| And ye shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free. John 8:32 (KJV) |
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I hate reading. In fact if you told any of my teachers I had read a postage stamp, they would in unison, call you a liar!! However coma, like all who have attended any kind of schooling, I too have been force to read.
Many years ago now, I was required to read the book "Baptist Distinctives". If you were require to write a book called 'pentecostal Distinctives", it would include two parts.
Charles Fox Parham, the (white) father of 'pentecostalism' was busted for sodomy with little boys in California(no I didn't California had a law against that either). Finnis Jennings Dake, the author of the 'bread and butter' pentecostal Bible was busted, send up the river and spend time in the big house for taking a sixteen years old girl across state lines for quote, unquote 'petting' parties. Kathern Kuhlman was booted from her own church for sleeping with a 'pentecostal' preacher not her husband. Later she died of a drug overdose after faking her own kidnapping to Mexico(some say to get an abortion). Aimee Semple McPhearson, married five times divorced four times, died of a drug overdose.
Let us not forget the "Jim's". Jim Baker busted for tax evasion after being sued by his mistress. And Jimmy Swaggart, decrying Jim Baker, while seeking out working ladies, shall we say.
Oral Roberts, anyone ......
Charles Fox Parham was barred from the Azusa Street Mission, by William Seymour, the other(black) father of 'pentecostalism'. Parham went down the street and began his own Azusa Street Mission and wrote his own Apostolic Faith newspaper.
Not to be out done, in less than one hundred years of existence, 'pentecostalism' has more than eleven hundred and twenty five(1125) denominations. Not my count, the Reader's Digest made that count. Use any good search engine and count them yourself.
Yes I have had people explain, 'well look at the methodist'. The Methodist church has been around since the American Revolution. count them yourself.
Yes, I have had people exclaim, 'what about the baptist?' The Baptist church traces its roots to John the Baptist, more than two thousand years ago. Again do your own research. There are Northern, Missionary, American(all one group, just different names), Southern, Freewill, Primative, United, and Divided Baptist. No wheres close to the eleven hundred 'pentecostal' denominations and growing.
Yes, I've had Roman Catholic try to tell me of their unity. In fact the Roman church should be called the western church. It is the product of division in the early part of the second millennium. A quick search will net several Catholic denominations here in the US.
Add together all denominations, except 'pentecostals', including all non-christian religions and you are still no wheres close to the eleven hundred twenty five 'pentecostal' denominations and growing.
All 'pentecostals' claim to be lead by the Holy Ghost. Do you really believe He is that confused??
Don't bother to address me with that answer, be honest with yourself.
To thine own self, be true.
Even, John Wesley freely admitted that tongues ceased in the first century. Do you own research.
Tongues ceased in the first century, that is a very known fact. Every theologian agrees tongues ceased and were unheard of until, the gospel restoration movement of the early nineteenith century. That movement gave us groups like the Mormons , Church of Christ/Disciples of Christ, Seventh Day Adventist and the Jehovah' Witness's, as well as the Holiness church, from which 'pentecostalism' traces its roots.
An article in the Journal of the American Scientific Affiliation entitled "An Ethnological Study of Glossolalia(Speaking inTongues)" by George J. Jennings, March 1968. Jennings observes that glossolalia is practiced amoung the following non-Christian religions of the world; the Peyote cult among the North American Indians, the Haida Indians of the Pacific Northwest, Shamans in the Sudan, the Shango cult of the West Coast of Africa, the Shago cult in Trinidad, the Voodoo cult in Haiti, the Aborigines of South American and Australia, the aboriginal peoples of the subarctic regions of North America and Asia, the Shamans in Greenland, the Dyaks of Borneo, the Zor cult of Ethiopia, the Siberian shamans, the Chaco Indians of South America, the Curanderos of the Andes, the Kinka in the African Sudan, the Thonga shamans of Africa, and the Tibetan monks.
I look forward to some good explainations of that article .......
For Pentecostals the events of Azusa Street mark the watershed event in modern Pentecostalism. To them the events of Azusa represented a new outpouring of the Holy Spirit. However, it was not viewed in that light by the most eminent theologians of the day.Here are some of their comments:
G. Campbell Morgan described the Azusa Street activities as "the last vomit of Satan."
R.A. Torrey declared that this new Pentecostal movement was "emphatically not of God, and founded by a Sodomite."
H. A. Ironside said both the holiness and Pentecostal movements were "disgusting. . .delusions and insanities." In 1912 he said of their meetings "pandemonium's where exhibitions worthy of a madhouse or a collection of howling dervishes," were causing a "heavy toll of lunacy and infidelity."
W.B. Godbey said of the Azusa Street participants "Satan's preachers, jugglers, necromancers, enchanters, magicians, and all sorts or mendicants," and he claimed the movement was the result of spiritualism.
Clarence Larkin "But the conduct of those possessed, in which they fall to the ground and writhein contortions, causing disarrangement's of the clothing and disgraceful scenes, is more a characteristic of demon possession, than a work of the Holy Spirit. From what has been said we see that we are living in "Perilous Times," and that all about us are "Seducing Spirits," and that they will become more active as the Dispensation draws to its close, and that we must exert the greatest care lest we be led astray."
(All of these statements were taken from "From Holy Laughter to Holy Fire" by Michael L. Brown, pages 197&198)
Just setting the record straight, trying to clarify the muddle once again. I have had many pentecostals try to explain that pentecostalism began at pentecost and it did not.