August Lindstedt was born in 1887 in Sweden and was the oldest of 6 children. His father was a steel mill caster who died of "black lung" when August was 12 years old. August got a job at a steel cable factory to help his family out.
It wasn't recorded when August accepted the Lord as his personal savior. But, as a young man he felt the calling to preach Christ to the Russian people.
August enrolled in Orebro Missionskola to train for the ministry. At the age of 20, he graduated from the Baptist Bible School. By this time, his brothers and sisters were old enough to help out his family.
So, August took a job at a steel cable factory in Rosiiju in the Ural Mountains from 1915 to 1917. Here he learned to speak Russian and about the Russian culture while preaching to the workers there. When the communist revolution came in 1917, he fled to St. Petersburg, and then back to Sweden.
He took a job as a pastor, but kept his burden for the Russian people in his heart. It was here that August met Eric Waldmar Olson in 1921. Together they planned to build a Bible school in Siberia and teach Russians the English language (all ministerial books were written in English at this time).
They moved to Vladivostok to help the Christians who were already there. It was during this time that August met Margaret Bergskold. She was a musician and a teacher from America. Their engagement came as a shock to her mother because he was 35 and she was 22. They married in Vladivostok in 1923 against her mother's wishes.
They remained in Vladivostok for a few years trying to help the 30 to 40 believers who were struggling to keep their church going. Things were going well and they started printing religious materials, and working on an orphanage. All their work ceased in 1922 with the entering of the Bolshevics. August was arrested in 1924, but released because they thought a "harmless Swedish preacher" wasn't going to be much trouble.
The Lindstedt's moved to Manchuria, but Olson had to return to America. The church had to move around along the Trans-Siberian railroad to keep safe from the Russian civil soldiers. When the people move, August, Margaret, and their family went with them, sharing their money of $50 per month with those in need.
After a brief stay in America, they came back to Russia. By 1931 his church had more than 500 regular members, with 5 "daughter" churches. People came and went through his church, moving on to other parts of the world.
In 1933, August helped Pastor Petrov organize a Chinese orphanage for war children with no sponsors.
The Lindstedt family moved to Shanghai in 1940. They tried to keep contact with the church in Manchuria, but when Japanese gained control of Shanghai during World War II their ministry was confined to the city. Here, his congregation of Russian Baptists numbered 387 to 725 church members with 395 Sunday School students.
The Lindstedt family was able to stay together during the Japanese occupation because the Swedish ambassador gave Margaret, an American, a Swedish passport. When the Japanese came to take her to a concentration camp, she showed them the passport and they left her alone.
Times were tough here. Chinese money was considered worthless, and there was a bad famine in the area, but they were happy to be together.
When the war ended, August and Margaret moved to Tsingtao, China, where many Russian refugees had settled. But lack of proper diet and medical care took a toll on August's health. and his family returned to America in 1947. He died in 1950 at the age of 63.
His three youngest sons stayed in America. His oldest son, Lars, became a missionary to the Philippines for 36 years and planted 4 churches on two of the islands.
Many of the Russian converts spread throughout the free world- Australia, South America, Canada, the United States, and New Zeland- taking the gospel with them and furthering the work that August started so long ago.
