CHURCH OF GOD HISTORY & HERITAGE
TELLING THE CHURCH OF GOD STORY
This page contains links to selected publications, articles, and other
accounts that tell the story of the Church of God around the world.
accounts that tell the story of the Church of God around the world.
A BRIEF HISTORY
David G. Roebuck
David G. Roebuck
The Church of God dates its origins to the establishment of the Christian Union on August 19, 1886, in Monroe County, Tennessee. Rejecting the exclusivity of the Landmark Baptist movement that dominated churches in that region, R.G. Spurling called for establishing a church based on the New Testament rather than creeds and traditions that had shaped much of Christianity since the Protestant Reformation. Eight persons accepted his invitation to sit “together as the Church of God,” and with the assistance of his father, Richard Spurling, they set in order the Christian Union. Over the next twelve years, R.G. Spurling established other Christian Union congregations in southeast Tennessee.
In the closing years of the nineteenth century, a revival of holiness changed the lives of some Baptists in the nearby Camp Creek community of Cherokee County, North Carolina. Key to this transformation was a ten-day revival at the Shearer Schoolhouse in the summer of 1896, where four evangelists proclaimed the necessity of holiness and called for their hearers to seek sanctification. As the spirit of revival continued over the next four years, opponents to the new doctrine persecuted the holiness believers and turned them out of their churches.
In the midst of this persecution, God honored their hungry hearts. A.J. Tomlinson later recorded, “The people earnestly sought God, and the interest increased until unexpectedly, like a cloud from a clear sky, the Holy Ghost began to fall on the honest, humble, sincere seekers after God. . . . [O]ne after another fell under the power of God, and soon quite a number were speaking in other tongues as the Spirit gave them utterance.” The Lord had done an extraordinary work, but according to Charles W. Conn, it would be some time later before they “would understand the doctrine, person and nature of the Holy Spirit.”
Although history does not reveal the role of R.G. Spurling in the holiness revival, he encouraged the holiness believers to establish a congregation. On May 15, 1902, Spurling and R. Frank Porter set in order the Holiness Church in the home of W.F. Bryant, and the congregation called Spurling to be their pastor.
A.J. Tomlinson, a missionary to the mountains from Indiana, joined the Holiness Church in 1903, and the congregation selected him as pastor. Tomlinson had settled in nearby Culberson, North Carolina, in 1899, where he had established his Samson’s Foxes ministry to reach the area’s children. By 1904, success with congregations in Bradley County, Tennessee, along with good schools, job opportunities, and a north/south railroad, led Tomlinson to relocate fifty miles to the west in Cleveland, Tennessee.
In January 1906, delegates from five Holiness Church congregations met together in an Assembly at the home of Margaret Murphy and her husband, J.C. This began a tradition of General Assemblies that have shaped the government, doctrine, and practice of the denomination. The second General Assembly in 1907 adopted the name Church of God for the growing movement. By the time A.J. Tomlinson received his baptism with the Holy Spirit at the third General Assembly in 1908, the Church of God had become a Pentecostal denomination.
Tomlinson’s experience and leadership accelerated their urgency to restore God’s church and to finish the Great Commission. Edmond and Rebecca Barr became the first Church of God ministers to take the gospel outside the United States in 1909, and today the Church of God ministers in 185 nations and territories of the world.
In the closing years of the nineteenth century, a revival of holiness changed the lives of some Baptists in the nearby Camp Creek community of Cherokee County, North Carolina. Key to this transformation was a ten-day revival at the Shearer Schoolhouse in the summer of 1896, where four evangelists proclaimed the necessity of holiness and called for their hearers to seek sanctification. As the spirit of revival continued over the next four years, opponents to the new doctrine persecuted the holiness believers and turned them out of their churches.
In the midst of this persecution, God honored their hungry hearts. A.J. Tomlinson later recorded, “The people earnestly sought God, and the interest increased until unexpectedly, like a cloud from a clear sky, the Holy Ghost began to fall on the honest, humble, sincere seekers after God. . . . [O]ne after another fell under the power of God, and soon quite a number were speaking in other tongues as the Spirit gave them utterance.” The Lord had done an extraordinary work, but according to Charles W. Conn, it would be some time later before they “would understand the doctrine, person and nature of the Holy Spirit.”
Although history does not reveal the role of R.G. Spurling in the holiness revival, he encouraged the holiness believers to establish a congregation. On May 15, 1902, Spurling and R. Frank Porter set in order the Holiness Church in the home of W.F. Bryant, and the congregation called Spurling to be their pastor.
A.J. Tomlinson, a missionary to the mountains from Indiana, joined the Holiness Church in 1903, and the congregation selected him as pastor. Tomlinson had settled in nearby Culberson, North Carolina, in 1899, where he had established his Samson’s Foxes ministry to reach the area’s children. By 1904, success with congregations in Bradley County, Tennessee, along with good schools, job opportunities, and a north/south railroad, led Tomlinson to relocate fifty miles to the west in Cleveland, Tennessee.
In January 1906, delegates from five Holiness Church congregations met together in an Assembly at the home of Margaret Murphy and her husband, J.C. This began a tradition of General Assemblies that have shaped the government, doctrine, and practice of the denomination. The second General Assembly in 1907 adopted the name Church of God for the growing movement. By the time A.J. Tomlinson received his baptism with the Holy Spirit at the third General Assembly in 1908, the Church of God had become a Pentecostal denomination.
Tomlinson’s experience and leadership accelerated their urgency to restore God’s church and to finish the Great Commission. Edmond and Rebecca Barr became the first Church of God ministers to take the gospel outside the United States in 1909, and today the Church of God ministers in 185 nations and territories of the world.
LeRoy, Wanda Thompson, and David G. Roebuck. “‘Making Full Proof of Their Ministry’: Women in Church of God Missions.” In in International Journal of Pentecostal Missiology, Vol. 3 (2014), 40-57.
Roebuck, David G. “The Founding of North Cleveland Church of God.” Cleveland, Tennessee. Heritage Night, October 9, 2011.
Roebuck, David G. and Louis F. Morgan. It Seemeth Good to the Holy Ghost and Us. Cleveland, Tenn.: Church of God Historical Commission, 2014. Revised 2020.
Roebuck, David G. and Louis F. Morgan. Living the Word: A Brief History of Church of God Ministries. Originally published as Living the Word: 125 Years of Church of God Ministry. Cleveland, Tenn.: Church of God Historical Commission, 2012. Revised 2020.
Roebuck, David G. “‘The Lord Will Get Him a Band’: A.J. Tomlinson and the Pentecostal World-Wife Mission Band.” Paper presented at the Forty-Fifth Annual Meeting of the Society for Pentecostal Studies, San Dimas, California, March 2016.
Roebuck, David G. “Restorationism and a Brief History of the Church of God.” Cyberjournal for Pentecostal-Charismatic Research. Vol. 5, February 1999.
Roebuck, David G. ed. Rightly Dividing the Word of Truth: A Century of Church of God Education. Cleveland, Tenn.: Church of God Historical Commission, 2018. Revised 2020.
Roebuck, David G. and Louis F. Morgan. To the Ends of the Earth. Cleveland, Tenn.: Church of God Historical Commission, 2016. Revised 2020.
Roebuck, David G. “‘Unraveling the Cords that Divide: Race Relations in the Church of God.” Paper presented at the Fortieth Annual Meeting of the Society for Pentecostal Studies, Memphis, Tennessee, March 2011.
Tomlinson, A.J. "Brief History of the Church that is Now Recognized as the Church of God." In The Last Great Conflict. Cleveland, TN: Press of W.E. Rodgers, 1913, 184 - 198.
Roebuck, David G. “The Founding of North Cleveland Church of God.” Cleveland, Tennessee. Heritage Night, October 9, 2011.
Roebuck, David G. and Louis F. Morgan. It Seemeth Good to the Holy Ghost and Us. Cleveland, Tenn.: Church of God Historical Commission, 2014. Revised 2020.
Roebuck, David G. and Louis F. Morgan. Living the Word: A Brief History of Church of God Ministries. Originally published as Living the Word: 125 Years of Church of God Ministry. Cleveland, Tenn.: Church of God Historical Commission, 2012. Revised 2020.
Roebuck, David G. “‘The Lord Will Get Him a Band’: A.J. Tomlinson and the Pentecostal World-Wife Mission Band.” Paper presented at the Forty-Fifth Annual Meeting of the Society for Pentecostal Studies, San Dimas, California, March 2016.
Roebuck, David G. “Restorationism and a Brief History of the Church of God.” Cyberjournal for Pentecostal-Charismatic Research. Vol. 5, February 1999.
Roebuck, David G. ed. Rightly Dividing the Word of Truth: A Century of Church of God Education. Cleveland, Tenn.: Church of God Historical Commission, 2018. Revised 2020.
Roebuck, David G. and Louis F. Morgan. To the Ends of the Earth. Cleveland, Tenn.: Church of God Historical Commission, 2016. Revised 2020.
Roebuck, David G. “‘Unraveling the Cords that Divide: Race Relations in the Church of God.” Paper presented at the Fortieth Annual Meeting of the Society for Pentecostal Studies, Memphis, Tennessee, March 2011.
Tomlinson, A.J. "Brief History of the Church that is Now Recognized as the Church of God." In The Last Great Conflict. Cleveland, TN: Press of W.E. Rodgers, 1913, 184 - 198.
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“We will tell the next generation about the glorious deeds of the Lord. We will tell of his power and the mighty miracles he did.” Psalm 78:4 NLT
“We will tell the next generation about the glorious deeds of the Lord. We will tell of his power and the mighty miracles he did.” Psalm 78:4 NLT