January 27, 2026

Thomas Coke, the father of Methodist missions, promoted new preaching opportunities for Methodist missions around the world while navigating racist colonial systems. Coke advocated for his missionaries to have access to preach to enslaved Africans on plantations; preached emancipation to slaveholders in America; called upon George Washington to end enslavement; and helped to found the Colony of Sierra Leone for free Blacks. Coke grew in his mission theology from an earlier approach to saving souls to integral mission with concern for education and the well-being of the whole person. The article makes the case that while Coke had a complex relationship with British colonialism and worked within racist systems, he was an abolitionist and worked for the eventual emancipation of Africans and people of African descent.