Chinese Saint
🇨🇳John Sung
1901–1944 · Chinese · Evangelist & Revivalist
“I am willing to be a fool for Christ, to preach the Gospel simply and plainly.”
Biography
John Sung (Song Shangjie) was born in 1901 in Hinghwa, Fujian Province, the son of a Methodist pastor. A brilliant student, he earned a PhD in chemistry from Ohio State University in 1926. During a revival meeting in New York, he experienced a radical conversion that transformed his life entirely. He burned his academic certificates and returned to China as an evangelist. Over the next fifteen years, Sung conducted revival campaigns across China, Taiwan, and Southeast Asia with extraordinary power. His preaching was direct, dramatic, and deeply convicting—often lasting several hours with vivid illustrations and personal calls to repentance. He organized Evangelistic Bands—small groups of newly converted believers trained to evangelize their communities—which became a model for lay evangelism across Asia. Suffering from tuberculosis and intestinal disease, he continued preaching even when gravely ill, dying in 1944 at just forty-two years of age. The number of people converted through his ministry is estimated in the hundreds of thousands. He is often called the Billy Graham of China and one of the greatest revivalists of the twentieth century.
Key Works
Sung left behind extensive diaries spanning his entire ministry, later compiled and published, which offer an intimate window into his spiritual life and evangelistic methods. His Evangelistic Bands system—a structured approach to follow-up discipleship—became his most enduring organizational legacy. Sermon collections and testimonies gathered by those who witnessed his campaigns document the breadth of his revival ministry. Biography Flame for God by Leslie Lyall and John Sung: Flame for God in the Far East remain the standard accounts of his life and work.
Legacy
John Sung's Evangelistic Bands gave birth to a lay witness movement that fueled church growth across Southeast Asia for decades. The churches he planted and the believers he trained formed the backbone of Christianity in Malaysia, Singapore, Indonesia, and the Philippines. His model of fervent, Spirit-filled evangelism combined with immediate discipleship training remains a benchmark for Asian missions. His life is a testament to the power of total consecration—a scholar who gave up prestige and comfort to bring the Gospel to his people.