This Gospel Shall Be Preached, Vol. 1: A History and Theology of Assemblies of God Foreign Missions to 1959: 001 by McGee Gary B

Author:McGee, Gary B. [McGee, Gary B.]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Pentecostal churches--Missions--History., Assemblies of God--Missions--History.
Publisher: BookMasters
Published: 2012-04-12T00:00:00+00:00

Strategy and the Post-War Era

World War II curtailed some missionary activities, notably those in Europe and the Far East. As a result, the missions department gave more of its attention to regions still available for evangelism. Although travel could be perilous, missionaries opened three new fields in Africa: Nyasaland, Tanganyika, and Basutoland.

Latin America and the West Indies, however, presented the safest and most convenient doors of opportunity. During this period, the Assemblies of God began new works in Costa Rica, Paraguay, Colombia, Jamaica, and the Bahamas.1 As early as 1941, Perkin wrote that “the vast continent of South America is still open to our activities and as there are over eighty million people there needing the gospel message, we are planning for definite advances into that land which was so long known as ‘the neglected continent.’ ”2 While over 158 furloughed missionaries (out of 403) remained in the United States during the war because of their inability to return overseas, 28 new missionaries went abroad in 1942. Of these, 24 headed for Latin America and the West Indies.3

In spite of intense opposition from Roman Catholic constituents, great advances occurred in the Latin American endeavors.4 Like their conservative evangelical counterparts, the Assemblies of God missionaries viewed the Roman Catholic Church in Latin America as a distortion of New Testament Christianity in theology and practice. One writer asserted that the Roman Catholic Church in Peru was “no more Christian than counterfeit coin is money.”5 Melvin L. Hodges, a missionary to Central America and later field secretary for the region, stated that “there are no people who walk in deeper darkness than these very ones who seem to proclaim Christ. Here there is not absence of truth, but truth distorted into falsehood, for there is no religion in the world more adept at ‘changing the truth of God into a lie’ than Romanism.”6 This reflected the attitudes of Assemblies of God members in the United States, a posture that remained largely unchanged until the rise of the Catholic charismatic movement in the 1960s. With that development, many Council members began to review their attitude toward Catholics and make some contacts. Even then, the General Council officially viewed the Roman Catholic Church with cautious suspicion for many years.7

To survey the conditions on the mission fields and prepare for the post-war era, the department called for a 3-day conference of missionaries to convene at Central Bible Institute in April 1943. Fifty-eight missionaries from 18 countries attended the sessions and offered their advice. Chairmen or representatives of the various overseas district councils read reports describing the work and needs of their fields.8

The missionary conference produced six major goals for the future. First, field secretaries, or regional missionary administrators, would be appointed for all the major areas of activity. Two had already been appointed and others would follow. Second, the department would attempt to recruit 500 new missionaries who had received Bible institute training and practical experience in ministry.9 Such recruits could evangelize abroad and staff foreign Bible institutes to prepare other young people for service.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.