Ronald Blough was born in Johnstown, Pennsylvania having a Pennsylvania Dutch/Amish/Mennonite heritage. During the Korean War he served in the U.S. Marine Corp. After a thirteen-month overseas tour, he was among four thousand Marines on the troopship USS General A. E. Anderson returning stateside. During that voyage on September 2, 1954 God used a Gospel meeting...Ronald Blough was born in Johnstown, Pennsylvania having a Pennsylvania Dutch/Amish/Mennonite heritage. During the Korean War he served in the U.S. Marine Corp. After a thirteen-month overseas tour, he was among four thousand Marines on the troopship USS General A. E. Anderson returning stateside. During that voyage on September 2, 1954 God used a Gospel meeting and a fellow Marine to point him to the Savior. He testified, “I repented with a broken contrite heart and was received by grace into the open arms of Christ. The load of sin was lifted and I slipped into my bunk a happy, forgiven sinner!” From the time of his salvation to the present, by God’s grace, his goal has been expressed in Galatians 1:10: “For now do I persuade men, or God: or do I seek to please men? for if I yet please men, I should not be the servant of Christ.” In 1958 Ron married fellow Bob Jones University student Marlene and together they graduated in 1959 with the goal to serve the Lord on the mission field. Immediately after graduation they received missionary dental training by W. G. Lewis in Sexsmith, Alberta, Canada. From 1960-1966 Ron pastored a church and servicemen’s center outside of Yokota Air Base in Japan. A mission trip with a group of G.I.s to Hokkaido, Japan inspired him to reach the unreached Japanese on the Hokkaido coast of the Sea of Japan. He ministered in Hokkaido from 1966-1976. Subsequent ministries have been in New Hampshire (1977-1985) and Alaska (1986-2014). He pastored Calvary Baptist Church in Ninilchik, Alaska from December 1989 to May 2005. Other ministries were at Whitestone Logging Camp and in the town of Hoonah on Chichagof Island in Southeast Alaska. He and Marlene have made their home in South Carolina since March 2015. Their quiver is full— 9 children and many grandchildren and great grandchildren— the number keeps changing! | more | less
