Missionary
Historian
Biographer
Michael Parker served as a missionary and professor of church history in Sudan and Rwanda, 1995-2006. Most recently, he was a professor of history and the director of graduate studies at the Evangelical Theological Seminary in Cairo, Egypt, 2012-2020. During the interim in his years as a missionary, he served as the pastor of a congregation and as an administer of mission for his denomination. His biography of Dr. Kenneth Bailey, noted below, was published in 2024. He is also the author of numerous articles and five previous books, including John Winthrop: Founding the City upon the Hill (2008) and The Kingdom of Character: The Student Volunteer Movement for Foreign Missions, 1886–1926 (2014). While working in Sudan he published a series of short stories in the genre of creative non-fiction: The Children of the Sun (2000). And while working in Egypt, he published two books in Arabic: A History of Christianity (2020) and A History of Christianity in Egypt (2022). Dr. Parker is a graduate of UCLA, Fuller Theological Seminary, and the University of Maryland.
Through Middle Eastern Eyes: A Life of Kenneth E. Bailey
Kenneth E. Bailey was both a missionary and a New Testament scholar. As a missionary, first in Egypt and later in Lebanon, Israel-Palestine, and Cyprus, he experienced first-hand the life of traditional Middle Eastern villagers, which led him to the conclusion that the village culture he witnessed in the 20th century had hardly changed since the 1st century. Consequently, he was able to reinterpret Jesus’ parables and life experiences through this traditional culture. In a remarkable series of acclaimed books, which include The Cross and the Prodigal (1973, 2005), Jacob & the Prodigal (2003), and Jesus through Middle Eastern Eyes (2008), Bailey showed that Jesus was the first mind of the New Testament who used story and metaphor to challenge the leaders of his day in ways often unappreciated by contemporary readers.
This biography explains the origins of Bailey’s key ideas and recounts his often-fraught missionary career—one that included the austere and sometimes harsh life in the simple villages in Upper Egypt, the perils of life in Beirut during the Lebanese Civil War (1975-1990), and being evacuated four times during the military conflicts in the region—that made possible his groundbreaking insights into the New Testament.
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View the complete series of video introductions to Dr. Parker’s Kenneth Bailey biography on the FoMENTS YouTube channel.
Read Michael’s recent article on the biography for The Presbyterian Outlook.
“Most scholars dream of making significant contributions to their fields of study and perhaps even of upending them with new discoveries. Kenneth E. Bailey (1930-2016), though not widely known outside of ecclesial circles, enjoyed this pleasure. He taught pastors and New Testament scholars to view the parables and actions of Jesus through the lens of traditional village culture in the Middle East, and he also showed them that Jesus’ parables were not simple prose stories but, rather, highly sophisticated and carefully crafted works of poetry. These were Bailey’s two essential messages.”
John Winthrop: Founding the City Upon a Hill
Puritan politician, lawyer, and lay theologian John Winthrop fled England in 1630 when it looked like Charles I had successfully blocked all hopes of passing Puritan-inspired reforms in Parliament. Leading a migration, he came to New England in the hopes of creating an ideal Puritan community and eventually became the governor of Massachusetts. Winthrop is remembered for his role in the Puritan migration to the colonies and for delivering what is probably the most famous lay sermon in American history, "A Model of Christian Charity." In it he proclaimed that New England would be "a city upon a hill"--an example for future colonies.
In John Winthrop: Founding the City upon a Hill, Michael Parker examines the political and religious history of this iconic figure. In this short biography, bolstered by letters, sermons, and maps, John Winthrop introduces students to the colonial world, the Pequot Wars, and the history of American Exceptionalism.
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The Kingdom of Character: The Student Volunteer Movement for Foreign Missions 1886-1926
The Student Volunteer Movement for Foreign Missions was a Protestant missionary recruiting organization. Launched in the late nineteenth century, it played an indispensable role in the creation of the modern missionary movement. While it was influenced by the optimism and expansiveness that characterized Americans at the turn of the century, it also mirrored the period's provincialism and ethnocentrism.
The Kingdom of Character provides a thorough history of the Student Volunteer Movement (SVM), exposing both its strengths and weaknesses. Parker highlights how these student leaders addressed issues such as gender roles, the social impact of World War I, and various internal controversies, while emphasizing an American middle-class worldview that stressed the Victorian idea of character in their hope to spread the gospel around the world.
The Kingdom of Character is a great read for those interested in the creation of the modern missionary movement.
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