Church of God Turns 135

Artist James Marshall’s depiction of the grist mill at Barney Creek

August 19 is the birthday of the Church of God. On this day in 1886, a small group gathered at a gristmill along Barney Creek in Monroe County, Tennessee—not far from the Coker Creek stop on the well-traveled Unicoi Turnpike.

According to Dr. David Roebuck, director of the Pentecostal Research Center and Church of God historian, on that summer Thursday, 135 years ago, Richard Green Spurling, “preached a sermon on God’s church and invited his hearers to set aside man-made creeds and traditions, to adopt the New Testament as their only rule of faith and practice, to give equal rights to interpret Scripture according to one’s own conscience, and to sit together as the church of God.”

Eight responded to Spurling’s invitation, including his father, Richard Spurling, who as an ordained Baptist elder had the ecclesial authority to set a church in order and to moderate their business meeting. They called themselves Christian Union—signaling a rejection of separatism and exclusivism they had experienced in other churches.

A few days later, Elder Spurling ordained his son as their first pastor, and over the following decade or so, Richard Green Spurling organized other Christian Union congregations in nearby communities.

Although none of those original mountain congregations have survived until 2021, Richard Green Spurling’s vision, first proclaimed alongside an Appalachian mountain creek, now reaches more than 7,600,000 members globally, who worship in more than 40,000 congregations, in 185 nations and territories of the world.
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For the earliest publication of this account, see A. J. Tomlinson, “The Last Great Conflict” (Cleveland, Tenn.: Press of Walter E. Rodgers, 1913; reprinted White Wing Publishing House, 1984 and 2011).

Church Historian, David G. Roebuck, posted this video. Church of God General Overseer Tim Hill also posted a greeting about the birthday of the Church of God and it can be viewed by clicking here.

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