Timeline of Christian Missions - 1900 To 1949

1900 To 1949

Main article: Christianity in the 20th century See also: Timeline of Christianity#20th century See also: Modern history of Christianity#Late modern history (1848-present)

• 1900 - American Friends open work in Cuba; Ecumenical Missionary Conference in Carnegie Hall, New York (162 mission boards represented); 189 missionaries and their children killed in Boxer Rebellion in China; South African Andrew Murray writes The Key to the Missionary Problem in which he challenges the church to hold weeks of prayer for the world
• 1901 - Nazarene John Diaz goes to Cape Verde Islands; Maude Cary sails for Morocco; Oriental Missionary Society founded by Charles Cowman (his wife is the compiler of popular devotional book Streams in the Desert); Missionary James Chalmers killed and eaten by cannibals in Papua New Guinea
• 1902 - Swiss members of the Plymouth Brethren Christian Missions in Many Lands (CMML) enter Laos; California Yearly Meeting of Friends opens work in Guatemala
• 1903 - Church of the Nazarene enters Mexico
• 1903 First group baptism at Sattelberg Mission Station under Christian Keyser in New Guinea paves way for mass conversions during the following years
• 1904 - Premillennialist theologian William Eugene Blackstone begins teaching that the world has already been evangelized, citing Acts 2:5, 8:4, Mark 16:20 and Colossians 1:23
• 1904 - European Christian Mission was founded in Estonia by J.P. Raud. Today it is known as European Christian Mission International.
• 1905 - Gunnerius Tollefsen is converted at a Salvation Army meeting under the preaching of Samuel Logan Brengle. Later he would become a missionary to the Belgian Congo and then first mission secretary of the Norwegian Pentecostal movement.
• 1906 - The Evangelical Alliance Mission (TEAM) opens work in Venezuela with T. J. Bach and John Christiansen
• 1907 - Massive revival meetings in Korea; Harmon Schmelzenbach sails for Africa; Presbyterians and Methodists open Union Theological Seminary in Manila, Philippines; Bolivian Indian Mission founded by George Allen
• 1908 - Gospel Missionary Union opens work in Colombia with Charles Chapman and John Funk; Pentecostal movement enters Rome and southern Italy as well as Egypt
• 1909 - Pentecostal movement reaches Chile through ministry of American Methodist Willis Hoover
• 1910 - C.T. Studd establishes Heart of Africa Mission, now called WEC International; Edinburgh Missionary Conference held in Scotland, presided over by John Mott, beginning modern Protestant ecumenical cooperation in missions
• 1911 - Christian & Missionary Alliance enters Cambodia and Vietnam
• 1912 - Conference of British Missionary Societies formed; International Review of Missions begins publication
• 1913 - African-American Eliza George sails from New York for Liberia; William Whiting Borden dies in Egypt while preparing to take the gospel to the Muslims in China
• 1914-1918 World War I numerous missionaries in Africa and Asia in British, French, German and Belgian colonies are expelled or detained for the duration of the war, if their nation was at war with the colonial authority
• 1914 - Large-scale revival movement in Uganda; C.T. Studd reports a revival movement in the Congo
• 1914 Paul Olaf Bodding completes his translation of the Bible into the Santali language.
• 1915 - Founded in 1913 in Nanjing, China as a women's Christian college, Ginling College officially opens with eight students and six teachers. It was supported by four missions: the Northern Baptists, the Christian Church (Disciples of Christ), the Methodists, and the Presbyterians.
• 1916 - Rhenish missionaries are forced to leave Ondjiva in southern Angola under pressure from the Portuguese authorities and Chief Mandume of the Kwanyama. By then, four congregations existed with a confessing membership of 800.
• 1917 - Interdenominational Foreign Mission Association (IFMA) founded
• 1919 - The Union Version of Bible in Chinese is published; Gospel Missionary Union enters Sudan
• 1920 - Baptist Mid-Missions formed by William Haas; Church of the Nazarene enters Syria; Columbans enter Australia and New Zealand
• 1921 - Founding of International Missionary Council (IMC); Norwegian Mission Council formed; Columbans enter China
• 1922 - Nazarenes enter Mozambique
• 1923 - Scottish missionaries begin work in British Togoland
• 1924 - Bible Churchman's Missionary Society opens work in Upper Burma; Baptist Mid-Missions begins work in Venezuela
• 1925 - E. Stanley Jones, Methodist missionary to India, writes The Christ of the Indian Road
• 1926 - Charles J. McDonald, a Southern Baptist layman, started work in the town of Wahiawa, Territory of Hawaii, with a Sunday School which eventually became the First Baptist Church of Wahiawa.
• 1927 - Ngulhao Thomsong translates the Bible into Thadou-Kuki Language East African revival movement (Balokole) emerges in Rwanda and moves across several other countries
• 1928 - Cuba Bible Institute (West Indies Mission) opens; Jerusalem Conference of International Missionary Council; foundation of Borneo Evangelical Mission by Hudson Southwell, Frank Davidson and Carey Tolley.
• 1929 - Christian & Missionary Alliance enters East Borneo (Indonesia) and Thailand
• 1930 - Christian & Missionary Alliance starts work among Baouli tribe in the Côte d'Ivoire
• 1931 - Franciscan missionary the Venerable Gabriele Allegra arrives in Hunan China from Italy to start translating the Bible
• 1931 - HCJB radio station started in Quito, Ecuador by Clarence Jones; Baptist Mid-Missions enters Liberia
• 1932 - Assemblies of God open mission work in Colombia; Laymen's Missionary Inquiry report published
• 1933 - Gladys Aylward (subject of movie The Inn of the Sixth Happiness) arrives in China; Columbans enter Korea
• 1934 - William Cameron Townsend begins the Summer Institute of Linguistics; Columbans enter Japan
• 1935 - Frank C. Laubach, American missionary to the Philippines, perfects the "Each one teach one" literacy program, which has been used worldwide to teach 60 million people to read
• 1936 - With the outbreak of civil war in Spain, missionaries are forced to leave that country.
• 1937 - After expulsion of missionaries from Ethiopia by Italian invaders, widespread revival erupts among Protestant (SIM) churches in south; Child Evangelism Fellowship founded by Jesse Irvin Overholzer
• 1938 - West Indies Mission enters Dominican Republic; Church Missionary Society forced out of Egypt; Madras World Missionary Conference held; Dr. Orpha Speicher completes construction of Reynolds Memorial Hospital in central India
• 1939-1945 World War II numerous missionaries in Africa and Asia in British, French and Belgian colonies are expelled or detained for the duration of the war, if their nation was at war with the colonial authority
• 1939 - A sick missionary, Joy Ridderhof, makes a recording of gospel songs and a message and sends it into the mountains of Honduras. It is the beginning of Gospel Recordings
• 1940 - Marianna Slocum begins translation work in Mexico; Military police in Japan arrest the executive officers of the Salvation Army
• 1942 - William Cameron Townsend founds Wycliffe Bible Translators; New Tribes mission founded with a vision to reach the tribal peoples of Bolivia
• 1943 - Five missionaries with New Tribes Mission martyred; 11 American Baptist missionaries beheaded in the Philippines by Japanese soldiers
• 1944 - Missionaries return to Suki, Papua New Guinea after withdrawal of the Japanese military
• 1945 - Mission Aviation Fellowship formed; Far East Broadcasting Company (FEBC) founded; Evangelical Foreign Missions Association formed by denominational mission boards
• 1945 - The Venerable Gabriele Allegra establishes the Studium Biblicum Franciscanum in Beijing
• 1946 - First Inter-Varsity missionary convention (now called "Urbana"); United Bible Societies formed
• 1947 - Conservative Baptist Foreign Mission Society begins work among the Senufo people in the Côte d'Ivoire
• 1948 - Alfredo del Rosso merges his Italian Holiness Mission with the Church of the Nazarene, thus opening Nazarene work on the European continent; Southern Baptist Convention adopts program calling for the tripling of the number of missionaries (achieved by 1964
• 1949 - Southern Baptist Mission board opens work in Venezuela, Mary Tripp sent out by CEF Child Evangelism Fellowship to the Netherlands.