Bishop Earl Paulk
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Earl Paulk (1927-) is founder of Chapel Hill Harvester Church in Decatur, GA.
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[edit] Background
Earl Pearly Paulk, Jr. was born May 30, 1927 to the late Dr. Earl Pearly Paulk Sr. and Addie Mae Tomberlin Paulk. At 17, Paulk said he received a call from God to enter ministry, traveling and preaching on the weekends while attending college. He later married Norma Davis. Paulk attended the Candler School of Theology, becoming the first Pentecostal to attend the seminary, which was predominantly Methodist.
[edit] Civil Rights Work
Paulk's pastoral ministry began in the Atlanta area at Hemphill Avenue Church of God just as the Civil Rights Movement was getting underway. Paulk would work closely with Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. and his family in the civil rights fight. He also signed The Atlanta Manifesto, a statement prepared in the Fall of 1957 a group of clergymen in Georgia, relating specifically to the violence in Little Rock, Arkansas, and in general to the whole problem of racial integration from the point of view of Christian social responsibility. (Copy available through Theology Today, published by Princeton Theological Seminary in Princeton, NJ)
[edit] Church & Ministry
In 1960 The Harvester Ministry began in an area of Atlanta called "Little Five Points" In 1972, the church moved to the southern part of DeKalb County and became known as Chapel Hill Harvester Church. While there, the church experienced massive growth, enlarging that building a few times, having services in a tent, then building the K-Center, and ultimately settling into a large, almost Gothic building (thus the church's unofficial name as the "Cathedral at Chapel Hill". The church was famed for combining visual arts (particularly with the dance team) with a liturgical style. Paulk, who had previous experience television and radio ministry early on, later expanded his media ministry and for many years, his show aired on TBN. He also was a semi-regular guest on TBN's "Praise the Lord" and served as the longtime bishop of the International Communion of Charismatic Churches from 1982 until 2005. His public housing ministry was once called one of a "thousand places of light" by President George Bush, Sr.
