Love made Perfect

Author

Andrew Murray was the second child of Andrew Murray Sr. (1794–1866), a Dutch Reformed Church missionary sent from Scotland to South Africa. He was born in Graaff Reinet, South Africa. His mother, Maria Susanna Stegmann, was of French Huguenot and German Lutheran descent.

Murray was sent to the University of Aberdeen in Scotland for his initial education, together with his elder brother, John. Both remained there until they obtained their master’s degrees in 1845. During this time they were influenced by Scottish revival meetings and the ministry of Robert Murray McCheyne, Horatius Bonar, and William Burns. From there, they both went to the University of Utrecht where they studied theology. The two brothers became members of Het Réveil, a religious revival movement opposed to the rationalism which was in vogue in the Netherlands at that time. Both brothers were ordained by the Hague Committee of the Dutch Reformed Church on 9 May 1848 and returned to the Cape.

Murray married Emma Rutherford in Cape Town, South Africa, on 2 July 1856. They had eight children together (four boys and four girls).

Residence in Utrecht
In 1846 they lived in the Minrebroederstraat.

From 1847 to 1848 they lived at the Zadelstraat .

Religious work in South Africa
Murray pastored churches in Bloemfontein, Worcester, Cape Town and Wellington, all in South Africa. He was a champion of the South African Revival of 1860.

In 1889, he was one of the founders of the South African General Mission (SAGM), along with Martha Osborn and Spencer Walton. After Martha Osborn married George Howe, they formed the South East Africa General Mission (SEAGM) in 1891. SAGM and SEAGM merged in 1894. Because its ministry had spread into other African countries, the mission’s name was changed to Africa Evangelical Fellowship (AEF) in 1965. AEF joined with Serving In Mission (SIM) in 1998 and continues to this day.

Through his writings, Murray was also a key “Inner Life” or “Higher Life” or Keswick leader, and his theology of faith healing and belief in the continuation of the apostolic gifts made him a significant forerunner of the Pentecostal movement.

Murray died on 18 January 1917, four months before his 89th birthday. A bibliography compiled by D. S. B. Joubert estimates that Murray published over 240 books and tracts; this number includes about 50 books, many of them authored in both Dutch and English.