Pentecostalism

God saves and keeps His people through sound doctrine and seeks worshippers who worship Him in spirit and in truth, so what a church believes and how it worships are never small matters.

Modern Pentecostalism began in January 1901 at Charles Parham's Bible school in Topeka, Kansas, where students sought tongues as the sign of Spirit baptism and believed they had received foreign languages for missions, a claim the mission field soon disproved.

From April 1906, William J. Seymour's Apostolic Faith Mission at 312 Azusa Street in Los Angeles became the launching point of worldwide Pentecostalism, remarkable for its interracial fellowship and decisive in making tongues the initial evidence of Spirit baptism, yet marked by practices Scripture does not allow.

After Azusa Street, Pentecostals organized into denominations: the Trinitarian Assemblies of God in 1914, Oneness bodies that revived the ancient error of modalism, and Aimee Semple McPherson's Foursquare Church, while later ministries such as Cleansing Stream and Hillsong carried Pentecostal teaching further.

Every believer is baptized by the Holy Spirit into the body of Christ once, at the moment of saving faith, and is then commanded to be filled with the Spirit day by day; the evidence of His presence is His fruit, not tongues.

The tongues of the Bible were real human languages, given by the Spirit as a sign to unbelieving Israel and, when interpreted, to build up the church, under clear rules that put understanding first.

The speaking in tongues practiced today is not the biblical gift of languages but learned, language-like speech, so believers should test every experience by Scripture and rest their assurance in Christ alone.

The miraculous sign gifts confirmed Christ, His apostles, and the revelation they delivered, and now that God's Word is complete it bears its own witness, while God still answers prayer and heals in His providence.

God has spoken fully in His Son and in the Scriptures delivered through His apostles and prophets, so every claim of new revelation or present-day apostleship must be tested by that completed Word, which leaves no room for either.

The Holy Spirit is fully God and a divine person, and His chosen ministry is to glorify Christ, guide into truth, convict the world, and teach, so a Spirit-filled life is a Christ-centered life.

God sets believers apart in Christ at salvation and makes them more like Christ throughout life by His Word and Spirit, so no experience can complete sanctification in a moment or stand above Scripture rightly divided.

The charismatic movement carried Pentecostal experience into the historic denominations, the Roman Catholic Church, and new independent churches, and its worship has shaped churches far beyond its own.

The Word of Faith movement teaches that faith-filled words can claim health and wealth as every believer's right, but Scripture teaches us to ask according to God's will, to be content in Christ, and to trust His grace in suffering.

We are not Pentecostal or charismatic because we hold Scripture sufficient and final, and we gladly affirm the Holy Spirit's real work in every believer, discerned by the Word He inspired.