By Christina Rodriguez
Part One
In a packed church in Mexico City, thousands raise their hands in worship, the music pulsing with passion and purpose. At the helm stands a pastor from Toledo, Ohio, a man whose voice has crossed oceans, whose message has moved crowds, and whose story began in quiet corners of Midwestern faith and family. Bishop Michael Pitts, founder of Cornerstone Church and the Cornerstone Global Network, is not just a preacher, he is a spiritual architect whose calling has stretched far beyond what anyone, including himself, could have imagined.
A Spiritual Inheritance
For Bishop Pitts, faith wasn’t something he stumbled upon, it was embedded in his DNA. “Both sides of my family were always in church,” he recalls. “It wasn’t strange to hear someone praying around me. It was normal.”
His maternal grandmother played a pivotal role in shaping that view. She didn’t just talk about God, she showed him how to walk with Him. Meanwhile, his father’s miraculous healing from polio through the ministry of Oral Roberts confirmed, early on, that the supernatural was not only possible, but it was also part of the everyday fabric of faith.
But it wasn’t until age 14 that Pitts says he made his salvation his own. And at 16, everything changed. In what had felt like another ordinary church service, a powerful presence overwhelmed him. “I began to cry,” he says. “That was the moment I knew, this wasn’t just church. This was a calling.”
A Divine Partnership
Around the same time, he met a young woman named Kathi, who would become his wife and ministry partner. “Our first date was in Fort Wayne. We were broke, we got free chips and salsa,” he says with a smile. “But she started talking about God, leadership, and the Bible, and I fell in love with her that day.”
Kathi Pitts, who came from a free-spirited, mission-minded family, brought her own gifts to the table, especially in music. Together, they formed a ministry duo whose strength was in shared purpose and relentless pursuit of God’s will.
Cornerstone Church is Born
At 18, Pitts wrote two paragraphs about what the church he dreamed of would look like: a place where everyone belonged, where God’s power was real, and where broken people found healing. He didn’t know how it would happen, only that it must.
In 1986, without the backing of a denomination and with very little experience, Michael and Kathi launched Cornerstone Church in a small Toledo storefront at Douglas and Central. “Everything we owned was on one power switch, the sound system, lights, even the computer,” he laughs. “We were fortunate in our ignorance. I wouldn’t recommend it, but it worked.”
The early days were tough. The Pitts did it all, Michael played keys, Kathi sang, they preached, prayed, taught the children, and cleaned the building. But what they lacked in resources, they made up for in clarity of vision and spiritual grit.
The Church That Found Its Identity
After outgrowing their first location, they moved to Byrne Hill Plaza, where Cornerstone began to take shape–not just as a place of worship, but as a beacon for the broken. “We discovered we were called to the hurting,” Pitts says. “Race wasn’t a barrier. It was never going to be a white church, a Latino church, a Black church, it was going to be THE church.”
As the church expanded from storefront to plaza to Airport Highway and eventually to a massive campus in Maumee, the vision only deepened. With only three volunteers, Pitts and Kathi pastored a congregation that quickly swelled to thousands. They raised up leaders like Pastor David and Toni Banks, Pastor Jeff and Nicola Smith, and many others who helped carry the growing work forward.
One of their proudest expansions was on the East Side of Toledo, where an old adult theater was transformed into a Friday-night worship hub that drew hundreds. “That’s who we are,” he says. “We take broken places and fill them with hope.”
Called to Place, Called to Purpose
When asked why he never left Toledo, despite national and international invitations, Bishop Pitts offers a profound insight: “God is a God of place. Every person has a place where they can be great. I took ownership of this city because I knew God wanted me here. Cities should change because you’re there.”
Indeed, Toledo has changed because of his presence. From prison yards to packed-out stadiums, from single mothers to CEOs, Bishop Pitts has touched lives that most ministries never reach. And while Cornerstone’s physical buildings have changed, its mission remains the same: to reveal the Kingdom of God to anyone and everyone who walks through the doors.
Coming Next Week:
“Kingdom Without Borders: The Global Apostolic Reach of Bishop Michael Pitts”
Explore Bishop Pitts’ ministry across Latin America, the birth of Cornerstone Global Network, his books in Spanish, and his legacy as a spiritual father to pastors and churches around the world.