Church in Triangle, Va., and to start a congregation in her hometown, Roanoke Rapids, N.C.

“The Lord seemed to be saying, ‘Go home to Roanoke Rapids and start a church,’” Tuning recalled. “I had not lived there in 40 years, and I didn’t really want to leave Mount Zion. But we don’t pick our assignments; God does.

“So, I was trying to show the Lord I would be obedient to the call he had on my life. I was saying, ‘Lord, show me what you want me to do.’ I Googled something about church starting and Roanoke Rapids, and the first thing that came up said CBF was looking to start a church in that area.”

She sent an email to Andy Hale, CBF’s church-starting director at the time. Soon, she joined a new church-starting cohort, which led to her commissioning at the CBF General Assembly in Greensboro, N.C., in the summer of 2016.

Although Tuning’s path to church starting pivoted on a single search-engine click, it began decades earlier and included several other “firsts.”

She was born and raised in Roanoke Rapids, where she graduated from high school in 1976. “I was influenced by my father, who was a Navy veteran, about how noble it is to serve our country,” she said, and she enlisted in the U.S. Army a year later.

“During my military career, I took college classes at night and sometimes during my lunch hour and on weekends at various military installations,” she recalled. Along the way, she became the first member of her family to earn multiple college degrees. Eventually, they included associate’s and bachelor’s degrees, two master’s degrees and a doctorate.

She also became the first African-American female warrant officer, or legal administrator, in the U.S. Army’s Judge Advocate General Corps. In that capacity, she won numerous military awards for innovation and efficiency.

Later, she became the first Black woman associate dean of the School of Business at Strayer University’s campus in Woodbridge, Va.

While still in the Army and working on her doctorate in education and business, Tuning heard from someone higher than Uncle Sam.

“It was during this time that God called me to preach, and in 1995, I delivered my initial sermon and was licensed to preach,” she said. She took time off from her doctoral studies to earn a Master of Divinity degree at Howard University School of Divinity and then went back to George Mason University to complete her doctorate.

“My military career helped mold me to become a better servant for the Lord,” she reflected. “It was as though God had placed me on a path and directed my footsteps to make it all come together for his good. I just tried to be obedient to my call and serve according to the gifts that he has provided and instilled in me.”

Tuning sharpened her ministry skills under the tutelage of Pastor Alfred Jones Jr. at Mount Zion Baptist Church.

“I worked closely with him and basically received hands-on training in aspects of ministry I didn’t encounter while in seminary,” she said. That included responsibilities for training and assimilating new members, coordinating baptisms, starting and operating jail and prison ministries, developing children’s church, providing spiritual guidance to the pastor’s aide and collaborating with the pastor as they built a new church facility.

“I was grateful for the opportunities afforded me and tried to accomplish any/all tasks which were required of me,” she said. “It is because of these opportunities that I developed the right skillsets and blossomed.”

Across 21 years on the Mount Zion Church staff, Tuning felt happy and secure, and she didn’t necessarily want to take the next step God seemed to be preparing for her.

“When God called me to become a pastor, I was reluctant,” she recalled. “To be honest, I didn’t even want to be ordained. I saw what my pastor went through. I didn’t want to do these things. But the Lord would have his way.

“Still, when God told me to go to Roanoke Rapids and start a church, I was kind of reluctant because in the back of my mind, I never saw women being pastors. I thought, ‘Lord, am I hearing you correctly?’”

Her online search and subsequent call to CBF paved the path to which God seemed to be directing. It all started with CBF’s church-starting program, which provided her new church money for three years and offered plenty of other support.

“CBF was very instrumental in helping me,” she said. “They provided coaching, peer cohorts and other encouragement. They provided a pathway forward.”

CBF’s unconditional affirmation of her as a woman pastor also made a huge difference in her ministry, she added. “Had I stayed at my current location in Virginia, I probably would not have been afforded an opportunity (to start a church) because of the area I was in. Even though my pastor accepted me, my going out and getting a church was highly unlikely.

“As a divorced woman in ministry with two adult children, many times, I was not accepted. I felt isolated and unwelcomed. There were times that I would go and support my pastor at other churches and was not allowed to even go in the pastor’s study, not to mention the pulpit.”

Working with CBF, Tuning’s “highly unlikely” opportunity to start a church turned to reality.

“This (rejection) all changed when I became a part of CBF,” she explained. “I felt welcomed — a sense of belonging — and they took the call on my life seriously. I feel so honored and blessed to be a part of CBF because I believe this is the way heaven will look — people from all walks of life fellowshipping and worshiping God together in spirit and in truth.”

From her commissioning in the summer of 2016 and a six-month ramping-up period, HOPE Christian Fellowship Baptist Church held its first worship service in a rented hotel room Jan. 15, 2017.

Looking back, Tuning sees clearly how God led her to launch HOPE Church.

“It started from my meager beginnings,” she explained. “I would come back here every quarter to put flowers on my parents’ and loved ones’ graves. And I would see the degradation of the community … like people living in a camper with no running water or electricity. It hurt my heart, and I felt I had to reach out to those who are hurting, who are in need.”

She felt God gave her the name for the congregation, HOPE (Helping Others Prepare for Eternity) Christian Fellowship Church, with a later addition. “People said they didn’t want to be involved in a cult,” she recounted. “So, I put ‘Baptist’ in the name, because we’re not a cult and because I believe in Baptist doctrines.”

Whatever its full name, the church has been “trying to show love and compassion” to folks desperately in need of kindness, she explained.

“A lot of people who attend our church feel they don’t fit in with some churches because of the way they dress or where they live,” she said. “But they can feel comfortable in our church because of the love we exemplify.”

Sometimes, HOPE Church has been a gateway to other congregations, Tuning conceded.

“Once they got to feeling good about themselves and got tired of attending church in a hotel room, they would leave and go to the churches they had longed to belong to,” she said. “So, I felt a bit down. Then I talked to the Lord and realized these people don’t belong to me; they belong to the Lord. Maybe God used me to plant a seed, and then they went somewhere else to be watered and to blossom.”

After three years meeting in a hotel room, the location of the church suddenly didn’t matter. Covid struck, and gathering in person became impossible. For Tuning and HOPE Church, that was less of an obstacle that it was for other congregations.

“I was already leading Bible study by way of a conference call,” she said. “A lot of people in this area don’t have Internet, and so we found conference calls provided a way for everybody to be connected and made participating easy for seniors who aren’t tech-savvy.

“So, when Covid started, we already knew how to stay connected. In fact, some pastors were calling me, asking how we conducted church remotely. Plus — here’s the good news — Covid actually saved us money, because we didn’t have to rent a hotel room every week.”

On top of that, HOPE Church expanded its reach. Because a shared location became unnecessary and remote connection became possible, some people participate in the congregation from across the United States, she said.

The time away from in-person worship and the financial savings made possible by not leasing worship space eventually benefitted the church, she added. In September 2022, the congregation bought a building that previously was used as a church and a small house, which is located on nine acres, and renovated it to become their current meeting space.

In addition to using the campus for worship and Bible study, the church has other plans for its new property. “We hope to start a community garden and a food pantry to feed people and give things to our neighbors,” Tuning said. “We have seesaws and horseshoes, and we plan to put up basketball goals. We want this to be a safe place for children to come.

“God has truly been good to us,” she stressed. After being refused a loan on another property, the opportunity to buy their current building and land came with far less red tape.

“The seller financed the church for us, and I give God all the glory and credit. Only he can do this,” she said. “God didn’t allow us to get the first church because he had something better for us.”

Making things better has been a theme throughout Tuning’s life. And her friends in Roanoke Rapids and in CBF insist that’s still true.

The pastor has demonstrated she is “a devoted and genuine Christian through her kindness,” reported David Medlin, a member of the congregation. “She shows acceptance and tolerance for all humankind. I truly feel blessed for having met her.”

To illustrate, Medlin added: “She also has shown my family and my 91-year-old mom … much love and a renewed faith and perseverance through the hard work she put into the church. Carrie has been a testament for God’s compassion to everyone through her actions and deeds.”

Tuning “was a strong leader before God called her into ministry,” added Dellar Burch, a HOPE Church member who lives in Mississippi but participates online and via conference call. Burch has known Tuning since Tuning was her teacher at Strayer University.

“Pastor Tuning’s father and her career as a JAG warrant officer in the Army … shaped her as a strong leader,” Burch said. “One of her quotes is, ‘When God gives you vision, he makes provision.’ She stands out among strong leaders and leads by example.”

By her involvement in CBF — particularly as a founding member of CBF’s Pan African Koinonia — Tuning has made the Fellowship stronger, noted Kasey Jones, CBF’s coordinator of outreach and growth.

Tuning is “the epitome of resilience, commitment and care,” Jones said. “During her tenure as pastor of HOPE Christian Fellowship, she has maintained the ministry while caring for sick family members, facing prejudice in her community and being the true presence of Christ by offering support to those hurting and lost in her community.

“Her vision to be a place of hope for those who are in need and offer a place ‘where everybody is somebody and Christ is in charge’ is powerful and inspirational.”

Tuning reciprocates those feelings, noting the Fellowship creates beautiful, powerful outreach through PAK.

“It’s a way of inviting other churches, people who look different and another ethnicity into CBF,” she said. “We come together and see we are all serving the same God. We may be different in delivery style, but we worship and praise the same God.

“It exemplifies what heaven will look like.”