Oral Roberts and David Yonggi Cho: A Life-long Relationship in Theology and Ministry

Abstract

Th is article explores the relationship between Oral Roberts, American healing evangelist, and Dr. Yonggi Cho, the pastor of the world’s largest church in Seoul, South Korea. It points out how their similar stories of healings were used in their own healing ministries. It also traces the infl uence that Roberts’ theology of hope, prosperity, and healing had on the most infl uential fi gure in Korean Pentecostalism. Introducti on In April 2006, the author had the opportunity to travel with Dr. Cho, my long-time mentor, to Los Angeles to participate in the Azusa Centenary Conference where Cho was set to be a plenary speaker. Included in his itinerary was a visit to his ailing friend Oral Roberts at his home in Newport Beach, California. On the way, Cho shared with me how Roberts had been a spiritual mentor whose books had a profound infl uence on him, especially in the formative years of his ministry. He told how his Th reefold Blessing was directly attributed to Roberts’ inspirational teaching of the seed-faith principle. He also described the core of Roberts’ theology Spiritus 4.1 (2019) 5–16 htt p://digitalshowcase.oru.edu/spiritus/ © The Author(s) 2019 Reprints and Permissions: Spiritus@oru.edu