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Kenneth Uptegrove |
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Kenneth Uptegrove,
founder of ArkHaven Ministries, is a “Revivalist” Christian writer who
desires to speak to the entire Evangelical Christian community.
His 40-year
career as a computer professional equipped him to uses the apologetics
style of writing.
Ken is well known for being
academic, thorough, and gracious.
A burning
desire is shut up in his bosom to see churches, cities, regions, and
whole nations completely transformed by the power of God.
In 1986, at age fifty, he went into full
time ministry, concentrating his efforts on writing a newsletter,
articles for a local paper, and working on a book. Since going into
ministry work he has studied church history and related subjects
extensively, such as Bible manuscript history, Bible translations, and
Holy Land archeology. He also is interested in such subjects as
cosmology, astronomy, geophysics, paleontology, anthropology,
naturopathy, and horticulture. His interest was never of
the intellectual sort, quite the opposite. His quest was more of
the spiritual sort, wanting to gain a broader and deeper
understanding of God and His creation. Leonard Ravenhill said in
one of his letters that Ken was "educated in the Holy Ghost school of
silence."
Ken was an honor student and
all-conference basketball center in his high school years (1952-56).
Then he spent three years in the Army (1957-60), two of which were
spent in Germany. In 1963 Ken married Joyce Smith. In 2005 both his 95 year old
mother and his beloved wife of 43 years, Joyce, died.
They have three sons and six grandchildren. Since then Lora
Gibson, another Godly woman came into Ken's life and eventually got
married. Lora is a prophetic lady who has the same vision and giftings Ken has.
Ken's father was a football player at the
University of Nebraska Cornhuskers and a Golden Gloves boxer in 1932,
33, & 34, and was a successful educator and coach.
Ken believes that anyone who has studied
church history extensively will have grown beyond the boundaries of
the fellowship of believers they believe God would have them worship
with. We can only be
in one church at a time, but our paradigm can be much larger than the doctrine
of that one church. That is why Ken feels that he can speak to the
entire Evangelical Christian community (and Ken considers Charismatics
and Pentecostals -- all who evangelize -- to be Evangelical). This uniquely qualifies Ken
to be able to edit the work of fellow writers from many different
doctrinal groups.
[Continued below]
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The Mission Statement For ArkHaven
Ministries
To bring unity and
community to the body of Christ!
God is bringing restoration to His Church, and bringing
forth His Kingdom on earth as it is in heaven!
In “The Next Great Move of God” we will see the restoration of
the Acts model for the church, and the 1 Corinthians 12, 13, 14 model
for church services. God is doing this to prepare the Bride
of Christ to conclude the church age more gloriously than the
first century saints brought in the church age at Pentecost.
Ken shows us how self evident the Acts model is still
the same church age model today as it was in the first century
church.
Not until the church is operating in all the provision that God has
set in place for her to evangelize with, can the church bring the lost
to Christ on the scale we all wish to see. Not until we
are truly following the Acts model for the church can we ever hope to
be the Bride who has truly made herself ready for the Bride Groom.
This is the subject of his book: Dawning: The
Next Great Move of God.
Ken has
been using the ministry name, ArkHaven, and the Noah’s Ark logo since
1986. Yet, neither his literature nor website ever carried any
articles about the Ark until the fall of 2004. ArkHaven's
reference to Noah's
Ark (and
the
Ark of the Covenant)
has to do with
the protection, the provision, and the
promise of God associated
with these Arks. Which gets to our next point...
Ken
Uptegrove is a visionary.
Although not
accomplished yet, the ultimate and future goal of ArkHaven Ministries is to form a
totally self sufficient Christian community for end-time ministry purposes. As
Christians in China and many other countries have found out, the
church can suffer terrible tribulation today. In fact there is
more martyrdom and persecution in the world today than in any time in
history. And to think it can not happen in America is not
realistic. Should we not be ready for such an eventuality?
Although not accomplished yet,
The ultimate and future goal of ArkHaven is to form “an
Christian community
of intentional neighbors.” It is no coincidence that this Acts model lifestyle
is also the best preparation a Christian can make to sustain life and continue
in ministry even in the hardest of times. Are hard times coming? Are hard
times already here?
Many prominent economists
and theologians (i.e., David Wilkerson & Larry Burkett) tell us
a depression is coming to
America. The author describes how God is calling Christians to prepare
for this depression physically, mentally, and spiritually.
This envisioned self sufficient community will be
a village of "intentional neighbors" where everyone owns their own
home and controls their own affairs. The common purse concept
will be absent at first (but might have to be in full effect when the
depression comes), but a common purpose and mutual service will be our way
of life.
Our purpose will be to go into the highways and byways
to minister Jesus Christ to all we find. Our service will be to
meet all the needs within our community by serving each other.
There will be a diversity of ministries, professions, skills and
crafts present.
We anticipate that we
will need our own utilities, food source, housing, and everything else
needed to sustain a healthy life style. Why? Because we
anticipate that the economy will collapse to such a degree that only
those who are ready for such a time with a totally self sufficient
community (reminiscent of the Amish life style) will be able to not
only survive, but be able to take care of the needs of refugees and meet their physical
and spiritual needs.
We each will give of our services without
charge. All of us will obligate ourselves to do our part to
serve as unto Christ (Mat. 25:31-46). That means that the farmers grow
the food for all, the mechanics keep all the machinery operational, the
doctors treat all the community, etc. Money to finance every aspect of
the community will come from people within and outside of the community who
will operate business throughout the world.
This is the vision
behind the ministry name of ArkHaven.
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What ArkHaven Is Not
ArkHaven will not
be a paramilitary armed camp of survivalists or a bunch of secluded, hiding pacifists.
Our protection will be divine or none at all. Our prayer
warriors will keep up a prayer hedge about us at all times. The
camp that is armed is depending on their own numbers, training, and
equipment...the arm of the flesh. But there is always some group
out there that can outgun you. It is God's way to offer a vision
of long term provision and peace to a militant band of potential
raiders as opposed to a bloody shoot out at OK Corral.
ArkHaven is not Amish
or Mennonite in its theology, even though their self sufficiency and
community concepts will be very evident on the ArkHaven campus.
I like to point out that if you had asked an Amish farmer how he was
faring the depression back in the 20's he would have asked, "What
depression." Someone within the community makes or grows everything needed within the
community. They are survivors, not survivalists.
Survivalists (as a
general rule) horde food and supplies and arm themselves to protect
their stuff. Survivors are able to peacefully bring themselves
and others through good and bad times by growing and making everything
they need on their own property. They know how to be totally
self sufficient while at the same time be totally dependant on God to
lead and protect them.
ArkHaven will train
our people to minister so that we can
better reach out into the surrounding community to serve.
I would like for the community to assemble at least 5 mornings a week
for prayer and praise … and to schedule our day … but I also think it
will be healthy for us to be in local churches on Saturdays or
Sundays. That keeps down the gossip that we are a weird cult group,
and in fact keeps us from becoming one. I learned this from the
YWAM’ers years ago (my wife was YWAM trained in Hawaii).
Kenneth
Uptegrove
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My Heart's Passion
Although I have a passion to see the Great Commission fulfilled, my
major focus and calling is to play my part in preparing a glorious Bride
for the coming Bride Groom.
The theme
running through my book: Dawning: The Next Great Move of God, says
that the next great move of God is more about quality than quantity. The
multitudes will be there, but more importantly, within that multitude
there will be the prepared Bride who has a passion for the Bride Groom.
God is calling the church to exceed the purity and power of the first century church.
And even more importantly, God is preparing a
glorious Bride who has focused on nothing else but preparing herself for
the Bride Groom, the Lion of Judah, the everlasting King! My mission is to
teach and exhort all who will listen, to be ready for that day.
Testimony of Ken's Miracle Birth
There were three morbid reasons why Ken should
not have been born alive. And at the very best he should have had a
severe case of Cerebral palsy. But two praying grandmothers had
their churches praying for me. One of them prayed the Hanna prayer.
"Oh Lord, save his life and call him from the womb to ministry."
That prayer was answered.
Those three reasons were; he was breach, he was
too big for his mothers pelvic (9 ½ lb), and the umbilical cord was
wrapped around his neck three times. The only option available to
save his life was caesarian section, but in 1936 the caesarean section
procedure was not as safe as it is today. Of her four sons, only
this one time did she have these difficulties. Ken was her second
and largest son (she had 4 sons and no daughters.
His Mothers doctors told his Dad (Ed) that they could save
one life but not both. A caesarean section would save Ken's life, but she
(Helen) would die. But if they dismembered Ken, then they could save her
life. That is not an option anyone wants to choose between, but Ken's Dad
made the decision Ken would have made. He decided to save his wife
and hope for another child. He literally signed Ken's death warrant
by signing a release form giving the doctors permission to dismember him.
When the three Gynecologists had scrubbed they
entered the delivery room to dismember him, but upon entering they found Helen in labor and the nurse
trying her best to get Ken out of there. These compassionate
Doctors were moved by the nurses heroics and Helen's hopes and threw in
with them, and the impossible happened. He had turned and was headed
the right way. It was then discovered that the umbilical cord was
wrapped around his neck three times. His Mother says his nose was
pushed up between his eyes and took three days to come into the right
place. You can imagine the pain she went through for a few days.
But that was not the end of the miracle.
Ken was hospitalized for the first time in
his life at age
68 (in March 2005) with Streptococci Bacteria in his blood stream,
so this was not an illness or injury, but an infection. Ken was in ICU for 3 days, and
in a VA hospital for 8 days in all. His doctor told him
that he came within an hour of dying when the medical team was able to
treat him with enough antibiotics to keep his organs from closing down. At
this writing in 2009 He still has never had an operation, and he has never suffered a
serious injury.
All his life he has had nothing of any consequence wrong
with him, and today his health and physical conditioning is excellent (see
picture of Ken at
age 73 in November 2009). Looking for an
explanation, he attributes this miracle to the covering prayed over him at
birth by his grandmother Uptegrove. That covering has remained over him to this day. Ken is
very much into health, nutrition, and bodily fitness.
Is this covering part of the calling Ken has to
form the ArkHaven ministry described above?
Two weeks before Ken was hospitalized, his
mother died at age 95, and in December of the same year his wife died.
As with Job, God brought good out of all this into
Ken's life to bring a change in his mind-set so that He can bless Ken
further. This horrendous year of Job's crucible taught Ken that life is fragile and death is sure, so
we must learn how to lay our lives down and be a dead man before Christ.
Then we can become truly committed to our calling.
Very recently the Lord brought a new wife
into Ken's life. They are very suited for each other. They both have
the same vision and Spiritual siftings. Her maiden name was Lora Lee
Gibson, but now she is Mrs. Lora Uptegrove, Ken's beloved wife.
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The Story Behind
Our Ministry Name:
ArkHaven
ArkHaven is a reference to the Ark of the Covenant and to Noah's Ark.
Both of these Arks were places of God's promise, protection, and
provision. The ultimate and future goal of ArkHaven Ministries
is to form a Christian community—a haven for end-time ministry purposes. We
will be featuring articles and link pages on this subject soon.
The original name was Ark-ten, but God
allowed me to change it to a more understandable name—ArkHaven. When
the Lord first told me the name I mistakenly assumed that "ark" was an
abbreviation for Arkansas, and that "ten" was a colloquialisms for
"town," or Arkansas Town.
But the Holy Spirit quickly corrected me.
He said that this community is an "Ark" as in Noah's Ark and the Ark of
the covenant, and that "ten" is the number 10. I had to look up the
number 10 in Bible symbolism to see what it means.
Ten implies completeness of order, nothing lacking and nothing over. It
signifies that the cycle is complete and that everything is in its proper
order. Thus ten represents the perfection of divine order.
When we combine the two words (ark + 10)
we get this definition: God's place of provision protection and promise,
nothing lacking, until
completeness of order is seen.
