I had a cup of tea yesterday with Hubert Allen, the grandson of Roland Allen [“the prophet'”]. A very warm and humble man who is delighted that a new generation is reading his Granfer’s book almost a century later. Roland Allen predicted his writings would be ignored for many years and he was right. Hubert signed my copy of his book “Roland Allen: Pioneer, Priest, and Prophet and showed me some new editions of his ‘Granfer’s’ books, including the classic Missionary Methods: St Pauls or Ours and The Spontaneous Expansion of the Church.There are some other writings and snippets and thoughts that have never been published. Hubert said I can come over next time and view some of those documents. COOOOOL!!!!
Hubert’s lecture on his Granddad given in 2003 worth a read. Heres the PDF:
The Continuing Relevance of Roland Allen
by Hubert Allen, [PDF 225kb]
Related: My thoughts on Roland Allen and Mega-churches in cyberspace
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wow…
almost Jesus…
RA is one of my big faves!
Did you put something suspicious in his tea?
Is that really a herd of elephants in the background?
Wow! Roland Allen is my hero. When I read The Spontaneous Expansion of the Church it was so cutting edge, I had to keep looking at the front of the book to remind myself it was written decades and decades ago.
When I read your bit on Rolland Allen I had never heard of his name let alone read his books. Funnily enough the next day my Father gave me a bunch of books including Missionary Methods by Roland Allen.
I have ploughed through most of it and he certainly was a man before his time. I was taught this stuff by the Southern Baptists Mission Board in Singapore in 2003 and thought the stuff was so cutting edge and radical yet this man wrote all of this before the second world war, amazing!