Page 38 - A Dissertation for Doctor of Philosophy

Preaching in the Stage of Stagnation (1990s – 2002)

In 1992 and after a long struggle of democratization in Korea, the civil government was

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established. This government sought to reform its society and the church in many ways. As a
result, the Korean society experienced many changes, one of which was the trend toward anti-

authoritarianism. People in the society and in the church demanded freedom from authoritarian

structure in the institutions to which they belonged. Unfortunately, the church and pulpit were

unprepared to cope with this mercurial culture.

Although prophetic voices calling for the renewal of church and preaching existed during

the last decade, the church did not reform accordingly. Instead, the Korean Church went into

“‘Babylonian Captivity’ under the spell of secular materialism, rather than becoming a

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transforming agent.” Expectedly, the explosive growth of the Korean Church ebbed and even

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achieved negative growth in 1993. While small churches suffered from losing members, big
churches continued growing but boasting only nominal Christians. Some Churches grew rapidly

by gaining membership through transfers from other churches rather than gaining members by

53 President Young Sam Kim was an elder of a major Presbyterian Church and a severe
church critic.

54
Chi Young Kay, “A Study of Contemporary Preaching in Korea: Its Exegesis,
Hermeneutics, and Theology,” Ph.D. diss., School of Theology at Claremont, 1990, 4. See also
Bong Rin Ro, “The Korean Church: Growing or Declining?” Evangelical Review of Theology 19
(October 1995), 350. He gives an illustration of result of explosive growth in Korea. He reports
that “Explosive church growth from 1908-1990 has resulted in the development of some of the
largest churches in the world: the Yoido Full Gospel Church (706,000 members), Yongnak
Presbyterian Church (60,000 members), and Kwanglim Methodist Church (73,000 members). In
the capital city of Seoul alone with eleven million people there are more than 6,533 churches.”

55 Ibid., 350. By quoting government statistics, he reports 9.0 percent growth in 1989, 5.8
in 1990, 3.9 in 1991, 0.6 in 1992, -4.0 in 1993.