DAVID NUNN

DAVID NUNN

December 11, 1921 – April 15, 2003

Like many of his peers David Nunn was reared in poverty and hunger. His saving grace was that his childhood was spent in a Pentecostal family. Though he was miraculously healed when he stuck a nail in his foot as a boy, he backslid and stayed away from the Lord until the age of 22 he became an alcoholic. After World War II, where he served with the Army Air Force he was converted in November 1946 and ‘delivered from the bondage of drink and all the evil habits of my life. He began a preaching ministry in the Assemblies of God as a local pastor in Texas in 1948 and 1949, when he sponsored various deliverance evangelists and was deeply influenced by their ministries. In January 1950: “God spoke to me again and said: ‘Get up from here and go into every city, heal the sick therein and preach the kingdom of Heaven is at hand.’

He resigned from the Assemblies of God as they were at variance with aspects the healing movement and established his own evangelistic association in 1952 and shared in the great climax of the revival in the early 1950s. He associated himself with the Voice of Healing group and became a trusted co-worker of Gordon Lindsay.

Nunn He later recalled that he had seen “as many as twenty-five totally blind receive their sight in one single service” and “in one single campaign I counted thirty-three people who were healed of paralysis or of a crippled condition.” For a time Nunn was the radio speaker for a Voice of Healing broadcast, but with the decline of interest in the revival in the late fifties the program had to be abandoned. In 1958, he was still convinced that the revival was in its youth.

As Gordon Lindsay began to contemporise his own ministry Nunn decided to set out on his own, by establishing his own association, Bible Revival Incorporated. He began to publish ‘The Healing Messenger.’ Nunn’s magazine began with a circulation of 5,000 and rapidly expanded to over 60,000. By 1970 the circulation had passed 140,000. He also began to build a small and select radio network. After five years, he was regularly heard over nine stations, and after ten years, he was heard on nineteen.

He continued to conduct healing revivals overseas throughout the 1960s and to a lesser extent in the 1970s. Nunn held large crusades in India, Africa, Central America and South America, and sponsored many churches and ministers in those nations. He believed that the simple faith of the people in underdeveloped countries made them good prospects for a healing revival: “Great ministers with ministries from God are still reaching the heathen world where the heavenly message is still being confirmed with power.” He wrote, “They cannot be reached by the old line conventional method, but only through the power of God will they be reached.” Nunn also sustained his ministry by raising money to support native ministers and Bible schools in backward areas. His ministry was relatively small, but he could say, “Every year we’ve given more to missions,” and his 1972 budget provided over $200,000 a year for mission work.

Tony Cauchi
Januray 2012

Bibliography: D. Harrell, Jr., All Things Are Possible (1975); Art: J. A. Hewett, International Dictionary of Pentecostal and Charismatic Movements (2002);