O. L. Jaggers
Rev. O. L. Jaggers was a prominent Voice of Healing evangelist whose ministry connected the postwar healing revival, Gordon Lindsay's publishing network, William Branham's circle, Jim Jones's early revival work, Full Gospel businessmen, Christian Identity-adjacent "Flying Saucer" theology, and Klan-connected promoters such as William D. Upshaw; through national advertising, radio ministry, revival campaigns, and his later leadership at LeRoy Kopp's Calvary Temple, Jaggers became part of the same unstable revival ecosystem where Pentecostal healing claims, prophecy, apocalyptic speculation, racialized theology, celebrity evangelism, and controversial figures overlapped.
Rev. O. L. Jaggers was a Voice of Healing evangelist who worked closely with Gordon Lindsay, William Branham and the other revivalists from the late 1940s. He was well respected among Pentecostals due to his family connection to the Assemblies of God. His father was one of the original founders of the Assemblies.[1]
In 1951, Voice of Healing began heavily advertising Jaggers as the evangelist launched a nationwide radio broadcast in collaboration with The Voice of Healing.[2] That same year, Indiana's Rev. Jim Jones of Peoples Temple was given $3,000 per week (Almost $36,000 per week in today's money) to hold revivals with Jaggers.[3] This places the year connecting Jones to William Branham much earlier than previously thought. Branham would have already been aware of Jones as editor of the The Voice of Healing.[4]
Jaggers went on tour selling the "Flying Saucer" theology of Christian Identity to the masses,[5] and both the Christian Businessmen[6] and Voice of Healing organizations sponsored him. Even Congressman William D. Upshaw, who later helped boost William Branham's failing ministry after an alleged healing in Leroy Kopp's Calvary Temple in Los Angeles, endorsed Jaggers as "one of the finest evangelists" he'd heard. Upshaw, who single-handedly saved the 1915 Klan during a government inquisition, worked closely with several key figures in the revivals, including Wiliam Branham's mentor and second-in-command of that 1915 Klan, Roy E. Davis. Jaggers went on to become the head pastor at Leroy Kopp's Church.
FORMER CONGRESSMAN UPSHAW SAYS ABOUT O. L. JAGGERS
Recently, while preaching in Dallas, Texas, I crossed the path of one of the most resourceful Bible preachers I have ever heard. Rev. O. L. Jaggers had been called back to Dallas, Texas, for a second City-wide meeting. This was one of the greatest union revival meetings ever seen in the home city of the immortal George Truett. There were several thousand conversions and many hundreds of Bible healings, so palpably the work of the great physician that infidelity was put to a stammering hush.
Let it be remembered that O. L. Jaggers is not a "Divine Healer." The truth is ... I have never seen a "Divine Healer." These Pentecostal preachers whose ministry has been so signally blessed in Salvation and Divine Healing campaigns will say: "Not unto us ... but to God be all the Glory."
O. L. Jaggers is the man of consecrated culture and personal charm ... and one of the finest Evangelist I have ever heard. Mark Matthews ... with all his Presbyterian eloquence would have loved him! Bishop Arthur Moore, one of the most magnetic BIble orators in America, would feast on his clarity of thought and cogency of argument! While Louie Newton ... with all of his Baptist orthodox, meticulously, would go fishing with Jaggers and bait his hook! While lawyers like Walter McElreath, the greatest constitutional legal mind in Georgia, would find a Christian statement of his own stature in this great Bible Champion.O. L. Jaggers also has the greatest radio ministry of any Bible Evangelist I know in America. I rejoice to know that my home city of Atlanta is to hear, during the greater part of January, this poised and powerful prophet of God.
- Former Congressman William D. Upshaw