'THE HIGHLIGHT OF MY LIFE': Montoyas celebrate 50th anniversary as pastors of Sinai Pentecostal Church

When Sam Montoya arrived in San Marcos, he was just 21 years old. A fresh face in the community as the new pastor of Sinai Pentecostal Church. 

That was in 1971. Now, Montoya — the longest serving pastor in the city — will celebrate his 50th anniversary as a pastor on Sunday. 

“To me, serving Sinai Pentecostal Church is the highlight of my life,” Montoya said. “Serving God, and the people.” 

Montoya, 71, always knew he wanted to be a pastor. In fact, he comes from a family of ministers. His parents were both pastors of their own church in Austin. Between his eight siblings, five of them have become ordained ministers themselves. 

“I’ve been raised in church but at the age of 17 that’s when I had an experience. I really had what I call a spiritual experience with the Lord,” Montoya said. “And this is what I wanted to do.” 

Montoya attended seminary in the Rio Grande Valley. And when he was asked if he wanted to become the pastor of Sinai Pentecostal Church located at 208 Laredo Street in San Marcos in his early 20s, he jumped at the opportunity. It was close to his parents in Austin. 

“It was a little church,” Montoya said. “And we’ve just been growing here. We’ve been in this neighborhood all this time. The good thing about this church, it serves not only our congregation but we serve neighborhood meetings, election voting site, and for years it was a food bank distribution site.”

It’s in serving that Montoya says he finds joy. He’s helped with community organizations, including Community Action, Southside Community Center, American Red Cross and the Hays County Food Bank. Montoya describes himself as a people person. He enjoys visiting those in the hospital and nursing homes, although the pandemic has hampered his ability to do his usual visits. 

Montoya has opened his church to be used by the Mexican Consulate to allow Mexicans living in the area with needed services such as issuance of Mexican passports, Consular IDs, Mexican voter IDs, legal services and free health screenings.

When Hurricane Rita slammed the Gulf Coast in 2005, Montoya and Sinai Pentecostal Church opened their doors to those needing shelter. 

“We just opened it up and people would come in and sleep here in the pews,” Montoya said. “There were a lot of people. The ladies of the church were cooking meals for them.

“It’s always been a community,” Montoya added. “That’s what we’ve tried to strive for.” 

Reflecting on his 50 year anniversary, Montoya says he has too many memories to share — many good and others of his early time with the church. But Montoya’s wife, Melba, who has also been at Sinai for 50 years and serves as a pastor as well, said it’s always been fun to serve the community with Sam. 

“With him it’s never boring,” Melba Montoya said. “When we’re working here in San Marcos, we always have something to do and get people involved. When we go to other countries, it’s the same thing. He gets people involved. He gets them work. He gets them doing stuff. It’s a fun thing. It’s always been fun with him.”

As the longest serving pastor in San Marcos, Mark Carrillo recognizes Sam Montoya as a “pastor of pastors.”

“I know a lot of pastors invest their time in him for counsel and wisdom,” said Carrillo, a member of the pastoral staff at Sinai Pentecostal and an ordained minster. “He’s only pastored this church for 50 years so that's very hard, especially in the pastoral community, to come by. This is obviously a divine, we believe, appointment from God that he’s been here that long at one church. That’s a blessing for us.”

With the 50th anniversary coming Sunday, the City of San Marcos issued a proclamation calling March 7, “Sam and Melba Montoya Day.” Sinai Pentecostal Church will have two services Sunday honoring the Montoyas — 8:30 a.m. in Spanish and 10:30 a.m. in English. Both services will be limited in capacity because of the pandemic. 

Sam Montoya said God has been good to him over the last 50 years of pastoring. He’s grateful for the community who’s supported him and Melba throughout their journey in San Marcos. 

“I’m so thankful,” Montoya said. “From the city council to every nonprofit organization to the ministers of the city and especially to this congregation. They should be the ones to come out in the paper, not me. They should be the ones. I feel because they have taken care of us from day one. I tell the people, ‘y’all raised us. We were kids. We were children.’ I made a lot of mistakes in my beginning years and they were so patient with me. They were so patient with me and so I’m thankful to this church.”