by Doug Kutilek
Adoniram Judson Gordon (1836-1895) was born in New Hampshire into a devout Christian home and was, of course, named for famous New England native and pioneer missionary, Adoniram Judson. Gordon was converted to Christ at 15, and by age 16 sensed God wanted him to devote his life to the Gospel ministry.
From his youth, A. J. was eager for knowledge, read widely, and excelled in his schoolwork. Gordon attended New London Academy in New Hampshire, followed by four years at Brown University (where Francis Wayland was president), and finally three years at Newton Theological Institute, where one of his favorite professors was Horatio Hackett, under whom he gave particular attention to the study of Greek. Gordon had a lifelong commitment to Bible inerrancy and opposed liberalism and destructive higher criticism, which he rightly believed to be spiritually deadly.
His first pastorate was Jamaica Plains Baptist Church outside Boston (1863-1869), followed by a 25-year pastorate at Clarendon Street Baptist Church in Boston. He vigorously opposed the even-then ongoing process of established churches abandoning the inner cities and leaving them without a Gospel witness.
During the first half-dozen years at Clarendon Street, Gordon had a solid, if unremarkable, ministry. The church was formal, stiff, and self-satisfied. But that was all changed — transformed — when D. L. Moody went to Boston for a crusade in 1877. Moody’s tabernacle was erected across the street from Gordon’s church, and Gordon’s congregation enthusiastically cooperated in Moody’s crusade, the Clarendon Church building being regularly used for after-service counseling of those responding to Moody’s preaching. The church and pastor developed a continuing burden for the “down-and-outers” of Boston and a greater appreciation for achieving the work of the ministry through the power of the Holy Spirit.
During the last decade of his life especially, Gordon was consumed with the cause of foreign missions, preaching, traveling, writing, and promoting this essential work, even to the injury of his own health (and, some think, a shortening of his own life). He was, for a time, chairman of the executive committee of the American Baptist Missionary Union. He was also associate editor of The Missionary Review of the World. Among the missionary outreaches he championed was Jewish evangelism.
Somewhat unusual among Baptists in the northern United States in that era, Gordon unashamedly embraced the imminent, pre-millennial coming of Christ, and participated in the famous pioneering Niagara Conference (1878) promoting pre-millennialism. One of his most famous books, Ecce Venit, is about the imminent and personal second coming of Christ (adopting, however, a “fulfilled” rather than “yet-future” view of Revelation 4-18).
Gordon saw the desperate need for many more biblically trained missionaries. At the same time, he recognized the impossibility of meeting the demand through the standard and rather lengthy college-and-seminary course of training. So, in 1889, Gordon founded Boston Missionary Training School, a three-year Bible institute. Gordon was severely criticized by some of his contemporaries for this supposed “short-cut” method of producing missionaries. Along with D. L. Moody’s Bible institute in Chicago, BMTS set the pattern for several generations for training those preparing to serve in conservative, fundamental ministries. After his death, this school was renamed in Gordon’s honor.
Gordon was a regular speaker at Moody’s summer Bible conferences in Northfield, MA, as well as similar conferences elsewhere. He spoke frequently and regularly at preachers’ meetings and mission conferences, and on college campuses.
Always a prolific writer, Gordon started and published the monthly magazine The Watchword (1878-1895), which focused on prophetic themes. Among the more notable of his numerous books are The Ministry of the Spirit; The Holy Spirit in Missions; How Christ Came to Church; and In Christ. He also compiled a hymnal and wrote several hymns, composing the music for, among others, “My Jesus, I Love Thee.”
There were a few “warts” in Gordon’s views. His teaching that the New Testament gift of healing persists to the present day would be at odds with those who recognize all the miraculous spiritual gifts expired in the first century (he did not oppose the use of medicines and physicians, as some do). Likewise, his openness to women in the ministry is contrary to the views of nearly all fundamental preachers.
Worn out by incessant labors, Gordon, just 58, died after a brief illness. His last utterance: “Victory!”
The standard biography is Adoniram Judson Gordon by his son Ernest B. Gordon (Revell, 1896). See also Dictionary of Baptists in America, edited by Bill J. Leonard (IVP, 1994), pp. 134-5. George Houghton wrote his 1970 doctoral dissertation at Dallas Theological Seminary on Gordon. George Dollar, A History of Fundamentalism in America (Bob Jones University Press, 1973), pp. 21-26, has an extended analysis of Gordon’s life and contribution.