The origin of the Eastern District Church of the Nazarene may be easily understood against the origin of the church in Southern Africa. The Church of the Nazarene recently celebrated its first 100 years in South Africa in 2019 at Mbombela Stadium. The district’s history is intricately linked to the church in Eswatini and Mozambique. The latter celebrated its centenary last month. The Church of the Nazarene in Mozambique (founded in 2022) was started by migrant mine workers who were at Sabie and went back home to Mozambique to evangelise to their families. In 1919 the Church of the Nazarene was first introduced to South Africa at Sabie, a gold-mining town on the Eastern Drakensberg Mountains by Harmon Schmelzenbach. It was Schmelzenbach’s wish to spread the gospel to every place where there was a need.  Accompanied by his Swazi assistant, Joseph Mkhwanazi, Harmon Schmelzenbach roamed many miles out from eSwatini, where he had planted the Nazarene Church in 1910, to find new areas where they could bring the saving message of Jesus Christ. Sabie was chosen because the work opportunity at this place attracted many people from surrounding areas and outside the borders of South Africa. Up to this time the work of the Church of the Nazarene in Swaziland, since 1910, was largely in a rural setting, but at Sabie, a new challenge and open door of evangelism opened where there was a high concentration of people.

Due to two developing factors, the successful work at Sabie was short-lived. The first was the more productive deep gold mining activity that was taking place on the Witwatersrand in the Johannesburg area and the second was the massive reforestation project around Sabie where the eucalyptus and pine were grown in order to get support timber for the expanding mines of the Reef.  As a result, the church work came to a close when people were moved out of the area in large numbers.

As the Sabie work was losing its momentum, Joseph Penn, in 1922, went to the Albany farm, 16 miles east of Sabie and opened a station there and named it Bethel. In addition to a successful evangelistic mission that was carried on there, a Nazarene day school was established and many boys and girls from the surrounding farms came to learn. Both Rev. Enos Mgwenya and Rev. Samson Mkabela ministered at Bethel from the 1930s through the 1950s serving as pastors and educators. Unfortunately, the Bethel work came to an end during the 1960s as a result of expanding forestation which resulted in the movement of people from this area. The focal point of the operation was already established in the Lowveld area of Mpumalanga where the masses of the people were living. The Arthurseat farm was purchased in 1935 with the proceeds acquired from the sale of the Christopher Hahn property at Sabie.

The Arthurseat mission station, where overseas Nazarene missionaries lived,   became a very important hub for the Church of the Nazarene work in South Africa for many years. A church building was built on a hill with its entrance facing an umnombela tree that produced very delicious wild fruit. Worshipers coming to church would feed on the tinombela fruit and rest in the shade of the tree. Because of this tree, the Arthurseat Mission Station was affectionately known by the local people as Emnombeleni (The place of the umnombela tree). Several Nazarene outstations, where churches and schools were established, were under the supervision of the Arthurseat Mission. These outstations were Bethel, Zoeknog, Sandriver, Craigburn, Greenvalley, Klaserie, Welverdiend and Ludlow. When the International Holiness Mission merged with the Church of the Nazarene in 1952, the following centres, Acornhoek (where the Ethel Lucas Memorial (now called Tintswalo) Hospital was, Cottondale, Islington and Edingburgh were brought under the supervision of the Arthurseat Centre.

One of the important works of the church was running and maintaining day schools. Mr J Russell Saoli (1915-1986) a pioneer educator from the Eastern Cape in Matatiela, first worked in our Nazarene day school at Siteki in Swaziland in 1935. While there, he gave his life to God during a revival service. In 1936 he went to Matatiel and married Esther Mulutsoane and then came to Arthurseat in 1937 to establish a school on the mission station. This was a day when local parents were not willing to send girls to school, so Saoli began teaching boys. From these humble beginnings the Arthurseat Nazarene School, under the leadership of Saoli, grew and became strong. In the 1940s high school classes were added under missionary Lorraine Schultz’s leadership.

In 1952 the International Holiness Movement and the Church of the Nazarene merged.

The Xitsonga Hymnal, Tinsimu Ta Ku Twanana was first printed in 1957 and this landmark venture saw 10000 copies being printed. The first 3-in-1 Hymnal that combined Izihlabelelo Zokudumisa, Melodi ya Tumelo, and Tinsimu Ta Ku Twanana was put together in 1976. Reverends Water Tshabalala, William Mohlaphodi, and Malungana were the people who worked at the library where Shirley Press Bindery was based at the time. At that time the Church of the Nazarene had one large district that covered many areas up to Gauteng (Transvaal). The first District Superintendent of the Eastern Transvaal was Rev Ennos Mgwenya (1962 to 1974). The second District Superintendent was Rev Aaron Mathebula (1974-1976). The third District Superintendent was Rev Hannibal Sebati (1976 to 1983). He was succeeded by the fourth Rev Meshack Ribisi (1983 to 1991). The fifth District Superintendent was Rev John Sibanda (1991). Reverend Marakalala took over in 1991 and ran the District until 2005. Reverend Goodwin Chirwa (2005 to 2016).