Passing through Korea

During the Russo-Japanese War in 1904-1905, OMS Co-Founder, Juji Nakada, secured permission from the Japanese government to minister to Japanese troops fighting in Manchuria. As he passed through Korea, which borders Manchuria, Rev. Nakada preached wherever the opportunity arose. Two Koreans in particular, Chung Bin and Kim Sang-jun, were profoundly moved by Nakada’s preaching on “the glorious experience of sanctification.” Nakada, only on an itinerant ministry, went on to Manchuria.

A Providential Meeting

The two Koreans, burdened about their struggle for the life of holiness, were left with no source of spiritual guidance. Providentially, they met a Korean doctor who knew Nakada and had visited the OMS Bible Training Institute in Tokyo. He urged that they visit the school. Deciding it must be the place for them to hear more about the experience they were seeking, Chung and Kim unexpectedly showed up in Tokyo one day in 1904.

Praying for Korea

A map of the Orient hanging on the wall of OMS Co-Founder, Charles Cowman’s study had red letters denoting the countries for which he constantly prayed. One of them was Korea. When Charles returned to Tokyo from one of his deputational tours in America, the Koreans who had entered the Tokyo Bible Training Institute during his absence greeted him. Within three years they had learned the Japanese language and completed enough Bible training to gain a vision for a similar school in their country.

Accepting the New Requirement

The two Koreans begged the OMS founders to erect for them a Bible Training Institute where Korean native preachers might be trained. When God asked Charles Cowman to go to Korea, he said to his coworkers, “It is part of the original contract to do the will of God as far as He shall make it known, and I accept this new requirement.

Thus, God called the Oriental Missionary Society to open new work in Korea in 1907. Within six months after visiting Seoul to secure a suitable location for a Bible training institute there, the Koreans reported over 270 inquirers at the new Bible school.