TntMPD was created and is still maintained by Troy Wolbrink, a missionary serving with Campus Crusade for Christ. As Troy sought to build relationships with those who gave and prayed on behalf of he and his wife Tammy's personal ministry, he quickly found that doing that effectively was a significant administrative job. At first he tried using several off-the-shelf contact managers, but they all lacked the ability to track donations. Out of frustration, he used his skills as a software developer to build a tool to help automate a very time-consuming part of his ministry.

In Campus Crusade for Christ, this process is called Ministry Partner Development, or MPD. The first three initials, Tnt, have a double meaning: In addition to being synonymous (in English) with dynamite—because TntMPD is very powerful software—Tnt is also an acronym for "Troy and Tammy" Wolbrink.