Founders | Chad and Monica Fisher
Letters from the Founders
“If you know me - you know I’m passionate about seeing lost people saved, broken people restored, and hurt people healed.
As a little boy, I endured the hell of sexual abuse at the hands of an extended family member. For many years it caused me to battle feelings of worthlessness and being alone.
But in 2006, Jesus saved my life. But He did more than that - He healed my broken heart and freed me from the shame of the abuse. Reality is, I’ve been preaching almost since the day I was saved. As an adult I’ve told my story of being healed from the abuse. And what’s been the biggest shock of my life is the reality that I’m not alone. Literally, around the world, in churches near and far, I’ve encountered people who are survivors of terrible childhood trauma.
Many years ago, there was a dream birthed in my heart that God would allow me to be what I wished I had had, in a different season of life. I’ve dreamed of the day I could speak into little boys and girls like me - tell them that they aren’t alone - and introduce them to a God who can heal their broken heart.
Restore the Wonder Ministries is the fruition of that dream. My wife, Monica and myself, along with our three daughters are giving our lives and finances to see wonder restored to broken hearted children.”
- Chad Fisher
“I know the love of Jesus is life changing and can heal the deepest of hurts. James 1:27 says, “Pure and genuine religion in the sight of God the Father means caring for orphans and widows in their distress and refusing to let the world corrupt you.” Our goal for camp is to give one on one intentional attention to every camper. We want them to feel the love of Jesus through us and to know that they are seen, known, and loved.”
-Monica Fisher
In the early 90’s, we heard a speaker at a convention make a statement that has shaped our lives and our family’s journey. He simply said, “Believe in other people, more than they believe in themselves, until they believe in themselves more.” I feel like one of the main reasons that statement hit me so hard was because I saw that firsthand when I was 15 years old. My parents divorced when I was 6 and I lived with my mother until I was 14. We moved a lot as she switched jobs. Changing schools made it hard to have any deep friendships. I spent the summer after I turned 14 with my father. At the end of the summer, my belongings were shipped to Missouri and that ended any contact I had with my mother. After three short months in Missouri, my father and stepmother decided I was no longer welcome in their home, and I was placed in foster care with amazing and loving foster parents. They truly showed me that they believed in me way more than I believed in myself.
A couple years later at a similar convention, Sharon and I gave our hearts to the Lord and started pursuing what He had for us. A dream was birthed to host summer camps for children in foster care, but the realities of life and the sands of time buried that dream within us. In place of that dream, we began serving the youth ministry at our church, and have done so now for over 25 years. We believe in the next generation, and this seemed the ideal place to serve and help students discover their God given talents and destiny.
In 2016, we met Pastor Chad and Monica Fisher. They shared heartwarming stories about a summer camp they served at in Texas and cast vision about hosting a similar camp in Missouri. What Sharon and I thought was dead, sprang back to life. Sharon came from a family where physical and verbal abuse was an everyday occurrence disguised as discipline. I came from a story of abandonment that was saved by the love, generosity, and grace of a foster family. Together we understand the challenges children face when their stories of abuse, abandonment, and neglect force these precious children into the arms of social services and foster care. Our desire is to help foster an environment where these children not only realize that they are loved, valued, seen, and cherished, but also that they can come to know there is a God in Heaven that loves them and can help put the broken pieces of their life back together.
Working together with Pastor Chad and Monica, Restore the Wonder Ministries is a labor of love and the progressive realization of a lifetime dream.
- Phil and Sharon Wellin