Carl Fredrich Juergensen
(1862–1940)

Country of Origin

  • Germany

Countries/Regions of Ministry

  • United States
  • Japan

Traditions

  • Pentecostal

Ministries

  • Missionary

Carl Fredrich Juergensen was a German-born American missionary and one of the pioneers of Pentecostalism in Japan. Born in Schleswig-Holstein, Germany, on December 4, 1862, he married Frederike Sophia Martin in 1888. The family immigrated to the United States in 1897 and settled in Cleveland, Ohio, where Carl worked as a garment merchant.

Although originally Lutherans, the Juergensens encountered Pentecostalism through Charles F. Kelchner, an early independent Pentecostal minister. After their daughter Agnes experienced healing following Kelchner’s prayer in 1909, Carl and Frederike embraced the Pentecostal faith and felt called to missionary service. Although they initially considered Germany, they became convinced through visions that God was directing them to Japan.

The Juergensens left the United States with their daughters, Marie and Agnes, in 1913, leaving their son John behind. Arriving in Yokohama without missionary sponsorship or even arrangements for housing, they were introduced to the Japanese Holiness leader Juji Nakada, who helped them find their first home in Tokyo. By the end of 1913, they had established the Full Gospel Mission (Zenbi Fukuin Dendokan) near the University of Tokyo. Their activities included nightly evangelistic meetings, street preaching, prayer for the sick, Sunday schools, and Bible classes in English and German.

Financial difficulties remained a constant challenge. Initially independent faith missionaries, the Juergensens depended largely upon irregular support from American friends. World War I made fundraising particularly difficult because of their German background. In 1918, however, Carl received missionary appointment from the Assemblies of God in the United States. The family lived simply among Japanese people and expanded its ministry by opening stations in Koishikawa in 1915 and Fujimae in 1917. Sunday Schools became especially successful, sometimes attracting more than one hundred children.

Language was another major obstacle for him. Carl never learned sufficient Japanese and depended upon interpreters, many of whom proved unreliable, particularly when interpreting his teaching on the baptism of the Holy Spirit. His daughter, Marie, eventually became his first dependable interpreter. 

Carl’s son John and daughter-in-law Esther came to Japan in November 1919 to join the family's missionary work. When US Assemblies of God missionaries in Japan organized the Japan District in 1920, Carl became its first field representative. After a long-awaited furlough in the United States from 1922, Carl and Frederike returned to Japan in 1924. Their daughters, Marie and Agnes, also became credentialed Assemblies of God missionaries.

The Juergensens conducted extended tent evangelistic campaigns in Tokyo’s Takinogawa Ward. On October 15, 1927, with the help of other Assemblies of God missionaries, they erected the Takinogawa Church, the first Pentecostal church building in Japan. Under Japanese minister Kiyoma Yumiyama, partnered with Marie Juergensen, the congregation flourished. A Bible school was established in 1931, further extending their influence through its graduates.

Carl and Frederike retired in 1936 but remained in Japan. Carl died in Karuizawa, Nagano, on August 29, 1940. Takinogawa Church survived World War II and later became the historic site where the Japan Assemblies of God was formally established on March 15, 1949.

Masakazu Suzuki
Central Bible College, Tokyo

This article is the author's abridged version of Masakazu Suzuki, "Juergensen, Carl," in Brill's Encyclopedia of Global Pentecostalism, ed. Michael Wilkinson et al. (Leiden: Brill, 2021).  

For Further Reading:

  • Juergensen, Marie. Foundation Stones: Carl F. Juergensen, Springfield, MO: Foreign Mission Department of Assemblies of God, n.d.
  • Shew, Paul Tsuchido. “History of the Early Pentecostal Movement in Japan: The Roots and Development of the Pre-War Pentecostal Movement in Japan (1907-1945).” Ph.D. diss., Fuller Theological Seminary, 2003.
  • Suzuki, Masakazu. “The Life and History of C. F. Juergensen and Takinogawa Mission in Japan.” Presented at the 34th Annual Meeting of the Society for Pentecostal Studies, Regent University, Virginia Beach, VA, March 10-12, 2005.
  • Suzuki, Masakazu. “The Origins and the Development of the Japan Assemblies of God: The Foreign and Japanese Workers and Their Ministries (1907 to 1975).” Ph.D. diss., Bangor University, 2011.


© 10/8/2026