ABOUT THE SCHOLTZ'S When he's not riding a bucking bronc, repairing a saddle or shoeing a horse, the Rev. Paul Scholtz is ministering to cowboys.  Better known to some as "Preacher Paul", this cowboy, who wears a bandana instead of a collar, is an ordained minister who uses his lariat to rope in his flock.  Behind the chutes at a rodeo seems an unlikely place for a preacher, but he is far from the typical pastor, Scholtz is a missionary-evangelist to the cowboy community.  He climbs atop stock chutes to pray with a cowboy before a ride or tells a small group of riders about God's love at a restaurant after the rodeo.  He leads Sunday morning services in rodeo arenas and counsels cowboys in his office - two lawn chairs parked near the family's trailer.  Wherever there's a rodeo, the cowboy preacher and his wife, Linda are there.  Their 36 -foot gooseneck trailer with living quarters and horse stalls is the back, serves as home, counseling center, ministerial office, and a place for bruised cowboys to heal.       "The only exposure most cowboys have to ministers is on the radio and TV," he said.  "We're trying to make Jesus Christ relevant for them".  Whenever possible they hold services at the rodeos, but Mr. Scholtz is the first to admit that he wasn't always a religious man.  As a youngster he learned at night to rodeo in pastures by painting horses with turpentine to make them buck.  "You make a lot of bad habits and bad enemies doing that," he said.  "I was a pretty rotten character.  I had stolen slugs of stuff and had a porno library."  One evening he went to a revival as a favor to a friend who could win prizes for every guest he brought.  "But when I came, I thought, "Who told that preacher about me?"  he said.  "I became a Christian that night.  I gave up any ideas of being a rodeo cowboy because it was a dark black sin".      Paul and Linda are part of a small but growing group of rodeo ministers.  “Working among rodeo people is not a conventional ministry, but it’s never boring.  We consider ministry as outreach work to acquaint folks with the gospel.  Cowboys and cowgirls get saved the same way regular folks do, but our services do have a Western flavor to them.”     During these services, Linda plays the guitar and sings, and Christian cowboys are asked to share their testimonies.  Paul preaches and gives an invitation to kneel at the altar.       Mr. Scholtz spent three years at college and a year in Vietnam before enrolling in Central Bible College in Springfield, Mo., in 1972-76.  There he met Linda, a rancher's daughter, at the college.  College officials didn't warm to the idea of a minister, who spent his time with the cowboys.  Hollywood had stereotyped the cowboy as a drinking, stealing womanizer - much different from their idea of a Christian.  "They were in culture shock when I arrived," he said.  "I'm not your normal every day Bible student.  I don't wear a suit and horn-rimmed glasses and I showed up with a gunny sack for a suitcase, and my saddle."      And Scholtz had a way of being a burr under the college dean's saddle.  Scholtz had horses on the football field, hung his saddle on the third floor of the dorm, and his preaching illustrations definitely reflected the cowboy culture.  The college was located across from a rodeo arena, where he and his wife occasionally talked to the cowboys about Christ and gave them Bible tracts.  One day, while helping a stock contractor, Scholtz was asked to conduct a funeral for a horse.  One of the contractor's favorite horses had bucked off a rider, run into a fence and killed itself.  The contractor couldn't bear to see his horse sent to a rendering plant and wanted to bury it with a funeral, and a cowboy congregation.       While most clergy would have sidestepped that request, Scholtz saw it as a chance to minister to the cowboys.  During the sermon, he talked about death, faith, and the need to prepare for heaven.  Scholtz was called into the college dean's office after the funeral, but instead of chewing him out, the dean said maybe they had overlooked rodeo as a ministry field.       A couple weeks later, another stock contractor asked Scholtz if he and his wife would accompany him as rodeo chaplains.  "We said we'd go until we starved out," said Scholtz.  That was 25 years ago.  "We're not getting rich, but we love what we're doing," The Scholtz's are supported by churches and by working the rodeos.  Paul is also a pick-up man, horseshoer, and saddle maker.       Linda is an integral part of this ministry team as well.  Linda’s trick riding has given her many opportunities to minister to others.  She was even selected to participate in the 52nd Presidential Inaugural Parade in Washington D.C., in 1992, where she and two other women comprising the All-American Trick Riders presented the largest flag in the world ever carried on horseback.      Linda many times conducts a puppet ministry with plenty of singing and action for the rodeo children ages 4-12 while Paul is preaching to the adults.       They are also very involved in helping put on several Rodeo Bible Camps sponsored by the Fellowship of Christian Cowboys across the country.      Numbers of cowboys and their family members have committed their lives to Christ every year.  Many of the cowboys and cowgirls participating in the National Finals Rodeo in Las Vegas last year, were born-again Christians, Scholtz said.      As they tour the circuit, preaching to and praying with the cowboys, Scholtz works to help them look beyond the rodeo years - those times when they will be "too old to ride broncs or are too busted up to bulldog steers."