“Hi everyone, I’m Jake, and I’m the Lead Pastor @FirstPresHayward. I was born and raised in Olympia, WA and graduated from Western Washington University, where I met my wife Joan. Shortly after graduation, we moved to San Diego where I served as Area Director for @YoungLife in Point Loma. During my time there, I continued my education @FullerSeminary, where I graduated in 2008 with a Master of Divinity Degree and was ordained as a pastor in the @PCUSA. My first pastoral call was as a Youth and Children’s Pastor, where I began to invest in students at a local high school after noticing many students were being bussed in from inner-city San Diego. Seeing a huge need, my church and I formed a non-profit called UrbanLife, which now serves over 400 students and families each year. UrbanLife seeks to be a safe place for young people to learn about themselves, develop lasting friendships, discover who God is, and use their skills, passions and gifts to serve others. In 2014, I felt the call of God to take on the role of Lead Pastor at FirstPres Hayward and led the transition from a declining mainline denominational church to a thriving multi-cultural missional body that has been transforming the community through social justice and agape love. Hope Unlimited has partnered with First Pres for many years, but recently we decided to create an amazing vision to give radically to others. Hope Unlimited is one of the two organizations that FirstPres chose to fundraise for, to reach a goal of giving away $1,000,000 by the year 2023 through a campaign called #Give2023. I had the opportunity to visit Brazil and Hope Unlimited in 2018, which intensified my passion to serve others. #Give2023 has hosted a multitude of fundraisers, from rummage sales to galas, in order to serve the less fortunate. My wife Joan and I have been married for 20 years and have 4 children, 2 of whom were adopted. I'm an avid sports fan and enjoy playing basketball.” @pastorjakem (at Hope Unlimited for Children) https://www.instagram.com/p/B3NKnZIJLgK/?igshid=1azasi5dkux4o
