Press Release
Dr. Charles Ray Stewart (Carlos Rey)

	Charles Stewart has been involved in missions all his life. Born in Cuba to missionaries Verlin and Pauline Stewart (who later transferred to Colombia, South America), Charles received his elementary and secondary education in Bogotá, Colombia.
	Having felt the call to missions himself, Charles then served as interpreter on various Teen Witnessing trips to Mexico, received a Bachelor of Arts degree in Missions from Southwestern Assemblies of God University in Waxahachie, Texas, and served as a missionary evangelist in Colombia and Venezuela.
	Upon returning to the States, Rev. Stewart held several pastoral positions while pursuing a Bachelor of Arts degree in Spanish literature at the University of Houston and the University of Texas at Arlington, and a Master's degree in Latin American history at Southern Methodist University in Dallas. He then served another year's temporary missions appointment in Colombia, teaching in two Bible Schools and working as an evangelist.
	Charles' wife Linda was born and grew up in Houston, Texas. She received her Bachelor of Science degree in Elementary Education from East Texas State University and her Master of Education degree in Guidance and Counseling from Houston Baptist University.
	In 1981, Charles and Linda were appointed to serve as Assemblies of God missionaries to Colombia. In Bogotá, the capital, Rev. Stewart started and directed the National Department of Communications for the Colombian Assemblies of God, a city-wide inter-church choir that ministered in evangelistic concerts and on TV, served on the Executive Presbytery, and taught in the Central Bible School. As part of a team called Los mensajeros (The Messengers), Charles and Linda also ministered in Kids' Crusades and Camps, and participated once a year in taping Spanish Children's Television programs with STAR Ministries in Florida. During this time, Linda served as National Director of Child Evangelism.
	In 1985, at the request of the Division of Foreign Missions (DFM), Rev. Stewart assumed the position of Editorial Director of Life Publishers International (Vida Publishers). His responsibility was to oversee the publication of all Bibles, books, curriculum and evangelistic materials in Spanish, French and Portuguese.
	During his ten years at Vida (1985-95), Rev. Stewart managed the publication of the Thompson Chain‑Reference Bible (in Spanish, French and Portuguese), the Spanish Full Life (Pentecostal) Study Bible, the Minister's Bible in Spanish; the International Inductive Study Bible in Spanish; and the Book of Life/Hope, a harmonized chronology of the Gospels, that is, the life of Christ in one continuous narrative, in the world's major languages.
	The most time-consuming project Rev. Stewart was involved in during those years was the translation of the New International Version of the Bible (NIV) into Spanish. In 1987, the International Bible Society (IBS) asked him to serve as Coordinating Editor for the Spanish Nueva Versión Internacional (NVI). A preliminary edition of the New Testament was released in 1990, followed by an English/Spanish Parallel edition in 1991. He then served on a Bible Translation Committee made up of eighteen Bible translators and scholars representing a wide array of countries and evangelical denominations from Latin America, whose work resulted in the publication of the entire text of the Bible in 1999.
In 1995, Charles Ray Stewart was asked to serve as the broadcaster of the Spanish Radio and TV evangelistic program UN MENSAJE A LA CONCIENCIA® (A MESSAGE TO THE CONSCIENCE). Six days a week in more than 30 countries including Argentina, Bolivia, Chile, Colombia, Costa Rica, Dominican Republic, Ecuador, El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, Mexico, Nicaragua, Panama, Paraguay, Peru, Puerto Rico, Spain, Uruguay, and Venezuela it is broadcast 4,000 times per day and published in over 50 newspapers and magazines. To the Hispanic audience he is known as Carlos Rey.
The miracle is that the average yearly cost of the print media space and radio and tv time would be over $70 million, but it is all donated! The operational cost has been minimized to the extent that each dollar invested in this Hispanic Media Evangelism ministry has a value of $300. “The goal is not just to maintain what we already have, but to finish the task of evangelizing Latin America,” Charles concludes, “for there are over 250 million Latin Americans yet to reach!”
In 2005, Rev. Stewart earned a Ph.D. degree in Communication from Regent University.