Lecture

We begin our study today of the history of the charismatic movements. What I would like to do is to assume that you have read the syllabus that is attached to the materials that you received so that you know the general sequencing of the lectures, that which is required of you as you prepare for each lecture, and examinations and attendant things.

My first lecture today is a general one in which I want to lay out a few general comments. What I’d like to do is this:

One, I would like to place the issue of the history of the charismatic movements within the broader divisions of Christianity today. So I’d like to talk about one of the kinds of divisions or substrata within and among Christians, and I’d like to place the great charismatic movement within that tradition;

Second, today I’d like to raise the question that is pivotal, I believe, and that is, What exactly is the question that is being raised by the charismatic movement? What is the point?;

Third, I would like to speak about the diversity within the charismatic movements. I think that one of the few things or early things that you realize is that the charismatic movement is a very broad movement with many innuendos [nuances] and many differences. And of course, the course we have together is called the movements, the charismatic movements, and it’s a history course;

And then, fourth, I’d like to present an overview of our course to tell you broadly where it is that we are going.

So first today: the diversities among Christians. And I’d like to place the charismatic movement within this larger, larger movement of the Christian tradition. So first, the divisions among Christians. And I’m using the word division not in a pejorative way at all, but they are, as you may be aware, nuances or differences within and among Christian people. And that’s what I would like to address. Generally speaking, of all the subsegments of Christianity, we are all heirs of the Reformation tradition. That is our heritage. Among us, though, we have been generally divided, sometimes tragically and pathetically, unnecessarily. But among us there is a division, for instance, between mainline denominations and independent churches. And that’s a rough division among Christians. Among mainline denominations, there are Lutherans; there are Presbyterians; there are Baptists and Episcopalians and Methodists, for instance. And there are also independent groups of Christians such as the Bible church movement or the independent churches. So in one way the terrain of current Christendom has that division—mainline historical denominations, independent separatist denominations. A second division that you might have would be between the sacramental expressions of Christianity and the non-sacramental expressions. I am aware that these are broad categories, but we’re just trying to make some contours as we begin our course. A sacramental emphasis within Christianity would be, for instance, among Episcopalians or Lutherans or Presbyterians, who in varying degrees see that the grace of God is mediated through the sacraments of baptism and the Eucharist. And there are non-sacramental groups as well: a Baptist, for instance, and many Pentecostals de-emphasize the efficacy of baptism and the Lord’s Table and generally see them as expressions or memorials, more than anything else. So we have mainline denominations. We have independent groups. We have groups that emphasize sacramentalism and those that are less sacramental. There’s also a division among Christians over church government. Episcopalians, for example, tend to emphasize a very hierarchical structure and a rule by bishops. Presbyterians emphasize rule by the local session or by presbytery; it’s more of a republican form of government. Baptists, for instance, or Congregationalists believe that the locus of authority in church government does not reside in hierarchy, as among Episcopalians and some Methodists, but it resides among the people; power rests in the people. So there’s division in mainline and historical denominations and more recent independent groups. There’s division among sacramental emphases and non-sacramental emphases. There’s a division between differences of church government.

There are other ways in which the Christian community expresses difference, and one of which is, of course, that great cleavage between Calvinism, which roughly speaking finds its origin of expression in the writings of John Calvin, and the Arminian tradition. The Arminians are said to follow the insights of Jacob Arminius. So among Christians today, there are those who more or less follow John Calvin. There are those who more or less find their impetus and insight in Arminianism.

Another way or division among Christians is that between covenantal theology, which emphasizes the great covenant with Abraham and subsequent covenants and the unity of the Bible in those covenants. And for instance, dispensationalism, which emphasizes not so much the unity of the Old and New Testaments but the discontinuity in varying degrees between those two great Testaments.

Another division or way of organizing Christianity today is on eschatological issues. Many are, for instance, amillennialists who believe that there is no millennial reign of our Savior in history, but it speaks of the eternal state. Postmillennialists generally see a present and increasing reign of the Lord upon the earth that will culminate in the victory of the church and the Lord’s coming. Premillennialists tend to see that the coming of Christ will inaugurate the kingdom of God on the earth—not either come after it or there will be no kingdom.

So all that I am saying as we begin our course together is that as you look at Christianity, we are segmented in various ways by certain theological opinions. There’s mainline; there are independents. There’s more sacramental emphasis; there’s less or no sacramental emphasis. We are divided by forms of church government, for instance. We are divided theologically between a Calvinistic emphasis and an Arminian emphasis, between covenant theology and dispensational theology, between various views of eschatology—amillennial, postmillennial, premillennial.

There is another division among us. I’m not using the word division in any pejorative sense. We are segmented also into what is called charismatic tradition and a non-charismatic tradition. The charismatic tradition emphasizes the gifts of the Spirit. Some of them, they would argue, are operative today, or all of them, whereas non-charismatics would argue not all gifts have ceased but certain gifts have ceased. And the history of the charismatic movements is the subject of our discussion in this course.

So what I am saying is that among the heirs of the great Protestant Reformation there are nuances, there are teachings that represent various points of view.

The second question for this initial lecture is this: What essentially is the issue between those segments of Christianity that are divided into charismatic Christian people and non-charismatic Christian people? If we can use these broad terms as we begin our course, and I might say that as the course progresses, we will attempt to more specifically define our terms, but now we are speaking broadly. If you think of the difference between the Charismatic movement and the non-charismatic movement, it is certainly not on the issue of the doctrine of salvation. On that issue, all Christians generally agree—and certainly, the charismatic movement is a profoundly Christian movement. So the issue is not about who the Lord Jesus Christ is, is salvation by grace or by works, it is not about the great historic doctrines of the faith. So if the issue that is before us is not about the doctrine of salvation, what is the question that the charismatic movements seek for us to take seriously? And the answer to that, I think, is the question, not so much How do I know God? but How do I walk with God? It is a question of sanctification. How do I know God in victory and in power? How do I walk with Him availing myself to all of the strength and mercy and provisions that He has for me as a Christian person? So I see the charismatic movements today as profoundly Christian, as seriously Christian, as seriously grappling with the Bible, and trying to earnestly walk with God in simplicity and power, availing ourselves to all that God has for us. So the issues that swirl out of the questions, How do I walk with God in victory and power? How do I have the strength for ministry? boil down generally to two issues where the differences lie: one is the issue of baptism; and the issue there is, Is there one baptism or are there two baptisms? Is there a baptism in the Spirit, and is there a baptism with the Spirit? So the question then becomes this, Do I receive at salvation all the power that God has for me, all the strength that He has for me though I may not avail myself to it and have to understand it as I grow in strength? Or, Is there a second once-for-all experience of God’s grace that follows after I am saved? Support for this comes from various texts in the Bible. Acts 2 is a central passage that could be argued that the saved apostles were powerless until the event of the baptism that is clearly taught in that passage on the day of Pentecost. Other texts that could be used would be the experience of Romans 8, the story of the Samaritans who received the Spirit of God.

Another text that is often used is Acts 9 at the conversion of Paul, and then, of course, the story of Cornelius in Acts 10 in which the text says “that the Spirit came upon them as it did [Peter speaking] upon the apostles at the beginning.” And then in Acts 19, you have the story of the conversion of John’s disciples who had not heard of the Spirit of God. That, coupled with the teachings of 1 Corinthians 12–14, makes up the ground of the discussion of the issue of baptism. So what I am saying is simple: the issue is not about the doctrine of salvation. It is about a very important subject called the doctrine of sanctification. Another important question is How do I walk with God? How do I know Him in power and strength? Is there one baptism, or are there two? Am I baptized in the Spirit as well as with the Spirit or by the Spirit?

So what I’m saying is this: that among many in the charismatic movement, they would argue this—that Spirit baptism is an experience that is distinct and usually subsequent to our salvation experience. In other words, it is a second work of grace and often called, at least among earlier charismatics called Pentecostals, the second blessing. They say that Spirit baptism is an experience where the totality of the Spirit is possessed by an individual. They would use the phrase “the fullness of the Spirit is received.” Or you might ask if you are Spirit-filled. So we receive the Spirit in two increments—at salvation for redemption and subsequently for power and strength. They say that Spirit baptism is an experience where a believer is empowered for witness and Christian service. Therefore, people are urged to seek the baptism of the Holy Ghost, and they’re taught how to receive it. They say it is an experience in which the full bestowment of the gifts of the Spirit are given. They say the initial evidence of receiving the baptism of the Spirit is the presence of one or more spiritual gifts.

So let me reiterate where we’ve come. I have tried to argue that among professing serious Christian people there are various subdivisions of us into various categories—mainline, independents, sacramental, non-sacramental, hierarchical in government, independent congregational in government or Presbyterian, Calvinist, Arminian, covenant, dispensational, premillennial, amillennial, postmillennial. And our subject is about the division of the charismatic movements and the non-charismatic groups and how they interact particularly in this century. The second question is, How are we different? Do all profess to be the inheritors of the grace of God? It’s not about salvation. The issue is about the doctrine of sanctification: How do we walk with God? How do we avail ourselves of everything that God has for us? That is such a monumentally important question, and it boils down, I think, to two issues: When does the baptism of the Holy Spirit occur? And what occurs when that baptism occurs, is there one baptism, are there two baptisms, or are there many?

The second theological difference is about the gifts of the Spirit. Traditionally, charismatics have taught that baptism occurs as a second subsequent experience to salvation, and the sign evidence of that second subsequent experience is one of the grace gifts. Traditionally, classical Pentecostals assign that specifically to the gift of glossolalia or motoric speech commonly called tongues. When the movement began to emerge in America, it was pejoratively called by its adversaries the tongues movement; that’s an unkind statement. But the issue is, Did the gifts that we see that the Holy Spirit gave in the first century to His church continue or did they cease? Let me be specific here. Generally, all Christian people believe that some at least of the gifts found in 1 Corinthians, Romans, Ephesians 4 continued on into the church. So the issue really becomes, Did all of the gifts continue, did none of the gifts continue, or did only some of the gifts continue? Those of a more charismatic persuasion have a larger list of the continued gifts than traditional non-charismatics do. I must hasten to add this too—that in a way the title “charismatic movement” might give you the impression that non-charismatics do not believe in the gifts of the Spirit; that’s not true. The issue is not, Do they believe in the gifts of the Spirit? But which ones are still available? So in some sense, we’re all charismatic Christians; we believe in the gifts of the Spirit. The issue is that some have a longer list of extant gifts than other people do; that’s all. So the issue is, How do I walk with God? And it boils down to issues like what is the baptism of the Spirit that we find occurring, for instance, in the book of the Acts? Well, that’s the question. And the other issue is, Did the grace gifts cease in the first century? And there the issue of text is found in the Corinthian letter.

You might also say that other differences would be what their approach is to the Bible. Charismatics generally put an emphasis upon Acts and Luke but not as much emphasis on the epistles of Paul, whereas non-charismatics tend to neglect Luke and Acts and emphasize the Pauline letters. Another emphasis that divides is between the issue of the role of experience versus the role of the mind.

Non-charismatics endued by the Enlightenment tend to emphasize the rational aspects, not the emotive aspects, of faith, whereas charismatics try to grapple earnestly with the legitimate emotive or emotional aspects of experience as it imports upon the Christian faith. Let me reiterate one more thing before we pass on. When it comes to the number of spiritual gifts, all Christians agree that spiritual gifts continued and continue to today. Where they differ is how many have continued to this day. And even among charismatic people within the charismatic movements, some have a longer list of extant gifts today than others do. For example, most charismatic people would not argue that the gift of apostleship continues to this day because they believe that apostleship has with it the idea of writing infallible truths like the Bible. So even among charismatics, and this is a division among them that we will talk about later, there are those who believe that the gifts of the Spirit include all of them that are listed in the Bible, but there are other charismatics who believe that prophecy (as technically defined) or apostleship (as technical defined) did indeed cease. So there are some differences even among charismatics on some very important issues.

What we have done so far is this. One, we’ve talked about various subdivisions among professing Christian people. We have talked about what the major issue is that the charismatic movement is asking us to seriously consider. And I have argued that it has to do with the doctrine of how to walk with God in power and effectiveness in our day. So I view the charismatic movements as profoundly Christian movements that seriously seek to honor the Lord and to obey His Word.

The third question has to do with diversity within the charismatic movements themselves. Notice that we called our course Charismatic Movements. And one of my purposes is to help us to understand that it’s not a monolithic movement. There are shades of difference. There are differences of teaching. There are differences of practice. There is a common thread, and that is their views of baptism of the Holy Spirit as being in two parts at least and their larger segment of continuing gifts than traditional non-charismatics would generally embrace. Among the charismatics, though, there is great diversity, and let me talk about that diversity for a moment. When the charismatic movement first came upon the scene in America, for instance, in the late nineteenth century and born in the great Azusa revivals of 1906 to 1909, the first expression was called the Apostolic Faith Movement, derogatorily called the tongues movement. But what was born as a movement in those early days is called now today classical Pentecostalism. These are your traditional Pentecostals, Assemblies of God, for instance, Church of God in Christ, who by later definitions of charismatics tended to be rigid, tended to be precise without much innuendo. So the classical Pentecostal movement was born probably about 1901 and was the form of charismatic expression through about 1960. In 1960, a new type of Pentecostalism was born, commonly called neo-Pentecostalism because it was new. Born, as we will describe it, from a cacophony of movements in the post-World World II era, I will call it renewalism—charismatic renewalism. It recognized that for a variety of reasons the classical Pentecostal movement was not pushing forward enough and that there needed to be a rebirth. And so you have charismatic renewalism born in about 1960 or 1959, usually identified with a rector, Dennis Bennett, in Van Nuys, California. And the renewalist movement had two prongs to it or has: It penetrated the mainline traditional denominations in this country and others, and it penetrated beginning in the late 1960s the great Roman Catholic Church. Unlike classical Pentecostalism, which tended to be a separatist movement that birthed new denominations separating from the mainline churches like Methodism, charismatic renewalism was a move back into the churches that are traditional mainline. They were not so much Pentecostal with an emphasis on Acts 2 so much as they were broader and rightly called the renewal movement or charismatic movement. And then in the 1970s, we have seen, or probably 1980s, what could be called the restoration movement. And this is a group of varieties of charismatic expression such as the Vineyard movement of John Wimber—his most prolific, the Kansas City Fellowship and sometimes called the Kansas City Prophets or the Prophets’ movement. We have seen what is called the discovery of the fivefold ministry of Ephesians (chapter 4). It has been likened this way: there is a classical Pentecostal movement that will carry us up to the 1050s; there’s a renewalist movement that is born in the 1960s, and into the 1970s and 1980s; and now in the 1980s and 1990s, there is the restoration movement. Peter Wagner likened it this way: there is the first wave called classical Pentecostalism; there’s the second wave called renewalism (or at least, I’m using that title for it); and there is a third wave which is restorationism in the last times.

I’m saying this to say to you that do not think of the charismatic movements as a monolithic movement. There are many differences among charismatic people while there are certain commonalities. And what we will do in our time together is methodically work through the history of those movements and seek to define them, to contrast them, to give you a lineal history of the movement as we possibly can within the limitations of the time that we have for us. Now let me review before I come to my last point. I want you to deeply appreciate the charismatic movements today. I will try to be very fair. I will try to be accurate in my descriptions. I will try to present it as a person who is telling their own story would tell it. I think the first thing that we all owe as Christians to each other is understanding and compassion. And though there are disagreements perhaps among us as Christians, they should not consume us.

Now, so what I have done is this. First, I have said to you that among Christian people today there are some general differences among us, and I tried to highlight seven of those ways of identifying differences—mainline, independents, more sacramental, less sacramental. And, of course, ending with the notion of our course that there is a division of benevolent, good, not tragic, difference of opinion called charismatic and non-charismatic. Second, I’ve tried to ask the question, What is the issue that is being raised—that is the discussion that divides charismatics and non-charismatics? And it is the doctrine of sanctification or the issue of how do I walk with God in victory and in power. While there are many subissues that we will get into, it boils down to the notion of essentially two things at least in this embryonic beginning: the baptism of the Holy Spirit—is it one or more than one? And second, the gifts of the Spirit—did they continue, and are they signs or evidences of one’s second baptism. The third issue is to realize that we have entitled our course Charismatic Movements on purpose to highlight the fact that there are divisions or differences among charismatic people. There is classic Pentecostalism such as the Church of God in Christ or the Assemblies of God, Church of God Holiness; they are classic Pentecostal people; they have certain essential characteristics that differentiate them from other charismatics. There is the renewalist movement, which tends to be a spiritual movement in the mainline, traditionally liberal denominations, and that has two expressions; one is Protestant mainline churches, and the other beginning in 1967, Roman Catholic.

And then today in the 1980s and 1990s, there are various expressions of what they call the third wave or the restoration movement, which comprises the Vineyard movement, the Kansas City Fellowship movement, the Prophets’ movement, fivefold ministries discussion (and I will get to that).

My fourth and final point in this initial lecture is to try to give you in the few moments that we have on our tape left a general overview of how the course will spin out. What are its divisions? And this is what I envision: we will begin next time by talking about the question of the history of the spiritual gifts before the nineteenth century and raise and answer the question, Did the spiritual gifts cease? When did they cease, if they did? which is a very large point of discussion between polemics of charismatics and non-charismatics. Then I think all historians are agreed that the charismatic movement is born, at least in its embryonic beginnings, as a child of Methodism. So then we will go from a general discussion of the gifts to the nineteenth century to the roots of the current expression of Pentecostalism/charismatic movement in John Wesley and in his American counterpart, Charles G. Finney. I believe that the books would tell us that those are two key people. From there, we will go into a history of Methodism as it comes into the United States and into the life of a very important lady by the name of Phoebe Palmer. Phoebe Palmer, according to the books, is the key central person in interpreting Methodism in what becomes the Holiness Movement. So what I’m going to argue is this: that it is out of Methodism through Phoebe Palmer that the Holiness Movement is born in the 1830s and 1840s in America. That Holiness Movement was an attempt to return strength and purity to Methodism (at least in some people’s opinions). That Methodist movement grew teaching two works of grace until finally in the 1880s and 1890s it was put out of the Methodist Church or pushed or volunteered to leave, so that your early Pentecostal people are Methodist background people by and large. So out of Wesley and Finney, or at least through Dr. Wesley, comes Methodism. Out of Methodism comes the Holiness Movement that is eventually incorporated in 1867 in the National Holiness Movement. That National Holiness Movement with its two works of grace was put out of Methodism or became uneasy with it as our century turned. At that point, many former Methodist groups departed from Methodism. Some remained Holiness in their background, like Church of the Nazarene, for instance.

Others through the first decade of the twentieth century developed a third work of grace and became classical Pentecostals, and that is the birth of Pentecostalism as far as I can tell by reading the literature. Then we’ll trace the history of classical Pentecostalism. After that, we’ll come to the 1950s; we’ll trace the birth of the two renewalist movements—Roman Catholic and Protestant. And then in the 1980s and 1990s, we will take up what is commonly called third wave or oft-times called restorationism. And then talk about the current manifestations today of third-wave charismatic theologies, which are many—the curses movement, the prosperity movement (sometimes called health and wealth movements, which have been criticized both by charismatic people as well as non-charismatic people), the Vineyard movement, the Prophets’ Movement, and so on. And that will be our course.

So my assumption is simply this—the way to begin is to talk about Methodism, for Methodism births Pentecostalism. Classical Pentecostalism will birth the renewalist movement through the Full Gospel Businessmen’s Fellowship and Oral Roberts, and then through John Wimber and others. That massive, massive restoration movement that is now currently with us, and that will be our course.

As I conclude, I would like to recommend a very important general work that I think will help us through the course. And that is what is called the Dictionary of Pentecostal and Charismatic Movements edited by Stanley Burgess and Gary McGhee. That is a very fine work, and I’ll be consulting it all the way through the course because I think that is a fine way to get material before us that is objective. This concludes our first lecture, which is a preparatory lecture on the history of the charismatic movements.