People sometimes wonder why the Presbyterian Church has been so influential in Korea when, at first glance, other cultures seem more aligned with ours. The answer, according to Kennedy Smartt, one of the PCA’s leading founders, is Dwight Linton.

Mark Lowrey, now with Great Commission Publications, sees it the same way. “What we have in Korean ministry,” Lowrey says, “is because of Dwight. He’s the one who’s responsible. He’s the one who planted the seed, who watered and nurtured it. … Look at what God’s done through the work of this man.”

Linton was born in Korea, the son of Presbyterian missionaries, and a grandchild of Eugene and Charlotte Ingram (Lottie) Bell, missionaries who arrived in Korea in 1895. Dwight Linton and his wife Margie returned there in1952; together, they ministered for 25 years.

“I believe Dwight’s more responsible than anybody for our denomination’s influence in Korea and among Korean people in this country,” Smartt told byFaith. “He’s trained pastors and church planters, he loved the people there, and he had a special place in his heart for them.” 

Van Hoyt, the missions director at Chestnut Mountain Presbyterian in Flowery Branch, Ga., said, “I’ve never seen anyone who had a heart for a group of people like [the heart] Dwight had for the people of Korea.”

“He was a pastor to pastors for the Korean church,” Smartt remembers. “He’d be on the phone for hours talking with members of a congregation or with pastors, helping them through tough situations. He never lost patience.”

“The man was the consummate missiologist,” Lowrey told us. “He knew mission theory and mission practice. He understood the Korean language and the English language. He understood Korean culture and American culture. And he could, better than anyone I’ve ever seen, help us understand one other.”

Beyond his missionary work, Linton inspired others with the consistency of his faith. “Things didn’t always go well for Dwight,” Hoyt said. “He had some tough times in his life, but he was always walking with God. He was always faithful—always certain of God’s faithfulness. I never saw anything that could distract Dwight from his walk with the Lord.”

Lowrey remembers Linton the same way. “He was dedicated to God, ministry, and serving other people,” Lowrey recalled. “He was a good listener. He loved working with people, and seeing to it that they were empowered to accomplish their ministries.”

“I first met Dwight when he’d returned from the mission field. He joined Mission to North America as the head of what was then called 'special ministries.'” Lowrey, then a young man with big dreams of a Reformed campus ministry, spent a week with Linton sharing the vision. “It’s because of Dwight that the PCA now has a campus ministry,” Lowrey told byFaith. “He understood the need and the potential. It was Dwight who pushed it through.” Lowrey became the PCA’s first coordinator of campus ministry.

Linton is remembered as being humble and down to earth, a man with a servant’s heart. “He was always finding time to help no matter what the need was,” Van Hoyt remembers, “even if it meant helping me sharpen a saw or load firewood.”

“But he was savvy, too,” Lowrey said. “He was an innately good sociologist and cultural anthropologist. He understood cross-cultural ministry better than anyone.”