Robert "Charles" Sheppard

Thirty-year Abilene resident Robert “Charles” Sheppard died of heart failure on October 20, 2022, in San Antonio, Texas. He was 91. A celebration of his life will be held at the Boerne church of Christ in Boerne, Texas, on December 10, 2022, at 1 PM.

Charles was born in Houston, Texas, on July 3, 1931, the eldest son of Henry Cecil “Bunk” Sheppard and Margie Anne Melton. He graduated from Houston’s Milby High School in 1949, having been a three-year two-sport athlete, a senior class officer, and a two-time member of the All-State chorus as a bass. On his first day at Abilene Christian College (ACC), Charles was introduced to Bonnie Jean Carman. They married on January 25, 1951. Charles worked seven days a week while attending classes at both ACC and Hardin-Simmons University and was awarded a BBA in January 1953.

Upon his graduation, Charles moved with his family to Lake Jackson, Texas, to begin his career with the Dow Chemical Company. During the next twelve years, Charles was employed by Dow’s Chemical Engineering Department and worked his way into middle management. He actively served the Lake Jackson church of Christ as a Gospel song leader, teacher, and deacon assigned to missions. During this period, Charles was one of seven deacons who, along with minister Stanley Shipp, felt God’s call to serve as missionaries in foreign lands.

In 1965, Charles resigned from Dow and moved his family of six to the Philippine Islands, where he began his service as a teacher and administrator at Zamboanga Bible College. There he was instrumental in the training and mentoring of dozens of men who continue to this day to teach and preach the Gospel. Family circumstances required the Sheppards to return to the U.S. in 1968, but Charles continued until his last days to champion and support the ministry of the Gospel in the Philippines.

For a full year after returning from the Philippines to Lake Jackson, Charles sought full-time employment while supporting his family with funds drawn from savings, weekend preaching stipends, and a few real-estate sales commissions. In August 1969, Charles landed a position with the Diamond Shamrock Corporation in Deer Park. When he left Diamond after two years, Charles retained the Meador-Brady personnel firm to assist him in finding another position. They offered him the opportunity to build for them a division that would supply temporary employees. He accepted the offer and, over the next ten years, built Top Talent Temporaries from an idea to a firm employing over 10,000 in five states. During this time, Charles served as an unpaid minister of evangelism at the Central church of Christ in Pasadena and did some weekend preaching in Houston-area churches.

In 1981, Charles left his position as Meador-Brady corporate vice president to enter full-time church work, assuming the position of Minister of Evangelism with the Memorial church of Christ in Houston. After four years with the Memorial church, the elders of the Heights church of Christ asked Charles to become their pulpit minister and to take on the challenge of leading its renewal.

After a nation-wide search, the President of Abilene Christian University recruited Charles in 1988 to work for ACU’s College of Biblical Studies as the Director of Academic Development. In this capacity, Charles endeavored to increase endowments for the College and to raise funds for student scholarships and special missions projects, bringing in several million dollars each year until his retirement in 1996.

For nearly thirty years, Charles was privileged to serve with the shepherds of three congregations. He served on the board for Christian Service Center in Abilene, was a ten-year member of the ACU Alumni Board, and for many years made weekly visits to an Abilene-area prison to teach Bible. He attended missions workshops in southeast Asia, Mexico, and Central and South America, often contributing lectures or conducting the singing. A cappella Gospel music was a passion of Charles’s, and his favorite song was “Above the Bright Blue.”

In his leisure time, Charles enjoyed fishing, collecting coins and clocks, frequenting estate sales and auctions, maintaining an immaculate and colorful yard, and singing with the ACU Alumni Chorus. He and Bonnie participated with other family members in the annual Red River Family Encampment many times and sailed together on several cruises.

Charles was predeceased by his parents; his brother and sister-in-law, Gene and Doris Sheppard; his brother-in-law Chuck Cobb; and his son, Bob Sheppard.

He is survived by his beloved wife of 71 years, Bonnie Sheppard; children Greg and wife Karen, Brenda and husband Duane O’Banion, and Larry; nine grandchildren and seventeen great-grandchildren; sister June Cobb; brother and sister-in-law Hank and Ruby Sheppard; and numerous nieces and nephews.

Charles’s remains were cremated by Neptune Society. Burial of the cremains will be made at a later date.

In lieu of flowers, the family suggests that donations be made in his honor to Project Philippines through the Southwest church of Christ in Amarillo, https://my.southwest.org/give?