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Pentecostal Unity
Written by Peter Youngren on December 8, 2006This year we have celebrated the 100th anniversary of the Azusa Street Pentecostal phenomenon. An October survey from Pew Forum on Religion and Public states that more than 40% of Pentecostals, in a majority of countries surveyed, indicate that they have never spoken in tongues. In the United States only half of Pentecostals have spoken in tongues. It was the experience of speaking in other tongues, just like on the day of Pentecost, which propelled the Pentecostal movement to the front pages of newspapers across the world 100 years ago. Of course no one has suggested that speaking in tongues has ceased among Pentecostals, not at all. In fact today, people from a wide range of denominations and backgrounds enjoy this gift.
The term “Pentecostal” is usually used in reference to the denominations that sprang up from the Azusa Street revival and other similar outpourings approximately 100 years ago, while the term “Charismatic” is used concerning later moves of the Holy Spirit that have affected the church world, particularly in the 60’s and 70’s. In Brazil Pentecostals are more likely than Charismatics to speak in tongues, whereas in India Charismatics are more likely to do so than Pentecostals. In Guatemala it is about equal, all according to a column by Ted Olsen in the current issue of Christianity Today. In his article Mr. Olsen goes on to suggest that if speaking in tongues is not what brings unity among Pentecostals, maybe belief in material prosperity is. Here he quotes the interesting statistic that in Nigeria 95% of Pentecostals agree that “God wants to grant material prosperity to all believers, while 97% believe God will grant good health and relief from sickness to believers who have enough faith.” In the Philippines that percentage is 99%. These are all interesting observations, but I cannot help to think that we are missing the whole purpose of Pentecost. I had always considered speaking in tongues the smallest sign of the Baptism in the Holy Spirit, while a passion and love for lost humanity is the greatest sign. Certainly the result of the first Pentecost was that believers received power to be witnesses unto Christ (Acts 1:8). I remember in my teens reading T.L. Osborn’s book “Purpose of Pentecost”. It certainly reinforced the idea that baptism and the Holy Spirit and speaking in tongues was to empower believers to preach the Gospel of Jesus Christ with signs and wonders following. Am I unrealistic? I appreciate speaking in tongues and I believe God desires to give both physical healing and material blessings to His people, but looking into the book of Acts I can’t help but notice that the gift was given to empower us to action for the world.
The Great Commission without the Day of Pentecost is a cruel and impossible command. Alternately, the Day of Pentecost without the Great Commission is a self-centered blessing.
What are your thoughts?
Keep blogging.
-Peter Youngren
Wendy
Pastor Peter: Did you mean to invoke guilt with your final comment ‘Day of Pentecost without the Great Commission is a self-centered blessing’? I think we have to encourage all believers to have a balanced view of the Gospel. i.e. Encourage ‘blessing seekers’ to have a deeper compassion for the lost and the ‘evangelists’ to have a greater understanding of the inheritance available to us all through Christ Jesus. I think we can learn from each other. After all, evangelists need lots of money to spread the gospel and blessing seekers need to freely give their money. May we all trust God as our source so that we can give more, go more and do more for Jesus every day. Love, Wendy
Lucky
er,your stats only demonstrate the Church’s inability to yield to Jesus.Peter your message on grace is wonderful but it creates a sadness inside because I realize I need to yield to Jesus even more but I don’t know how? Please don’t tell me ‘What must I do’ to get there because every time the Christ in me spoke I don’t recall doing anything special.The heart of the Church is to yield to Jesus but we’re more confident in ‘What must I do’ which bare little or no fruit than the confidence in the Christ in us which would yield a harvest.To all�
Pastors don’t just say ‘Yield to Jesus’, but teach us how to be more confident in the ‘Christ in us’ than the ‘What must I do’ in all aspect of life.
Beena Thomas
Certainly a great thought to think about.. On the day of Pentacost the Holy spirit invaded the earth and the speaking in tongues was an evidence to that. Somebody had to testify that it happened. We cannot see the wind but what we definately see is the effects of the wind in terms of leaves flying or trees swaying for example and one can say that wind exists.
Holy spirit being the comforter and helper sent from heaven as per John only points to Jesus and his magnificience. As per Paul as mentioned in Corinthians speaking in tongues edifies oneself and helps us to pray as per the will of God and he also boasted of praying more in tongues than anybody else…But if it is being used publicly to flaunt one’s spirituality or just make the charismatic fanfare its definately not bearing fruit.
Relating to me, one thing I have realized as the holy spirit is revealing more of Jesus and his beauty to me , his love is so invading my heart that I am on cloud nine…Ooo Lah Lah as you say!! Now at least I realize though as a tip of the iceberg of this LOVE what paul meant when he says the love of God which has been poured into my heart through the holy spirit Rom 5:5 COMPELS me to preach the Gospel. A baptism of the holy spirit which does not give you a passion for the lost can be self fulfilling I might say..It all depends upon how much you allow the Love of God to flood you and you reach the fullness of God as said in Ephesians. It has to overflow out with understanding of how much GOD WANTS THIS RECONCILED WORLD TO KNOW OF HIS LOVE FOR THEM.
Lets all labour to enter his rest & to know how much he loves us. When all of us do our part it won’t be an effort to tell your sphere of influence about our wonderful savior , it will just flow freely. Amen!!
Andreas Cucca
I totally agree, the blessing of Abraham is Jesus Christ and through him we get salvation and also recive the Holy Spirit. A sad thing I realised in the last years is that alot of the ‘well known’ preachers are living lavish lives with expensive cars, houses and private jetplanes. Why? because they somehow thing they deserve it. It hurts my heart when I realised that so many are giving to those preachers to get materially blessed but in reality they are getting scammed. Another thing that is a sideeffect to this kind of theology is that your life with God gets messured by how much money you got. A preacher who visited Sweden for some healingmeetings a coupple of times a few yrs back is saying to his church, If you arnt millionairs within so and so much months of attending his church, they must have unconfessed sin. I belive in that we need alot of money to fullfill the great comission, the cry of the unreached is echoing in my spirit. Thats were our money should go. God wants to breathe life into us so that we can give life to others. Toghether in the Harvest!/ Andreas Cucca, Sweden http://www.andreascucca.blogspot.com
Rakhi
~ India
Hello Peter Youngren, Really very nice and good info you share on 100th anniversary of the Azusa Street Pentecostal phenomenon. Thanks for your nice info.
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GEORGE THOMAS
The passion to win the souls of the lost humanity is the true spirit of pentecost or Charismatism. It is disheartening to see that the terms has since eroded into the movements meant to hoard materialistic personal gains.you are doing a wonderful job, Pastor.May the spirit of God guide you throughout your mission