The Original Pentecostal Movement

Angela53510 · Nov 2, 2013

Wow! Now we are getting somewhere. I am actually shocked if this is the origins of the Pentecostal movement. Such heresy, so unbiblical. I knew I left for a reason!

I guess this is why the charismatics didn't want to post about the origins of the movement. Because the movement was birthed in lies, made up by preachers with no understanding of the Bible!

SarahM777 · Nov 2, 2013

cont.

As professor of Church History at Assemblies of God Theological Seminary, Gary McGee said about this period, “Nothing but unbelief now could prevent the New Testament Church from being reestablished in holiness and power.” [9]

Fourthly, the Holiness movement brought an emphasis on immediate healing by faith. Most Christians in the Holiness movement in the nineteenth-century assumed that speaking in tongues ended in the Early Church, but other gifts such as healing and miracles were still available to Christians. Ministries that emphasised prayer for the sick gained attention in America. Belief in the miraculous power of God to heal the sick immediately by faith found an easy reception in the Holiness movement where belief in instantaneous sanctification or empowerment already existed. Since Spirit baptism brought a restoration of the relationship intended by God in the Garden of Eden, “the higher life in Christ could also reverse the physical effects of the Fall, enabling believers to take authority over sickness.” [10]

A. B. Simpson and A. J. Gordon were among those who began teaching healing in the atonement. Much of their belief was based upon Isaiah 53:4-5 where they taught that Christ provided healing in the atonement by also becoming not only our “sin-bearer” but also our “sickness-bearer.” In 1864 the doctor R. Charles Cullis built his first “healing home” where the sick would be treated with prayer rather than with medicine. In 1900 the Autralian healer Alexander Dowie built “Zion City” near Chicago to bring “leaves of healing” to the nations.

We've covered a lot of ground in the last three articles (a period of almost two hundred years.) By way of summary Pentecostalism has its roots in the eighteenth-century Wesleyan doctrine of entire sanctification, which taught that sanctification involves a “second blessing” as an experience of the Spirit distinct from conversion. Then in the nineteenth-century the Irvingites spread a charismatic eschatology which taught that the period prior to the second coming of Christ would see an end-time outpouring of the Spirit, accompanied by a restoration to the Church of the sign gifts such as tongues and healing. Wesleyan doctrine also spread to America in this century where it inspired the Holiness Movement, which reformed Wesleyan theology on the “second blessing” by teaching that Spirit-baptism was a second experience to miraculously empower Christians.

Talking Pentecostalism: Where Pentecostalism came from (PART 3)

SarahM777 · Nov 2, 2013

Angela53510 said:

Wow! Now we are getting somewhere. I am actually shocked if this is the origins of the Pentecostal movement. Such heresy, so unbiblical. I knew I left for a reason!

I guess this is why the charismatics didn't want to post about the origins of the movement. Because the movement was birthed in lies, made up by preachers with no understanding of the Bible!

And the blog is by a Pentecostal

zone · Nov 2, 2013

SarahM777 said:

hmm:

"the Charismatic movement has shown that Pentecostalism transcends denominations." - which i would agree with. that's obvious...and the Strange Fire Conference had some convincing stats etc.

yet those of The Original Pentecostal Movement would deny they are Charismatics; or rather shun/reject the title or label charismatic. i'm not sure why. the doctrines and activites are the same.

it seems to be a matter of prominence or excess. like nobody really wants to own up to Kenneth Hagin yet he's a leader.
this article suggests an interesting idea - that the term charismatic is basically describing the pentecostal movement as it has entered mainline (or other) denominations. okay.

as for it being a REFORMATION movement. this is good to highlight, for certain.
the internal doctrines themselves certainly seem to be continually "reforming"

Peter Wagner has said as much, hasn't he?

The New Apostolic Reformation is a title originally used by C. Peter Wagner to describe a movement within Pentecostal and charismatic churches. The title New Apostolic Reformation is descriptive of a theological movement and is not an organization and therefore doesn't not have formal membership.

Among those in the movement that inspired the title NAR, there is a wide range of variance on specific beliefs. Those within the movement hold to their denominational interpretations of the ongoing ministry of the Holy Spirit within each believer.

Unlike some parts of Protestant Christianity, these include the direct revelation of Christ to each believer, prophecy, and the performance of miracles such as healing. This move has also been given the descriptive title, the Third Wave of the Holy Spirit.[2]

Although the movement regards the church as the true body of saved believers, as most Evangelical Protestants do, it differs from the broader Protestant tradition in its view on the nature of church leadership, specifically the doctrine of Five-Fold Ministry, which is based upon a non-traditional interpretation of Ephesians 4:11
[2]....Wilder, Forrest (2 August 2011). "Rick Perry's Army of God". Texas Observer. Retrieved 15 August 2011.
New Apostolic Reformation - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Though few organizations publically espouse connection to the NAR, there are several individuals often associated with this movement including:

Mike Bickle - President of the International House of Prayer[4]
Lou Engle - Founder of The Call[7]
Mike and Cindy Jacobs - Founders of Generals International
Bill Johnson - Head Pastor of Bethel Church
Rick Joyner - Founder of Morning Star Ministries
C. Peter Wagner - Founder of Global Harvest Ministries[1]

According to Wagner, “The second apostolic age began in the year 2001” when the lost offices of prophet and apostle were restored.[8]

...

this is the bit i find amusing...but pointless really - if you claim 5-fold ministry etc, that's NAR. so whatever.

Though few organizations publically espouse connection to the NAR, there are several individuals often associated with this movement.....

...

side note: oops.

OCTOBER 31, 2013
Majority Of Charismatic Manifestations Are Fake

Program segments:

• Mike Bickle Says Majority of Charismatic Manifestations are Fake
Fighting for the Faith

[video=youtube;511_SiErw0U]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=511_SiErw0U[/video]

Mike Bickle - Perspective on the Manifestations of the Holy Spirit

"80% of it is fake"

zone · Nov 2, 2013

SarahM777 said:

Nineteenth-century Premillennialism (Irving's legacy) !!!

SarahM777 said:

AAAHHHHH.......i get it.
wow. okay.....so, Irving = premillennialism + latter rain.
k....

SarahM777 said:

r-i-i-i-ight.
k.

SarahM777 said:

like.......big.
dot connect.
k

zone · Nov 2, 2013

SarahM777 said:

heretic alarm.
awful.
need confirmation on that.

...

okay - wikipedia alert. footnotes; footnotes.

Forerunner of the Catholic Apostolic Church

For years the subject of prophecy had occupied much of his thoughts, and his belief in the near approach of the second advent had received such wonderful corroboration by the perusal of the work of a Jesuit priest, Manuel Lacunza, writing under the assumed Jewish name of Juan Josafat Ben-Ezra, that in 1827 he published a translation of it, accompanied with an eloquent preface. Probably the religious opinions of Irving, originally in some respects more catholic and truer to human nature than generally prevailed in ecclesiastical circles, had gained breadth and comprehensiveness from his intercourse with Samuel Taylor Coleridge but gradually his chief interest in Coleridge's philosophy centred round what was mystical and obscure, and to it in all likelihood may be traced his initiation into the doctrine of millenarianism.

It was through Irving that Lacunza's theory was introduced to the early leaders of the Plymouth Brethren such as John Nelson Darby, who had attended one of the conferences on biblical prophecy at Powerscourt House (the home of Lady Powerscourt) and various other localities in County Wicklow from 1830 to 1840. The Letters and Papers of Lady Powerscourt has been published.[1]

The first stage of his later development which resulted in the establishment of the Irvingite or Holy Catholic Apostolic Church in 1832 was associated with the 'Albury Conferences'., moderated by Hugh Boyd M‘Neile (1795-1879), at his friend Henry Drummond's seat, Albury Park at Albury, Surrey concerning unfulfilled prophecy, followed by an almost exclusive study of the prophetical books and especially of the Apocalypse, and by several series of sermons on prophecy both in London and the provinces. His apocalyptic lectures in 1828 crowding the largest churches of Edinburgh on summer mornings.[2]

In 1830, however, there was opened up to his ardent imagination a new vista of things spiritual, a new hope for the age in which he lived, by the revival in a remote corner of Scotland of those apostolic gifts of prophecy and healing which he had already in 1828 persuaded himself had only been kept in abeyance by the absence of faith.

Edward Irving - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

right.

"absence of faith" = don't believe someone is raising ppl from the dead or hearing directly from God < got the T-shirt.

so suppression of the gifts type-thing. they were gone, but coming back. restoration. okay....

zone · Nov 2, 2013

SarahM777 said:

CONVERSION = freed from the condemnation of sin.....but NOT FULLY SAVED.

SarahM777 said:

well, ya....i guess most figured out they weren't perfect.
so the doctrine needed reforming.

sigh.

is it Finney coming up next?

i need a nap first.

ty sarah.

SarahM777 · Nov 2, 2013

zone said:

Yup,Finney is tied to it too

SarahM777 · Nov 2, 2013

Talking Pentecostalism

[h=3]Revivalism and Power (Part I): Finney and Pentecostalism[/h]
Describing the power of God during revival, Charles Finney wrote:

“This power is a great marvel. I have many times seen people unable to endure the Word. The most simple and ordinary statement would cut men off from their seats like a sword, take away their bodily strength, and render them almost as helpless as dead men. Several times it has been true in my experience that I could not raise my voice, or say anything in prayer or exhortation except in the mildest manner, without wholly overcoming those who were present. This was not because I was preaching terror to the people, but the sweetest sounds of the Gospel would overcome them.

This power seems sometimes to pervade the atmosphere of one who is highly charged with it. Many times great numbers of people in a community are clothed with this power when the very atmosphere of the whole place seems to be charged with the life of God. Strangers coming into it and passing through the place are instantly struck with conviction of sin and, in many instances, converted to Christ.” (Finney, p. 19-20)

The ‘power’ – the mysterious and surprising power of God – had never before had such a vital role to play in bringing revival. The Great Awakenings, particularly the second wave of revivals that gave birth to the Methodists, had its strong focus on holiness. It in turn gave birth to the Holiness movement when Wesley’s Methodism spread to America. But then Charles Finney emerged within the American movement, affecting a deep shift in emphasis, significantly changing the focus of the movement from sanctification to empowerment. The Holiness movement became the Power movement and revivalism changed its focus. Finney’s revivalism was a quest for power, and it found fertile soil in the landscape of American idealism at the turn of the nineteenth-century, and in turn found a permanent place in what is now the biggest and still fastest growing movement in the world: Pentecostalism, the power-revival movement still feeling the affect of Finney’s legacy and continuing to dramatically shape 21[SUP]st[/SUP] century Evangelicalism.

Enter Pentecostal revivalism

Reading Charles Finney as a Hillsong College student in 1997 had a deep impact upon my changing spirituality. I had left for the Sydney leadership college after year 12 to begin a decidedly indefinite period of preparation for what I planned would be a lifelong ministry as an evangelist and church planter. The entire endeavour would amount to a brief excursion of a little less than one full calendar year, but the effect of that 12 months is still being felt in my life today, well over a decade later.

As an evangelical ‘charismatic’, much more than an old-school Pentecostal,Power from on High changed not only the way I evangelised people, but also the way I prayed. The book’s blurb summarises Finney’s approach to revivalism well:

“Is it possible to lead sinners to the Lord with one look or a single sentence? Charles Finney did. He knew the secret of winning souls to Christ—an outpouring of power from heaven. In this book, he gives remarkable stories of dramatic conversions, along with instructions on how to receive power from God, overcome sin, and prevail in prayer.”

Without realising the significant of my choice for a Sydney AOG college, I had walked into a distinctively Pentecostal culture. I myself had converted to a Pentecostal doctrinal system years earlier, but existed in a mainline Brethren church that had turned Charismatic. At home I was considered ‘full on’ for simply holding to the notions of divine healing and tongues as compulsory evidence of Spirit baptism. But here, these were but mere elemental truths. This was a place where Kenneth Copeland was in the curriculum, Prosperity preaching was a significant element of every church service, and Charles Finney was recommended reading from the library book list. And any serious student sought him out first. I was now to be affected by a new exposure to the first-fruits of the Holiness movement and a mainstay culture of revivalism.

Although I was already a very passionate and active evangelist, I had only led a handful of people to Christ. But now, Power from on High gave me not only answers on how I could be more effective, but also the guarantee of success: If I fulfilled the conditions described by Finney, I would succeed in winning more souls.

Talking Pentecostalism: Revivalism and Power (Part I): Finney and Pentecostalism

Cont

SarahM777 · Nov 2, 2013

At the same time, the Pensacola Revival of Brownsville USA was well underway. I had already been referred to Leonard Ravenhill by a close and dear mentor, Kevin Wilcock, and chewed my way through Ravenhill’s scolding Why Revival Tarries and Revival God’s Way. But now I was able to listen directly to the preaching of his protégée, Steven Hill, and watch the video replays of the dramatic responses to his sermons, with hundreds of people pouring forward from their pews towards the altar of the church in repentance of sin, service after service, year after year.
Hill’s Time to Weep described the “power of repentance that brings revival”, and also had a deep influence on my spiritual quest for personal revival. After reading this book, I began to make it my daily goal to spend long hours on my knees in prayer and fasting for power, and with my head on the carpet weeping over the lost multitudes. I’d regularly follow this routine with walk-up evangelism in my Local Street, mall or shopping centre. I would spend Friday night going through Parramatta mall with Bible college friends, asking every passerby, “Have you heard the good news?” Saturday nights we might journey to Oxford Street in the city seeking to find and convert Pedestrians.

And people did make decisions to follow Christ. One or two people here, a few more there; but I was hungry for souls and a few handfuls in as many months was well below our expectations. Finney’s Revivalism promised mass conversions. According to Finney, the Power of God, the Power to be witnesses, should bring whole streets to Christ, if we fulfilled the conditions necessary. Together we should be able to reach hundreds, thousands of people, eventually changing the city, the nation, the world even—provided we remained humble, provided we did the hours in prayer, provided we wanted it enough, fasted enough, wept and remained 100 per cent abandoned to Christ’s mission. And so we endeavoured to ‘press in’ harder.

But although we were never completely aware of it at the time, the results were far from evident. Yes dozens of people had made ‘decisions’, but many of these commitments to Christ later fell through. We were heart-broken again and again to see much of our labour torn apart by the power of sin in the lives of our converts which remained a destructive influence despite all of our prayer and preaching. We were earnest, sincere, but still lacking success.

We needed more power. And so at the time we simply became hungrier and spiritually desperate for the dynamic and effective enabling of the Spirit that had been promised to give us real and lasting success. We began and attended more prayer meetings, spent longer in private prayer, and time and time again I returned to Finney’s How to win souls and his Power from on High, asking myself, what was I missing and how could I obtain what we still lacked.

From Holiness to Power

Some years later I know look back on myself and those years at Hillsong immersed in Finney’s revivalism, and I have now the ability to make sense of Pentecostalism and its particular quest for power within the context of the history of Evangelicalism.

Pentecostalism itself has its roots in nineteenth-century American Revivalism, inheriting the emphasis of Charles Finney directly from the Holiness movement. In the eighteenth-century John Wesley’s doctrine of 'entire sanctification' taught that sanctification involves a 'second blessing' as an experience of the Spirit distinct from conversion. Wesleyan doctrine spread to America where it inspired the ‘Holiness’ movement in the 1840-50s, it’s name coming from the original motive of preserving and spreading Wesley's doctrine of entire ‘holiness’, Christian perfection and Methodism's “second blessing” emphasis. However the Holiness movement in turn reformed Wesleyan theology on the 'second blessing' by shifting to the notion that Spirit-baptism was actually the second experience (not sanctification/ entire holiness) and the purpose was to empower Christians for miraculous evangelization of the world.

The Holiness movement sought to restore what it understood to be New Testament Christianity to the Church in the last days in preparation for Christ's return in order to accomplish the churches mission of converting the world. This led to the movement developing what it saw to be the “full" gospel” = Christ as not only Saviour, but also Baptizer and Healer, as well Coming King.

At the turn of the twentieth century the Holiness movement was pregnant with Pentecostalism. What was missing was only one element that the worldwide revival only a few years after the turn of the century would deliver: the gift of ‘languages’ (tongues) for equipping the end time church with the gift it needed for inter-national and worldwide evangelism, and at the same time serving an immediate evidence/sign of the second work in order to distinguish those who had the power from those Christians who had not.

"By the turn of the century, the Holiness movement had become preoccupied with the ‘Pentecostal reformation of Weslyan doctrine’ and the four themes of the full gospel. In fact, when the Pentecostal movement began a few years later, only the priority given to the gift of tongues distinguished it theologically from Holiness beliefs" (Systematic Theology, p. 15-16.)

To understand Pentecostal spirituality we need to first understand the Holiness movement which gave it birth. Phoebe Palmer and John Inskip were leaders in the movement who, although still teaching that the second work of grace was sanctification, began employing the new scriptural imagery of Spirit “outpouring”, and Spirit “baptism”. But it was primarily through the significant influence of the evangelist Charles Finney (1792-1875) that the nature of the second work of grace began to slowly shift to “instant empowerment.” He taught not only that the second experience was Spirit baptism, but that it brought something entirely additional to sanctification: it gave a unique power from God.

Talking Pentecostalism: Revivalism and Power (Part I): Finney and Pentecostalism

cont

SarahM777 · Nov 2, 2013

Finney within Pentecostalism

With Finney’s doctrine and new emphasis, the Holiness movement adopted a new form of revivalism with a quest for power that became the DNA later inherited by the Pentecostals. This late nineteenth-century American revivalism generated a third ‘great awakening’ that swept the globe as a worldwide revival after a re-occurrence of tongues-speaking at the Azusa Street meetings from 1906-1909 gained international attention: The ‘Holiness’ movement had given birth to the ‘Empowerment’ movement, propagating a new message of Pentecostal power and how it could not only be received, but also evidenced.

Accordingly, understanding Pentecostalism needs to begin by understanding the emphasis of Charles Finney on power. It was his shift to focus on empowerment, and his confidence in the certain effect of the use of natural means that formed the backbone of what became the Pentecostal movement, radically altering still further the way Christians would understand their mission.

In the next post we’ll look through the historical developments that gave rise to Finney’s new empowerment and how this radically altered Christian thinking and the direction of Evangelicalism.

Talking Pentecostalism: Revivalism and Power (Part I): Finney and Pentecostalism

SarahM777 · Nov 2, 2013

Power and Revivalism (Part II): Finney’s new empowerment

America’s two Great Awakenings had a huge effect on Christian thinking. The intense revivalism of nearly an entire century was a fire pot for theological innovation, evolution and diversion as much as anything, and we’re still feeling the effect of that today, particularly with the ever rising influence of modern-day Pentecostal revivalism.

Charles G. Finney (1792-1875) was the outstanding evangelist of the Second Great Awakening (ca. 1795-1930) and the dominant theological figure. He came from within Presbyterianism but was significantly influenced by Wesley's Plain Account of Christian Perfection, which crystallised his belief in 'entire sanctification' as a state of perfect trust in God and commitment to his will. But for him this state of perfect consecration to God was only the means to the second blessing. The higher Christian state, attainable following conversion, was a state of empowerment through the experience of Spirit-baptism.

Finney was also immensely influenced by Nathaniel W. Taylor's form of Arminianism, called New Haven Theology. New Haven theology was a late stage of the New England theology that originated in the work of Jonathan Edwards to defend the revival of the First Great Awakening (ca. 1735-43). Understanding New Haven theology and its historical development is the key to understanding Finney’s new revivalism.

Jonathan Edwards

In the 1700s during the First Great Awakening, Jonathan Edwards (1703-58) rejuvenated Augustinian theology and Calvinism to give spiritual legitimacy to the revival. His theology dominated American Christianity for almost a century.Edwards is regarded as the classical theologian of revival. He emphasised the sovereignty of God in revival and the inability of people to produce revival. He also taught that genuine Christianity was not revealed by the quality or intensity of religious affections or experiences, but by a change of heart to love and seek God’s pleasure. Emotions or wilful exertion could not produce or ‘cause’ the work of God.

Along with George Whitefield, he taught that salvation belonged entirely to God and that people did not possess the natural ability to turn to Christ apart from the work of the Holy Spirit. In Original Sin (1758) he taught that all mankind were present in Adam when he sinned. Consequently all people share his sinful character and guilt. Only God’s sovereign grace could cause them to repent. The human “will” was not an independent faculty, but an expression of basic motivation. Modern versions of “free will” only served to remove human responsibility.

Through Edwards, New England theology began with a focus on: the supremacy, sovereignty and majesty of God; the morality of divine justice for a sovereign God; and the problem of causation behind sin, including the problem of the freedom of the human will. But Edward’s successors would not master his theological rigour, and introduced subtle changes to his theology that would have a significant affect over time. Eventually in the nineteenth-century, his protégé would reverse many of his basic teachings.

David Hume

The Enlightenment was at its climax in the eighteenth-century (the age of ‘reason’). David Hume (1711-1776) was a Scottish philosopher and one of the key figures of the Enlightenment. He wrote Treatise of Human Nature (1734-37) which was taken by orthodox Christianity as an attack because it taught that all human knowledge is a product of experience. Hume reasoned that actual reality cannot be known for certain, because human knowledge cannot go beyond the appearance of probability, only having certainty over the relationship between ideas, not between objects. The concept of causality, cause and effect, was an assumption, an association made because of the appearance of cause and effect. In Dialogues, Hume denied the argument of natural theology. While not denying the existence of God, he argued that God’s existence cannot be established from reason or sense experience, and cannot be proved from causality.

Thomas Reid

Thomas Reid (1710-96) was a moderate Presbyterian and was particularly disturbed by Hume’s Treatise of Human Nature (1739), which he saw as a denial of the reality of external objects, causation and the unity of the mind. He attempted to overcome what he saw as a threat to Christianity from Hume in his writings: Inquiry into the Human Mind on the Principles of Common Sense(1764), Essays on the Intellectual Powers of Man (1764) and Essays on the Active Powers of Man (1785).

Scottish Realism was the popular movement that he left behind him in the eighteenth and nineteenth-century. It aimed to stem the infidelity of the Enlightenment and combat the scepticism of David Hume with a philosophy of ‘common’ sense and natural ‘realism’, which taught a universal and innate human freedom and the power of people to shape their own destinies. The “self-evident” principles of ‘common experience’ were: the existence of external objects, causality and the obligations of morals.

Scottish Realism has been shown to have had an immensely influential effect on American theology during the nineteenth-century. Among those influenced were the children, grandchildren and protégé of Jonathan Edwards.

Talking Pentecostalism: Power and Revivalism (Part II): Finney’s new empowerment

cont

SarahM777 · Nov 2, 2013

Timothy Dwight

Edward’s own son, Jonathan Edwards Jn. (1745-1801) and his grandson, Timothy Dwight (1752-1817) both deviated from Edwards. Dwight was a revivalist and a theologian of the Second Great Awakening, and was particularly influenced by the eighteenth-century rationalist movement, himself contributing to Scottish realism in America.

Both tended to view sin as a summation of evil deeds rather than principally a wrong state of being that produces evil deeds. Dwight had a greater view of human ability, and in contrast to Edwards, emphasised the natural ability of people to respond to the gospel. He also endeavoured to emphasise the ‘reasonable’ nature of the Christian position by giving it a rational defence in the context of the Enlightenment, rather than emphasising the supremacy and majesty of God, as had Edwards.

But it was one of Dwight’s students that changed the emphasis of New England theology most dramatically.

Nathaniel Taylor

Timothy Dwight’s best student Nathaniel W. Taylor (1786-1858), who was profoundly influenced by his revivalism, accepted Scottish realism, the humanistic teaching of common sense realism that teaches that ‘reason’ provides proof of the first principles of morality that make humans free moral agents. And building on the foundation laid by Dwight, he contended that people inherently possessed a natural power to be able to make free choices. He modified Calvinism to make it compatible with the revivalism of the Second Great awakening in the opening decades of the nineteenth-century.

His teaching on human nature famously stated that individuals always possessed a “power to the contrary”. Following the lead of Jonathan Edwards Jn. and Timothy Dwight, he taught that although everyone did in fact sin, this was not a result of God’s predestination of human nature.

Going completely against the teaching of Jonathan Edwards, he reversed many of the original positions of New England theology, teaching that sin was actually is the exercise of wilful actions against God, rather than an underlying condition of existing by nature with a will in opposition to God.

In order to make them compatible with the actual practices of the revivals of the Second Great Awakening, Taylor altered almost every doctrine of the Reformation and Calvinism, including revelation, human depravity, the sovereignty of God, the atonement, and regeneration.
W. A. Hoffecker has written about him:

“He insisted that people are lost but denied that Adam’s sin was imputed to all people and that everyone inherits a sinful nature that causes one to sin. Even though a person sins, that person has the power to do otherwise, thus remaining morally responsible. God made humans with a proper self-love, a natural desire for happiness, which motivates all choice.

Taylor also reinterpreted Calvin’s teaching on God’s sovereignty by calling God a moral governor who rules, not by determining the destiny of all people through election, but rather by establishing a moral universe and judging its inhabitants. God promotes moral action by a system of means and ends in which people can respond to ethical appeals for repentance.

He opposed the legal view of the atonement that stressed Christ’s substitutionary death on the cross in the place of sinners to satisfy God’s justice. Instead, God as benevolent moral governor sent Christ to die so that his death could be preached as a means to urge sinners to turn freely from their sin out of self-love and be converted”. (Elwell, p. 1168).

In direct opposition to Jonathan Edwards in the 1740s, Taylor undermined the distinction between the Holy Spirit’s sovereign work of regeneration and human repentance, and in so doing denied the absolute grace of God in salvation.

In what is now called New Haven Theology, Taylor's form of Arminianism greatly influenced a new revivalist and evangelist, Charles Finney, who would go even further in bringing this new theology of revivalism to its maturity.

Talking Pentecostalism: Power and Revivalism (Part II): Finney’s new empowerment

cont

SarahM777 · Nov 2, 2013

Charles Finney

Dramatically converted in the middle of the revivalism of the American Holiness movement in 1821, Charles G. Finney (1792-1875) became the leading evangelist and leader in the movement. He is credited with establishing the modern forms and methods of revivalism, indirectly inherited by Pentecostalism. He spent the last 40 years of his life constructing a new theology of revival, casting into shadow the classic work of Jonathan Edwards.

He was influenced profoundly by Wesley’s theology, by the emphasis of the American Holiness movement, and by New Haven Theology. Underpinning all of Finney’s doctrine was his conviction from Wesley that the practice of Christian perfection was the attainable duty of all Christians, and his conviction from Taylor that God has established natural means and ends in which people can and will respond to ethical appeals for repentance.

Accordingly, Finney taught that God had established the means by which humans could produce revival. He believed that not only had individuals possessed the ability within themselves to make a choice to follow Christ, but also that Christians possessed the power within themselves to live holy lives.

He taught that the result of God's help combined with strenuous human effort was blessing and revival: "A revival is as naturally a result of the use of the appropriate means as a crop is of the use of its means." In his Revival Lectures, Finney taught that God had revealed laws of revival in Scripture: when the Church obeyed these laws, spiritual renewal followed. In direct contradiction to Edwards, Christians had the ability by means of complete commitment and faith to bring the Holy Spirit's blessing.

He thus gave a central role to human ability as a means to bring God's blessing and the Spirit's power, creating revival by use of human means. Whereas Edward’s had emphasised the sovereign grace of God in salvation, Finneyemphasised human choice in conversion, and went as far as psychologising conversion. His Lectures on Revivals of Religion (1854) taught techniques for success.

He had expected revival to overtake America and bring social, political and economic reform. But later in his Letters on Revival (1845) he revised this expectation, confessing to over-optimism. However he nonetheless hoped that Oberlin theology (named after Oberlin College in Ohio where he was professor since 1836), propagated also by the likes of Asa Mahan, would generate a “new race of revival ministers” and in time ‘awaken’ Christians to the attainable duty of walking in Christian perfection.

Oberlin theology emphasised a second more robust and mature stage of Christian experience. While different names were employed, Finney distinctly taught it as “baptism of the Holy Ghost”, and differed from Wesley in requiring entire sanctification as the means to obtaining this blessing, being a state of complete commitment to God’s will rather than perfect sinlessness. He also came to believe that this state should be reached by a process of steady growth, rather than by a dramatic single ‘crisis’ event.

Oberlin theology had an enormous effect on nineteenth-century evangelical belief. Finney’s pioneering of his so-called ‘new measures’ in revivalism and his active encouragement of concern for society and the role of revival in reforming America meant that his theology not only had a dramatic effect on the shape and direction of the Holiness movement towards the end of the nineteenth-century, but also had a widespread social impact on American culture. It continued to have an influence well into the twentieth-century directly through the Holiness movement, but indirectly it continues to have an almost unquantifiable impact via its inheritance in the genetic makeup of Pentecostalism.

Charles Finney's central emphasis on human ability and his confidence in the effect of natural means to change the world can ultimately be understood as an over-reaction to David Hume's scepticism and rejection of causality. In an age of Enlightenment, when Reason was the language of debate, and Philosophy had seemingly taken the ground out from under Christianity by rejecting causality and confidence in human ability, Thomas Reid reacted by asserting the power of people to shape their world and their destiny. His approach of fighting reason with reason, and philosophical innovation with theological revision set in place a chain-reaction that would result in the evolution of a brand new modern revivalism: from Timothy Dwight to Nathaniel Taylor, from Charles Finney to Pentecostalism; and from the Pentecostal movement the “new race of revival ministers” continues to grow, exemplified and amplified acutely in the model of ministry that was practiced by Leonard Ravenhill and Stephen Hill.

Today revivalism has long left behind Edward’s insistence on total dependence on the sovereign and free grace of God and has become a new form of Christian legalism. It insists on the central role of human ability and free choice, and preaches a Christian duty of exercising total commitment to his work that brings a new and unique power from God to change our lives, our world and society.

In the next post, we’ll look directly at Charles Finney’s Power from on High in order to understand Finney’s teaching and its problems: The need for power; conditions of receiving power; the effect of possessing power; power in prayer and power in preaching.

Talking Pentecostalism: Power and Revivalism (Part II): Finney’s new empowerment

Splagna · Nov 2, 2013

zone said:

Yeah, I agree with you...don't believe the Bible teaches total perfection, but I believe the Bible teaches we have the potential to live sinless lives.

I once knew a holiness preacher that had my respect (I don't necessarily judge another Christian on his/her doctrine, but how the Lord used them to change lives). He once told me that he had reached total perfection and was proud of it. What an oxymoron!

Not all Pentecostals accepted the doctrine of total perfection. The Keswick doctrine was influential among Pentecostals, also.

As far as conversion is concerned it doesn't appear Parham and his school differed much from the Holiness and Fundamentalist of the time. According to Menzies, just prior to studying Acts his school was examining the Bible concerning the doctrines of repentance, conversion and sanctification (p. 37).

SarahM777 · Nov 2, 2013

Talking Pentecostalism

Gifts of the Holy Spirit: What Pentecostals believe

Pentecostalism began with a belief that in its origin God was restoring New Testament Christianity by bringing a discovery and recovery of the ‘sign’ gifts to the Church, including tongues, interpretation, miracles, healing and prophecy.

In the nineteenth-century those in the Holiness movement assumed that speaking in tongues had ended with the close of the Early Church period but that the other gifts such as healing and miracles should still be available to Christians. However by the turn of the nineteenth-century a widespread desire for the gift of tongues had also emerged. This was coupled with the already existent desire for a restoration of the ‘full gospel’ [1] involving Spirit-baptism as a post-conversion experience of empowerment that enabled the exercise of these sign gifts.

The Holiness movement revivals that occurred at the beginning of the twentieth-century that gave birth to Pentecostalism involved miracles, healing, tongues-speaking, prophecy and discernment gifts. The expectancy of a restoration of the miraculous gifts to the Church as a mark of the end of the Church age lead early Pentecostals to interpreted these events surrounding their origin as this end-time restoration of the ‘Apostolic faith’ in preparation for Christ's return.

Pentecostal churches today continue to place central importance on miraculous and prophetic gifts in the life of the church. All spiritual gifts of the New Testament period are expected to be in use within healthy churches as God’s provision for his body. Such spiritual gifts are seen as an essential part of God’s working within his Church. They are not only to be desired but actively sought.

Talking Pentecostalism: Gifts of the Holy Spirit: What Pentecostals believe

The_highwayman · Nov 2, 2013

Enow said:

Preaching as they did at Azusa to receive the Holy Spirit "again" after a sign of speaking in tongues that comes with no interpretation has been rebuffed by Paul as by his folly, he even tried to reach out in Christ's love to correct those in error.

2 Corinthians 11:1Would to God ye could bear with me a little in my folly: and indeed bear with me. [SUP]2 [/SUP]For I am jealous over you with godly jealousy: for I have espoused you to one husband, that I may present you as a chaste virgin to Christ. [SUP]3 [/SUP]But I fear, lest by any means, as the serpent beguiled Eve through his subtilty, so your minds should be corrupted from the simplicity that is in Christ. [SUP]4 [/SUP]For if he that cometh preacheth another Jesus, whom we have not preached, or if ye receive another spirit, which ye have not received, or another gospel, which ye have not accepted, ye might well bear with him.

2 Corinthians 13:[SUP]5 [/SUP]Examine yourselves, whether ye be in the faith; prove your own selves. Know ye not your own selves, how that Jesus Christ is in you, except ye be reprobates?

Romans 16:[SUP]17 [/SUP]Now I beseech you, brethren, mark them which cause divisions and offences contrary to the doctrine which ye have learned; and avoid them. [SUP]18 [/SUP]For they that are such serve not our Lord Jesus Christ, but their own belly; and by good words and fair speeches deceive the hearts of the simple.

1 Corinthians 1:[SUP]9 [/SUP]God is faithful, by whom ye were called unto the fellowship of his Son Jesus Christ our Lord. [SUP]10 [/SUP]Now I beseech you, brethren, by the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, that ye all speak the same thing, and that there be no divisions among you; but that ye be perfectly joined together in the same mind and in the same judgment. [SUP]11 [/SUP]For it hath been declared unto me of you, my brethren, by them which are of the house of Chloe, that there are contentions among you.

1 Thessalonians 5:[SUP]21 [/SUP]Prove all things; hold fast that which is good. [SUP]22 [/SUP]Abstain from all appearance of evil. [SUP]23 [/SUP]And the very God of peace sanctify you wholly; and I pray God your whole spirit and soul and body be preserved blameless unto the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ. [SUP]24 [/SUP]Faithful is he that calleth you, who also will do it. [SUP]25 [/SUP]Brethren, pray for us.

2 Thessalonians 3:1Finally, brethren, pray for us, that the word of the Lord may have free course, and be glorified, even as it is with you: [SUP]2 [/SUP]And that we may be delivered from unreasonable and wicked men: for all men have not faith. [SUP]3 [/SUP]But the Lord is faithful, who shall stablish you, and keep you from evil. [SUP]4 [/SUP]And we have confidence in the Lord touching you, that ye both do and will do the things which we command you. [SUP]5 [/SUP]And the Lord direct your hearts into the love of God, and into the patient waiting for Christ. [SUP]6 [/SUP]Now we command you, brethren, in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, that ye withdraw yourselves from every brother that walketh disorderly, and not after the tradition which he received of us. [SUP]7 [/SUP]For yourselves know how ye ought to follow us: for we behaved not ourselves disorderly among you;..........[SUP]14 [/SUP]And if any man obey not our word by this epistle, note that man, and have no company with him, that he may be ashamed. [SUP]15 [/SUP]Yet count him not as an enemy, but admonish him as a brother.

Ephesians 4:[SUP]12 [/SUP]For the perfecting of the saints, for the work of the ministry, for the edifying of the body of Christ: [SUP]13 [/SUP]Till we all come in the unity of the faith, and of the knowledge of the Son of God, unto a perfect man, unto the measure of the stature of the fulness of Christ: [SUP]14 [/SUP]That we henceforth be no more children, tossed to and fro, and carried about with every wind of doctrine, by the sleight of men, and cunning craftiness, whereby they lie in wait to deceive; [SUP]15 [/SUP]But speaking the truth in love, may grow up into him in all things, which is the head, even Christ:

So tell me how false teachings can be singled out as preaching another Jesus or another spirit to receive if you actually believe preaching to receive the Holy Spirit again after a sign of tongues is not the same thing?

Where did I state in any post that I personally believe preaching to receive the Holy Spirit again after a sign of tongues is not the same thing?

The_highwayman · Nov 2, 2013

SarahM777 said:

Sarah,
Does the Bible mention anything about leaving things alone and being quiet and letting God take action if you believe it is in error?

I don't need to act because if a doctrine/movement/idea/person is not of God, God will take care of it and if I continue to fight against it and it is God, then I am fighting God, and God wins every time.

God does not need our help and those of others to point out the problems in the Body. Most of you worship Paul more than you worship Jesus. If you studied Jesus more, it will enlightened you about Paul, you cannot study and understand Paul, until you uncover Jesus.

We call this spiritual maturity and going into perfection and not laying again the foundations of basic teachings, which you should already be rooted in.

So I will ask you again: Does the Bible mention anything about leaving things alone and being quiet and letting God take action if you believe it is to in error?

And I will ask you again if the enemy counterfeits anything of God?

SarahM777 · Nov 2, 2013

The_highwayman said:

Titus 1
10 For there are many rebellious people, full of meaningless talk and deception, especially those of the circumcision group.11 They must be silenced, because they are disrupting whole households by teaching things they ought not to teach—and that for the sake of dishonest gain.12 One of Crete’s own prophets has said it: “Cretans are always liars, evil brutes, lazy gluttons.”[14 and will pay no attention to Jewish myths or to the merely human commandsof those who c]13 This saying is true. Therefore rebuke them sharply, so that they will be sound in the faithreject the truth.15 To the pure, all things are pure, but to those who are corrupted and do not believe, nothing is pure. In fact, both their minds and consciences are corrupted.16 They claim to know God, but by their actions they deny him. They are detestable, disobedient and unfit for doing anything good.

Matthew 3

3 In those days John the Baptist came, preaching in the wilderness of Judea2 and saying, “Repent, for the kingdom of heaven has come near.” 3 This is he who was spoken of through the prophet Isaiah:
“A voice of one calling in the wilderness,
‘Prepare the way for the Lord,
make straight paths for him.’”[a]

4 John’s clothes were made of camel’s hair, and he had a leather belt around his waist. His food was locusts and wild honey. 5 People went out to him from Jerusalem and all Judea and the whole region of the Jordan. 6 Confessing their sins, they were baptized by him in the Jordan River.
7 But when he saw many of the Pharisees and Sadducees coming to where he was baptizing, he said to them: “You brood of vipers! Who warned you to flee from the coming wrath? 8 Produce fruit in keeping with repentance. 9 And do not think you can say to yourselves, ‘We have Abraham as our father.’ I tell you that out of these stones God can raise up children for Abraham. 10 The ax is already at the root of the trees, and every tree that does not produce good fruit will be cut down and thrown into the fire.
11 “I baptize you with[b] water for repentance. But after me comes one who is more powerful than I, whose sandals I am not worthy to carry. He will baptize you with[c] the Holy Spirit and fire. 12 His winnowing fork is in his hand, and he will clear his threshing floor, gathering his wheat into the barn and burning up the chaff with unquenchable fire.”

Matthew 23

13 “Woe to you, teachers of the law and Pharisees, you hypocrites! You shut the door of the kingdom of heaven in people’s faces. You yourselves do not enter, nor will you let those enter who are trying to. [14] [b]
15 “Woe to you, teachers of the law and Pharisees, you hypocrites! You travel over land and sea to win a single convert, and when you have succeeded, you make them twice as much a child of hell as you are.
16 “Woe to you, blind guides! You say, ‘If anyone swears by the temple, it means nothing; but anyone who swears by the gold of the temple is bound by that oath.’ 17 You blind fools! Which is greater: the gold, or the temple that makes the gold sacred? 18 You also say, ‘If anyone swears by the altar, it means nothing; but anyone who swears by the gift on the altar is bound by that oath.’19 You blind men! Which is greater: the gift, or the altar that makes the gift sacred? 20 Therefore, anyone who swears by the altar swears by it and by everything on it. 21 And anyone who swears by the temple swears by it and by the one who dwells in it. 22 And anyone who swears by heaven swears by God’s throne and by the one who sits on it.
23 “Woe to you, teachers of the law and Pharisees, you hypocrites! You give a tenth of your spices—mint, dill and cumin. But you have neglected the more important matters of the law—justice, mercy and faithfulness. You should have practiced the latter, without neglecting the former. 24 You blind guides! You strain out a gnat but swallow a camel.
25 “Woe to you, teachers of the law and Pharisees, you hypocrites! You clean the outside of the cup and dish, but inside they are full of greed and self-indulgence.26 Blind Pharisee! First clean the inside of the cup and dish, and then the outside also will be clean.
27 “Woe to you, teachers of the law and Pharisees, you hypocrites! You are like whitewashed tombs, which look beautiful on the outside but on the inside are full of the bones of the dead and everything unclean. 28 In the same way, on the outside you appear to people as righteous but on the inside you are full of hypocrisy and wickedness.
29 “Woe to you, teachers of the law and Pharisees, you hypocrites! You build tombs for the prophets and decorate the graves of the righteous. 30 And you say, ‘If we had lived in the days of our ancestors, we would not have taken part with them in shedding the blood of the prophets.’ 31 So you testify against yourselves that you are the descendants of those who murdered the prophets. 32 Go ahead, then, and complete what your ancestors started!
33 “You snakes! You brood of vipers! How will you escape being condemned to hell? 34 Therefore I am sending you prophets and sages and teachers. Some of them you will kill and crucify; others you will flog in your synagogues and pursue from town to town. 35 And so upon you will come all the righteous blood that has been shed on earth, from the blood of righteous Abel to the blood of Zechariah son of Berekiah, whom you murdered between the temple and the altar. 36 Truly I tell you, all this will come on this generation.

37 “Jerusalem, Jerusalem, you who kill the prophets and stone those sent to you,how often I have longed to gather your children together, as a hen gathers her chicks under her wings, and you were not willing. 38 Look, your house is left to you desolate. 39 For I tell you, you will not see me again until you say, ‘Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord.’[c]”

Seems to me that my Bible says that the prophets and Jesus were not very kind and gentle and said NOTHING to false prophets.

Seems to me also there is nothing more for us to discuss.

Kerry · Nov 2, 2013

Enough, the original Pentecostal movement started with the original church. Why would some fathom that that has changed. They spoke in tongues as the Holy Ghost gave the utterance. The people outside heard the glory of God in there own language and 3,000 people were added to the church. I think we need more of that, don't you or are you scared. If you scared then say you scared. Just don't deny it.

The Original Pentecostal Movement

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