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Bethel Bible School: Houston (1905) - Parham started a new Bible school in Houston, TX, where he
taught the baptism in the Holy Spirit with speaking in tongues. One of his students was a young black
man named William Seymour, who would be the man that God used to spread Pentecostalism at Azusa
Street
Early Pentecostal Doctrines: Tongues are the evidence of the baptism in the Holy Spirit (if you
don't speak in tongues, you don't have it), every Christian should be baptized in the Holy Spirit,
you could speak in tongues as a normal part of your Christian life, baptism in the Holy Spirit is
the only way you can escape Great Tribulation, missionaries don't need to learn foreign
languages
o 214 N Bonnie Brae - As the group grew, Richard and Ruth Asberry later invited Seymour to do
worship services and prayer meetings at their home (214 N Bonnie Brae St). The Aberrys were
Baptists who felt sorry for Seymour though didn't agree with his doctrine. Meetings were
attended mostly by poor black women and a few husbands at first. Soon white Believers joined
in too, yet no one was speaking in tongues.
o Lucy Farrow - In late March, Parham sent Lucy Farrow, Seymour's friend who spoke in tongues,
to help encourage the group and lead them into speaking in tongues
o Fasting - Seymour suggested the group do a 10-day fast until they spoke in tongues
Tongues!
o 9 April 1906 - Edward (Owen) Lee got healed and then started speaking in tongues when
Seymour prayed for him. At the prayer meeting that evening, Seymour and 7 others were also
baptized in the Holy Spirit and spoke in tongues. Jennie Moore spoke in Hebrew and
miraculously learned how to play piano.
o Revival - Huge crowds began gathering at Bonnie Brae Street, leading to 24-hour meetings for
3+ days. People filled the streets and every inch of the house. There were so many people that
the porch collapsed!
Azusa Street Mission
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Crowds grew too large for the Asberry home, leading the group to a former African Methodist Episcopal
church at 312 Azusa St, a broken building in the ghetto
The building was really old and in need of repair, so everyone helped fix it
14 April 1906 - First meetings at Azusa St location
Crowds from all over America and the world came to the revival, received the baptism in the Holy Spirit,
spoke in tongues, were healed, saved, delivered, and brought the revival back to their communities
Newspapers reported on the revival, bringing more people and spreading it further. Even the very
negative reports drew seekers
Formality and Control - they put a name on the building, built a throne for William Seymour, tried to control the
order of service, tried to orchestrate the spread of revival much like a denomination would do
o Seymour eventually named the Azusa mission "Apostolic Faith Mission," so some feared he was turning
it into just another one of Parham's churches
Sectarianism - self-righteous people turned to judging and criticizing others, fighting over pet doctrines, trying to
get more time in the Upper Room to "tarry" for the Holy Spirit
o Seymour's marriage to Jennie Evans Moore (13 May 1908) was denounced as sin by some
Increasing numbers of demonic manifestations weren't dealt with appropriately
Unlike previous revivals, the Christian community and general public largely rejected the Pentecostal Revival
Increasing segregation was drawing non-blacks away from Azusa and into their own things
People were changing their views on some of the bad teaching
o Works-based theology - if you sinned even once after sanctification, you lost your salvation
o Said sanctification was instantaneous, instead of progressive
o People "tarried" for days to receive the Holy Spirit instead of just receiving Him by faith
o Tongues were seen as only and always for foreign missions, so people who could speak in tongues left on
the mission-field expecting to not have to learn the languages
o Most people only spoke in tongues once and thought that was enough
o Expected God to sovereignly move on them and make them speak in tongues, outside their control
o Believed if you didn't speak in tongues, you weren't baptized in the Holy Spirit
Clara Lum and Florence Crawford stole their 50,000-person mailing list, redirecting funds and seekers to their
own ministry in Portland, Oregon
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Overview - Azusa Street was the launching point of the worldwide Pentecostal Movement, one of the
largest and most dynamic Christian movements known to history
Missions Focus - Pentecostals felt a new burden to preach the word of God throughout the world. They
thought that tongues would allow them to do missions without learning new languages, expected signs
and wonders to follow their preaching. They felt the message of the Gospel needed to be proclaimed
outside the church.
Two Ways the Movement Spread:
o 1) Pentecostal missionaries
o 2) Literature - tracts, magazines, newsletters, and secular newspaper reports
Who Were the Missionaries?
o About 200 missionaries in the first years
o Missionaries had a ton of zeal and passion and saw many signs and wonders
o Difficulties: lacked the funding, support, and training of their non-Pentecostal counterparts; were
often rejected by established missionaries; normal disease, lack of funds, death, and stress of
missions; highly-independent and sometimes elitist attitudes made it hard to work cooperatively
Four Types of Missionaries:
o The Naive - the naive ones who left with no training or funding or planning, just the power of the
Holy Spirit and tongues, only to get disappointed and return heartbroken
o The Survivor - the hard-working ones who stayed in the foreign field when things weren't as
easy as they expected, learned the language and culture, wrote letters for finances, overcame
difficulties, and trained converts for leadership posts
o The Veteran - Veteran missionaries already on the field who received the Holy Spirit and then
ministered in more power, adding stability and expertise to the movement
o The Graduate - Graduates of short, intense Bible institutes that trained missionaries to minister in
the power of the Holy Spirit, without all the intellectual training of a formal seminary
Spread in America
The first place Pentecostalism spread after Azusa Street was throughout the US
Multiple Sites of Renewal - Topeka, KS (1901); Moorehead, Minnesota (1904); Azusa St (1906);
Chicago, IL; Dunn, NC; Toronto, Canada
Worldwide Spread
Western Europe
o Roots - Keswick Conventions, Welsh Revival, Holiness teachings
o Norway - English Methodist minister doing missions in Norway (Thomas Ball Barratt), received
baptism in Holy Spirit with tongues in US through reports of Azusa, returned to Norway (1907)
spreading the message
Barratt's church in Oslo became one of the centers of revival in Europe. Many church
leaders visited Barratt's meetings and received the baptism in the Holy Spirit and tongues
o England - Alexander A Boddy (Anglican vicar) was seeking revival after visiting Wales, Keswick
Conventions, and Barratt's Oslo meetings. He invited Barratt to preach at his church in
Sunderland, where revival broke out (1907)
Smith Wigglesworth became baptized in the Holy Spirit at his 1907 Sunderland meetings,
taking the teaching worldwide
o Germany - Jonathan Paul visited the Oslo meetings and took the teaching back to Germany,
where they were denounced and suffered much persecution
o Sweden - Lewi Pethrus (Baptist pastor) visited Oslo and came back to Sweden in power,
spreading the movement even further
1902 - Pethrus spontaneously began speaking in tongues, but he didn't understand what
was happening
1907 - Pethrus visited Barratt's meetings and joined the Pentecostal Movement, still
pastoring Baptist churches throughout Sweden
1913 - While pastoring Filadelfia Baptist Church, he was expelled from the Union for his
views on baptism in the Holy Spirit and communion, thus beginning the Pentecostal
Union in Sweden
Pethrus's Pentecostal church became the largest free church in Europe and largest
Martin Ryan - arrived in Hong Kong with a team of 20 church members from US
(October 1907), with a lot of zeal but little training or plan, yet despite discouragement
they pressed on and saw fruit
1907 - revival fell among missionaries in Wuchow, many of them speaking in tongues
Tibet - Victor G Plymire, a Christian and Missionary Alliance missionary to Tibet, received
baptism in the Holy Spirit and spoke in tongues while on furlough in US (1908), returned to
Tibet in power, where he baptized their first convert after 16 years of work
Japan - Martin Ryan, together with his team, stayed in Japan for a time, witnessing to students
with the hope they would spread Jesus back to their home cities and nations
Korea
Sister Daniels and Sister Brand came from California and preached Pentecost in Korea
(1908)
Yong Do Lee - Methodist evangelist who began a Pentecostal ministry that saw many
miracles and tongues (1928)
Mary Rumsey - received the Holy Spirit baptism at Azusa then came to Japan and
established a beachhead to reach into East Asia (1928)
Inner Mongolia - Swedish Pentecostals like Folke Boberg came here in 1922
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Africa
o Roots - John Alexander Dowie already had a strong network of churches in South Africa
o South Africa
Mary Johnson and Ida Andersson - left Moorhead, MN, in November 1904 as
missionaries to South Africa after the Swedish-American revival
John G. Lake and Thomas Hezmalhalch
John G Lake - a businessman and elder at John Alexander Dowie's church in
Zion, IL, who received the baptism in the Holy Spirit and tongues in 1906 under
Parham's ministry. Established churches in Africa and healing rooms in America,
everywhere seeing incredible signs and wonders.
1908 - Lake, his wife and 7 kids, Hezmalhach, and 3 others arrived in Africa.
Lake's wife died the first year due to malnutrition and exhaustion.
Their ministry planted hundreds of churches in Africa and saw many miracles
1912 - After a highly-successful ministry in South Africa, Lake returned to US
Elias Letwaba - A black South African preacher who worked with Lake, built a Bible
school, and spread Pentecostalism especially among the black South Africans
Charles and Emma Chawner - Canadian missionaries to Zulu in South Africa (1908)
o Liberia - Lucy Farrow and Julia Hutchins arrived shortly after Azusa Street
Other black Americans went to Liberia, Angola, and elsewhere on the western coast
William Wade Harris - from a Liberian Methodist family, he led an indigenous movement
in Ivory Coast and Ghana, with thousands converted, tongues, healings, miracles, etc.
Incredible testimonies of power encounters and the hand of God
o Other missionaries went to Mozambique, Ghana, Nigeria, and elsewhere
Latin America
o Argentina - Luigi Francescon, an Italian-American baptized in the Holy Spirit in Chicago under
William Durham (1907), preached to Italians in Argentina (1909), beginning the movement there
o Chile - Dr. Willis Hoover and First Methodist Church in Valparaiso were studying the book of
Acts and praying for the baptism in the Holy Spirit, which they learned about through books and
testimonies. Soon revival came to the church, and though the Methodist denomination rejected it,
one of the fastest-growing Pentecostal movements in the world began as a result
o Brazil
Most spectacular growth of Pentecostalism in the world
and was spreading them around the Bucovina region (sometime before 1914). There are even some
reports of people speaking in tongues.
o Transylvanian Saxons
1919 - A Saxon Baptist woman in Drlos (near Sibiu), influenced by an unknown American
Pentecostal's teaching, got baptized in the Holy Spirit, creating a small Pentecostal revival among
Lutheran Saxons, which was largely ignored by the Romanian community
1923 - Michael Thelman was baptized in the Holy Spirit and later became pastor over the Saxon
Pentecostal churches of Transylvania
o US - First Romanian-American Pentecostal churches were formed in Michigan and Ohio (1921-1922)
1923 - Pavel Budeanu was ordained the first Romanian Pentecostal minister (Assemblies of
God), wrote a pamphlet called "Biblical Truth" about baptism in the Holy Spirit and healing
Most Pentecostal Romanians were immigrants from Transylvania
Gheorghe Bradin (1895-1962)
o 10 September 1922 - Bradin left the Baptist church and began the first Pentecostal church in
Romania, in Pauli (near Arad)
By the end of the year, about 30 people were meeting together, yet no one was baptized in
the Holy Spirit or spoke in tongues
They named this new church "Biserica lui Dumnezeu"
The meetings were essentially extended prayer meetings, people seeking the power of God
At this time, Pentecostals called themselves "baptisti penticostali"
o February 1923 - The second Pentecostal church was founded, in nearby Cuvin, in the house of
Vasile and Persida Semenascu, who met together with three others
Persida Semenascu became the first Romanian baptized in the Holy Spirit
o 3 June 1923 - In a meeting of the group in Pauli, 8 people were baptized in the Holy Spirit and spoke
Growth
o January 1925 - After the publication of the Ministry of Cults' decision on Pentecostal teaching,
many people grew interested in this new doctrine.
Hundreds of people came to Gheorghe Bradin asking to learn more about baptism in the
Holy Spirit and speaking in tongues
Those who couldn't visit wrote letters
As a result, the ideas spread further in Romania
o 1926 - Despite persecution, there were by now 6 illegal Pentecostal churches in Romania: Puli, Cuvin,
Arad, Mderat, Pncota, and oimo
o 1927 - A Hungarian Pentecostal Church in Timioara was begun and allowed to operate freely, because
they were Hungarian and the Orthodox Church wasn't so concerned about them
o 1948 - Despite opposition and persecution by the Orthodox Church, the Pentecostal churches expand at
an astounding rate. By 1948, they have over 700 illegal churches with 3,061 total members.
Official Recognition and Further Growth
o 4 November 1948 - Under the Communists, two of the three main Pentecostal streams joined together and
filed documents to become a legally recognized religion in Romania
Gheorghe Bradin's "Apostolic Churches" (with 500 houses of prayer)
"Holy Spirit-Baptized Christians and Disciples of the Lord" (with 200 houses of prayer)
o 1948-1958 - Romanian Pentecostal churches grew by a factor of 17
3,061 members in 1948 --> 53,691 in 1958
o 2002 - Pentecostal Christians are the fourth-largest in Romania with 324,462 members (just behind
Orthodox, Roman-Catholic, and Reformed Christians)