Christ. Ordination and consecration In 1963, Ellis was ordained by Bishop Ozro Thurston Jones, Sr. of the Church of God in Christ; he was elevated to the episcopacy in 1970 by Bishop Brumfield Johnson of the United Holy Church of America. In the Church of God in Christ, Ellis organized the Adjutant's Corp. He served as the third Chief Adjutant of the National Adjutancy of the Church of God in Christ. In 1989, Ellis was asked to lead a Oneness Pentecostal congregation outside of the Church of God in Christ. He determined Oneness Pentecostalism and Trinitarianism weren't entirely different conceptions, yet rejected distinctions between the persons of the Trinity. He came to believe there was no scriptural support for the doctrine of Trinitarian Christianity. Ellis soon after founded the United Pentecostal Churches of Christ (now the United Covenant Churches of Christ). Joint College of Bishops During his tenure as presiding prelate of the United Pentecostal Churches of Christ, he co-founded the Joint College of African-American Pentecostal Bishops. The Joint College of African-American Pentecostal Bishops (JCAAPB), more commonly the Joint College of Bishops (JCOB), was an ecumenical synod established by Ellis, Wilbert Sterling McKinley, Roy Edward Brown, and Paul S. Morton in November 1993. The Joint College of Bishops originally functioned as a high church Pentecostal body, later expanding into other Protestant traditions through Doye Agama and the Apostolic Pastoral Congress. Membership of the Joint College of Bishops have been noted for reappropriating the history and meaning of vestments as upheld by their initial users in Roman Catholicism and Anglicanism. One instance of reappropriation is teaching the chimere is a prophetic garment; in contrast with instruction from the newly-established college of bishops, the chimere was originally part of academic dress before adoption by Anglican bishops. Leaders within the Joint College of Bishops have also been noted for teaching five-fold ministry and the ordination of women. During theological disputes on Christian universalism within the Joint College, Ellis and the college denounced Carlton Pearson as a heretic for advocating universalism. Under his administration, the Joint College of Bishops also admitted and certified gay bishop O.C. Allen of the Vision Church of Atlanta in 2012, spurring further controversy within African American Pentecostalism. Controversy, later life In 1995, Ellis was fired after briefly serving as a city police chaplain for his comments toward Muslims, stating Islam was "bloody and dangerous" at worst; in 2001, Ellis