My personal journey began 65 years ago. As I look back over my life, I can see how, due to the sovereign hand of God, I am now in a unique position to do what I am doing today. Over the course of my life I have been privileged to meet some very unique people and have had some of the most outrageous experiences; all of these weaving a pattern into the cloth of my life that I could never have designed on my own!
I have had the honor of serving in many leadership positions over the years including serving as senior pastor in several churches. I also served a number of times as youth pastor, associate pastor, as well as having several college departments under my leadership. Also through God’s foresight and design I filled these positions for several mainline denominations.
While I served in ministry for many years, most of the family income was not from the churches I was serving. Most of our income came through income earned by both my wife and myself through our jobs. In my case, I was a professional in several trades, all being within the construction arena. I was a General Contractor for many years and spent the last ten years of my years in construction as an Oregon State Certified Inspector, both for residential and commercial structures.
Today I see how God’s hand directed me into all of these arenas for His own sovereign purposes, much as God had arranged for the Apostle Paul to be a professional tent-maker. You might ask, what does any of this has to do with hosting a blog-site? God arranged it this way, at least in my case, so that I would have a well-rounded experience base to draw from. As I write, it is usually from the perspective of having done many things, meeting a wide variety of people, and generally having lived a very full life. I thank God for this every day!
This brings me to the purpose of this blog. Isaac Newton, who lived about 400 years ago, was given credit for this quote:
“About the time of the end, a body of men will be raised up who will turn their attention to the prophecies, and insist on their literal interpretation, in the midst of much clamor and opposition.”
There are quite a number of these people today, and I happen to be one of them. God gave me an interest in Bible prophecy when I was still in my early teens. Although I never considered it the main drive in my life–not even in my career as a member of the “clergy,” my interest and recognition of God’s plan unfolding before my very eyes was heightened with each passing year. This has especially been the case as I have watched a trickle of fulfilled “end-time” prophecies so many years ago become an all-encompassing, violent, unstoppable river today.
Because of what I am seeing today, one of my goals is to help others begin to see how quickly God’s Word is coming to pass. This encompasses many things being reported in world news today. But, for anyone that spends time researching current events, it becomes quickly clear that the mainstream news is not the whole source of news as it is really unfolding. Alternative news sources need to be tapped, but with great discernment–the type of discernment that can only come from the Holy Spirit of God.
God willing, as this blog site grows, more and more will be made available to show what is going on in our world and how it fits with what God said through His prophets thousands of years ago. I am a believer in being informed, especially in light of the fact that Jesus instructed us to watch and be aware. Our world is hurtling full speed toward destruction. The Son of God spent much time describing this very slot in time–our time, our generation.
The world fights tooth and nail to push God as far away as possible. The Church, on the other hand, is mostly blind and deaf, or is turning apostate–once again, as the man from Galilee predicted. It is a small percentage of so-called “Christ-followers” who actually know how close we really are to the return of the Messiah. My goal is to do anything I can to help lift that percentage.
Another goal of this blog-site is to provide written articles that will help stir the spiritual part of us–that very part that craves a walking-talking relationship with our Creator God. I don’t much care for formulas, and, even though I believe in each person’s individual giftings by the Holy Spirit, my emphasis is on our general overall calling, and that is to fulfill the Great Commission, as God gives us the ability and empowering to do so, and of course while there is still time.
From time to time you will find guest articles being uploaded. There will also be other extras made available as it is possible to do so.
God Bless, and Keep Looking Upward!
Jake