God’s Battle Axe – Aimee Semple McPherson

We are honouring a female pioneer of faith in early 20^th Century in this month’s edition of the magazine. Aimee Semple McPherson was a Canadian evangelist in the 1920s and 1930s. She is famous for founding the Four Square Church. We pray that her life and dedication to God’s service will challenge our readers to do likewise.

 Aimee was born on October 9, 1890, to James and Minnie Kennedy, a Methodist and Salvation Army devotee respectively, in Ontario, Canada. She was introduced to Pentecostalism as a teenager through the preaching of Robert Semple, whom she eventually married. When he died two years later, she married a businessman, Harold McPherson. For a few years, they struggled financially, living in a gospel car plastered with Bible verses and slogans like ‘Where will you spend eternity?’ Slowly, she began attracting crowds and the attention of the press.

 Though she and her husband quietly divorced, her ministry continued to expand. Using Hebrews 13:8, ‘Jesus Christ, the same yesterday, and today, and forever’ as her theme, she preached that the “full menu” of the Bible was available for listeners’ first-hand experience. She moved around the country proclaiming that Jesus Christ has offered lavish feast to the faithful. Aimee pleaded with people to accept His invitation using the words of a familiar gospel song, “Come and dine, the Master calleth, come and dine”.

 In 1919, she held a series of meetings in Los Angeles, United States of America that catapulted her to national fame. Within a year, America’s largest auditoriums could not hold the crowds. She later acquiesced to popular demand to pray for the sick, and “stretcher days” became hallmarks of her campaigns. Reporters who covered her meetings marvelled at her oratorical skills. One of them said, “Never did I hear such language from a human being. Without one moment’s intermission, she would talk from hour to an hour and half, holding her audience spellbound”. Pastors from many denominations threw their support behind her citywide campaigns. In 1922, she visited Australia, the first of a number of trips abroad.

         On January 1, 1923, Aimee dedicated Angelus Temple, which held up to 5,300 worshippers. The ceremonies included hundreds of colourfully clad gypsies (who had named her their queen), a roster of prominent Protestant preachers, and thousands of adoring fans. A church-owned radio station was launched in 1924. While she continued to preach “the four-square Gospel (Jesus as the Only Saviour and the Great Physician, the Baptizer with the Holy Spirit and the Coming Bridegroom), she became a citizen of note in Los Angeles. Her church floats won prizes in Rose Bowl parades, and the Temple itself became a tourist attraction. The comings and goings of “Sister” as she was affectionately known drew more people than visits of presidents and other dignitaries.

Well-advertised sermons offered the faithful who shunned nearby Hollywood entertainments a taste of theatre. Parades, uniforms, award-winning bands, and catchy music attracted people of all ages. Also, ambitious programs to feed the hungry and respond to natural disasters gained goodwill. People equally responded to her motherly qualities. During midnight forays into Denver’s red light districts, she promised its outcasts a bright future if they would be true to themselves. She embraced prostitutes with the assurance that she loved them and that there was hope for them in Christ.

         However, her rising popularity was checked in May 1926 when she claimed that she was kidnapped and held captive in a cabin. Earlier in  the afternoon of Tuesday, May 26, it was announced at the Temple that Aimee had gone for a swim, failed to return and was presumed drowned. For the next few days, Los Angeles talked of little else. Thousands walked aimlessly on the Ocean Park Beach where she was last seen, and an elaborate memorial service was held for her on June 20.

         Three days later, Aimee reappeared in Douglas, Arizona, with a tale of having escaped from kidnappers. The crowds that had mourned her loss prepared a lavish welcome home party. On Saturday, June 26, about 150,000 people lined the route from the train station to Angelus Temple, cheering and wishing her well. Later, some law enforcement operatives challenged her kidnapping story, but the Los Angeles District Attorney acknowledged that he had no case against her. When the focus finally shifted from the “scandal” in January, Aimee immediately set out on a national evangelistic tour. While her support base remained strong, press coverage changed. The months of innuendo left a legacy of unanswered questions that took a toll on her popularity.

Yet her ministry continued. During the great depression, the Angelus Temple’s Commissary provided food, clothing and other necessities to needy families. In 1940, Aimee addressed 10,000 people in the Oakland Auditorium. She died the next day of kidney failure and the effects of the mixture of prescription drugs she had taken. Her funeral took place on October 9, her fifty-fourth birthday. Though her popularity has shrunk significantly since the 1920s, about 50,000 people filed past her coffin. Her lasting legacy is the denomination she founded, the International Church of the Foursquare Gospel, with some 2 million members in nearly 30,000 churches worldwide.

In her lifetime, Aimee composed 175 songs and hymns, several operas, and thirteen drama-oratories. She also preached thousands of sermons, graduated over 8,000 ministers from the L.I.F.E. Bible College. It is estimated that during the depression, about one and half million people received aid from her ministry. While many of us may not achieve such a feat in our lifetime, God calls us to be faithful where we are. Commitment to the cause of Christ is the standard for measuring our usefulness in His body; not the great things we do for Him. To whom much is given, much is expected (Luke 12:48). Let us offer our all to God and trust Him to use our widow’s mite to prosper His Kingdom.

*** Materials sourced from Aimee Semple McPherson, Foursquare Phenomenon, Christianity Today, https://www.christianitytoday.com; and God’s Generals: Why They Succeeded and Why Some Failed by Roberts Liardon, Evangel Publishers, Kaduna, Nigeria.