Jamie Buckingham

Jamie Buckingham (1932—1992)

Country of Origin

United States

Countries/Regions of Ministry

United States

Traditions

Charismatic

Ministries

Christian journalist
pastor

Jamie Buckingham grew up in a pious Southern Baptist family on the Florida coast. Between his junior and senior years at Mercer University, he solidified his personal commitment to Christ at a summer conference center in upstate New York. Within a well-established cessationist stream, he headed to Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary (Fort Worth, Texas) where he earned two graduate degrees. By then, he and his wife, Jackie, were starting to build their family which would eventually include five children.

Buckingham's first pastorate at South Main Street Baptist Church, Greenwood, South Carolina, went well for eight years—until his adulterous affair sabotaged it. He and his family moved to Harbor City Baptist Church in Melbourne, Florida. At first they kept quiet about what had happened, but fifteen months later, the scandal became known and triggered a second firing. He was only thirty-five years old.

With his pastoral ministry clearly over, Jamie Buckingham’s life lay in ruins. What was next? He recounted:

Someone, perhaps my mother, had entered a subscription in my name for Guideposts magazine. I seldom read Guideposts, but in my idle time, which I now had in abundance, I picked it up. Someplace in that particular issue I found a half-page announcement of a writers’ workshop to be sponsored by the magazine. The stipulations were simple. Submit a first-person manuscript of 1,500 words following the basic Guideposts style. This would be evaluated and judged by an editorial committee who would then pick the best 20 manuscripts. Those selected would receive an all-expenses-paid trip to New York and would attend a one-week writers’ workshop, conducted by the magazine editors.

He put together a piece about an Air Force pilot he knew who had survived a midair explosion. Some weeks after sending it in, he was shocked to be informed that he was one of the chosen 20 out of more than 2,000 submissions. It was at that workshop that he met John and Elizabeth Sherrill, who mentioned helping a former gang leader named Nicky Cruz put his testimony into a book. By week’s end, Buckingham signed a publisher’s contract to develop what became the well-known Run, Baby, Run.

The process of researching for this book plunged him into new understandings of the Holy Spirit’s work, which Nicky Cruz had absorbed during his transformation at Teen Challenge. Within four months, Buckingham found himself at a Full Gospel Business Men’s Fellowship International convention in Washington, where he responded to an invitation and was filled with the Spirit. He testified:

… whom, up until that time, I only recognized as a boring phrase in the Doxology. Almost everything about me was revolutionized—instantly…. Everything within me had been striving against God. Like Jacob at Peniel, I had been vainly wrestling with the angel of the Lord trying to have my own way, yet at the same time unwilling to turn loose until he blessed me. Now the blessing had come. And with it, a limp. Yet even the limp—and the scars—are badges of His glory.

The success of Run, Baby, Run (more than 12 million sold since its debut in 1968) led to more chances to collaborate with people who needed help crafting their stories. Some notable titles were: Shout It from the Housetops with CBN leader Pat Robertson (1972); Tramp for the Lord with beloved World War II survivor Corrie ten Boom (1974); God Can Do It Again and eight other titles with evangelist Kathryn Kuhlman—and her post-mortem biography, Daughter of Destiny (1976).

Buckingham was careful with writing opportunities, however. He knew that some public figures needed more seasoning and a ministry should first obtain credibility. This wise perspective served his readers well during his long tenure as a columnist for Charisma magazine. When its sister publication was launched in 1983, Ministry Today, Buckingham was the natural choice for senior editor. He did not lecture or pontificate; he was known for winsome stories about real people’s foibles, including his own. His book output eventually totaled twenty-two solo titles and twenty-four collaborations. In addition, his curiosity about the Holy Land resulted in a video series he anchored that garnered wide distribution.

To his surprise, eventually the nondenominational Tabernacle Church he opened in Melbourne, Florida reopened a pastorate position to him and grew under his leadership to a membership of 4,000. In that process, Jamie and Jackie counseled multiple pastors in the restoration process. Having learned the hard way, Jamie gave loving but clear-eyed counsel from the Scriptures. His kind, self-deprecating personality shows best in his admission that:

Perfection still eludes me. I am still vulnerable. But most important, I am no longer satisfied with my imperfection. Nor, thank God, am I intimidated by it. I have reached the point of recognizing that God uses imperfect, immoral, dishonest people. In fact, that’s all there are these days. All the holy men seem to have gone off and died. There’s no one left but us sinners to carry on the ministry.

Dean Merrill