Category: md-14

Many religious bodies anticipated that the end of World War II would present unprecedented missions opportunities. Leaders in Churches of Christ also recognized the opportunity for mission work in the war-ravaged nations of Europe, and this brought about a dramatic and exciting shift in their missions efforts. This article highlights some of the initial church planting efforts in Europe undertaken by missionaries from Churches of Christ during the postwar period and then focuses on the missionaries’ expectations and attitudes, the motivations that propelled their work, and the preparation, strategy, and methods employed by these missionaries.

Even before World War II ended, religious bodies in the United States and beyond knew that the war’s conclusion would present unprecedented missions opportunities. Baptist military chaplain Dudley T. Pomeroy wrote, “The greatest opportunity in Christian Missionary History will be presented to the Church with the Coming of V-Day. . . . Just as American Industry has led the world at war, American Christians must take the lead in Christian Enterprizes [sic] in the post-war world.”1 By October 1946, various denominations had raised or were in the process of raising millions of dollars for missions and physical relief in the wake of the war.2 In July 1947, the International Missionary Council hosted a missionary conference in Whitby, Ontario, that was attended by over one hundred representatives of forty nations “to discuss the Christian World Missions in the light of post-war realities,” inspiring Southern Baptist Theological Seminary professor H. C. Goerner to proclaim that the world had entered a “New Day for Christian Missions.”3 Unsurprisingly, Churches of Christ4 also recognized and responded to the new opportunities.

Prior to World War II, Churches of Christ had been involved in limited ways in foreign missions, primarily with a few missionaries working in what would have been considered “pagan” areas (Africa or Asia) of the world.5 World War II brought a dramatic and exciting shift in mission work in Churches of Christ, as church leaders quickly recognized the opportunity for mission work in the war-ravaged nations of Europe. As with other faith fellowships,6 members of Churches of Christ who had served in the armed forces in Europe returned with reports of the great need in Europe for missionaries. One young soldier wrote back, “Germany needs the gospel about as much as any other place that I have been. . . . In my last talk with a German whom I know he said, ‘You need to send good Christian soldiers over to help us.’ ”7 Harold Paden, who had served in the Tenth Mountain Division fighting in Italy during the war, recalled, “It took time and the experiences of WWII for God to get my attention and make me understand His need for me in Italy. . . . Who would go teach the Italians?”8 Optimism ran high regarding such opportunities. L. R. Wilson wrote, “Today the opportunities for spreading the gospel are greater than at any time in our past history. As a result of the many contacts which have been made and our increased methods of transportation and communication, we now have the opportunities of carrying the gospel to every nook and corner of the earth, which would have been exceedingly difficult before the war.”9 Churches of Christ mobilized for the challenge of taking the gospel to Europe. Less than five years after the close of the war, missionaries from Churches of Christ had established churches in the Netherlands, Switzerland, Germany, Belgium, Italy, and France.10

This article highlights some of the initial church planting efforts in Europe undertaken by American missionaries11 from Churches of Christ during the postwar period before focusing on three major components of this flurry of missionary activity: (1) the missionaries’ expectations and attitudes; (2) the motivations that propelled the work; (3) the preparation, strategy, and methods employed by the missionaries.

Initial Church Planting Efforts

The Netherlands was the first nation in Europe that Churches of Christ entered after the war. In the summer of 1946, seventy-one-year-old Jacob C. Vandervis and Bill L. and Bonnie Phillips arrived in Holland and began their work.12 It was almost a year before they had their first converts, establishing the first congregation in Haarlem. Converts in Amsterdam had traveled to Haarlem for worship on Sundays, and the first family to be baptized was the H. Bakvis family, residents of Amsterdam. The Bakvis family hosted weekly Bible studies in their home, leading to the baptisms of four others and the establishment of a congregation in Amsterdam. By 1950 the missionaries reported twenty-eight members in two congregations.13

Switzerland was not initially targeted for mission work by Churches of Christ. Rather, missionaries planning to work in Germany would first go to Zurich to await permission to enter Germany. Under the leadership of Delmar Bunn, who had arrived in Switzerland in the summer of 1946, they rented a room for worship services, hosted an evangelistic campaign and weekly Bible studies, and were able to establish a small church with the first conversion in 1948.14

Before the arrival of full-time missionaries in Germany, US military personnel had begun a congregation in Munich and baptized about fifty Germans. However, according to Bob Hare, the vast majority fell away “because they were converted to loaves and fishes instead of to Christ and because of inadequate teaching.”15 The most well-known pioneer of mission work in Europe from Churches of Christ was Otis Gatewood (1911–1999). In June 1945, the elders and deacons of the Broadway church in Lubbock, Texas, met with Gatewood and his wife, Alma, and decided to send them to (West) Germany as missionaries. On June 17, 1946, Gatewood and Paul Sherrod, one of the leaders of the Broadway church, left the United States to conduct a two-month survey trip to several European countries, ultimately choosing Frankfurt, Germany, as the city where the work would begin. On May 16, 1947, the Gatewoods and Roy and Jaxie Palmer left the United States to begin mission work in Germany. Lieutenant General Lucius Clay had permitted two missionaries from Churches of Christ to enter Germany for permanent mission work; these were the first permits granted to any American religious group to send missionaries into Germany. Leaving their families behind in Zurich, Gatewood and Palmer entered Germany on June 6, 1947. They immediately secured a hall for worship services, and on the first Sunday, June 15, twenty-two people came for the English worship service, thirteen of whom were Germans. In late 1947, additional permits were granted, and Gatewood and Palmer were soon joined by their families, the Loyd Colliers, Bunn, Herman Ziegert, and Kathryn Patton. The work grew steadily, and in 1950 Churches of Christ in Germany claimed over one thousand members in nine congregations.16

The initial catalyst for beginning work in Italy was Harold Paden and his experience serving in Italy during the war. Harold convinced his brother Cline of the need, and together they began planning for their mission work.17 In 1947 and 1948, Cline Paden and Bill Hatcher took a six-week survey trip to Italy, visiting Genoa, Milan, Rome, Naples, and other cities. As a result of that trip, interested individuals selected Rome as the city where the mission work should begin.18 In 1948, Gordon Linscott, who had also fought in Italy and spoke Italian, and his wife, Peggy, arrived in Italy to begin the work and to prepare for the arrival of others.19 In January 1949, a team consisting of Cline and Jo Paden, Harold and Bettye Paden, Wyndal Hudson, Bill and Peggy Hatcher, Jack and Rosetta McPherson, K. D. (Dale) and Tillie Pittman, and Joe R. Chisholm sailed from New York to join the Linscotts in Frascati, about twelve miles southeast of Rome.20 The group rejoiced in the first baptisms by March; by June, the Frascati church had over fifty members.21 In 1950, Carl Mitchell and Howard Bybee joined the work in Milan.22 Despite various forms of opposition and persecution ranging from heckling, slander, assaults, stonings, attempted bombings, legal threats, and imprisonment, the missionaries soon established congregations in Rome, Milan, Florence, and several other cities.23 In Frascati, the missionaries established an orphans’ home “not only to care for homeless youngsters but ultimately to develop gospel preachers.”24 By 1950 these efforts had resulted in over two hundred converts.25

Yvonne Noel was the first convert in Belgium.26 Through her work and the efforts of Jacob Vandervis, who would travel from Holland, at least sixteen Belgians had been converted before the first full-time missionaries, S. F. Timmerman Jr. and his wife Maxine, arrived on September 19, 1948.27 Noel assisted Timmerman in the early days, and though she eventually fell away, Timmerman credited God with using her to begin the work in Belgium.28 After preaching only his second sermon, Timmerman baptized his first convert in Pepinster on September 26.29 Timmerman also discovered about twelve Polish people who designated themselves as the “Church of Jesus Christ.” After ascertaining their beliefs, Timmerman invited the Poles to be united with his Belgian body of believers, and the Poles accepted.30 By 1950, Timmerman reported congregations meeting in Pepinster, Liege, and Verviers. Eventually, the Timmermans also started a congregation in Brussels.31

As in Germany, US military personnel in France started some temporary English-speaking congregations during the war years, but no permanent congregations were established until the postwar arrival of full-time missionaries.32 The first missionaries to France from Churches of Christ were Melvin Anderson and Maurice Hall and their families, arriving in Paris in November 1949. Hall had served as a captain in the army in the occupation zone of Germany and had been influenced by the work of Gatewood and Palmer in Frankfurt. He had also visited France during his military service.33 Several Christians studying or working in Paris agreed to assist the missionaries in the early phases of the work.34 Within a week of their arrival, the missionaries began worship services in homes. For about six months, services were conducted in English until the missionaries learned French well enough to have services in French.35 One early breakthrough in France came in the summer of 1950, when the missionaries conducted several gospel meetings. Timmerman came from Belgium to conduct a revival in Paris, and a French Pentecostal evangelist named Hubert Knevals attended. After several discussions with him, the missionaries decided they agreed on the major doctrinal points, and Knevals consented to work with them, thus providing a boost to their early efforts. Three others were baptized at the conclusion of the meetings.36 By late 1950, the church in Paris reported nineteen conversions. In addition, Anderson was making regular preaching trips to northern France, where a few others were converted.37

Thus, by the end of 1950, the first congregations of Churches of Christ had been established in at least six nations—the Netherlands, Belgium, Switzerland, Italy, (West) Germany, and France. There were no fewer than twenty congregations and perhaps twelve hundred or more members.38 The bulk of these were in Germany.

Expectations and Attitudes

The sense of optimism that characterized the United States following the victories of World War II was shared by Churches of Christ, and this optimism was reflected in the expectations regarding the new mission efforts to Europe.39 Though occasionally tempered by the realization that things might not go as well as expected,40 in general, the missionaries and their supporters had high goals and grand visions of what they believed could be accomplished in Europe. They were not simply thinking about quick successes but imagined what results their efforts could bring over the years. “I began to visualize Germany as we hope it to be ten to fifty years from now,” wrote Kathryn Patton in a letter from Frankfurt.41 Paul Sherrod predicted “that the church is on the eve of a globe-encircling expansion, perhaps as great as any time in history” and suggested that it was “not unreasonable to work and expect to have several thousand missionaries out supported by churches in America.”42 B. Sherrod anticipated, “When we get to Europe, I hope we can get churches started and have 1,000 to 2,000 members, and they will be strong enough to start their own mission work.”43

Each missionary saw his or her particular field as one in which great things would be accomplished. The elders of the Sherman Street congregation in Denver, Colorado, wrote of the work in Belgium, “We think that there is no field in the world today that offers a richer opportunity for preaching the gospel than the little nation of Belgium.”44 Expectations were especially high for Germany and Italy. Of Germany, Carl Spain wrote, “The Lord is adding to the church daily such as are being saved, and the situation promises to be very much like it was in Jerusalem in the time of Paul.”45 Almost from the start, missionaries in Germany planned to build an auditorium that could seat between five hundred and a thousand people. Gatewood said, “We are greatly worried because we are nearing the seating capacity of the largest auditorium available to us in the city. . . . The greatest problem is the erection of a church building.”46 Gatewood also stated, “We believe that before many years have passed Frankfurt, Germany, will not only be a radiating center for the gospel in Germany, but into other parts of Europe and the world.”47 Cline Paden articulated the expectations for the work starting in Italy in a front-page headline in the August 30, 1950 issue of the Christian Chronicle: “Prospects of Becoming Largest Non-Catholic Group in Italy in the Next Ten Years Not Unlikely.” Just two weeks earlier, Carl Mitchell said he believed “there can be a church of several hundred here in two or three years’ time.”48 Those who ran the orphans’ home in Frascati believed there would be “no limit to the growth of the church of Christ in Italy when these boys leave” the home.49

These lofty expectations were intimately related to the ideals of Churches of Christ as a restoration of the New Testament Church. The movement’s historical tension between the plea for unity and the plea to restore “the ancient order of things” can be seen in the writings of the missionaries to Europe.50 These missionaries expressed interest in establishing unity with other religious groups in Europe and actively sought out groups with whom they might join forces, but they gave greater emphasis to the restoration ideal. Thus, unity could only be achieved when these groups accepted the missionaries’ concept of truth. Missionaries in France discovered an indigenous group in Strasburg, whom Maurice Hall described as “very close to the truth in most points of doctrine and life.” They referred to themselves simply as “Christians” and desired “to restore the church of Christ.” However, he was concerned that they differed from American Churches of Christ “mainly in the matter of music and the Lord’s Supper.” In addition, the missionaries found it necessary to teach the Strasburg group their understanding of baptism by immersion.51 The missionaries and the French evangelist Hubert Knevals disagreed on “one or two minor points,” but when the Frenchman accepted the American position, the Americans accepted him as a coworker.52

Regarding Timmerman’s discovery of the Polish group in Liege, Belgium, he discovered that “they were opposed to all forms of sectarianism, that they believe in holding conscientiously to the Scriptures, that they teach and practice the truth on baptism, that they hold no particular notions regarding the Holy Spirit and his work, that they follow a simple New Testament pattern of worship, etc.” He went on to report that “there was only one point on which their former practice and the New Testament did not agree.” The Polish believers were not in the practice of celebrating the Lord’s Supper each first day of the week. When they accepted Timmerman’s understanding of weekly communion, unity was achieved.53 The missionaries in Italy denied reports that they were fellowshipping a conservative group of Italian “Brethren,” pointing out that the “group’s use of instrumental music in worship and other denominational forms . . . made it impossible to fellowship them.” They did express hope, however, that they could “bring these people in line with New Testament doctrine and practice.”54 Regarding “restorationist” type groups in Germany and elsewhere, Bob Hare cautioned, “By far the majority of the groups whom we have contacted . . . have proven to be of little value as far as being able to lead them to the truth is concerned.”55

If the efforts toward Christian unity were limited, the efforts toward restoring New Testament Christianity in Europe were front and center. Roy Palmer declared, “It is our purpose to plant the plea for a restoration of New Testament Christianity firmly and steadfastly in Germany.”56 In the view of the first missionaries to Italy, the church had fallen into apostasy at Rome, and Churches of Christ now had the opportunity to bring a restored church in all its purity back to Rome and the rest of Europe. Bill Hatcher claimed that in “about the year 325 A.D., the Roman Catholic Church reared its ugly head in Italy and the apostacy [sic] from the truth of Jesus Christ began.” He was convinced that Italy was “desolate as far as a known member of the body of Christ is concerned” and believed that if missionaries preached the same gospel in Italy that Paul had preached, missionaries would “reap the same harvest today—simple New Testament Christians, and churches of Christ.”57 Cline Paden suggested that “shortly after the days of the Apostles, Italy had known nothing but Catholicism,” but “now for the first time since the Apostasy is an effort being made to bring the Church back to the very scene of its departure.”58 He wrote of the vision, “We believe that it is fitting and proper that we start in the very place where the church had its falling away,” and he spoke of plans to convert a “family to simple New Testament Christianity.”59 Otis Gatewood issued the challenge for evangelizing Italy, “Here we go, Brethren, into a country that has resisted the reformation movement and has not come in contact with the restoration movement.”60 He also wrote, “Here in our generation the pure gospel of Christ was returning to a nation that had heard the preaching of the apostles.”61 While sailing for Paris, Hall wrote that he and Anderson were about “to become the first preachers of the simple gospel to that land in nearly two thousand years.”62

Closely related to the restoration plea was the emphasis on maintaining doctrinal purity.63 At the first Lubbock Lectures, Robert Alexander insisted that the “first thing” that needed to be considered was that the work “must be done definitely in harmony with the New Testament pattern of teaching and practice” and that any missionary who “gets out of line with that pattern” should be called into account.64 One eldership reported that it would “take a fighting stand against any premillennialist or premillennialist sympathizer who would go to Belgium,” and the elders expected their missionary not to fellowship any coworker who might have premillennialist sympathies.65 At the second Lubbock Lectures, Roy Palmer insisted that “young men must be trained to preach the simple gospel of Christ in its purity.”66

Missionaries spoke of the “pure gospel of Christ”67 and “pure Christianity,”68 which was finally being brought to Europe, “where the church went into apostasy,”69 and where the fields were “fouled up with other false doctrines, but false religions have been uprooted.”70 Gatewood believed he and his co-workers were enjoying success in Germany because they were “teaching [the Germans] the Word of the Lord instead of the philosophies of men which they have been so accustomed to hearing in the churches.”71 The missionaries perceived Protestantism to be a poor substitute for what they were offering.72 Likewise, Gatewood expressed that many Italians who had rejected Roman Catholicism were prepared to accept “the truth.”73 Timmerman reported that a “very intelligent” young Yugoslav woman raised in a Catholic institution “came to see the abuses and errors of that religion and finally found the right way.”74 The common sentiment was expressed in statements that, in many places, one could “not find a single church of our Lord, nor one true member of His body.”75

Additionally, the missionaries evinced a strong anti-Catholic sentiment. Raymond Kenney suggested that in Germany, areas that were less influenced by Catholicism “might be more receptive of the Gospel.”76 Gatewood blamed Catholicism for ignorance and poverty and denounced it as a “corrupt institution.”77 Hatcher wrote of Roman Catholicism’s “rear[ing] its ugly head” and accused the Roman Catholic Church of “spread[ing] its erroneous doctrines abroad.”78 Linscott, who was involved in extensive relief work in Italy, considered relief work done by the Catholic Church to be no more than political stunts.79 Cline Paden referred to the “Catholic propaganda machine” that had built barriers against Protestantism,80 and he expressed his opinion that Catholics were “idol worshippers” who “seemed to worship mechanically.”81 He recommended, “Let us work and pray that Catholicism will not last for 36 more popes.”82 Of course, this attitude is not surprising. It was simply a reflection of the common attitudes of Churches of Christ (and Protestants in general) in America at the time.83 These attitudes were reinforced by the persecution the missionaries in Italy faced in the early years of their work.

Motivations

We can identify at least several major ideas which either motivated missionaries and church leaders or which they used to motivate others to become missionaries in Europe in the period following World War II.

First and foremost, leaders and missionaries from Churches of Christ perceived the Great Commission as a command to be obeyed. Maurice Hall declared, “Jesus said for us to ‘Go’; we MUST go!”84 Bybee wrote, “I felt that foreign mission work was imperative because the Lord said to go into all the world.”85 Others pointed out that while Churches of Christ had emphasized the “baptizing and teaching” part of the Commission, they had not obeyed the “going into all the world” part, and the time had come to obey all of the Great Commission.86

These early missionaries to Europe truly believed the world was lost, and it was up to Churches of Christ to take the saving message of the gospel to the world. Hall called attention to “40,000,000 lost Frenchmen,”87 and Hatcher challenged, “Think of it, brethren, forty-five million people [in Italy] starving without the Bread of Life . . . [are] facing a never ending eternity.”88 Keith Coleman declared, “[O]ur mission is primarily to save souls.”89 Sherrod summarized the thinking: “There are perhaps two billion people in the world today eternally lost. . . . [T]hose who have not heard of Christ are lost and without hope in the world, and also Christ is depending on us to take the word to them.”90

Although it was always secondary to people’s spiritual needs,91 missionaries were motivated by the great physical needs of the people of Europe. Otis Gatewood called attention to the obligation of Christians “to bind up the wounds” of the German people: “Isn’t it the duty of the Christian to love his enemy; feed him when he is hungry; clothe him when he is naked?”92 Indeed, as discussed below, the missionaries were active in various forms of humanitarian work.

Sometimes shame and comparison to others were employed as motivating factors. According to Hatcher, “One of the greatest shames that will ever be brought against the body of our Lord is that we have made no greater effort to take the gospel into all the world as the Lord commanded us to do.” Churches of Christ had condemned Catholicism but had not “lifted our little finger to tell these people” about the true gospel.93 Hall referred to the warning of Ezekiel 33 about the watchman who failed to warn the people.94 Gatewood challenged his American brethren, “If they [Mormons] think that it is worthwhile to send 125 missionaries there, do we not love the people of Denmark enough to send two evangelists to teach them the Truth.”95 Sherrod exclaimed, “How puny have been our efforts to bring the gospel to the WHOLE world.” He pointed out that if members of the Churches of Christ were as zealous as Seventh Day Adventists, they would send thousands of missionaries to the fields.96 Gatewood warned, “Every denomination will be going and we’re going to have to compete with them.”97

The opportunity was immediate. People in Europe were in need, and they were apparently receptive to the message of the gospel. Writers sensed that Churches of Christ had never had such a wonderful opportunity in Europe, and it would probably never be repeated. Palmer suggested that the time presented “Our Greatest Opportunity.”98 Sherrod insisted that “the fields are white unto harvest. . . . When grain gets ripe, it may fall and be ruined if the harvest is delayed.” He continued, “The church may never again have such wonderful opportunities as now.”99 The idea was to strike while the iron was hot.

Although it is not often mentioned, Sherrod called attention to the motivation of God’s love for all: “Christ died for all—white man, red skin, yellow, black. . . . ‘But God commendeth his own love toward us, in that, while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us.’ (Rom. 5:8).”100 Carl Mitchell mentioned love for lost souls as an important motivation and quoted Joe Gibbs, who insisted, “The very basic motivation was concern for, a love for lost souls.”101

An interesting motivation was that by bringing the gospel to Europe, the church could potentially prevent future wars and open a pathway to lasting peace. For example, Wilson suggested that “the best way to prevent [the conquered nations] from attempting war upon us in the future is to convert them to the Lord Jesus Christ. If we can make Christians out of any appreciable number in the next generation, it will go a long way towards cementing us together in love and brotherhood. . . . In no other way can we hope to put an end to carnal warfare.”102

Preparation, Strategy, and Methods

Up to the years immediately following World War II, little academic work in missiology had been done in Churches of Christ. Missionaries from Churches of Christ generally had little training in areas such as cultural adaptation or contextualization of a message.103 According to Phillip Elkins, “most of the efforts were made by men who had no experience in foreign missions, and practically no one had any special training to provide the guidance that was needed.”104 It would be easy to view early missionaries as well-meaning but naïve. One should remember, however, that in many ways, these missionaries were pioneers, and they were paving the way for others to follow.

Many of these early missionaries did, however, enroll in Christian colleges to receive at least some training; one would presume that most of this would have consisted of training in biblical studies, though several also studied languages. Furthermore, many of these missionaries had extensive training and experience in ministry and evangelism before going to the mission field. Hall, who had previously assisted with mission work in the Philippines in 1945, and Anderson studied at Abilene Christian College, where part of their education included the study of French.105 Cline Paden studied at Abilene Christian, and Harold Paden studied at Pepperdine, while Hatcher studied at both of those schools, plus Harding College. All three served as ministers in US churches before going to Italy.106 Bybee ministered in congregations in California and had spent six months studying the Italian language before his departure.107 Gatewood had begun preaching at the age of fifteen, had studied at Abilene Christian, and had been a church planting domestic missionary in New Mexico and Utah. After deciding to do mission work in Germany, he went to Pepperdine, accompanied by Jacob Vandervis, to prepare for preaching the gospel as a foreign missionary.

Interestingly, at Pepperdine, Gatewood also taught personal evangelism and mission work and was one of Hatcher’s teachers.108 Alma Gatewood studied at Harding, Abilene Christian, and the University of Colorado.109 Timmerman had been preaching regularly from the time he was seventeen years old, studied at Harding College (where there were no missions classes), and had helped establish a church in Oak Ridge, TN, where he served for four years prior to his becoming a missionary.110 Coleman graduated from Harding and then studied for three years at Wheaton, taking courses in Greek, Hebrew, German, and “courses which would help him meet modern unbelief.” He preached and did mission work for several congregations in Arkansas and Illinois before moving to Zurich to continue his study of the German language.111

In order to gain information about the situation in Europe, several people took survey trips to Europe to “spy out the land” and to discover receptive areas. As mentioned, Gatewood and Sherrod toured several countries, and Cline Paden and Bill Hatcher toured Italy.112 Bunn spent thirteen months in Zurich, “taking advantage of learning opportunities there.”113

Although Elkins has claimed that “Most [missions] spokesmen [for Churches of Christ] assumed that physical identification is unnecessary,”114 these early missionaries did recognize the importance of learning the languages of the people with whom they worked.115 The challenge, which came from Switzerland, was, “Who will choose Switzerland as a field and come soon to begin preparing for the language.”116 As mentioned previously, Floyd reported that upon arrival in Switzerland and “preparatory to entering mission work in Germany,” Coleman would spend time studying the German language. Floyd also noted that Coleman had already studied German at Wheaton College.117 Lucian Bagnetto (who later did work in Germany) pointed out how silly it would be for someone using broken English to try to convert an American and that the same principle applied in Europe.118 Of Germany, Raymond Kenney wrote, “In order to reach the German people . . . one would need . . . to master their language.”119 Gatewood reported in July 1947 that he and Palmer “spend several hours each day studying German.”120 Gatewood reported that before the missionaries in Germany could speak fluently, they would write their sermons in English and, after having them translated, they would read them in German.121 However, by 1950, several missionaries were considered “well gifted and experienced in speaking the German language.”122 In Italy, Wyndal Hudson was so determined to learn the language that he moved away by himself to the town of Perugia, where he lived with an Italian family.123 S. F. Timmerman, who became fluent in French, emphasized the importance of learning the languages of the country where one worked: “If you can’t speak people’s language, you can’t know what they think.”124

Thus, although training in missiology was lacking among the early missionaries to Europe, many did have significant educational training, often at Christian institutions of higher learning, ministerial experience, and commitment to language learning.

The strategy of the missionaries to Europe tended to include four major components: (1) securing a physical location for meetings and ministry;125 (2) providing humanitarian aid; (3) engaging in evangelistic methods of outreach; (4) nurturing new converts and preparing future leaders.126

The earliest missionaries from Churches of Christ to Europe were convinced that buildings were essential to launching and sustaining their work. Several workers even delayed their departure for Italy until property had been purchased because they felt “that it would be inadvisable to try to make a beginning there without a meeting place, and other facilities almost essential to a successful start.”127 One cannot peruse the journal articles of the time without being struck by the number of references to the need for buildings.128 In Paris, Hall and Anderson sold their cars so they could pay the lease on a building they were trying to secure.129 One of the first things the missionaries in Frankfurt did upon their arrival was to rent an auditorium that would seat two hundred people. In 1948, after reporting that in Frankfurt, the missionaries were now renting an auditorium that would seat about six hundred, Otis Gatewood announced that “[w]e have promises that we can start erecting a new church building before too long.”130 Actual construction on a building in Frankfurt began on May 15, 1950.131 It appears that to the missionaries of that time, it was almost inconceivable that any work could be successful without a building.132

Because of the physical devastation of Europe, humanitarian work was a natural component of ministry.133 The missionaries shared Gatewood’s conviction “that it was impossible for us to do the work that we should do unless we did something to help [the people of Europe]. It is hard to tell hungry people about the love of Jesus when you have plenty of food and do nothing to try to feed them.”134 American members of Churches of Christ responded to pleas for aid and sent thousands of packages of food and clothing to the missionaries, who then distributed them to the poor.135 In Italy and Germany, orphan homes for boys were established to provide places where homeless boys could live and be taught the gospel.136 Some missionaries adopted orphans themselves.137

Humanitarian work set the stage for proclaiming the gospel.138 Gatewood reported of the Germans, “They have seen Christianity in action, and now they are anxious to hear about it. Our work in teaching and preaching so that they might hear has begun.”139

The missionaries used a variety of evangelistic methods to make contacts and to lead people to conversion, including the following: inviting people, especially those who had received packages of food and clothing, to church services,140 visiting their religious neighbors’ worship services,141 talking to people on the streets and in their homes,142 conducting Bible classes for non-Christians,143 holding large evangelistic meetings,144 practicing hospitality,145 providing Sunday school for children between the ages of four and twelve years and conducting vacation Bible school,146 translating and passing out tracts and handbills,147 using correspondence courses,148 preaching over the radio,149 putting religious articles in newspapers and circulating their own newspapers,150 and going house to house or visiting people who had shown particular interest at the large meetings and conducting personal studies with them.151

Beyond mere conversion, the early missionaries to Europe recognized and addressed the need for nurturing new converts and training future leaders.152 They held regular classes for new converts to be grounded in the faith and allowed some of the young men who had been converted to help with the classes and with church services.153 In addition to basic principles of Christian faith and life, classes in Germany, for example, also addressed such topics as the work and qualification of the elders, giving, and the responsibilities of church work.154 The major purpose of the Frascati Orphans’ Home was to train Italian boys to become leaders in the “New Testament” church in Italy, and in fact, some of them did.155 In Germany, the missionaries began a visitation program to get acquainted with the new members and ascertain their spiritual or physical needs.156 They also started a Bible Training School in which students were instructed in Old Testament, New Testament, Greek, personal evangelism, church history, and English. Especially for boys, they initiated a three-week Bible training program in the mountains.157 According to Bob Hare, “the chief aim of [the Bible Training School] was to develop teachers, preachers, and leaders for the church.”158 In France, a formal “Bible School of Paris” was established.159 Unfortunately, in many cases, actual leadership was never effectively transferred to nationals.160

Perhaps one of the most disturbing practices for training new converts was sending them to the United States to attend one of the Christian colleges.161 This practice was widely accepted as “the proper way to strengthen the work” in the various churches.162 Based on reports from brethren who had visited Germany, Switzerland, and Holland, Robert Alexander stated, “One of the best things they can do, as quickly as they convert good men and women is send them back here to the U.S. where the Cause of Christ is strong and educate them so they can go back.”163 Otis Gatewood urged a group of boys in France to move to the United States to study. As early as 1948, three young Germans, Helmut Proconow, Fred Casmir, and Dieter Alten, had been selected to attend David Lipscomb College in Nashville.164 By 1950, the plan was to send the three back to Germany and to recruit at least one more to come to Lipscomb for training.165

Concluding Observations

The years immediately following World War II saw American Churches of Christ engage in a flurry of missionary activity in Europe. For the first missionaries, two of the strongest motivations for going were a sense of obligation to fulfill a command coupled with a deep conviction that Europeans needed the true gospel.166 Inspired to restore the “pure gospel” in lands that had not received it since the days of “the apostasy,” these first missionaries set out with a sense of expectant urgency. Although they knew little about modern missiology, these missionaries did have significant prior ministry experience and enjoyed remarkable early success. However, despite rich historical precedent for restorationist-type movements in Europe,167 the restoration plea, as articulated by early missionaries from Churches of Christ, lost traction in the following decades, and the work stagnated.168

Though the results of mission work by Churches of Christ in Europe have been mixed, it should be emphasized that the need for the gospel in Europe remains. According to D. A. Carson, “Europe is by far the ‘darkest’ continent, as measured by the percentage of the population without evangelical faith—certainly under 3 percent.”169

Allen Diles served twelve years as a church planting missionary in Prague, Czech Republic, and while there, completed the ThD in Church History/Historical Theology at Charles University (2005). Stateside, he has served as an elder in two congregations, and in 2018 Allen was part of a team that launched the Living Way Church of Christ in Searcy, AR, where he leads the missions ministry team. He has been teaching at Harding University since 2005 in the areas of Biblical Text, Missions, and Church History. He has published several scholarly articles and book reviews and is the author of Let Truth Prevail: An Introduction to European Christian Renewal Movements (ACU Press, 2021). He and his wife Laurie have two sons.

The first part of the essay highlights important persons and events during (1) the early history of the Churches of Christ in Cuba, (2) Cuba’s three decades of virtual isolation from foreign workers and resources in the wake of the Cuban Revolution, and later (3) the period of reconnection with North American churches following Cuba’s weakening restrictions on religious organizations in the mid-1990s. The second part of the essay analyzes four elements that make Cuba’s Churches of Christ unique in Latin America, namely, Cuba’s political history, her proximity to the United States, the influence of the Afro-Cuban religions, and her resilience in the face of economic hardship. The author concludes with an appeal for churches in North America to honor the autonomy and abilities of Cuban churches.

Beginnings Of Churches Of Christ In Cuba

When discussing the history of mission work in Latin America of the a cappella Churches of Christ, Cuba deserves a special mention. Cuba was the site of the first formal mission work in Spanish-speaking Latin America. José Ricardo Jiménez arrived in 1937. His was the earliest recorded work among a cappella Churches of Christ.1 It should be noted that the Foreign Christian Missionary Society (FCMS) had a work in Cuba beginning in 1899; this work was transferred to the Presbyterian church via a comity agreement in 1917.2 At that time, the a cappella churches were technically part of the same movement as the FCMS. However, when the a cappella churches separated from the Disciples of Christ in 1906, the FCMS identified with the Disciples of Christ.

In many ways, the work in Cuba restarted in 1987 when Spanish journalist Juan Antonio Monroy visited the island. Monroy was the first non-Cuban member of the Church of Christ freely able to visit the Cuban churches since the Cuban Revolution in 1959. For almost thirty years, the Cuban churches had lived in virtual isolation from the outside world. During those years, membership in Churches of Christ had dwindled from approximately 5,000 members in 1959 to about 300 at the time of Monroy’s visit. Of the 100 or so congregations that existed when the revolution began, only nine remained at the fall of the Soviet Union in 1989. Since that time, the restoration of abandoned works and establishment of new congregations has created a great need for leadership development.

The Beginnings of the Work in Cuba

Early mission work in Cuba was principally carried out by two Cuban-American men: José Ricardo Jiménez and Ernesto Estévez. Through their work, Churches of Christ were planted from the westernmost province, Pinar del Río, to Guantánamo in the east. Jiménez was the first to arrive, and among his first projects was the establishment of a radio presence. That was how he made his first contacts outside of Havana. Through appeals to churches in the United States, he raised financial support for missions in Cuba. Jiménez dedicated himself to radio work for more than a quarter of a century.

On July 25, 1948, the church purchased a building in downtown Havana on a main street named “10th of October.” The building could hold more than 100 people. It continues to serve as a meeting place for the church to this day. According to the national registry of churches, this church building also serves as the church’s national headquarters. Officially registered church buildings were also established in Consolación del Sur (Pinar del Río Province), Matanzas, Jovellanos (Matanzas Province), and Santiago. After the end of the Cuban Revolution (January 1, 1959), when the government forbade church gatherings outside of officially registered properties, these buildings became crucial to the church’s continued existence.

Use Of Media In Outreach And Training

Jiménez also established a Christian magazine, Revista Cristiana. He purchased a printing press for this and other publications. The slogan of the magazine was “Restoring the Church to Its Primitive Purity: Apostolic in Faith, Practice, and Worship.” On the back cover was printed:

No book but the Bible

No creed but Christ

No name but Christian

No theory but the gospel

No objective but service

In Christ: Unity

In opinions: Liberty

In all things: Love and tolerance.3

When Estévez arrived in Cuba, he dedicated himself to translating tracts from English into Spanish. He also printed a set of notebooks focused on doctrinal training for preachers. These were important in establishing a base for the teaching of consistent doctrine in the churches throughout Cuba.

Reynaldo Manrique, a preacher in Matanzas, published El Obrero Cristiano (“The Christian Worker”), containing literature he translated from English as well as some original material. These were printed on a mimeograph machine and distributed across the island. After the Revolution, when the mimeograph ceased to function, one engineer-turned-preacher, Fernando Oliver, built a new machine himself.4 Over the years, the churches also received materials from World Bible School and from the Baxter Institute in Honduras.5

The Cuban Revolution And Its Effects

On July 26, 1953, a group of young people, led by 26-year-old Fidel Castro, attacked the Moncada headquarters in Santiago, Cuba. The assault was unsuccessful. Castro was imprisoned, and later pardoned and exiled. Following a brief stay in Mexico, Castro returned on the yacht Granma with a group of eighty men, ready to lead an armed revolt. On January 1, 1959, Castro entered Havana in triumph. This began a new period in the history of Cuba.

At the time of the Revolution in 1959, an estimated 5,000 members of the Churches of Christ met in one hundred different locations. Six of these meeting places were buildings used exclusively for church gatherings. These church buildings were located in Consolación del Sur (Pinar del Río Province), Havana, San Antonio de los Baños (Artemisa Province), Santa Cruz del Norte (Mayabeque Province), Matanzas, and Jovellanos (Matanzas Province).

Following the Cuban Revolution, the first report to Churches of Christ in the United States about the work in Cuba was published on March 31, 1959.6 Jiménez and Estévez wrote an open letter to the churches in the United States, urging them not to rush to conclusions about the nature of the revolution. They requested that churches continue funding their work as they saw nothing but increased opportunities in a Cuba where the government was now separated from the Catholic Church.

During the initial years after the revolution, the church flourished under the new government. For example, a new congregation in Santiago received official recognition in 1959. Churches in the United States, however, were not so optimistic. Funding for the work in Cuba began to evaporate. The reports from Jiménez and Estévez show a certain desperation during this time. They were able to purchase vehicles and buildings for the church, as well as continue their radio ministries, but they were unable to find Christians in the United States willing to continue their support. Letters sent to former supporters were all in vain. These missionaries found it harder and harder to provide for their families and for the work of the church.

Jiménez was able to broadcast radio programs for two years after the revolution, but he discontinued the programs in 1961 for lack of funding. This troubled him greatly, for he knew that the work would not advance as it had without the support of the radio programs. Estévez, facing health issues and advancing age, decided to return to Tampa, where he died a few years later.

As late as 1965, Jiménez was still sending letters to various churches, telling them that his work had not been hindered in any way, nor had Churches of Christ experienced any opposition from the government. He argued that the government was only restricting those religious groups that had involved themselves in political affairs. He pleaded with his brothers in North America to restore their support, especially so that he could continue with the radio ministry.

The political climate changed once again in 1965. New restrictions were implemented that had a direct effect on the Churches of Christ in Cuba. Excessive fines were levied against local churches based on accusations that they had falsified their reports of funds, members, and property. Several places of worship were closed, notably in the provinces of Pinar del Río y Matanzas. During this time, Jiménez reported that the government only allowed formal religious meetings in legally recognized church buildings. All other religious gatherings were forbidden.

Jiménez passed away in 1974. As in many countries, all churches in Cuba are required to have a structure of elected officials who deal with the government. Fernando Oliver took over the leadership of the church with the help of several other church members. For health reasons, Oliver eventually left Cuba to live in Florida.7 Ammiel Pérez, a preacher from Havana, replaced Jiménez as representative of the Churches of Christ to the Cuban government.8

New Ties With Christians In Other Countries

In 1975, the Cuban Church of Christ renewed contact with the outside world through letters that were sent by Ernesto Estévez to Juan Antonio Monroy in Spain.9 Monroy, a Christian journalist and evangelist employed by Herald of Truth, published these letters in Restauración, a Christian journal Monroy published in Spain. In 1976, Restauración reported that the Church of Christ in Cuba had 5 meeting places, 240 members, and 10 preachers.10

Monroy had been baptized in 1950 by a Cuban missionary to Morocco. His dream was to visit Cuba and preach to the people there. A door opened for him in 1985. He was invited as a journalist to the inauguration of Daniel Ortega as President of Nicaragua. While there, he had the chance to meet Fidel Castro. Monroy spoke with Castro, expressing his desire to visit the churches in Cuba. As an ex-Communist turned Christian journalist, Monroy had always been denied a visa to Cuba. Castro told Monroy to apply again.

When Monroy returned to the Cuban embassy in Madrid, he was granted the long-desired visa. His dream came true on March 13, 1987, when Monroy arrived on Cuban soil. At this point, he had preached throughout Latin America but not in Cuba. This was the first of many trips.

Soon after this first arrival in 1987, Monroy met with a group of preachers at the church headquarters in Havana on 10 de Octubre Street. He also traveled to the other seven congregations that remained in Cuba.11 After Monroy’s visit, other foreign workers began to arrive, bringing financial assistance to the Cuban churches: Dryden Sinclair, Bill Stough, Harris Lee Goodwin, among others. In 1993, one group of North Americans held what they called “the first religious campaign since the Cuban Revolution,” preaching in nine different locations and baptizing 94 people. The reality, of course, is that this was the first religious campaign led by Christians from the United States. By that time, evangelistic campaigns had been held in Cuba for decades, and Juan Monroy had conducted several before 1993. After 1993, members of the Churches of Christ in the United States began to visit Cuba in ever-increasing numbers.12

A New Beginning

In the early ’90s, the government authorized the establishment of house churches, called casas culto. This led to an explosion of meeting places in every province of Cuba. Soon, the number of believers in Cuba doubled.

In the beginning, house churches could have no more than 25 people at any given meeting. However, the growth of these groups couldn’t be stopped, and the government eased this regulation, allowing churches to meet for study and prayer. Initially, they were not allowed to sing in these meetings. Again, these restrictions were eased over time.

These new freedoms coincided with the return of North American Christians to the island. Suddenly, Churches of Christ in Cuba had freedom to evangelize, to meet, and to grow. They also had resources needed for these activities. Dozens of preachers in Cuba began receiving regular financial support from churches in the United States around this time.

Leadership training has been a major focus for foreign groups working in Cuba. Such training has come in different forms: mass media, church conferences, and formal academic training. In 1995, Herald of Truth began transmitting radio programs to Cuba from the Cayman Islands. Around that time, José Antonio Fernández began working with Herald of Truth as follow-up coordinator. Later, broadcasts were conducted via shortwave from Quito, Ecuador and via AM frequencies from Florida. Since 2011, Herald of Truth radio programs have been reaching Cuba via AM radio on Transworld Radio out of Bonaire. The difference in response between shortwave and AM frequencies has been dramatic, nearing 300 letters per month. In 2014, the local post office requested that Fernández collect his mail every day, or else the quantity of letters would exceed the available space.13

Since 2006, the main radio program Herald of Truth has broadcast to Cuba is “Read the Bible” (Lea La Biblia). Instead of an overtly evangelistic format, the program focuses on providing tools for reading and studying the Bible, preparing Christians to have more confidence when interacting with God’s Word.

In 1998, the first national youth conference was held in the city of Matanzas. This soon became an annual event. Later, a men’s conference and a women’s conference were added. These conferences have been instrumental in edifying the church and strengthening ties between congregations in different provinces.14 They have also been important sources of training for the churches. Because of space restrictions, a limited number of participants can attend. Those who do attend typically take copious notes, returning to their home congregations and sharing what they’ve learned. I have had Cubans come up to me to discuss conferences I’ve given several years previously.They remember more about the content of these talks than I do!

One unforgettable moment in the history of the Church of Christ in Cuba occurred in 2001, when the Cuban government allowed the church to use the National Capitol Building in Havana for a national preachers meeting. It was the first time in recent history, and possibly in the entire history of Cuba, that a religious conference was held in the Capitol. Five hundred and fifty church members participated in the event, coming from all parts of Cuba as well as the Dominican Republic, Guatemala, Mexico, Spain, the United States, and Venezuela. High-ranking members of the Cuban Communist Party were present to welcome the group and to recognize the work being done by the Cuban churches.15

“This Is Cuba”

In October 2022, I made my thirty-eighth trip to Cuba. I’ve visited every province in Cuba. I co-authored a book on the history of Churches of Christ in Cuba. Yet, I will never present myself as an expert on the subject of Cuba nor of the church in Cuba; the situation is too complex for an outsider to understand. I have learned from my colleague and friend, Tony Fernández, a preacher in Cuba, that if someone asks why things have to be done a certain way, the best answer is: “This is Cuba.”

Four elements combine to make the situation of the churches in Cuba unique when compared with other Latin American contexts. Cuba’s political situation is the first element. At first glance, it would seem that what makes Cuba unique is the socialist system they have been under since 1959. However, I think we need to look back to Cuba’s colonial days: first as an official colony of Spain for 400 years and later as an unofficial colony of the United States for 60 years. The international community has viewed Cuba as a property to be possessed by others, and this outlook has influenced how Cubans view themselves and their country.

In addition, the socialist system in Cuba can be hard for foreigners to understand. It is difficult for Cubans to grasp as well, but they have learned to accept it and adapt to it. For 500 years, they have been forced to deal with regulations and restrictions enforced by foreign powers. When their own government creates seemingly irrational bureaucratic procedures, Cubans have learned to work within that system.

The second element is the proximity of Cuba to the United States. There is an expression used in Cuba (and Mexico): “Poor Cuba. So far from God; so close to the United States.” This proximity, combined with the colonial attitude of the United States toward Cuba, has led to a love-hate relationship. The antagonism between the two governments dates back to the founding of the independent Cuban state, when Washington’s diplomats, backed by US warships, rejected the first Cuban constitution and forced the Cuban delegates to write a new one granting the United States special privileges in Cuba (including the leasing of the Guantanamo Bay naval base). After the Cuban Revolution of 1959, Cuba worked with the Soviet Union to oppose the United States. In response, the United States government has maintained a policy of economic aggression toward Cuba for the last 60 years.

In contrast, the peoples of each country view their neighbors favorably. Research by the Pew Research Center in 2016 indicated that 73% of the United States population wants to see an end to the economic embargo of Cuba.16 For many Cubans, the United States represents an escape from their current difficulties. At one men’s conference, a church leader said of another Christian: “He’s gone to a better place. . . . he moved to Miami.” Everyone laughed at the joke while generally agreeing with the sentiment.

The third element is one that can be easily overlooked: the strong influence of the Afro-Cuban religions, often collectively called santería. In February 2021, the United States Commission on International Religious Freedom observed that approximately 70 percent of Cubans observe at least one practice based on Afro-Cuban religions.17 These religions are a syncretistic mix of African spiritism and Catholicism. They mainly developed within the slave culture, as slaves needed to appear to embrace their masters’ religion while desiring to maintain their heritage. These slaves accomplished this by assigning the names of Catholic saints to African gods, masking the true nature of their worship. For example, the patroness of Cuba is Our Lady of Charity (La Virgen de la Caridad del Cobre). For Catholic authorities, she is a manifestation of the Virgin Mary, who appeared to two Cuban fishermen in the city of El Cobre. For followers of santería, however, she is a representation of the African fertility goddess Oshun (for whom the Osun River in Nigeria is named). The Catholic virgin and the African goddess Oshun are both celebrated on September 8 in Cuba; for many Cubans, they are one and the same.

The ethical dilemmas created by the ongoing economic crisis represent the fourth element that needs to be considered. For many people, the harsh realities of life in Cuba force them to choose between following the letter of the law (civil and religious) and providing for those they care for. As is true in many places, the poor often define ethics and morality in relative terms rather than absolutes. The black market, prostitution, taking advantage of foreigners—all of these are seen as what has to be done to survive. Emigration is an accepted practice, even when it involves abandoning family members. In the last two years, the situation has become more extreme. Many traditional social safeguards have ceased to exist. Shortages of food and basic necessities have become more common. Desperation has grown, leading to an escalation in crime, an increase in family violence, and a rise in suicide.

Together, these four elements work together to create a situation that requires much forethought. For example:

Cuban officials may be somewhat uncooperative in light of the fact that we (United States citizens) come from a country that has the stated goal of overturning their government.

• Travel to Cuba and work on the island has to be done within legal frameworks established by two governments that are antagonistic toward one another.
• Non-Cuban Christians must accept that Cubans may have ulterior motives in their dealings with foreigners. These people may be looking for a way to escape to the United States. They may be seeking financial help. They may be working for the government, observing the movements and actions of foreigners.
• Non-Cuban Christians must remember that Cubans have a long history of accepting one religion on the surface while clinging to their traditional religion.
• Christians from other countries must keep in mind the economic differences between them and many of the Cubans they meet. This socio-economic distance is often much greater than the physical difference between individuals from the two homelands.

These elements come together to create a situation in which even the most experienced observer of Latin American affairs can feel a bit lost. Many church leaders with a history of working with Christians in other parts of Latin America have made serious mistakes in Cuba, because they have not recognized the unique nature of Cuba. For example, one biblical institute has been labeled as a human trafficking organization in Cuba because their representative in Cuba does not follow proper procedures when helping students leave the country. Since some of those students (who leave Cuba on tourist visas) have not returned to Cuba, the government feels this institute is engaged in illegal emigration.

Implications Of This Unique Cultural Setting

Far too often, non-Cuban Christians approach the Cuban churches with a lack of cultural sensitivity. Rather than learning about the complexities of the Cuban context, these Christians suppose that what has been true elsewhere will be true in Cuba. In addition, Cuban Christians are often treated as if they were children in the faith, although Churches of Christ in Cuba have existed for at least 85 years.

For the work of Churches of Christ to thrive in Cuba in the coming years, we have to let Cubans lead the way. The creative response of the Youth Conference team to the COVID crisis is an excellent example. At the height of COVID quarantines, Cuban national Liudmila Bencosme and her daughter Susana had the idea of using WhatsApp for the annual youth conference. The young people could not gather, but they could listen to audio files via WhatsApp and share messages of encouragement with one another. The virtual event was so successful that the Jóvenes de la Iglesia de Cristo (Church of Christ Youth) WhatsApp group is still active.

The later adaptation of that model to the work of the Texas International Bible Institute (TIBI) shows that Cubans can take resources provided by Christians in other countries and adapt them to their needs. Bencosme, who had taken on the responsibility of coordinating TIBI’s activities in Cuba, began distributing course materials to students via WhatsApp. Internet bandwidth is expensive in Cuba and connection speeds are often slow. Yet, in March of 2022, TIBI reported that 62 students had completed ten or more courses via WhatsApp.18

Just as Cubans across the island can maintain cars from the 1950s with little to no access to parts for those cars, so Cuban churches can lead the way in adapting Christianity to their context. One example of what this can look like is the support the University Church of Christ (UCC) in Abilene, Texas, provides to the Versalles congregation in Matanzas. Rather than supporting an individual preacher, UCC has come alongside the Versalles church to support the outreach efforts of this local congregation. The Versalles church regularly sends out teaching teams to more than fifty congregations in their province. UCC provides funding for this effort without stipulating how the money is to be used. The Versalles church reports how they’ve used the resources but does not have to ask permission to use them as they see best. Sometimes the money goes toward fuel so that members can visit the different mission points. Some of the funds help cover the expenses for preachers who go from place to place. Sometimes, especially during COVID, the money was invested in the church’s farm so that food could be produced to feed needy church members.

Christians from other countries also need to give the Cuban church freedom regarding the doctrine of the church. On the Mission Resource Network blog, Dan Bouchelle quoted an elder from Botswana as saying, “When the Missionaries came, they brought us the Bread of Life in the plastic bag of western culture. We ate it in the bag, never really tasted it, and now we are constipated.”19 Churches that support works in Cuba must allow the Cuban church to take the Bread of Life and put it in a Cuban bag, which may or may not look like the bag we are using. As non-Cuban Christians, we need to let them strip away the trappings of US culture and apply the gospel to their own context.

Far too often, foreign Christians seek to strip away the plastic bags others have provided, seeing them as legalistic and rigid. But instead of then serving the Bread by itself, we repackage it into a new, shiny, more progressive plastic bag, one that fits our views and interpretations.

Too many teachers go to Cuba wanting to push agendas of change instead of providing the Cubans with the tools they need to decide for themselves how the gospel fits in their situation. They may reach the conclusions that we have reached about, for example, the role of women, the use of instruments, and a hundred other topics. Or they may reach different conclusions. As North American Christians wishing to partner with Cuban Christians, our job as outsiders is not to decide for them. Our job is to equip them with the tools they need to study and decide for themselves.

Conclusion

The Lord is doing great things in Cuba. As the number of trained Cuban leaders grows, they are taking more responsibility for the direction of the future training of the church in Cuba. Given the complexities of the situation there, this truly seems to be a positive development. It is now up to Christians in other countries to step into an auxiliary role, providing resources as needed but allowing the Cubans to make their own determinations about the future of the work on the island. To God be the glory!

Timothy Archer is the Director of International Ministries for Herald of Truth, where he has worked since 2006. He has spent three decades working in Spanish ministry, including 15 years in Argentina. He has authored or co-authored six books in English and three in Spanish. Tim is an elder at the University Church of Christ in Abilene, Texas, where he attends with his wife Carolina.

For six of the eight years USA troops were in Vietnam during the American War, the Vietnam Mission Program (VNMP) was also present. The VNMP was the joint effort of eighty-four Church of Christ congregations from the USA and Vietnam. Together, these congregations served the Vietnamese people and American soldiers through a range of evangelistic outreach and benevolence programs. The VNMP had five primary missionaries who served in Saigon and the surrounding areas. At the start, there was evidence of ecumenical efforts by these missionaries and reports of positive attitudes about the work and Vietnamese people. However, over time sectarian and hostile attitudes emerged. This article provides an in-depth look at the work, mindsets, and attitudes of VNMP missionaries in Vietnam during the American War, along with speculations about the changes in these mindsets and attitudes over the years.

Mission work often inspires cooperation, be it with locals or other missionaries.1 The willingness to cooperate in missions was a development of the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries and is part of ecumenism: the ability and willingness of different denominations to work together. For example, at the 1910 Edinburgh World Missionary Conference, Protestant mission agencies in Britain, Europe, and the United States of America, including churches of the Stone-Campbell movement, came together and called for “denominational bodies to avoid duplication of efforts and unite in evangelizing the non-Christian world. Many associates within the Stone-Campbell mission organizations embraced this ecumenical vision, but others did not, producing new missions ‘independent’ of missionary societies and separate from missions of the US Church of Christ.”2 Thus, there is a historical pattern of some Churches of Christ participating in ecumenism and others holding onto sectarian attitudes.

Sectarianism is an extreme attachment to a sect.3 Commonly within the Churches of Christ, sectarianism refers to the belief that only Churches of Christ members will go to heaven. A lesser extreme of this attitude is manifest in the unwillingness to work with other denominations and judging them for what they consider to be incorrect beliefs.

The tension between sectarian and ecumenical efforts was evident among Churches of Christ missionaries in Vietnam during the American War.4 In this mission field, Churches of Christ congregations did not officially join with other Protestant denominations, like the Christian and Missionary Alliance (CMA), which was working in Vietnam simultaneously.5 Rather, American Churches of Christ created their own mission effort, the Vietnam Mission Program (VNMP).6

The VNMP was a joint project, starting in 1964, with multiple Churches of Christ around the United States. By the program’s end in 1972, sixty-eight stateside congregations and sixteen congregations and service members in Vietnam were recorded as participating in the program.7 The idea came at the request of Z. R. Daniel, William H. Oliver, and John Young, elders of the Royal Oak CoC in Royal Oak, Michigan. Royal Oak Church of Christ sent Maurice and Marie Hall, former missionaries to Germany and France who also taught at Michigan Christian Junior College,8 to investigate the missionary potential in Vietnam in 1962. The program started in 1964 with the Hall family and Phil Carpenter moving to Saigon to begin mission work.9 Phil Carpenter graduated from Michigan Christian College in 1963, and he was supported by Averill Avenue Church of Christ in Flint, Michigan.10 Wayne Briggs was the VNMP official missionary from 1966 to 1969, and Ray Cox replaced him and served until the program’s end in 1972. Shortly before Briggs returned to the USA, the program transitioned from the leadership of Royal Oak Church of Christ to Lennon Road Church of Christ (Flint, Michigan) in 1968, which ran the program until its close in 1972.11

Literature Comparison

Before exploring the VNMP more, one literary source needs to be discussed: The Stone-Campbell Movement: A Global History’s summary of “Operation Saigon.” According to The Stone-Campbell Movement, Operation Saigon started with Maurice Hall, Marie Hall, and Phil Carpenter in 1964. Two years later, thirteen more missionaries joined the original three in Saigon. The highlight of the mission work was a world radio program under Phil Nhon, and humanitarian relief, done with the help of military congregations. Additionally, the operation built an American-Vietnamese International School and had homes for orphans under the care of The Village Church of Christ in Oklahoma City, OK. The Stone-Campbell Movement claims there were seventeen Churches of Christ congregations by 1968. Unfortunately, that was the year that many missionaries left due to war escalations, and the number of missionaries dwindled by 1972 to only a few people. All the missionaries had left by April 25, 1975, when the North Vietnamese Army captured Saigon.

Is Operation Saigon the same as the VNMP? Possibly. Within the Christian Chronicle archives, there is only one reference to Operation Saigon in a recruiting article published on October 15, 1965. The article reported that missionaries Maurice C. Mall, Leonard Seake, Phil Carpenter, Lynn D. Yocum, and Gene Conner had laid “the foundations for ‘Operation Saigon,’” which other missionaries could join.12 With the notation that “Mall” was a misprint of “Hall,” the time frame and names would match the VNMP.

There is a further crossover with the mentioned radio program under Phil Nhon, the American-Vietnamese International School, and the Village Church of Christ orphan programs. According to this research, these programs are connected to or are part of the VNMP. For example, in an evaluation report, Maurice Hall discussed the start of the radio program, describing how Vietnamese Christian Phil Nhon is the right choice for the program due to his MA from the University of Saigon and his work as a translator, Bible scholar, and preacher. He had been part of Vietnam’s CMA (National Evangelical Church) but switched and was baptized and accepted into a Churches of Christ congregation.13

The mailbox addresses for the two groups are another potential connection between Operation Saigon and the VNMP. According to the Christian Chronicle, applications to join the operation could be sent to Church of Christ Mission, Operation Saigon, APO, San Francisco, California 96243. The “Saturate Saigon” program said their address was: Maurice C. Hall, Box 100, APO, San Francisco, 96243.14 While Operation Saigon did not give a box number, and the two had mail sent to different names, they shared a similar location. Of course, various overseas mission works may have used the same system due to convenience or other factors. Regardless, it is another connection between the two names.

Despite these similarities, differences between the VNMP and Operation Saigon are evident. One point of difference is in numbers. The Stone-Campbell Movement reported seventeen congregations created by 1968.15 However, according to a letter from the elders and staff of the VNMP in 1972, there were twenty-two congregations in 1968.16

Another interesting point of difference between Operation Saigon and VNMP regards their attitudes toward safety. Regarding Operation Saigon, The Stone-Campbell Movement notes, “The US Churches of Christ that supported the work in Vietnam recognized that it was a very dangerous place,” after which it goes on to describe the bombing of the US Embassy in Saigon in 1965.17 Yet, the “Saturate Saigon” program, connected to the VNMP through the missionary Lynn D. Yocum, encouraged people to sign up for the short-term mission trip to Saigon in May of 1966. Yocum, whom the Christian Chronicle also identified as an Operation Saigon missionary, described the situation: “The truth is that we go about our daily tasks without a great deal of concern or worried of threat to our safety. Some people have a picture of constant chaos present in the streets of Saigon, complete with the rapid fire of machine guns. This, however true in the past—both in Saigon and Los Angeles—, is not true now. If it were true, certainly the hundreds of tourist visas to Vietnam would not have been approved by the US government.”18 Thus, at least in one case, there was a difference in attitudes between that recorded by Williams, Foster, and Blowers and the missionary’s reports.

The most significant evidence for the connection between Operation Saigon and the VNMP comes from a letter from the leaders of the VNMP in 1972, who state that the VNMP began with the Orphan Care program, which Royal Oak Church of Christ, the Village Church of Christ, and others participated in during early 1966.19 The Stone-Campbell Movement claims the Village Church of Christ’s orphan homes for Vietnamese children were a part of Operation Saigon. If true, at least part of Operation Saigon became the VNMP.

In conclusion, it is possible that Operation Saigon was the work’s initial name and evolved into the VNMP. Alternatively, perhaps Operation Saigon was the popular name, and by 1966, VNMP became the official name. It is equally possible that part of Operation Saigon became the VNMP while other parts remained separate. Given the clear overlap but some differences, I claim the third possibility is more likely than the other possibilities. Regardless, there is more to the mission work done in Vietnam during the American war than The Stone-Campbell Movement reports.

Purpose and Importance

Five paragraphs are the extent of the The Stone-Campbell Movement’s coverage of Churches of Christ mission work during the American War. This short description could be considered relatively long, as the textbook describes the entire Stone-Campbell movement from its conception and development in 1830s to the late 1990s. However, there is an opportunity to add more depth to those paragraphs and learn more about mission work in Vietnam during the American War, not only about whom the missionaries helped and how many converted but about the missionaries themselves—their attitudes, thoughts, and work processes.

In this article, I pull out a magnifying glass and examine a specific area and time. It allows readers to consider the less studied human elements of mission work—the attitudes and collaboration efforts—of missionaries. It also provides a case study of historical accuracy about the tension between sectarian and ecumenical work in the Stone-Campbell Movement. I have found that the VNMP was characterized by shifting tensions between ecumenism and sectarianism, as well as missionaries’ positive and negative attitudes as the war progressed. Although the VNMP started in 1964, the Center for Restoration Studies at Abilene Christian University has records starting in 1966, which is this article’s point of departure.

Beginning: Hope and Collaboration (1966–1967)

War Dates: In 1966, the USA increased their troops in Viet Nam, and in 1967 they invaded the Demilitarized Zone (DMZ).

Between 1966 and 1967, two years after the VNMP started in 1964, over twenty-nine missionaries arrived in Vietnam, including Wayne Briggs, the VNMP-appointed missionary.20 Among those arriving and those stateside, there was an attitude of positivity and possibility about missions in Vietnam. For example, missionary Ralph Burcham wrote, “The Vietnamese are most receptive, and the time is ripe for a harvest of souls.”21 Similarly, Ira Y. Rice Jr., a missionary to the “Far East,” shared in his newsletter, “I had the distinct feeling that we were witnessing of [sic] the best-conceived and best-set-up missionary efforts in the entire history of our brotherhood.”22 Churches of Christ missionaries during this time appeared to be organized and filled with zeal to serve those in Vietnam.

Service in Vietnam occurred in various forms. In 1966, Maurice Hall reported programs involving Christian education, orphan care, and radio work. Vietnamese evangelism was done in prisons and through children’s classes. Churches of Christ missionary Lynn D. Yocum organized one evangelism program called “Saturation Saigon,” a short-term mission trip to preach to the local people in Saigon.23 Like Yocum’s advertisement, most newsletters noted little stress regarding the war and more concern over the work in Vietnam.

Besides evangelism, there was also a good amount of benevolent work occurring. The focus of the Churches of Christ benevolent programs between 1966 and 1967 appeared to be on orphans. According to Briggs, the Orphan Program encouraged participation from stateside congregations, who sent clothing, money, gifts, and candy for the children. Perhaps too much candy was sent, he reported in one newsletter. In 1967, a reported on hundred seventy-three orphans were being cared for in the Saigon area, Central Vietnam, and Da Nang. The Orphan Program had a 70% growth in six months.24

However, the missionaries did not do all this work alone but collaborated with others. Yocum noted working in his community with a Chinese man who spoke nine languages. He also had the support of military brethren. His classes included military, Vietnamese, Chinese, and Montagnard people.25 Mission and outreach efforts included all people.

While the newsletters reported no military-specific mission work or outreach, there were examples of service members working with missionaries to serve the Vietnamese. One of the best examples of this was with the Hieu-Duc Vietnamese Christians. A war attack destroyed their church building, and the congregation in Saigon, with the USA Marines, helped them rebuild their meeting place afterward.26 The Vietnamese Christians were also involved in evangelism efforts, going where foreigners were not welcome. For example, Burcham wrote about a Mr. Bao, who moved to Bien Hoa to minister to his fellow Vietnamese there. He had baptized five people at the time of Burcham’s report, and one of the new believers was a former Buddhist monk.27

The sincere desire to serve and minister to the Vietnamese and others in Vietnam was evident in newsletters, particularly through prayer requests. Wayne Briggs even included prayer requests for the Viet Cong (northern communist Vietnamese soldiers), their lost souls, service members, and Vietnamese people.28 There was hope that the gospel and their work could reach every soul they came into contact with in Vietnam.

The mission efforts brought new growth among various people groups in Vietnam. By 1967, new congregations were reported, including one in the Nha Trang base with service members and one in Cholon with Chinese residents. In addition, there were twelve reported congregations among the Vietnamese, two of which were confirmed to be new, and four of which were in Saigon.29 Programs expanded, and evangelism and collaborative efforts between Vietnamese, US servicemen,30 and Churches of Christ missionaries were proving fruitful.

Transition: Shift in Ministry Focus (1968–1969)

War Dates:1968 began with the Tet Offensive as the Viet Cong launched attacks around Saigon, Hue, and Khe Sanh. Two months later, the My Lai Massacre by US troops occurred, and by May, peace talks started. In November, the US halted the bombing. Then by September of 1969, President Nixon withdrew 550,000 US troops, and Ho Chi Minh died and was succeeded by Ton Duc Thang. In the USA, there were widespread anti-war demonstrations in November and December.

Between 1968 and 1969, the VNMP was in transition. The program shifted from the management of the Royal Oak Church of Christ to Lennon Road Church of Christ, and the Orphan Care program was entrusted entirely to The Village Church of Christ.31 Additionally, the primary missionary of the program, Wayne Briggs, returned to the USA and was replaced by Ray Cox.32 Lastly, before the end of 1969, the mission work became solely military-focused.33 In a newsletter, Lennon Road Church of Christ described its desire for the VNMP to center on sharing the gospel by establishing congregations, urging worship, providing counseling, and performing hospital visits.34

During the transitions, there were still signs of positive attitudes and collaboration. However, there were also signs of judgment, negativity, and sectarianism. For example, a former missionary, Maurice Hall, wrote a scathing article for Contact magazine about the laziness of new preachers who stopped at the sign of “red tape” in countries including Vietnam. He said, “The trouble with preachers and elders and other Christians is that they are too often concerned about the invisible barriers.”35 However, one newsletter spoke of Vietnam’s problems as a lack of well-trained workers and steady support,36 which contrasts with Hall’s blaming of people’s trepidation. Still, both signaled a negative view of their current situation.

Negative and positive themes were also evident in the mission work. While the Orphan Care program closed, evangelistic outreach persisted. For example, a new missionary, Dan Skaggs, arrived in Vietnam focused on evangelizing and training Vietnamese leaders; attendance in Saigon doubled with his arrival and work.37 Also, in 1968, Briggs started a popular cookie program for service members. The program, which involved stateside Christians mailing cookies and Bible tracts to hospital service members, aligned well with the VNMP’s new mission focus and continued after he returned to the USA.38

Even with the structural change brought about by Lennon Road Church of Christ taking over the VNMP, there was increased military and Vietnamese collaboration. One example of this collaboration came from military congregations financially supporting Vietnamese preachers’ education. For example, thanks to the military congregations’ support, Vo Thanh Duc became the first Vietnamese minister to attend Philippine Bible College (PBC). The same congregations supported Nguyen Dan Bao, who was scheduled to return from PBC a few months after Vo Thanh Duc.39 Y Kre Mlo, a Rhade Tribesmen evangelist who worked with missionary Lynn Yocum, was also enrolled in the PBC—supported by a combination of various Christians in Vietnam.40 Both Da Nang Airbase and Bien Hoa Airbase also supported other Vietnamese pastors.

Meanwhile, Vietnamese outreach continued. For example, the Duc Pho base requested more Vietnamese Bibles in a newsletter update, while Da Nang base noted they were the Vietnamese Hu Duc congregation.41 In Saigon, Nha Trang and Da Nang, there were joint worship services between Filipinos, Koreans, Americans, and Vietnamese.42 Therefore, even though official mission work shifted to the military, there was an ongoing collaboration between the Vietnamese and the military personnel.

Despite positive work between servicemen and Vietnamese, collaboration with non-Churches of Christ members or groups varied. For example, there was one episode where the missionaries struggled to deal with military authorities. Believers at Tay Ninh wrote that the military authorities threatened to close the congregation unless official endorsements from the USA came immediately. However, they reported that they were able to use their personal contacts to get the needed paperwork in time.43 This struggle against the military authorities contrasted with Briggs writing a few months later for people to trust the military-assigned chaplains and use them to spread information about Churches of Christ gatherings.44 Thus, in some places, there could be collaboration, but in others not so much.

Additionally, during these transitional years, the sectarian trait of fear of judgment began to show. For example, in one of Brigg’s later newsletters, he shared the sign on a church vestibule saying, “If you were on trial for being a Christian, would there be enough evidence to convict you?” While this sign was on the newsletter, thus likely read by other church members and not used in propaganda against other denominations, it is still an example of judgmentalism and fear being used as a tactic for repentance, a standard sectarian tool. However, Briggs also showed some ecumenical characteristics. For instance, he republished an article on baptism written by the CMA, giving it a positive endorsement.45 Both of these things occurred in the same newsletter, demonstrating that even though Briggs had some level of a judgmental attitude, he also had ecumenical tendencies.

By contrast, Cox’s newsletters were heavily sectarian.46 His writing highlighted the belief that only Churches of Christ members went to heaven and an unwillingness to work with other denominations. For example, in his newsletter a few months after Briggs’s vestibule-sign article, Cox wrote negatively about Catholicism, from which Christ of Christ members had saved another soul.47 Such evidence suggests that the staffing change contributed to the shift toward sectarianism.

Despite the end of some programs and structural changes in the VNMP, the mission work progressed. Between 1968 and 1969, there was a one hundred percent increase in the Vietnamese church, as reported by Briggs. Hieu Duc had the most growth as its Vietnamese congregation doubled in membership and had eight baptisms in three months.48 Additionally, newsletters reported progress among military personnel. For example, according to the 1969 March newsletter, there were ten baptisms since October in Tay Ninh. Furthermore, the American Vietnamese International School, which Churches of Christ newsletters viewed as a mission effort, increased its enrollment to over 300 students.49 Also, a new congregation started in Chu Chu.50 In sum, despite transitions and shifting attitudes, people still came to know Christ as the war continued.

Ending: Negativity (1970–1972)

War Dates: In 1970, peace talks ceased, the fight against communism spread to Cambodia, and South Vietnamese forces joined in the conflict in Laos. A major North Vietnamese offensive in 1972 was halted by US bombing. By January 1973, there was a ceasefire agreement, and USA forces withdrew. Then in 1975, Saigon was captured, and the war ended.

Between 1970 and 1972, the work of the VNMP had shifted entirely to the military. The work included the following: contacting Christians and placing them in contact with other Christians in Vietnam; encouraging Christians to teach others; assisting military Churches of Christ congregations; assisting families and chaplains; counseling, special visits to individuals upon request; periodic visits to units and bases; endorsements; newsletter to armed forces members; the Herald of Truth’ religious retreats and special preaching series; hospital visits and cookie distribution; weekly fellowship and devotionals in Saigon; lodging in Saigon for visiting service members and missionaries; audio-visual material and publication; sermon tapes; college information; and R&R and leave information.51 The congregations at military bases continued to hold services and other events during these years. The Tan Son Nhut Airbase hosted classes every night of the week in 1970. The newsletters offered tracts for servicemen to give out and Bible correspondence courses.52

There were reports of mission work with the Vietnamese done by base congregations who self-reported their work. Cox printed their reports in his newsletters, which may have indicated his approval or simply been following a policy to share what others reported to him. The Tan Son Nhut Airbase provided money to Lynn Yocum and Y Kre Mlo for a car to do mission work with the Rhade Tribe.53 The Da Nang base started a new project in Hieu Duc, helping a Vietnamese Christian man care for orphanages; they added another room to the existing orphanage and gave him Vietnamese Bibles.54 Additionally, Long Binh supported a Mr. Bao in his mission work.55 As none of Cox’s newsletters contained evidence of him working with Vietnamese members—which was not his job as the VNMP focused on the military—the newsletters highlighted his espoused sectarian views. Given those two things, he likely did not inspire the little work done by servicemen and Vietnamese people or other missionaries.

Cox’s newsletters demonstrated a struggle to relate to and work with Vietnamese people. In one newsletter, Cox asked for prayers for the Christians, US service members, and missionaries in Vietnam but left off prayers for any of the Vietnamese people themselves.56 The idea that missionaries forgot the Vietnamese was echoed in a later newsletter by a Christian, John E. Rogin, from the Phu Cat base. He wrote, “Viet Nam has tremendous growth possibilities if those of us who are sent over here have the proper teaching and are given the faith to take with us. . . . I feel too many times they [Vietnamese people] are overlooked and forgotten by the people back home.” After that article, Cox began to request prayer for the Vietnamese people and peace in Vietnam.57

Two years later, the extreme negativity and dislike towards the Vietnamese was evident in Cox’s January 1972 newsletter, where he wrote an article titled, “Viet Nam Mission Work, Anyone?” He described the Vietnamese as being poor, constantly jealous, having disgusting ways, and wanting money. Unfortunately, though, his dislike was not contained only to the Vietnamese. In the same newsletter, he published an article about an American lying to him about attending a photography school and how terrible it was that the Mormons had more converts than Churches of Christ.58

It is possible that Cox was not alone in his negative opinions of the Vietnamese. Nguyen Dan Bao, a Vietnamese evangelist, published an article in Cox’s newsletters about the evil bewitching Vietnamese women who wanted American money. “America is honest,” he wrote, “Vietnamese women is plenty [sic] of ruse.”59 While this paper cannot prove that Cox’s and Bao’s negativity about the Vietnamese people was widespread, since there are few newsletters from others available to analyze, the fact that Cox published the article could be taken as evidence of his agreement with Bao, and therefore, further evidence of his negative opinion of the Vietnamese people. More so, the fact that Cox saw the news of withdrawing troops positively, which he published in his 1972 March newsletter, demonstrates how pessimistic he was about his work in Vietnam—he was happy about the troops withdrawing even though it meant his work ending. Alternatively, he was happy about the withdrawal because his work was almost ending.60

The newsletters also focused more on traditional Churches of Christ elements. For example, Cox wrote a page-and-a-half article about why communion must be done every Sunday.61 In addition, there were articles on why Churches of Christ members should not worship with other Protestants and how not all worship was acceptable.62 These articles were followed by another titled “What Not To Teach Service Members Going Overseas.” In Cox’s words, people should not teach service members that “God loves them and will be with them, no matter what circumstances.” Rather, they should be taught to read the Bible and go to church when possible.63 There is no doubt that in his article he meant they should go to a Churches of Christ congregation.

A level of judgment and fear also underlined most of the newsletters. For example, in two newsletters, there was a cartoon with a judge wearing glasses. Beneath the cartoon judge, it read, “No one will be excused from God’s judgment; and no one will be too busy to be there.”64 Additionally, there were short questions about testing Bible knowledge with the declaration that if someone missed one question, they needed to go and study their Bible more because the questions were from the sixth-grade curriculum.65 Another example of judgmentalism included Cox writing, in response to a few service members/missionaries going home, “We find almost all should be leaving with their heads downcast having brought shame and reproach to the precious name of our Lord. It would be far better if they would not indicate Christian or Churches of Christ on their personnel data forms than to be a disgrace to the Lord’s body.”66 Cox had no issue using fear and judgment in his newsletters, letters which, due to their nature, were likely used to raise support and bring awareness of his work.

Besides judgmentalism, the outlook on congregational work became increasingly negative, although there were some positive reports from congregations. Base congregations increased and decreased in numbers based on rotation.67 The Pleiku base struggled with finding a permanent location.68 Nevertheless, there was a new congregation in Chu Lai in 1970 and a few baptisms in 1971.69 The cookie program was often praised and utilized. Interestingly, while previous newsletters provided information on how to donate to the mission work, his newsletters now specifically requested financial donations.70 By March of 1972, only two congregations were noted as sending in money to the VNMP, and only six base congregations were listed, compared to the fifteen mentioned in January.71 Thus, while the number of congregations decreased and membership fluctuated, there were still things to praise amongst the bases. Without much fanfare, the VNMP ended in 1972.72

Speculations

Why the shift toward negativity and the increase in sectarianism? One possibility is that the worsening of the war caused an increase in military mission focus, sectarianism, and negativity; evidence of this comes from comparing military dates with events in newsletters. For example, the VNMP’s transition to Lennon Road Church coincided with the 1968 Tet Offensive, which saw many missionaries leave. After this, the VNMP employed Ray Cox, and newsletters became increasingly hostile the longer he served, and as he served, the war worsened.73 Thus, perhaps the stress and struggle of serving overseas “got to him” and darkened his attitude. Unfortunately, there is no way to confirm this save for an interview with him or reading his journal if he had kept one at that time.

Another explanation for the increased negativity and sectarianism in the newsletters is that they reflected Churches of Christ sentiment in the USA.74 Firm Foundation articles from 1964 to 1971 followed similar feelings and themes as the VNMP newsletters. The January 1964 article was filled with positivity; the editorial wrote about a “spirit of aggressive optimism” for church planting and building. There was a focus on living spiritually and a call for unity over “bickering and strife.”75 By January 1969, however, the magazine presented the world more negatively. An editorial claimed that forces were at work to stop the truth, and preaching had lost its power. Most Christians reportedly did not live for Christ and argued about titles like “reverend” being unscriptural.76 The following year, in January 1970, this critique of the world and other Christians continued. One article discussed how it was the “Devil’s Decade.”77 January of 1971, the editorial discussed the spiritual depression that might be at an end but critiqued the World Council of Churches and spoke against all ecumenicalism, modernism, and liberalism. According to the author, the only thing to do was fight back by preaching the Bible.78 Thus, if the Firm Foundation indicates American Churches of Christ attitudes, then there was an increase in sectarianism matching Cox’s attitudes in his newsletters.79

More Research

As with any research, more questions arose from the work. Besides the questions surrounding sectarianism and negativity, there are questions about other missionaries. For example, what were the attitudes of other VNMP missionaries, like Maurice and Marie Hall or Phil Carpenter, whose newsletters were not in the archives for me to analyze? Outside of the program, other mission work by Churches of Christ missionaries in Vietnam was likely occurring at the same time. Was this the case? If so, did they overlap at all or interact with each other? How did they compare?

Additionally, it would be valuable to compare this research to other historiographies like The Stone Campbell Movement: A Global History. Finally, there is need to evaluate Churches of Christ mission work alongside other Protestant mission work, like the CMA, which was also active in Vietnam at the same time. How did the CMA compare with the VNMP or other Churches of Christ missionaries? Where were the overlaps? Did CMA or other groups struggle with sectarian or negative attitudes like Churches of Christ missionaries? More research might form a more precise image of historical mission work in Vietnam, which is valuable for its own sake and for the lessons that it might offer to current and future missionaries.

Conclusions

This article has offered an in-depth look at the work, mindset, and attitudes of Churches of Christ missionaries connected to the VNMP during the American war. At the program’s start, there was a collaboration between various denominations and groups. At this time, the newsletters rang with positivity about what God was doing in the country. Shifts in attitudes began between 1968 and 1969, during transitions with the VNMP.80 Various programs closed. Wayne Briggs, the VNMP missionary, returned home and was replaced by Ray Cox.81 At this time, the ministry switched from the care of the Vietnamese to military mission work.82 Between 1970 and 1972, the newsletters and documents became increasingly hostile, evincing a rise in sectarianism and judgmentalism. Despite the attitudes expressed by VNMP missionaries, the military congregations and the Vietnamese were still collaborating at the local level. As the US involvement ended in the war, so did the VNMP’s work.

Overall, the mission work of the VNMP experienced highs and lows. Some months saw baptisms, and others saw congregational membership decreasing. Some programs ended, and others persisted. Through it all, there was a tug-a-war between ecumenicalism and sectarianism among the missionaries and their attitudes surrounding the work.

Ariel Bloomer lived and did mission work in Vietnam between 2017–2019 while teaching ESL. Previously a social worker and ESL teacher, she has moved into ministry full-time. She recently graduated from the Graduate School of Theology at Abilene Christian University with a Master of Divinity and Masters of Arts in Modern and American Christianity. Her thesis, “Tính Thống Nhất Trong Sự Đa Dạng: Hanoi International Fellowship Ethnography,” (master’s thesis, Abilene Christian University, 2023), https://digitalcommons.acu.edu/etd/602, is focused on her church in Vietnam and the concept of unity in diversity versus unity and diversity.

In order for the church to flourish, disciples of Jesus must be trained to resist the evil “powers that be.” This is a challenge, though, because the people of God experience different cultural obstacles, and even their ability to resist is distorted by the powers themselves. The authors first explore ways of framing our understanding of the powers before presenting the Sermon on the Mount as a “resistance text.” Finally, they investigate the effects of the fallen powers in both Mozambique (specifically corruption) and in the United States (specifically racism), showing how Jesus’s teachings can help name the powers and provide practical strategies for resisting them in those contexts.

A discouraged Mozambican church leader opened up about his frustration: “It sure seems like evil is winning. And it’s not just the evil out there in the world—there is evil within the church, too. A fellow church leader is taking money that belongs to the Body of Christ and some church members are letting him get away with it! How is it that greed has possessed him and others in our community? How good is our good news if we can’t find a way to resist what is bad?” I (Alan) have heard many similar laments among the Makua-Metto people of Mozambique. But these conversations are certainly not unique to that part of Africa. Cries for a solution to the power of darkness in our lives can be heard all across the globe.

In Paul’s letters, he uses the language of the “principalities” and “powers” to describe what the body of Christ was up against (Eph 6:12). The Apostle uses this language to help the church see the ways that the good news of Jesus is at work in addressing the problem of evil and darkness. In short, the “powers” are divinely created spiritual forces at work in the world. They are “at one and the same time visible and invisible, earthly and heavenly, spiritual and institutional.”1 Like human beings, they too are fallen. And, though it may surprise us at first, the bigger story of redemption to which Paul bears witness includes how God is working to redeem all of creation—even the powers that be. As N. T. Wright explains in reference to Col 1:15–20:

So where do the “powers” come in? . . . First, in the great poem . . . we find the vital starting point. All things were made in Christ, through Christ, and for Christ. All things—including the “powers”! . . . God intended his world to be ordered, not random; to be structured, not chaotic. . . . What went wrong was that human beings gave up their responsibility for God’s world, and handed them over to the powers. . . . On the cross, Christ has defeated these rebel powers and stripped them of their ultimate power. Now he seeks to reconcile them, to create a new world, ordered by the power of the love of God.2

In this article, we will explore ways that the church should understand and engage the fallen powers. We believe that a first step is finding language to talk about the powers, learning to unpack a vocabulary unfamiliar to many. Although Paul’s letters are certainly helpful for this task, we suggest that the Sermon on the Mount interpreted as a “resistance text” against the powers is an underappreciated resource in framing the discussion. In the Sermon, Jesus gives us both language and strategies to help us flourish, even in enemy-occupied territory. In the second and third sections of the article, we will look at the effects of the fallen powers in two places: the problem of corruption in Mozambique and the challenge of racism in the United States. We will see how the Sermon on the Mount can help name the powers and provide practical strategies for resisting them in those contexts.3

Understanding the Powers and Unmasking their Strategies

Though many readers of the New Testament only consider two active entities within its pages, Fleming Rutledge reminds us that there are in fact three: “God the creator of the world, the Enemy who has invaded and occupied the world, and the human beings and other creatures who are held in captivity by the demonic occupier. Those are the three agencies in the New Testament scenario.”4 One significant problem, however, is that many Christians today are not sufficiently familiar with language about the powers to appreciate and understand the agency of the Enemy in the world today. For example, Westerners sometimes talk about “team spirit” or about a corporation that has been taken captive by (the power of) greed, but we rarely articulate the agency at play in such instances that works against the kingdom of God. To aid us in our exploration, we will rely on N. T. Wright, Walter Wink, Marva Dawn, and Charles Campbell as conversation partners before turning our attention to the Sermon on the Mount, setting the stage for the rest of the article.

Wright provides three guideposts for discussing the problem of evil using powers language. First, we need to remember the holistic nature of God’s justice.5 God is concerned with more than individual salvation; God wants the whole world to become the place it was intended to be when God formed it in the beginning and called it “good” (Gen 1:31). Second, we must recall that the line between good and evil runs right through every human heart. It would be inappropriate to think of good and evil as merely “us vs. them.” Instead, we must recognize the brokenness in each of us.6 Third, it is helpful to see the atonement as an event. God deals with the problem of sin, death, and Satan through decisive action.7 Wright notes, “What the Gospels offer is not a philosophical explanation of evil, what it is or why it’s there, not a set of suggestions for how we might adjust our lifestyles so that evil will mysteriously disappear from the world, but the story of an event in which the living God deals with it.”8 These three guideposts allow us to find our bearings as we begin the journey of understanding and engaging the powers.

It is hard to overstate Walter Wink’s influence in introducing and shaping the way “powers language” is used today to speak about the problem of evil.9 Wink asserts that the powers “are at once good and evil, though to varying degrees, and they are capable of improvement. Put in stark simplicity: ‘The Powers are good. The Powers are fallen. The Powers must be redeemed.’ ”10 Evil, then, is not merely a personal issue; it is both “structural and spiritual” as individual actions are linked to massive systems that take on a life of their own.11 Wink calls this “overarching network” of fallen powers the “Domination System,” a web of corruption that is “characterized by unjust economic relations, oppressive political relations, biased race relations, patriarchal gender relations, hierarchical powers relations, and the use of violence to maintain them all.”12 The “demonic character” of these powers “rests not so much in their transcendent nature or personal agency, as in their capacity to control the imaginations and behavior of human beings, individually and communally.”13 Our goal, then, becomes even more ambitious than becoming “free from the Powers.” Instead, life in the Kingdom of God aims “to free the Powers.”14

Despite her misgivings about some of Wink’s conclusions,15 Dawn draws from his work and offers deeper insight into the nature of the powers in relation to the people of God. She observes that because human beings comprise the church, and because the line between good and evil cuts right through every human heart, even churches, who were made to have a “unique role” in redeeming the powers, can be impacted or hijacked by evil spiritual forces.16 She writes, “Our churches operate as fallen powers when the gospel is no longer a stumbling block, when the ‘foolishness’ and ‘weakness’ of God outlined in 1 Cor 1–2 are discarded in favor of status, position, wealth, popularity, acceptability to the modern or postmodern minds, or power.”17 Dawn suggests “the overwhelming pressures on church leaders to be successful” and the “reduction of the gospel for the sake of marketing” as two examples of this phenomenon by which congregations might participate in the Domination System.18 Tragically, we can also add examples of more systematic corruption in congregational leadership that have led to the exclusion and abuse of women, children, people of color, the poor, and the disabled. Indeed, until Jesus returns, even the body of Christ is not immune to the evil grasp of fallen powers. Though this reality could lead us to despair, Dawn believes that the church still has significant reason to hold onto hope. First, God continues to tabernacle among God’s people by the power of the Spirit, despite human weakness.19 Second, as she so confidently reminds us: “Always we must remember that the powers can be changed . . . because Jesus Christ already is Lord over them.”20

Our survey thus far has remained mostly theoretical. Perhaps the best way for us to grasp the nature of the fallen powers’ work in the world is to take note of their various tactics. Charles Campbell describes nine different strategies that the powers have used throughout human history to sow seeds of corruption and disunity:

1. Negative Sanctions
2. [Supposed] Rewards and Promises
3. Isolation and Division
4. Demoralization
5. Diversion
6. Public Rituals
7. Surveillance
8. Language and Image
9. Secrecy21

One could identify additional tactics that the powers use, but Campbell casts a wide net. Much of the evil we see in the world today is connected to one or more of these nine strategies. Although the powers have implemented their strategies in new ways over time, the underlying principles of corruption remain the same—from Jesus’s day until now. In the first century, the Roman Empire publicly scourged and crucified anyone who defied Caesar’s dominion (Negative Sanctions, Public Rituals).22 In the colonial era, Europeans removed African peoples from their homelands and isolated them from their family members in order to keep them enslaved in the Americas (Isolation and Division).23 In the digital age, corporations distract consumers with entertainment and advertisements, keeping the masses blissfully unaware of the unfair business practices to which their spending contributes (Diversion, Language and Image).24 We could list many more examples. The centuries of success that the fallen powers have had using these nine tactics are overwhelming. Such continuity, however, also means that the most powerful methods of resistance throughout church history can be effective against the Domination System today. We can, therefore, look to the New Testament for guidance on how the twenty-first-century church might work to overturn systems of corruption and injustice.

The bedrock of Christian ethics—of how disciples of Jesus ought to live in a fallen world and resist the powers that be—is the Sermon on the Mount.25 These chapters (Matt 5–7) form the most comprehensive block of moral teaching in the Gospels. As we will show, the Sermon itself is a resistance text (a point amplified once we take note of the narrative context in which the Sermon is placed).26

Claiming divine authority, Jesus calls his hearers in the Sermon on the Mount to a way of living that is, as Jonathan Pennington puts it, “topsy-turvy and dissonance creating . . . Jesus’ wisdom and way for human flourishing are not portrayed as the natural outflow of human thinking and reflection. It is an irruption into this world.”27 Jesus’s sermon is an affront to the powers and systems of this world; he presents a yoke of flourishing that stands in contrast to the yoke of oppression that the powers have to offer.28 Wink reminds us that Jesus “repudiated the very premises of the Domination System: the right of some to lord it over others by means of power, wealth, shaming, or titles.”29 Jesus’s yoke empowers his disciples to reject the world’s binary of choosing between participating in violence or passively accepting it as one’s fate, and he calls us to embrace a non-violent “third way.” For example, Jesus’s exhortation to go the second mile is not encouraged “in order to build up merit in heaven, or to be pious, or to kill the soldier with kindness. He is helping an oppressed people find a way to protest and neutralize an onerous practice despised throughout the empire,” offering a way “in which the people at the bottom of society or under the thumb of imperial power learn to recover their humanity.”30 Jesus’s instructions for contextualized resistance “are, of course, not rules to be followed legalistically, but examples to spark an infinite variety of creative responses in new and changing circumstances.”31 He trains his followers to resist the powers in ways that reveal their brokenness (shining light on their strategies) and open up the possibility of their future redemption. Interestingly, after Campbell describes the powers’ nine corrupt strategies, he also moves to the Sermon on the Mount.32 In the next two sections, we will explore how the Sermon on the Mount provides alternative strategies for resisting the fallen powers in two places: the problem of corruption in Mozambique and the challenge of racism in the United States.

The Powers and the Makua-Metto People:
Naming and Resisting Corruption in Mozambique

In Mozambique, conversations about power dynamics are salted with the word aproveitar (Portuguese for “take advantage of”). People at every level of leadership or power assume that they should aproveitar their position for personal gain. This kind of corruption severely limits development. It was not uncommon for my [Alan’s] Makua-Metto friends to express frustration because attending nurses at the hospital might refuse to treat a sick child unless they were given a “tip.” Bus drivers would have cash on hand for traffic officers in order to keep themselves from being held up at road stops. We also knew high school students whose teachers would expect a “gift” in order for a student to pass their class, regardless of the quality of their schoolwork. How should disciples of Jesus respond to everyday experiences of corruption and abuse of power?

The Sermon on the Mount includes some of Jesus’s most practical teachings on the way that disciples ought to deal with everyday expressions of the problem of evil.33 His most challenging instruction, though, may be that of “nonviolent resistance.”34 Jesus’s teaching in Matt 5:38–42, given to a people living under an oppressive Roman regime, also speaks to the situation of abuse and corruption in which the Makua-Metto people find themselves.

Although a full cultural and rhetorical analysis of this passage is outside the scope of this article, a few observations about this text should be noted before we address its application. First, Craig Keener notes that “turning the other cheek summons disciples to neglect their honor and let God vindicate them when he wills.”35 Jesus does not instruct his disciples to become the proverbial “doormat;”rather, he provides a radical example of openhanded generosity to teach the principle of active nonresistance and non-retaliation in response to the backhanded blows and insults from those enslaved to the powers of evil.36

Second, in societies shaped by honor and shame, like the Mediterranean world of the New Testament as well as the Makua-Metto context,37 “a disciple must be so secure in his or her status before God that he or she can dispense with human honor. Such a person need not avenge lost honor because this person seeks God’s honor rather than his or her own (5:16; 6:1–18). If their lives are forfeit when they begin to follow Jesus (16:24–27), they have no honor of their own to lose.”38 Although the Roman soldier uses power and “forces” one into service, “ ‘going the extra mile’ is not only a case of submitting to unjust demands but also of exceeding them—showing love to one’s oppressor, although one’s associates may wrongly view this love as collaboration with the enemy occupation. It is bending over backward to show that one loves and takes no offense.”39 Jesus put this Kingdom ethic of engagement with evil into practice as he “supremely modeled this attitude in the passion narrative.”40

Third, Keener summarizes the rhetorical flow of Jesus’s argument this way: “If nonresistance means disdaining one’s right to one’s own honor (5:38–39), one’s most basic possessions (5:40), and one’s labor and time (5:41) when others seek them by force, one must also disdain these things in view of the needs of the poor (5:42).”41 Keener’s point about generosity to the poor is certainly applicable, but what if v. 42 is normative for the way disciples of Jesus should engage everyone on the socioeconomic spectrum: not only the powerless, but also in dealings with the powerful?42 Hagner states that this verse furthers “the line of thought in the preceding verses by teaching a charitable response to all who may ask for something or who may ask to borrow. In these illustrations, it is no longer a matter of response to mistreatment, or even to forced conduct, but to straightforward requests.” Jesus’s ethic applies to both justifiable and unjustifiable requests; in either case, we are called to respond with radical generosity in a way that is “alien to the perspective of the world.”43

Though the Makua-Metto people do not have to deal with the exact same ethical cases that Jesus references, they do need the same kingdom imagination to map a response to everyday evil in their own context.44 The history of Mozambique in general and the province of Cabo Delgado in particular has been shaped by communist ideology.45 Following the trends of other nations, this means that “top-level corruption . . . [and] lower-level corruption, which occurs in the daily encounters between lower-rank functionaries and the rest of society is not only extremely wide-spread, but appears to be inevitable.”46 Corruption is a problem in Mozambique, an expression of evil that severely limits development and impacts everyday life.47

In order to understand that from the Mozambican perspective, I (Alan) conducted individual interviews (20–40 minutes) with four church leaders and then discussed these findings with small groups or classes of mostly men (thirty-seven participants total). After conducting qualitative interviews about engaging the evils of corruption in this context and triangulation of the principles gleaned from the data in small groups, it was clear that Jesus’s instructions in the Sermon on the Mount provided a helpful resource for navigating the problem of corruption. Our interviews began by summarizing Jesus’s teaching in Matt 5:38–42 and asking participants to analyze its application to the ethics of gift-giving, bribery, and extortion. Out of those conversations a flowchart was developed and presented to groups of church leaders as a potential framework (see below).

Interviewees appreciated how Jesus’s instruction deals practically with life under a corrupt rule, offering direction for people who are on the underside of power. We discussed different scenarios and how various areas of life are shaped by these dynamics—from police stops, to processing documents with the local government, to getting treatment at the hospital, to dealing with school teachers and administrators. We discussed the struggle to do Christian ethics and appropriately distinguish between different exchanges:

• Bribery – “any gift or services given or promised by a client to a certain ‘power holder’ . . . in order to encourage him or her to violate a duty or moral obligation”
• Extortion – “the power holder’s intention of obtaining any pecuniary gift from a client as a condition to dispense duty or services”
• Gift-giving – Since, “prior to this modern bureaucratic system, most of the world operated on a gift economy that relied upon reciprocity and patronage, in countries where . . . officials are not properly compensated, there is a general understanding that they are permitted to look for compensation elsewhere, and the practice of what Western missionaries call ‘bribe’ is actually understood as part of their commission or a ‘tip in advance.’ . . . In reality, these . . . payments for services . . . do not fall under the category of bribes since in most cases they do not coerce officials to violate a duty (such as giving a visa without proper documentation), but only to ensure service.”48

Interviewees and participants agreed that starting the interaction as friends opened doors for proper exchanges between the powerful and powerless, as gift giving is appropriate under the right circumstances.49 Asking, then, is in the mode of friendship. But when the powerful use force and manipulation to get what they want, that is extortion—an evil perpetrated by the powerful on the powerless. Bribery, on the other hand, is manipulation of the powerless. Here both parties are complicit—this is also a distortion of God’s image and is a reflection of the image of the corrupt power, Mammon. In practice, the difficulty comes in distinguishing well among these three in everyday life, as the lines between them are often blurred. We also discussed the role of the conscience and determined that certain interactions may leave us feeling “icky” because we have not done the right thing or because we have been abused. Our reading of Matt 5:38–42 speaks to those distinctions and provides a map or guidelines for Christian ethics and the powers among the Makua-Metto—giving to those who ask of you (treating them in friendly terms)50 and turning the cheek when the powerful have taken an abusive stance.51

Mozambique’s problems with corruption have arisen because the powers have overstepped their boundaries and human leaders have not reflected God’s glory. The struggle to discern appropriate strategies of engagement and proper use of power should be done with wisdom.52 In the Sermon on the Mount (Matt 5:38–41), Jesus gives people who were under the corruption and abuse of Herod and the Roman powers a way to respond to gift-giving, bribery, and extortion that also fits this African context. His teaching is helpful for the Makua-Metto church’s work of naming and disarming the powers of evil today.

The Powers and Generation Z:
Naming and Resisting Racial Injustice in Memphis, Tennessee

In order to resist fallen powers, followers of Jesus must first name them. If the truth goes unspoken, then all of the fallen powers’ strategies remain at their disposal. For the church to expose the corrupt ways of the powers is to disarm them; this is the first step in tipping the scales and reversing the status quo for the downtrodden. Though truth-speaking is only the beginning of the long path toward justice, the journey cannot begin without it. After all, it is the belt of truth that holds the armor of God together.53

In the late spring of 2020, as the circumstances surrounding the deaths of Ahmaud Arbery, Breonna Taylor, and George Floyd came to light, racial injustice came to the forefront of white Americans’ consciousness once again.54 Ahmaud Arbery, a 25-year-old Black man, was shot and killed by a white father-and-son duo after they pursued Arbery, having suspected him of committing some crime.55 Breonna Taylor, a 26-year-old Black woman, was murdered while she was asleep in her own home: several white police officers, searching for another suspect, forced their way into her residence and shot her eight times.56 George Floyd, a 46-year-old black man, was killed when a white police officer held his knee on Floyd’s neck for nearly eight minutes after arresting Floyd for allegedly passing a counterfeit twenty-dollar bill.57 Neither Arbery, Taylor, nor Floyd were proven guilty of any wrongdoing before their lives were cut short. In the wake of these killings, millions of Americans participated in marches and other demonstrations across the country in order to protest racial inequality and police brutality in the United States.58 The community of Harding University (our alma mater) was directly affected by such racial injustice in 2018 when Botham Jean, an alumnus of the school and a native of Saint Lucia, was murdered by a white police officer in his apartment in Dallas, Texas.59 Many Americans at the time expressed their outrage over the unjust slaying of Jean, but the nation’s response surged to a new level following the murders of Arbery, Taylor, and Floyd.60

During the summer of 2020, at the height of these mass protests against racial injustice in America, I (Logan) was serving as a youth minister in Memphis, Tennessee—a city long-acquainted with the fallen power of racism and the hard work of racial reconciliation. Though current events should not commandeer the ministry of the church, its ministers must always follow the Spirit’s leading as their congregations seek to navigate the cultural storms stirred up by the powers that be. Thus, the squall of Arbery’s, Taylor’s, and Floyd’s deaths, which sparked millions of social media posts and nearly as many opinions,61 necessitated a response from our youth ministry leaders. What were American youth ministers called to do in order to guide teenagers through the cultural tumult around them?

Speaking the truth sheds light on corruption. It is vital for redeeming the powers, and it is the first step in living a virtuous life. Jesus makes this clear in Matt 6:1–21, the heart of the Sermon on the Mount.62 In this well-known section of the Sermon, Jesus lays out three scenarios in which hypocrites—who Matthew later identifies in ch. 23 as the powerful first-century Jewish religious leaders, the Pharisees—abuse their privileged position as interpreters of Torah by corrupting the true intent of the Law and using it to their own advantage. In the first, the Pharisees announce their giving to the needy with trumpets in order to boast of their generosity (vv. 2–4). In the second, they pray loudly in public to put their supposed piety on display for others to see (vv. 5–7). In the third, Jesus describes Pharisees who fast and let it be known by their sunken faces (v. 16). All three scenarios show how, just as church leaders today can become co-opted by fallen powers, the Pharisees had become corrupted by the power of legalism.63 The Law, given by God to instill wholeness through humble righteousness, had been hollowed out by the Pharisees’ lust for power and the communicable disease of hypocrisy. Jesus condemns such behavior, not because the Pharisees “really do not give alms, pray, and fast, but because they do so without a whole heart.”64 Jesus condemned them as a cemetery full of whitewashed tombs (see Matt 23:27–28).

The good news of the gospel is that virtue, too, is viral.65 Just as Jesus sparks creativity in responding to corruption in the secular world (Matt 5:38–42), so too does he open up opportunities for redeeming the powers within the community of God’s people. In Matt 6:1–21, he sheds light on the void within the hypocritical heart and offers ways to cultivate a fruit-bearing life defined instead by humility and integrity: giving, praying, and fasting in order to gain treasure in heaven, not the fading reward of earthly praise (vv. 19–21).66 When disciples of Jesus name the work of fallen powers in the world and resist their corruption by together practicing the righteousness and justice they preach with integrity and Spirit-filled creativity, restoration begins to take place.67

Like the Pharisees’ hypocrisy in Jesus’s day, racism in the United States will continue to exist so long as corrupt power structures remain hidden behind façades of righteousness and equality. As Jemar Tisby writes, “The festering wound of racism in the American church must be exposed to the oxygen of truth in order to be healed.”68 Of course, no single action will completely reverse racism in Memphis or in any other community today.69 Still, in the cultural moment that my co-minister (Fawn Taylor) and I (Logan) faced in the summer of 2020, we recognized that we had the responsibility to address racial injustice with our youth group in order to shed light on the powers that be. As two white youth ministers, our aim was to facilitate a conversation—to speak the truth by naming the fallen power of racism—and then to set an example by listening to the voices of students of color in our youth group. The ongoing coronavirus pandemic70 put obstacles in our path, but we found a way to gather together in the same room—masked and physically distanced from each other—with a small group of students. We invited everyone else in our youth ministry to join the conversation via online video conferencing. Fawn started the discussion by naming aloud the racial injustices so prominent in our culture: “Yes,” she said, “even fifty years after the changes brought about by the civil rights movement, people of color experience racism in the United States today.”71 For the next half-hour, we listened to students speak about how they had witnessed or experienced the power of racism at work in the world. Our conversation was sobering, as our truth-speaking revealed the ways in which injustice lurks, even among the students we love so deeply. Yet, because of our gathering that night, our youth group went home having been reminded of the Christian hope of redemption—even in the face of the fallen powers. Together, we made a mutual commitment to resist racism together: by listening to the experiences of women and men who face injustice due to the color of their skin, by working to educate ourselves and others on the history and ongoing reality of racism in the United States, and by publicly denouncing the fallen power of racism whenever it rears its ugly head in our churches or in our communities.72 The problem of racism in America is far from eradicated, but interpersonal commitments like these—in which Christ followers strive to be salt and light in their local communities—are necessary steps in exposing, disarming, and redeeming this fallen power.73

Historical instances of Jesus-followers engaging the fallen powers by living out the teachings of the Sermon on the Mount are helpful for Christians today. The work of Reverend James Lawson during the Civil Rights Era stands as an inspirational example of fallen power resistance. Lawson was an activist who played a pivotal role in the nonviolent protests of the 1960s. He recognized the importance of Christ-like radical resistance in the face of the fallen power of racism. The racial injustices in the United States at that time were clear to Lawson from his own experience as a Black American. He became a pacifist at an early age because of his mother, who encouraged that his every action be guided by love.74 After he spent three years in India learning Gandhi’s principles of nonviolent resistance, Lawson returned to the United States and implemented these countermeasures against the strategies of the fallen powers in the American south.75 In 1959, Lawson began conducting workshops on non-violence, training protestors to resist racial injustice in creative ways: “In his workshops, small groups of students, [both black and white], engaged in role-playing exercises. Some played angry white racists pounding on protesters while calling them racist epithets. Lawson taught them to withstand the taunts, slurs, and blows of the segregationists and to protect themselves without retaliating.”76

In 1962, Lawson moved to Memphis, Tennessee, to become the pastor at Centenary Methodist Church, where he continued his civil rights efforts.77 Six years later, he led a committee focused on improving the unequal working conditions of Black sanitation workers in the city.78 The mayor at the time, Henry Loeb, refused to cooperate; as a result, the sanitation workers went on strike. Lawson organized nonviolent protests, including a sit-in at City Hall, where union members, ministers, and other justice-seekers were met with brutality by police officers who clubbed and maced the nonviolent protesters.79 Lawson then invited Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. to come to Memphis and speak in order to shed light on the injustice that the sanitation workers faced.80 It would be Dr. King’s last speech before his assassination on April 4, 1968.

Two weeks later, after pressure from President Lyndon Johnson, the Memphis City Council approved a measure recognizing the labor union, increasing the sanitation workers’ wages, and improving their working conditions. Union leader Jerry Wurf, reflecting on James Lawson’s role in the civil rights movement in Memphis, said, “What Lawson never understood was the degree to which he was hated in Memphis. They feared [him] for the most interesting of all reasons—he was a totally moral man, and totally moral men you can’t manipulate and you can’t buy and you can’t hustle.”81 In the heat of the moment, James Lawson never backed down from his commitment to nonviolence and creative forms of resistance. His integrity provided the necessary foundation for his church and his community to redeem the fallen powers that be. Just as salt and light transform the spaces they inhabit, Lawson brought about significant change in Memphis through his creative methods of resistance—from inequality toward justice, from racism toward kinship, from fallenness toward restoration. In following Lawson’s example, the church can live out its calling to be driven not by a spirit of fear, but by the spirit of Christ’s love.

Conclusion

We must remember the ultimate hope of the church’s resistance: redemption. As Paul writes in Eph 6:12, “Our struggle is not against enemies of blood and flesh.” Therefore, our aim is never to vanquish. With Spirit-filled discernment and integrity, the church works to create opportunities for the fallen powers and those whom they have co-opted to repent and to “walk in newness of life” (Rom. 6:4). We are called to have, as St. Isaac of Nineveh writes, “merciful hearts,” that are, like God, aflame for all of creation: for humankind, birds, beasts, even demons—a list to which we may also add the fallen powers.82 The powers were created good; they have fallen; they must be redeemed. In their redemption is their transformation: from racism to kinship, from corruption to friendship.

A few years ago, the network of churches with which my (Alan) mission team worked in northern Mozambique experienced conflict centered around the behavior of a toxic church leader. After multiple attempts using a variety of strategies to address the issue, my colleague decided to try a different approach. He took a basin of water and a towel with him to a regional gathering, and there in the presence of many church members, he approached the man at the center of the conflict and offered to wash his feet. This church leader publicly refused to have his feet washed and, by all accounts, something in his authority and influence broke in that moment. His pride and commitment to retaining his own power at all costs were put on display for all to see. I was not present for this meeting, but in several interviews and conversations, the story was told in the same way. No one could explain the details of this power encounter or describe exactly what took place, but everyone was certain that something had happened at the spiritual level, impacting the dynamics of the group. A creative form of nonviolent resistance revealed the allegiance of this church leader to the fallen powers and opened up an opportunity for redemption and change within the corrupted system.83

The Sermon on the Mount has been and should remain an impetus for resisting and redeeming the powers that be. For example, the Golden Rule (Matt 7:12) has played a powerful role in the history of Christian opposition of racism,84 and Jesus’s third way of creative, nonviolent resistance in first-century Rome charted a path for dealing with the oppressive power of corruption.85 Christ’s Sermon, his kingdom manifesto, is a survival guide for disciples living in enemy-occupied territory. The Sermon on the Mount is Jesus’s “Rules for Radicals,” his “Rules for Rebels,” and a text that needs to be seen as our “Real Rules of Order.”86 By creatively applying Jesus’s teaching in ministry contexts like Memphis and Mozambique, God’s power is at work, even in our weakness—even when our best, most faithful efforts seem to fail and may end up costing us, like Jesus, our very lives.87 Even in death we can, like Jesus, be successful in naming and resisting the strategies of the powers, disarming them and working for their redemption in our churches and communities.

Alan Howell, his wife Rachel, and their three daughters resided in Mozambique from 2003 to 2018 as part of a team working among the Makua-Metto people. Alan (MDiv) served as the Visiting Professor of Missions at Harding University from 2019 to 2023 (Searcy, AR) teaching undergraduate and graduate courses in the areas of biblical studies, cultural competency, theology, and strategy. He is the Director of Church Relations at Mission Resource Network (mrnet.org).

Logan Thompson (MDiv) has worked in full-time youth ministry since 2015. He is the youth minister at the Mansfield Church of Christ in Mansfield, TX, where he lives with his wife, Maryn, and their two daughters, Joanna and Noah Beth.

College students have proved a significant sending force in the modern missions movement, most notably with the Student Volunteer Movement of the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. Those in Churches of Christ are no different, with state school campus ministries playing a significant role in missions efforts, particularly after World War II. This article examines the place of missionary mobilization, overseas campus ministries, and international student ministries in twentieth-century Churches of Christ campus ministries.

The link between the college campus and the world’s peoples has always been strong, and the contemporary American campus is no exception. From early collegiate missions societies across the East Coast to present-day missionary mobilization, the college campus has been a substantial player in world missions. Arguably no greater missionary movement has occurred in the history of the modern church than that of the Student Volunteer Movement, which began on American college campuses. Out of it, influential leaders like John Mott laid the foundation for missions on the domestic campus through international student ministry. In the twentieth century, Churches of Christ built on the foundation previously laid by others.

Cross-cultural ministry is only a portion of the larger story of twentieth-century campus ministry in Churches of Christ, yet it is a significant portion. The days of Bible Chairs and Campus Evangelism (1918–1970) saw a heavy focus on ministries sending and receiving full-time missionaries. The Discipling Movement (1971–1988) was a remarkable yet controversial period that saw a substantial impact on campuses around the world. Post-Crossroads (1989–1999) efforts increased the focus on international student ministry.1 This paper examines the history of missions in Church of Christ campus ministries, beginning with precursor efforts in the late nineteenth and twentieth centuries and focusing on missionary mobilization, overseas campus ministries, and international student ministries throughout the twentieth century.

Precursors to Church of Christ Efforts (1886–1917)

Three main organizations in the early twentieth century paved the way for Church of Christ efforts: the Student Volunteer Movement for Foreign Missions (SVM), the Chinese Students’ Christian Association (CSCA), and the Committee on Friendly Relations Among Foreign Students (CFR). John Mott was the primary figure that tied them all together. Just before Mott was a college student at Cornell, mobilization efforts in England led several influential Cambridge student-athletes to give their lives to missions. J. K. Studd, one of the so-called “Cambridge Seven,” spoke at Cornell in January of 1886 with words that would forever change the course of Mott’s life, saying, “Seekest thou great things for thyself? Seek them not. Seek ye first the Kingdom of God.”2 That night, Mott consecrated his life to Christ, like thousands more would in coming years. As the leader of the Cornell YMCA, he was invited later that year to the first international campus ministry conference at Mount Hermon, Massachusetts.3 In an attempt to impact the lives of younger students with more collegiate years ahead of them, only underclassmen were invited, except for Robert Wilder of Princeton. Wilder, who had been invited because of his significant impact at Princeton, suggested that a night be given to speaking to the needs of foreign missions.4 Robert’s sister, Grace, had prayed that 100 men from the conference would commit to missions; following the night with a missions focus, students began discussing the call to the mission field, signing their names to a commitment to go, “willing and desirous, God permitting.”5 Throughout the month-long conference, ninety-nine students committed, with the hundredth student signing his pledge during a farewell prayer meeting.6 The group then commissioned Wilder and a few others to mobilize more. They rallied 1,000 others in one year, and the Student Volunteer Movement was born.7 Formalized in 1888, Mott was made chairman, though this would not be his only position of global leadership.8

As SVM gained momentum, so did the need for international student ministry. In the early twentieth century, the largest group of international students coming to America was Chinese, so C. T. Wang formed the CSCA in 1908, which in three years grew from six to over eight hundred.9 Although Chinese students represented the greatest need, students from hundreds of other nations were coming to the United States as well, which led to the formation of the CFR by Mott in 1911.10 These early international student ministries provided a safe transition to students’ new homes, companionship with others, and opportunities for spiritual growth with the hopes of a Christian witness upon their return home.11 Eventually, these organizations would lose their evangelical focus, but not before sufficient strides had been made in missionary mobilization and international student ministry across American campuses.12 By 1918, the year campus ministry began in Churches of Christ, the effects of World War I on European colleges were only increasing the influx of international students to the United States and, with it, the global vision of American evangelicals.13

Bible Chairs and Campus Evangelism:
Sending and Receiving Full-Time Workers (1918–1970)

Churches of Christ began ministry on college campuses in 1918 at UT-Austin.14 Before Disciples of Christ and Churches of Christ had officially separated in 1906, Restoration Movement churches had established a campus ministry at the University of Michigan in 1893, though this came to be associated with the Disciples.15 For the first few decades, campus ministry operated through the function of a Bible Chair, in which “college students could take religious courses . . . at the [church] facility, and credit might (or might not) be given in their degree program.”16 Though historical data on campus ministries in early decades is scant, the creation of the National Bible Chair Lectureship in 1957 and Bible Chair Journal in 1958 provides a picture going forward.17 By 1958, Churches of Christ had ministries on twenty-nine campuses and were experiencing great momentum.18 Like campus ministry, the mission field saw little activity from Churches of Christ in the first half of the twentieth century, though this increased exponentially following World War II. At the end of the war, Churches of Christ only existed in fifteen countries. However, by 1960, seventy countries had churches, with forty hosting almost two hundred American missionaries.19 Until 1970, it would be the sending and receiving of these vocational missionaries that would remain the greatest missions focus of Church of Christ campus ministries.

In a later era, Dennis Files reminded campus ministers that the call of the Great Commission might mean that they not only mobilize students to the mission field but that they themselves go. However, early Church of Christ campus ministers needed no such reminder, as many of them were missionaries themselves.20 One of the most successful campus ministers of the twentieth century was Bob Davidson, who served students at Texas A&M starting in 1954. After a brief stint in campus ministry, Davidson left for Thailand, where he served as a missionary and saw many conversions before returning to work as a campus minister at A&M Church of Christ in 1970.21 Over the following decades, he would build on his experience as a foreign evangelist to lead a ministry that was often one of the largest in the nation. Part of that involved taking students on short-term mission trips, including some back to Thailand, through “Aggies for Christ in the Orient.”22 Jim Woodroof, though not a campus minister, would later serve alongside Davidson as the preaching minister at A&M Church of Christ after ten years in New Zealand.23 The year after Davidson left for Thailand, Wayne and Shirley Harris arrived in Lubbock, Texas, where Wayne led the campus ministry at Texas Tech. However, they, too, would leave for the mission field, heading to Denmark in the fall of 1961, with the belief that their time overseas would strengthen their leadership of college students upon their return.24 Robert Skelton was likewise a missionary, well-known in Churches of Christ for his work in Salzburg, Austria, from 1956 until he assumed the campus ministry position at Texas A&I in 1964.25 The following year, Leon Crouch left the campus ministry position at Texas Tech to plant a church in Liverpool, England, and Joe Watson left Oklahoma State for South Africa.26 In 1966, Gary Adams arrived in Cisco, Texas, to direct the Bible Chair after ten years of work in Holland.27

While many Bible Chairs were led by full-time campus ministers, other church leaders often contributed in various ways. Two influential leaders were elders Wayne Long of University Avenue Church of Christ (Austin, TX) and Frank Trayler of Edinburg Church of Christ (Edinburg, TX). Long, a professor at UT Austin, planted the first Church of Christ in Thailand during a temporary stint at the University of Bangkok.28 Upon Long’s return to the United States, University Avenue began looking for a missionary they might sponsor to continue long-term work in Thailand. This search led to the support of Parker and Donna Henderson as the first full-time missionary couple in Thailand from Churches of Christ.29 Trayler’s experience in Latin American missions uniquely equipped him to teach Bible Chair courses in Spanish. His work led the ministry at the largely Hispanic Pan-American College to grow to two hundred twenty-six in 1969, one of the largest in Churches of Christ at the time.30 During this time, campus ministries not only received missionaries, but those former missionaries (and other campus ministers) empowered and motivated students to pursue a call to missions.

One of the primary ways ministers at the time mobilized students was through their teaching. The first reference to such came in the fall of 1960, when the campus ministry at Texas Tech held a missions-focused small group with current and former missionaries leading discussions.31 Years later, the ministry at the University of Georgia would follow suit.32 Likewise, Tarleton State would host a similar “Mission Study Supper” with students hearing from influential missiologists such as Dr. George Gurganus.33 Students in campus ministries were urged to pursue vocational missions and to use the skills they were attaining at state schools for the sake of the Gospel cross-culturally, and many rose to this task.34

The short biographical entries of American Church of Christ missionaries in the 1964 book A Missionary Pictorial give a helpful picture of efforts at the time. Although many more of the nearly three hundred missionaries listed at the time came from Christian colleges than state colleges, thirteen of those were trained at state school campus ministries.35 However, the exact number of missionaries sent out as graduates of campus ministries is hard to discern since at least two from Eastern New Mexico (and possibly more from other campuses) were left out of the work. Stephen Eckstein Jr.—often regarded as the most prolific campus minister the Churches of Christ have seen—has long been revered for his teaching ability, and his ministry at ENMU was one of the most effective missionary-sending ministries, with six former students serving overseas in the mid-‘60s.36 Students from other campuses served later in the ‘60s and, thus, were not recorded, like Jim Pinegar and David Grimes, who left Memphis for Zambia and East Asia, respectively.37 Others shared the gospel around the world for a short time, such as John Coleman, who lived in Pakistan thanks to the Texas A&M Intercollege Exchange Program.38 Though international student ministry and overseas campuses ministries received attention during this time, it was the heyday of missionary mobilization.

The international student ministry these ministers and students engaged in gained momentum during the Campus Evangelism movement. “Campus Evangelism” was an organization formed in 1966 under the auspices of Broadway Church of Christ in Lubbock, Texas.39 Building on the strategies of parachurch ministries like Campus Crusade for Christ, Campus Evangelism sought to promote a new model of campus ministry across the country focused less on scholarship and more on evangelism.40 International student ministry had already been carried out a few years prior, particularly at Oklahoma State, where the aforementioned Joe Watson helped lead outreach and saw frequent church attendance by international students.41 Campus Evangelism, though, helped elevate international student ministry nationwide. The methodology of international student banquets and a mindset of bold evangelism were readily picked up by other ministries. New Mexico saw forty-five students attend a banquet, and Tennessee Tech set a goal of reaching one hundred international students in a school year.42 Georgia even had four international students living at its student center.43 Even still, the greatest days of international student ministry would lie ahead.

The Bible Chair and Campus Evangelism years would also see the start of overseas campus ministries that would reach their height in the ‘70s and ‘80s. As early as the late ‘50s, Church of Christ missionaries reached out to college students abroad.44 In 1960, Bible Chair Journal surveyed campus ministers and received a favorable response regarding future attempts at planting campus ministries overseas.45 By 1970, Churches of Christ had a campus ministry in Italy, Japan, Korea, and Switzerland, but this was only the beginning.46 Though Campus Evangelism would die after just a few years due to increasing controversy and a subsequent lack of financial support, it gave birth to a movement that would bring even more controversy and, with it, an even grander global vision.47

The Discipling Movement:
Reaching Campuses Worldwide (1971–1987)

Likely, the most influential campus ministry in Churches of Christ was a pilot project of Campus Evangelism planted at the University of Florida in conjunction with Fourteenth Street Church of Christ, later renamed Crossroads Church of Christ.48 Chuck Lucas, the campus minister (and later preaching minister) at Crossroads, rose to prominence after seeing incredible growth through the implementation of intense evangelism, followed by one-on-one discipleship of new converts, a practice common in the “Shepherding Movement” of charismatic churches in the ‘70s.49 In ten years, the church grew from one hundred in 1968 to over 1,000 in 1978.50 Also, Crossroads trained an incredible number of ministers who also saw growth on other campuses; in 1980, ten of the twenty-seven Churches of Christ that baptized over one hundred people had ministers trained at Crossroads.51 Around that time, Kip McKean, a convert of the ministry in Florida, began leading ministries to colleges in Boston that would see even more significant growth by the mid-‘80s. Far surpassing Crossroads, Boston saw almost 1,800 baptisms in the first six years, coming to be seen as the center of the movement.52 Thus, the “Discipling Movement” (or “Crossroads Movement” or “Boston Movement”) was born.

Despite all this exciting growth, controversy followed the Discipling Movement. Even by the early ‘80s, before the explosion of the Boston Church of Christ, multiple books had been written on the movement and the perceived control over disciples’ lives by their disciplers.53 Newspaper articles from Gainesville spoke of a “Reputation of Aggressiveness [and] Mind Control” that accompanied the church’s growth.54 Even still, the passion for world evangelism emanating from the movement was hard to deny.

Although the international student ministry would experience its greatest focus in the ‘90s, the high evangelistic fervor of the Discipling Movement meant that no other period would see as much fruit among international students. In some ways, the old methodology was carried over, with ministries still utilizing events like international banquets.55 At the same time, a more direct approach was taken, with ministries often starting evangelistic Bible studies geared toward international students on campuses like Oregon State, Ole Miss, and Ohio State, the first of which even held them in Spanish.56 Florida International University also had a Spanish evangelistic Bible study and a Spanish service on Sundays and saw forty-one international student baptisms in one year alone.57 In 1979, three different ministries converted students from Hong Kong, which sparked a desire for a directory of international students across the country who might connect with one another.58 Over the next two years, the campus ministry at Alabama A&M and Alabama-Huntsville converted students from Nigeria, Iran, the Bahamas, and Japan.59 The directory, inspired by these conversions and more at the turn of the ‘80s, found that Church of Christ campus ministries had one hundred and eighty Christian international students alone, not to mention the number of students coming to faith.60 Not only did these students come to faith, they were sent back to their home countries to reach others. One of these, Oswaldo Bustillo, was converted at the University of Washington in 1979; upon his return to his home country of Honduras in 1981, he helped a missionary-led church grow from twenty-five to ninety-five and become self-sufficient.61 The missionary impetus toward international students on campus carried over in students’ hearts as they moved to take the gospel to college students across the world.

As mentioned before, overseas campus ministries began in the Bible Chair days. The first of these began in Milan, Italy, in 1963 under the direction of Dr. Fausto Salvoni.62 Other ministries in Japan, Korea, and Switzerland soon appeared in directories.63 In the aftermath of Campus Evangelism and during the rise of the Discipling Movement, other ministries not necessarily associated with Crossroads still contributed to a growing global focus. Though not always viewed in the same light of missions as other ministries due to the long-standing prevalence of Churches of Christ in Canada, the rise of Canadian campus ministries in the late ‘70s is still noteworthy. In 1974, a ministry was established in Ottawa for students of Carleton and Ottawa universities.64 Soon thereafter, ministries arose to students at Edmonton campuses and the universities of Calgary, Regina, Saskatchewan, and Victoria.65 In 1982, another ministry not affiliated with Crossroads arose in Nigeria at the University of Ife, thanks to the efforts of Jide Oguntimein, an Ole Miss campus ministry grad and Ife faculty member.66 Graduates from three different ministries also attempted to start a campus ministry in Guatemala.67 Neither the Nigerian nor Guatemalan ministries were listed in directories, so exact numbers can be difficult to determine, but the greatest number of overseas campus ministries according to directories of Campus Journal (previously named Bible Chair Journal and later Campus Crosswalk) came in at 13 in the summer of 1983.68 Soon after, ministries would begin setting their eyes on the largest campuses in the world as targets of ministries. However, it would be members of the Discipling Movement who would begin to reach them.69

By the mid-‘80s, Boston Church of Christ was the new epicenter of the movement due to their increased growth and the firing of Chuck Lucas from Crossroads following “recurring sins.”70 Although Boston did not specifically set out to start campus ministries on the major campuses of the world, as they planted churches in major world cities, they focused their evangelism heavily on young adults, and campus ministry remained a major factor in the movement.71 In 1982, Boston Church of Christ sent Kevin Darby to Sydney, Australia, where former LSU campus minister Mike Fontenot served.72 However, the first church fully planted by Boston was born in July of 1982 in London, England, under the leadership of James Lloyd and Douglas Arthur.73 Unlike some other Boston church plants, its connection with campus ministry and church planting prior to some of the greater controversy surrounding Boston led to its listing in directories alongside other overseas ministries.74 In the fall of that year, the Boston Movement held its first World Missions Seminar to increase giving and workers for cross-cultural church plants.75 Over the next five years, Boston Church of Christ would plant churches and reach thousands of college students in Toronto (August 1985), Johannesburg (June 1986), Paris (August 1986), Stockholm (October 1986), and Bombay (November 1986).76

Along with the international church plants, Boston “restructured” a collegiate church in Kingston, Jamaica, in 1987.77 “Restructuring” was a practice Boston soon made common, particularly in the United States among churches formerly affiliated with Crossroads, in which leaders would willingly step down and move to Boston to be trained, and the Boston church’s eldership would assume remote authority.78 By this point, the mounting critiques of what mainline Churches of Christ felt to be unbiblical doctrines and un-Christlike pride and spiritual abuses were leading Churches of Christ and Discipling Movement churches to view themselves as two distinct groups. Though Boston churches would not become the “International Churches of Christ” until 1993, shifting views on baptism, ecclesiology, and authority in the fall of 1987 drew a line in the sand.79 By 1988, Campus Journal no longer listed Discipling Movement ministries as their own. The International Churches of Christ’s global impact was far from over, but 1987 marked the end of their place in Church of Christ campus ministry missions.

Post-Crossroads Efforts:
The Height of International Student Ministry (1988–1999)

Looking toward the end of the 20th century, collegiate Churches of Christ sought to recover from the turmoil of the Discipling Movement without departing from their global vision. The immediate break caused by the Discipling Movement led to a quick decline in the number of campus ministries, overseas ministries notwithstanding. Nonetheless, in 1988, building on the foundation Wayne Long set in Bangkok in the ‘50s, Russ Pennington established a campus ministry at nearby Rankhamhaeng University, then the largest in the world. More plans were established for a campus ministry in Hungary, led by a team from Oregon State to campuses in Budapest.80 In 1994, plans were also made for a campus ministry in South Africa. In 1997, Tim and Debbie Martin began a campus ministry in Vienna, Austria, to build on prior efforts of Christian faculty.81 Even still, the global vision of the late ‘80s and ‘90s shifted from overseas campus ministries to short-term mission trips and international student ministry.

One of the most significant forces in campus ministry missions post-Crossroads came thanks to Let’s Start Talking (LST). LST was formed in 1980 to equip college students to spend six weeks overseas sharing the gospel through free conversational English programs in partnership with local churches, which would carry out follow-up work.82 Particularly in the ‘90s, LST gained traction with campus ministries. In the summer of 1991, over one hundred workers went to nine European countries, many of whom came from state school campus ministries, including the ministry at California Polytechnic State, which held Bible studies in a former Communist seminar building in East Germany following the fall of the Iron Curtain.83 By 1995, LST sent students from a dozen different state school campus ministries to Europe, Asia, and South America.84 Other ministries took short-term mission trips apart from LST and also saw fruit. In 1992, Andy Miller led the campus ministry at UC-Bakersfield to Malaysia and Singapore for the summer and helped lead sixty-six people to Christ.85 The following summer, sixty students from the University of Arkansas led three people to Christ during a Spring Break evangelistic campaign in Mexico.86 Meanwhile, other ministries like Auburn, led by Jim Brinkerhoff, and Sam Houston State partnered for joint short-term mission trips.87 Let’s Start Talking and ministers like Brinkerhoff led the charge in short-term missions and domestic evangelism among international students.

In 1990, ten years after its inception, LST adapted its training to be used for conversational English in a domestic setting with international students, which it called FriendSpeak.88 Also in 1990, ministers collaborated to write Ministering on the College Campus, with Brinkerhoff writing a chapter on “Working with International Students.” By that point, Auburn had seen several international students come to Christ through an emphasis on relational evangelism. Brinkerhoff listed several methods of outreach present at the time including: Adopt-a-Student programs, conversational English classes, and International Student dinners.89 In 1994, Campus Crosswalk devoted an entire issue to international student ministry, providing a biblical basis and practical suggestions. In it, at least sixteen countries are noted as represented by international students in various ministries nationwide.90 Later that year, Campus Crosswalk editor Milton Jones published “The Circle Study,” a gospel illustration he designed as a campus minister at Washington specifically for international students, which began with man as created in the image of a Creator God and walked through salvation through God’s Son.91 Ministries used all these methods and more to befriend students and share the Gospel cross-culturally.

Moreover, while no single ministry might have seen as many conversions in one year as Florida International in the early ‘80s, many campus ministries still saw significant fruit. In 1993, Memphis had over eighty international students from nine countries in evangelistic Bible studies.92 As other ministries likewise leveraged relational evangelism or conversational English programs to share the gospel, they saw students come to faith and take the gospel back home.93 This emphasis on international student ministry and short-term missions would continue in Church of Christ campus ministry into the twenty-first century.

Conclusion

Shortly after the end of the twentieth century, Jim Brinkerhoff spoke about why, after many years in campus ministry with giftedness in teaching, he did not pursue a preaching position at a church. In reflection, he said, “At times, I gave it serious consideration. Each time, though, I thought to myself, ‘Where else could I go that carries with it the possibilities of the world vision that is inherent within campus ministries?’ We in campus ministries are among those who can rightfully claim to possess Archimedes’ Lever—‘Give me a place to stand, and I will move the earth.’ ”94 Church of Christ campus ministries in the twentieth century went to great efforts to do just that—to grab hold of Archimedes’ Lever to make an impact throughout the whole world.

Ministries like SVM, CSCA, and CFR paved the way for later efforts. Those in the years of Bible Chairs and Campus Evangelism sent and received numerous full-time missionaries to and from the mission field. The Discipling Movement, for all its controversy, saw a global vision and bold efforts to take the gospel to major cities and campuses around the world. Those who came through the other side of the Discipling Movement focused on short-term missions and international student ministries as one century closed and another began, making way for those who would continue their efforts into the twenty-first century.

Dylan Kirkland is a campus minister at University Church of Christ in Tuscaloosa, AL, and a PhD student at Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary studying evangelism with a research focus on campus ministry. Before working at University Church of Christ, he was a recruiter for Pioneer Bible Translators.