Q:
Hi Art,
In the early to mid 1930s your dad wrote about the revival meetings he organized and held around the mission field along with his Chinese colleagues. They seemed to have been pretty energetic events, much like Baptist tent revival meetings. Did you ever participate in any of these revival meetings? Any stories to relate?
Cheers,
Bill
A:
My comments on "revival meetings" are tentative at best because my memory of them is hazy! I never thought of my dad as a "charismatic" or his meetings as raucous -- it seems to me that he referred to his travels as presentations of "Bible Studies". Yet revival meetings may have been how they were represented, or, what they really were, I can't say. I never participated but I was outside the door at some of his presentations and can recall nothing noisy. I do remember a discussion I overheard among some missionaries about how wonderful it was that there were so many "revivals" on the mission field but I didn't know what a revival was and I remember no definition from them.! In the 1930's. There were, and are continuing today from what I read, is that there are numerous "Christian" fringe religious groups outside of the mission environment. One I remember was the "True Jesus Church" that emphasized foot washing as being scripturally necessary to be truly "Christian" -- they invaded a church service at the mission (briefly) with shouts and placards that what was going on wasn't "Christian" because there was no foot-washing in the congregation. When they left the service went on.
Art