April 22, 2006
100 years later, Azusa Street Revival still reverberates
Joe Ellis/The Clarion-Ledger
Jessica Robison pours out her emotions during Sunday service at Parkway Pentecostal Church in Madison.
Posted on 04/24/2006 9:43:14 AM PDT by george wythe
To those outside the movement, Pentecostals have always seemed exotic, a strange subculture with weird, even frightening, practices. How then to explain that according to the World Christian Database, it is now the second-largest and fastest-growing Christian group in the world, behind the Catholic Church, with about 580 million followers? Or that formal Episcopalians and contemplative Catholics include Pentecostal practices in their services? Or that nearly every mainline and evangelical denomination has been influenced by Pentecostal musical styles, as anyone who has been to a contemporary worship service can attest?
Bishop John Howe of the Episcopal Diocese of Central Florida, who once pastored a church with "charismatic" leanings, says the Pentecostal movement has been "a tremendous blessing" to all Christian churches.
[snip]
Speaking in tongues is probably the practice that puzzles and alarms non-Pentecostals the most. In some Pentecostal denominations, such as the more traditional Assemblies of God, the practice is downplayed and not much in evidence. Cecil M. Robeck, professor of church history at Fuller Theological Seminary in Pasadena, Calif., said in a recent interview that only about 40 percent of Pentecostals speak in tongues, and the number is lower in Third World countries, where the movement is growing the fastest.
[snip]
But some traditions are openly hostile to the practice. Earlier this year, the Southern Baptist Convention's International Mission Board adopted a policy that forbids any of its future missionaries from having a "private prayer language." The new policy reflects a longstanding antipathy among Baptists for speaking in tongues, which they regard as based on a faulty interpretation of scripture.
(Excerpt) Read more at theledger.com ...
The title calls Pentecostalism a religion, but it's more than than. It's a movement that has spread across all denominations.
There are plenty of charismatic Catholics, as as the quoted bishop says, these charismatic Christians are a blessing to all the churchers.
Not in mine.....
Is this really news? Seems like it's more suited for the Religion topic.
From sac bee:
Yearbook: Catholic, Mormon and Pentecostal churches grow fastest
The Associated Press
Last Updated 11:00 am PDT Tuesday, April 18, 2006
NEW YORK (AP) - The Assemblies of God, the Mormon church and the Roman Catholic Church were the fastest-growing major denominations in the United States last year, according to the just-released 2006 Yearbook of American and Canadian Churches.
The Assemblies of God, a Pentecostal church, grew 1.81 percent to just under 2.8 million members. The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints increased 1.74 percent to nearly 6 million people. And the Catholic Church, by the far the largest denomination in the United States, grew .83 percent to 67.8 million parishioners.
Only three mainline Protestant churches remain among the 10 biggest denominations in the country. The United Methodist Church, the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America and the Presbyterian Church, U.S.A., stayed in the top 10 despite experiencing declines in membership last year.
The Methodists ranked third, with about 8.2 million members. The Evangelical Lutherans Ranked seventh, with nearly 4.9 million people. And the Presbyterians ranked ninth with just under 3.2 million congregants.
The Southern Baptist Convention remains the largest U.S. Protestant group, with 16.3 million members. It is the second-largest denomination in the country, behind the Catholic Church.
The yearbook has been published for 89 years by the National Council of Churches, which represents 35 mainline Protestant, Episcopalian and Orthodox Christian groups.
In between our former church and our current one, we attended a Pentacostal church for about three years. When I started to become more involved with it, I found too many weirdnesses, such that I couldn't, in good conscience, become involved in the church. Too much looking to "signs and wonders," so much so that even people's facial ticks were considered the manifestation of the Holy Spirit.
I don't speak in tongues (my "private prayer language" is English), but it's fairly evident that there is greater support in scripture for the validity of tongues than not. The non-tongues denominations believe it has "ceased," but they base that upon a half a verse in I Corinthians.
I'm also convinced from my observations of the Conservative Baptist church that they pooh-pooh tongues, and other manifestations, not simply from scripture, as they'll contend, but from their exprience: their leaders have never experienced tongues and the like, so they are inclined not to consider it a valid gift for today. Hence, experience does play a large part in how many in the traditional, conservative evangelical churches view these things, despite the fact that they speak against basing one's theology upon experience.
IMO it's actually less than that. I would take issue with anyone (and it's usually a non-believer who says it) who refers to the different "denominations" within orthodox Christianity as different religions, as if each group worships different gods.
Within "orthodoxy" (OCA/GCA/RCA friends, please note the lower case "o") we have the same beliefs regarding the nature of God, while there are some "Pentecostals" who don't. I'm pretty sure the "Pentecostal" Assemblies of God hold to orthodox Trinitarian theology. I'm familiar with one congregation that refers to itself as a "United Pentecostal Church" but which preaches modalism (the belief that the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit aren't distinct personalities within the one Godhead, but rather are different "modes" that God assumes in time, and IIRC only one at a time) regarding Jesus Christ's deity.
When asked to comment they babbled incomprehensibly.
There are plenty of mistakes made by Believers...including this one. I've learned over the yrs to pray for them an allow God to be God. Our Lord has NO problem correcting our brothers and sisters. We are only human we are going to make our mistakes that's part of growing up in Christ Jesus. LOL...God Bless ;o)
Is this the one where the women don't cut their hair and don't ever wear pants?
Very wise counsel. Thanks.
Some Protestant denominations are made up exclusively of Pentecostals. Some of these denominations prohibit their women cutting their hair and wearing pants.
LOL you might want to re-word that
I'd love a life where I didn't have to wear pants, but there's too much crabgrass in my flowerbeds and too many fire ants and cockleburrs to make it safe in anything but thick trousers.
April 22, 2006
100 years later, Azusa Street Revival still reverberates
Joe Ellis/The Clarion-Ledger
Jessica Robison pours out her emotions during Sunday service at Parkway Pentecostal Church in Madison.
What's that religion where they don't wear hair and don't cut their pants?
Praise the Lord--for You DO work in mysterious Ways...:-)
THE FASTEST GROWING CHURCH does not mean much. The broad road that leads to destruction has most of the people traveling on it, so this does not prove much of anything.
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