This Gospel Shall Be Preached, Volume 2

A History and Theology of Assemblies of God Foreign Missions Since 1959

Gary B. McGee

• Publisher: Gospel Publishing House
• Year: 2012
• eBook ISBN: 9781607311768
• Topic: Theology & Religion
• Subtopic: Christian Ministry

Traces the historical and theological development of the Division of Foreign Missions of the General Council of the Assemblies of God from 1959 to the late 1980s.

Part One

Preparations for Advance

1

Pentecostal Missions Mature

A Worldwide Missionary Movement

Spiritual awakenings and missionary zeal have long been associated on the American religious scene—from the Haystack Prayer Meeting and the formation of the American Board of Commissioners for Foreign Missions (1810) to the Mount Hermon Conference and the founding of the Student Volunteer Movement for Foreign Missions (1888). Spiritual renewals have triggered fresh attempts to fulfill the Great Commission.

To these awakenings should be added the Pentecostal revival of the 20th century. In part, this worldwide revival stemmed from spiritual activity that began at Charles F. Parham’s Bethel Bible School in Topeka, Kansas, on January 1, 1901—for it eventually triggered revivals around the world. Foremost among them was the Azusa Street Revival of 1906–1909 in Los Angeles, California.¹ News of this revival traveled across the United States as leaders published thousands of copies of the Apostolic Faith (a newspaper distributed occasionally between September 1906 and May 1908). From coast to coast and overseas, expectant believers avidly read the testimonies and teachings in the pages of this and similar periodicals. Indigenous Pentecostal revivals also occurred abroad, although they have not yet received the historical analysis they deserve.

Those who attended the revival services on Azusa Street believed that the apostolic “signs and wonders” that had characterized the advance of the early Christians in the Book of Acts had been restored in the last days. The gifts of the Spirit, including tongues, interpretations, prophecies, miracles, faith, and divine healings, were given to aid in the advancement of the gospel. This emphasis on the work of the Holy Spirit, although rejected by many, constituted a unique position regarding the Christian world mission. Reliance was to be upon the Spirit, not the mechanical formulations of mission strategists. Such a wholesale return to the apostolic pattern of the first century was without parallel on the missionary landscape. Their enthusiasm for world evangelization propelled a diaspora of new missionaries even though the leaders of the revival did not organize a missionary society.

The first “missionary manifesto” among independent American Pentecostals, calling for the establishment of a missionary society, surfaced in 1908 at the Pentecostal Camp Meeting in Alliance, Ohio, under the direction of Levi R. Lupton, a holiness-oriented Quaker who experienced the Pentecostal baptism in December 1906. Although those attending the meeting had no interest in starting another ecclesiastical organization, they asserted that “such an affiliation of Pentecostal Missions is desirable as will preserve and increase the tender sweet bond of love and fellowship now existing and guard against abuse of legitimate liberty.”² In the following year, the Pentecostal Missionary Union in the United States of America was formed (modeled after an organization of the same name founded in Great Britain in January 1909), headquartered in Alliance. This effort, however, collapsed a year later.³ Nevertheless, whether through their own initiative or with the encouragement of this agency, over 185 Pentecostals had traveled overseas to engage in missionary evangelism by 1910 and could be found in Africa, China, India, Japan, Latin America, and the Middle East. More influential and successful missionaries soon followed in their footsteps.⁴

Pentecostal Missionary Agencies After 1910

Claiming that the apostolic power of the early Christian church had been restored, however, did not insulate Pentecostals from the vexations of missionary turnover, financial support, inadequate legal recognition, issues of training and strategy, as well as the need for effective communication with the supporting constituencies. The first major Pentecostal missionary agency to appear in America was the Pentecostal Mission in South and Central Africa, organized in 1910 by the Bethel Pentecostal Assembly of Newark, New Jersey.⁵ The Assemblies of God, founded at Hot Springs, Arkansas, in 1914, soon represented missionaries ministering not only in Africa, but in the Middle East, India, China, and Latin America as well. Among the reasons for calling the first Council, the conveners had stated:

We come together … that we may get a better understanding of the needs of each foreign field, and may know how to place our money in such a way that one mission or missionary shall not suffer, while another not any more worthy, lives in luxuries. Also that we may discourage wasting money on those who are running here and there accomplishing nothing, and may concentrate our support on those who mean business for our king.⁶

Five years later, the Assemblies of God created the “Missionary Department” to coordinate and promote its burgeoning overseas enterprise. Closely connected to the American Assemblies of God in its earliest years, the Pentecostal Assemblies of Canada, incorporating separately in 1922, also sponsored a far-flung missionary program.⁷

For various reasons, other Pentecostal denominations were slower in developing their overseas endeavors. The Pentecostal Holiness Church had set up a “missionary board” in 1904, but did not realize permanent achievements until the mid-1920s.⁸ The Church of God (Cleveland, Tennessee) traces its missionary heritage back to the voyage of R. M. Evans to the Bahama Islands in 1910.⁹ However, not until 1926—after the disruptions of World War I, inadequate financial support, and internal unrest in 1923—was a mission board appointed. Once in place, decades of steady growth followed. The leadership of J. H. Ingram through his worldwide travels effectively linked the organization to the efforts of independent Pentecostal pioneer missionaries who united with it.¹⁰

Contemporary with these efforts were those of the Russian and Eastern European Mission (1927),¹¹ the Apostolic Faith Movement (Portland, Oregon; first missionary sent in 1911),¹² the Pentecostal Church of God (1919),¹³ the Evangelization Society of the Pittsburgh Bible Institute founded by Charles Hamilton Pridgeon (1920),¹⁴ the Church of God of Prophecy (1923),¹⁵ the Church of God in Christ (1897; first Home and Foreign Missions Board in 1925),¹⁶ the Fellowship of Christian Assemblies (1922, 1951),¹⁷ the Independent Assemblies of God International (1922, 1951),¹⁸ the Pentecostal Assemblies of Newfoundland (1925),¹⁹ the International Church of the Foursquare Gospel (1927),²⁰ the Christian Church of North America (1929),²¹ the Elim Fellowship (1933),²² and the Open Bible Standard Churches (1935).²³ The Oneness Pentecostal church organizations, resulting from a division in the Assemblies of God in 1916, also sponsored important mission endeavors.²⁴

Europeans banded together to sponsor, among others, the Congo Evangelistic Mission (later the Zaire Evangelistic Mission) founded by William F. P. Burton and James Salter (1915),²⁵ the Pentecostal Mission Alliance in the Netherlands founded by G. R. Polman (1920),²⁶ and the mission initiatives of the Scandinavian Pentecostal churches.²⁷ In addition to the work of such organizations, missionaries sometimes served independently, depending on supporting congregations for financial assistance. Many of these ventures also proved successful.

Although no formal Pentecostal agency coordinated the efforts of the various organizations or those of independent missionaries, limited ecumenism did prevail in some fields, such as Liberia and India. By the outbreak of World War II, hundreds of Pentecostal missionaries had been sent overseas.

The Third Force

Along with other evangelical mission agencies, denominational missions programs and independent efforts experienced dramatic growth after World War II.²⁸ They also reflected growing sophistication in organization and promotions, increased missionary longevity, and growing financial stability.

While the Pentecostal missionary expansion went largely unnoticed by contemporary historians of the expansion of Christianity, observers began to comment early in the 1950s that a new movement of unparalleled significance had emerged within Christendom, representing a fresh and distinctive thrust that could no longer be ignored.²⁹ Its uniqueness became increasingly apparent with its worldwide growth.

Although Pentecostal missionaries from America and Europe had laid important foundations through the younger churches they helped to establish, indigenous Pentecostal movements (some with worship patterns and perspectives similar to classical Pentecostalism) also represented large segments of this growth.

In 1953, Bishop Lesslie Newbigin of the Church of South India identified a “third stream of Christian tradition,” which he labeled as Pentecostal, noting its emphasis on “that which is to be known and recognized in present experience—the power of the ever-living Spirit of God.”³⁰ Five years later, Henry P. Van Dusen, then president of Union Theological Seminary in New York, also referred to a “third force” in Christendom. In an article in Life magazine, he praised the mission successes of Pentecostals as well as those of Holiness, Adventist, and Church of Christ groups.³¹ This positive reference encouraged the Pentecostals to refer to themselves exclusively as the third major segment of Christianity.

During the same year, Donald Grey Barnhouse, a prominent American Presbyterian and editor of Eternity magazine, visited the headquarters of the Assemblies of God in Springfield, Missouri. Barnhouse praised the organization for its commitment to evangelical doctrines and, although he disagreed with its Pentecostal theology, reflected on its remarkable advance in missions overseas.³²

The Pentecostals clearly enjoyed being in the spotlight and testifying to their beliefs. But David J. du Plessis, an international Pentecostal leader, insisted, in the International Review of Missions in 1958,

The Pentecostal revival of this century is different. In the first place, there is no man who can claim to have been the founder of this great worldwide Christian revival. In the second place, there has been no new emphasis on any special doctrine. Rather, the emphasis is upon an experience.…

The Pentecostal revival today is merely a restoration of a personal experience of a life-changing salvation followed by the receiving of the baptism in the Holy Spirit with the evidence or confirmation of the initial manifestation of speaking in unknown tongues, which in turn is usually followed by experiences of power to cast out devils, heal the sick and miracles.³³

As Pentecostal churches thrived overseas, their doctrines and methods increasingly attracted the att...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Title Page
• Copyright
• Contents
• Foreword
• Acknowledgments
• Introduction
• Part One: Preparations for Advance
• Part Two: Global Conquest (1959–1967)
• Part Three: Evangelism, Education, and Expansion (1968–1977)
• Part IV: Into the 80s (1978–1989)
• Epilogue
• Endnotes
• Selected Bibliography
• Index