Beacon of the day | JaVaughn Miller, Who Once Faced Ridicule, Making Major Strides
July 3, 2022JaVaughn Miller in his apostle garb
Apostle JaVaughn Miller was ridiculed to the point that he became suicidal in 2013 when he gave up what he described as a good-paying job at a Kingston-based call centre to pursue religious ministry.
At that time, he asserted that he was acting on God’s instructions.
He also proclaimed that God was telling him that he would migrate from Jamaica and find a wife in the United States.
“It is just a blessing to see the manifestation of what God has spoken coming to past,” Apostle Miller told The Beacon, elated that he did not allow the naysayers to derail him.
No longer resident in the inner-city community of Trench Town in Kingston, the clergyman is now married to United States citizen Moesha Miller and living at Georgia, United States.
“I am a great example of believing who I am and what I carry. If I didn’t believe it, I wouldn’t be where I am now,” he argued.
He received the proverbial icing on the religious cake when, during a ceremony on June 11, he was affirmed an apostle in the Higher Calling International Fellowship of Churches, which has 54 branches in the United States.
“I am the youngest ever between the organization here in America that was elevated in the Higher Calling International Fellowship of Churches as an apostle,” the 26-year-old said.
Apostle JaVaughn Miller says God promised him a wife; he finds Moesha Miller
He is not unaccustomed to holding positions of influence in religious circles.
Back in Jamaica, he recalled, he served as an evangelist and subsequently as an assistant pastor and elder. He stated that he is the youngest in his bloodline to hold such posts.
“I am young in age but in spirit I am old; I am very old in spirit,” said Apostle Miller.
Baptized when he was seven years old, he grew up in a Christian family. His mother, Leleith Case, was an evangelist. He also has an uncle and an aunt who are pastors, he disclosed.
“I was always in church,” Apostle Miller said.
However, he admitted that, due to peer pressure in his teenage years, his passion for Christianity waned significantly to the extent that his church attendance became poor.
His life started changing for the better when he became associated with a group of Christian boys at Calabar High School where he was enrolled.
“From there, I really realized that God had a divine purpose on my life…” Apostle Miller told The Beacon.
Left to right: Apostle JaVaughn Miller strikes a pose with Chief Apostle Jermaine Johnson and his wife Lady Johnson as well as Moesha Miller
He joined the Inter-School Christian Fellowship group at Calabar High and also resumed regular church attendance.
Since then, Apostle Miller never looked back.
He attended different Kingston-based churches, including Bethel Bibleway Apostolic on Collies Road where he was baptized, and Holy Ground Apostolic that his aunt headed at Jacks Hill. He also worshiped at two Kingston branches of the Emmanuel Apostolic Church.
“The Holy Ground Apostolic was where I learned how to put a sermon together; that’s where I learned a lot of stuff spiritually and physically,” Apostle Miller said.
His strong religious background, he argued, kept him grounded amid the challenges that he and his family faced in Kingston.
He, along with two siblings, was raised by a single mother who worked as a nurse mainly at Maxfield Park Children’s Home.
“We really never had a father figure,” Apostle Miller recalled. “It was a rough time; we could barely find meals at times… But our mother made the sacrifice and made sure that we get an education at least so that we could do something better with our lives.”
His mother went as far as to put her pursuit of a degree on pause to help her children, he said.
Apostle Miller attended Melvina White Basic School on Slipe Pen Road in Kingston, Trench Town Primary, and Tivoli Gardens High. After a year at Tivoli, he transferred to Calabar High.
Not having enough subjects to matriculate to the sixth form programme at Calabar, Apostle Miller enrolled at the then Mico College, but stopped prematurely to find employment.
The clergyman, who officially migrated in 2020, is satisfied with the progress he has made especially as it relates to his religious work.
He and his wife are not only planning to have children together, but to also build a lasting legacy.
“We want to build a legacy that not just people can follow, but our children can see and emulate and have something to motivate them,” he said. “Trust me, it is not the end; it is just a start of where God is taking me… I have been fighting all my life. And why I keep on winning is because I am fighting the right battle; I am fighting it the way God wants me to fight it.”
Apostle Miller, in the meantime, urged others to keep their dreams alive.
“Never give up, and know who you are. That is very important. If you know who you are and what you are carrying, nothing that people say about you can shake the ground that you are standing on,” he further declared.
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