The beginnings of the Faith Movement in South Africa
Profile by Dr CUTHBERT CHIDOORI
My First General Conference of the Assemblies of God
The Congress on Mission and Evangelism held in Durban
W F P Burton and some Congo Missionaries
Nicholas
Bekinkosi Hepworth Bhengu
– His Youthful Dreams
– His Preaching
- Bhengu and Education
- Bhengu and Money
- Miraculous Experiences
- Spiritual Happenings
- The Sanctifying Spirit of God
– His Departure
Bhengu’s “Isinthunzi”
- Government and Politics
– Some Faults, Virtues and the Burden
of His Heart
President Lucas Mangope of Bophuthatswana
William
Frederick Mullan
The Fairview Assembly
Fred Mullan and the Gifts of the Spirit
A Miracle and a Vision
The Revival in Norwood
James E Mullan
Paul O Lange
William Branham in Durban
Oral Roberts in South Africa
Billy
Graham in Salisbury and Durban
The American Missionaries from Springfield, Missouri
C. Austin Chawner and the Portuguese Work
August Kast and the Mount Tabor Mission Station
Colin
La Foy and the Coloured Leadership
The Work in Zimbabwe
Mauritius and Reunion Island
Special
Answers to Prayer – 1
Special
Answers to Prayer – 2
A Beautiful Square with Good Vibes
Prayer and the Hippie Revival
The Young Turks
Tensions within the Group
The Split
of 1981 – Part One
The Split
of 1981 – Part Two
The Beginnings of the Faith Movement in South Africa
The Statement of September 1989
The Charismatic Renewal
The Start of the Pentecostal Revival World Wide and The Swedish Pentecostal Assemblies
Epilogue
APPENDIX 1 : How to be Filled with the Holy Spirit
APPENDIX 2 : The National Church by Nicholas Bhengu
APPENDIX 3 : Article from the Argus 5/02/1981
APPENDIX 4 : Pointers to the future of the Assemblies of God in the New South Africa (10/06/94)
Melville
Gelderblom is a tall, erect man, with an eagle eye, a booming
voice and a sharp interrogative manner that belies a rather ingenuous
nature. Seeing him now, in his 74th year, it is difficult to
believe that as a young man in his twenties he spent some months
in the Karoo in the Nelspoort Sanatorium for tuberculotics.
After that time at Nelspoort he was for six months in isolation, then he
appeared before a panel of railway doctors since he was a railway employee.
The doctors discharged him from his employment on the railways and sent
him home virtually to die. This happened at the very time when James Mullan
set about pioneering a new assembly in East London, Mel’s hometown.
His family had all been led by James Mullan to call upon the Lord for salvation.
When Mel met James Mullan he too called upon the Lord for salvation and
began to seek God for the healing of his lungs, and God did heal him. He
later entered the ministry and wherever he went his booming voice as a
preacher bore testimony to God’s healing power. Years later when
he was medically examined for an insurance policy, the dumb-founded doctors,
who knew he had a history of tuberculosis, had to pass him A1.
Melville Gelderblom
The saying is that we judge others by ourselves. This is particularly true
of Mel Gelderblom who is so honest that he is inclined to be naive
in his dealings with his fellowmen. Sometimes he credits them with
an integrity that characterises himself but which they themselves lack.
That is what happened at Welkom where Mel enjoyed a very fruitful period
of ministry. The year was about 1981 when the “name it and claim
it” faith movement first began to come into prominence in South Africa.
One of the new style teachers came to Welkom. Evidently he had made contact
with certain members of the Welkom Assembly of God. They were enamoured
of this young preacher who had best remain unnamed. But let me add he had
no connection with Ray McCauley and the Rhema Bible Church. His admirers
in the assembly asked Mel Gelderblom if this young teacher could be invited
to minister in the Welkom Assembly. Mel met with him and asked him the
following question: “Are you intending to start a church in Welkom?” Mel’s
concern of course, was lest this outsider creep into the assembly unawares
and cause division in the flock. The young man answered with an unequivocal, “No,
he had no plan to start an assembly in Welkom”.
Straight-forward, frank and naive as Mel Gelderblom was, he took him at
his word and invited him for a weekend of meetings. Within a month the
young man had broken his word, had started a new church, had purchased
a site for a church building, and had taken seven families as proselytes
from the Welkom Assembly. Mel was devastated. The shock waves rippled through
the Welkom Assembly. Mel felt he needed help to cope with the situation.
He called on me to come down to stabilise the Welkom Assembly. I made haste
to visit the assembly for the weekend. I spoke of the errors of the faith
teaching that was being propagated. I’m not sure now, whether it
was then, or on some other occasion, that I conducted a Holy Ghost receiving
meeting in which 12 or 14 of the Welkom believers were filled with the
Spirit and spoke in tongues. The assembly settled down after its rufflement,
but henceforth had to live with the presence of a new and militant congregation
on its borders.
On reflection I thought that other ministers besides Mel were likely to
be taken in by similar approaches to that he had succumbed to. They too
would need pastoral counselling and help.
With that thought in mind I wrote a paper to distribute among the ministers
of the Assemblies of God. I felt a duty to do so, being Chairman of the
Assemblies. Besides that, I was directly responsible for more than 70 churches.
I called my paper “Faith in God or Faith in Faith - Which?”
Evidently the paper met a need. Brother Charles Enerson, a long-standing
minister of the Assemblies of God, published it in a magazine which he
edited. But it was too long for him to include it all; he only printed
half of it and advised people to contact me if they wanted the rest. He
did this without consulting me at all.
In consequence I became inundated by requests for the article. It was printed
in magazines of a number of different denominations. While I did not object
to that, the fact was I had never intended it to be anything other than
an in-house paper written specifically for Assemblies of God ministers.
I was not crusading against the new churches, but unfortunately the document
did give me prominence as the supposed public enemy number one of the “faith
people” of which Ray McCauley’s Rhema Bible Church was the
largest.
At the time I did not know that certain pernicious doctrines were included
in the teachings of what came to be known as “the faith movement”.
There was the “double death” theory which held the view that
Christ did not atone for sin when he died on the cross. A whole drama was
said to have been enacted between the cross and the throne, with Christ
becoming in death “the step-son of Satan” and acquiring a Satanic
nature. Victory was said to have come when God raised Jesus from the sufferings
of hell which he was enduring, and exalted Him to Heaven.
This aberrant teaching could explain why some Pentecostal believers instinctively
felt averse to the new churches that were springing up in different places.
Among those so disturbed was Pam Gelderblom, Mel’s devout wife. She
felt very uneasy about the teachings that were affecting so many believers.
At one stage she began to wonder whether her reaction could be a subconscious
human response to what she and Mel had experienced in Welkom where they
were so dishonourably betrayed. She set out to pray this matter through
to clarity. As she prayed she heard an audible voice pose the question, “Where
is the blood?”
Indeed, this double death teaching is a perversion of the Gospel, subtly
creating a bloodless cult in substitution for the true Christian teaching
on Christ’s death. Pam searched through a number of magazines in
her possession. Only twice did she find any reference to the blood of Christ,
both in sermons by Ray McCauley.
Yet Ray McCauley himself did preach something like this heresy, but he
later saw the error of it and publicly recanted, an act of integrity which
redounds to his credit and places him now in the forefront of orthodox
Pentecostal preachers. In the 1980s relations between the Assemblies of
God and the Rhema / I.F.C.C. connection were distinctly strained, but maturity
has brought about a mutual respect. I feel that Ray McCauley’s Rhema
Bible Church at least, could now be regarded as a large and very successful
orthodox Pentecostal assembly. Even Ray McCauley’s preaching on prosperity
has taken on a balance that is totally acceptable.