Overseer J. Troy Blackwell, a native of Reidsville, North Carolina, now resides in Providence, North Carolina. In 1991, he was licensed by the Oak Grove Missionary Baptist Church in Suffolk, VA under the Leadership of Dr. Anthony Copeland. He was ordained by the Sharon Baptist Association and its allied bodies of Southeastern Virginia in June 1996. Formerly, he served as Pastor of the Lebanon Grove Baptist Church in Gatesville, North Carolina. After 21 years of active service, Overseer Blackwell retired from the United States Navy in August of 2002. He completed his undergraduate studies at St. Leo University. There, he earned a Bachelor of Arts degree, in Religious Studies, with a minor in Sociology.

He is both Kingdom and civic minded, having served as Co-chairman of a Family Life Conference in Hampton, Virginia. This was done in partnership with Gethsemane Baptist Church of Newport News, Virginia. Overseer Blackwell is a former member of the Hampton University Minister’s Conference and a lifetime member of the Nansemond/Suffolk NAACP. Currently, he’s a member of the Caswell County Branch of the North Carolina NAACP in Yanceyville, NC.

The final twelve years of his military career afforded him tremendous ministry opportunities to preach and teach in diverse situations to diverse individuals. He was a catalyst among his peers; organizing and developing ministries on board ships and within shore facilities to share the gospel of Jesus Christ. As a vessel of The Lord, God allowed him to preach, teach and evangelize on four different continents. Likewise, he shared pastoral and preaching responsibilities with assigned Navy chaplains in La Maddelena, Italy. While there, he preached alternately at the 11:00am Protestant chapel service. Through this assignment, he founded the Friday Night Gospel Fellowship – an interdenominational, interracial, intercultural fellowship.
Faithful to his calling as shepherd and leader, in 2002, he founded Freedom for Living Ministries, Inc., Providence, North Carolina, where he served as Senior Pastor for 14 years until being installed as the Senior Pastor of Cedar Grove Tabernacle of Praise, Greensboro, North Carolina on July 31, 2016, where in October of the same year, both churches were merged into one.

For six years, he served as the State Director and West Central District Director of Christian Education for the Full Gospel Baptist Church Fellowship International of North Carolina and in 2014, he was appointed as the District Overseer of the North Carolina Central District.

For the past eight years as Senior Pastor of Cedar Grove Tabernacle of Praise, Overseer Blackwell has led in establishing and carrying out the vision to grow the ministry in three key areas: Spiritually, Financially and Materially. The fruit of this vision has been the restructuring of the discipleship process by implementing a revised New Disciples Orientation Course, the establishment of the monthly Kingdom Empowerment Leadership Training (KELT) class for all clergy and auxiliary ministry team leaders, and the introduction of a debt-free strategy to pay off the church’s mortgage in five years. The result of these efforts has allowed the church to experience tremendous spiritual, numerical and financial growth, while simultaneously reaching the goal of becoming debt-free in five years. In addition to the tremendous growth in the aforementioned areas, the church has inherited 38 acres of land from Freedom for Living Ministries due to the merger of the two churches; land that Overseer Blackwell has plans to lead Cedar Grove in developing.

Over his 28 years in the Pastorate, Overseer Blackwell has continued to embody and embrace the motto “every member is a minister.” He has always maintained the fundamental belief that “God is a God of relationships” and that “we all need each other in this world because God will do little or nothing to us, for us or through us that doesn’t involve the use of someone else.”

His partner in marriage and ministry is Kimberly Wilson Blackwell, formerly of Danville, Virginia. They have been blessed with two gifted and wonderful children – Joshua (30) and Bethany (23)