A History of Missions course taught by Howard Culbertson at Southern Nazarene University
Course resources
- Course syllabus [ "What is a syllabus?" ]
- Historic missionary slogans from Hudson Taylor and others [ read slogans ]
- Conversion of the Barbarians, 400-800 A.D.
- Conversion of the Vikings, 800-1200 A.D.
- Early Roman Catholic missions to the nations, 1200-1600 A.D.
- Roman Catholic, Orthodox and Protestant missions, 1600 to the present
- Crossword puzzle on missions history (Perspectives)
- Crossword puzzle for exam 3
- Readers' theatre script for Lottie Moon, C.T. Studd and Hudson Taylor and his two wives
- PowerPoint: Epochs of missionary expansion [ view on-line ] [ download as PowerPoint ]
- Exam study guides [ go to exam guides ]
I like Ralph Winter's easy-to-remember, over-simplified 400-year eras of missions history. Here's how he breaks down the history of world evangelism over the last 2000 years:
- 0-400 AD Winning the Romans: Evangelizing the empire of the Caesars
- 400-800 AD Evangelization of the Barbarians [ read more ]
- 800-1200 AD Evangelization of the Vikings [ read more ]
- 1200-1600 AD Evangelization of the Saracens / Muslims
- 1600-2000 AD Evangelization of the Ends of the Earth [ read more ]
Researcher David Barrett has also divided that same period into five eras of global outreach. Approaching it from a statistical point of view, his epochs of missions history are a little different from those of Ralph Winter:
- 30-500 AD The Apostolic Era (Luke and Paul)
- 500-1750 AD The Ecclesiastical Era (Cosmas Indicopleustes and Francis Xavier) [ read more ]
- 1750-1900 AD The Church Growth era
- William Carey, the "father of modern missions" [ more info ]
- Henry Venn -- "self-governing, self-supporting, and self-propagating churches"
- 1900-1990 AD The Global Mission era (John R. Mott and Kenneth Grubb)
- 1990- present The Global Discipling era
from "Five Statistical Eras of Global Mission" by David Barrett, published in Missiology, January 1984
Video viewing guides
- Amy Carmichael and the Dohnavur Fellowship
- Beyond the next mountain -- the story of Rochunga Pudaite
- Breakthrough -- the story of James O. Fraser and the Lisu people
- The Burnham story -- missionary couple kidnapped by Islamic extremists in the Philippines
- Candle in the dark -- the story of William Carey
- David Livingstone: Journey to the heart of Africa
- Erdenet: The story of Jesus' Assembly -- church planting in Mongolia
- First Fruits -- the beginnings of Moravian world outreach
- The Good Seed -- Wycliffe Bible translators in Central America
- Hudson Taylor -- pioneer missionary to China
- Mama Luka comes home -- the story of Dr. Helen Roseveare
- Through Gates of Splendor -- the story of five missionaries killed in Ecuador by the Auca Indians
- When Things Seem Impossible -- A missionary is taken hostage along with a small airplane
- You can't ride two horses
- From the Dark -- conversion of Felix Vargas
Sample assignments
Links to missions resources on the Internet
Zinzendorf's world outreach prayer
German Count von Zinzendorf pushed the Moravians into becoming a major world missions force in the 1700s. John Wesley translated some of his written prayers from German into English. Here is one with a world evangelism flavor:
"My dearest Savior! We beg of you this same blessed look, this same irresistible look, which you always fix on the souls who like to look upon you, who like to receive you, who are ready to share your wounds, and who are even prepared to die for you.
"May all souls on earth, high and low, rich and poor, yearn for your look. And let us on our part testify amongst those we meet to your sacrificial love, that the number of those who succumb to your look may grow and grow. Indeed, we promise that we shall not rest until we are able to look upon you, and say: 'Lord, we have filled every place in heaven, by bringing every soul on earth under the bright light of your love.'"
Writing
StandardsMost courses at SNU contain a writing component.
I expect students to produce written work that is focused, well developed, organized and relatively free of grammatical, punctuation, and spelling errors.
Papers falling short of this standard will not be graded. That work will be returned to the students for further revision and resubmission.
See my writing checklist.Want to visualize history better?
There's been some great films made of missions heroes and great moments in missions history. [ read more ]
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Howard Culbertson, Southern Nazarene University, 6729 NW 39th, Bethany, OK 73008 | Phone: 405-491-6693 - Fax: 491-6658
Copyright © 1999, 2001 - Last Updated: June 28, 2012 | URL: http://home.snu.edu/~hculbert/misshist.htm
