New Resource Available to Study Church of God Black History
The Dixon Pentecostal Research Center is pleased to announce the availability of an important resource for the historical study of Black ministries in the Church of God.
During the days of segregation, members and ministers of African descent met in an Annual Assembly in Jacksonville, Florida. Existing minutes of those Annual Assemblies, along with several other Church of God publications, are now freely available online at PentecostalArchives.org.
Jim Crow laws and other inequities challenged interracial meetings during the first half of the twentieth century. In 1926, black ministers requested that the Church of God General Assembly find a way to “better take care of our affairs among the colored work.” In response to this request, the General Assembly agreed, “that the colored people be allowed to have a colored Assembly, and they still are and shall be recognized as the Church of God, and that we all belong to the body of Jesus (the Church of God). Neither shall it be construed that they are a body separate and apart from the General Annual Assembly of the Churches of God, therefore the General Secretary and Treasurer shall have charge of their tithes to be used exclusively for them.” The General Assembly also agreed that black congregations should be able to promote their orphanage in the Church of God Evangel, be able to select their own general overseer, and “attend to their own business.”
Over the next four decades, our Black constituency developed a structure referred to as the “Church of God Colored Work.” Congregations created a national office and built an Assembly Auditorium in Jacksonville, Florida. They selected national leaders, appointed state overseers, and constructed an orphanage and industrial school in Eustis, Florida. The General Assembly dissolved the “Church of God Colored Work” in 1966.
With the help of donors such as Dr. Kenneth L. Hill and Evangelist Janice Hill, Administrative Bishop of Southern New England, the Dixon Pentecostal Research Center has digitized known Minutes of those “Colored Work” Assemblies and is continuing to search for Minutes that have been lost. These digitized Minutes, totaling 2,336 pages, are now available online at PentecostalArchives.org.
The Church of God partners with other Pentecostal denominations to form the Consortium of Pentecostal Archives, which freely places historical resources online for students and scholars. Along with the Church of God (Colored Work) Minutes, the Dixon Pentecostal Research Center contributes known issues of Samson’s Foxes (1901-1902), The Way (1904-1905), Church of God General Assembly Minutes (1906-2016), The Faithful Standard (1922), and The Pentecostal Minister (1981-1989). The Church of God Evangel is available from 1910 to 1964 and from 2005 to 2020.
The Dixon Pentecostal Research Center is continuing to raise funds to digitize additional pages of the Evangel along with other periodicals. Donors wishing to assist in preserving our Church of God history and heritage can contribute to the Dixon Pentecostal Research Center at https://www.dixonprc.org/donations.html.
(Source: Pentecostal Research Center, Dr. David Roebuck, director)
