Azusa Street Revival

from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

As Azusa Street Revival ( English for Azusa Street Revival ) is called the Pentecostal revival movement starting from the Azusa Street Mission , which originated in the Azusa Street 312 in Los Angeles had and one of the most important historical events of the emerging Pentecostal movement applies.

history

The Azusa Street Revival began in 1906 when the African American preacher William J. Seymour began holding Christian gatherings with a few followers in private homes. Seymour was supposed to pastor a small congregation in Los Angeles, but his sermons about his experiences with the Pentecostal movement were rejected, so he held his meetings first at a trailer's home on Bonnie Brae Avenue . There, on April 9, 1906, the first of its supporters had experiences with the baptism of the Spirit and speaking in tongues .

Due to the growing number of visitors, the congregation had to move to a larger building, a former African-American Methodist church , at 312 Azusa Street within a week . “It was an old building they had rented there, right in the city center. It had previously served as a Methodist church, but had not been used for church services for a long time, but had become a storage room for old junk, wood, mortar and other things. The dirt and debris had now been cleared to the side that there was enough space for a few benches, which consisted of empty nail barrels with boards over them. If I remember correctly, there was room for about 30 people. These primitive seats were arranged in a square so that the congregation attendees could look at each other. ”( Frank Bartleman : Fire falls in Los Angeles). Meetings were held there every day. The congregation was named Apostolic Faith Mission .

On April 18, 1906, a Los Angeles newspaper published an article critical of Seymour and his community. On the same day, the San Francisco earthquake struck, prompting wandering preacher Frank Bartleman to link the newspaper article to the earthquake and the end of the world through a leaflet. The leaflet spread almost all over the west coast, attracting thousands to the Azusa Street gatherings.

Due to the great interest, the company began to publish its own magazine, which was named The Apostolic Faith and which soon had an edition of tens of thousands. The gathering increasingly attracted interested parties and guests from the north of the USA who eventually returned to their home churches with new experiences or who founded new, Pentecostal-influenced churches themselves. Initially, the meetings were mostly attended by Afro-American believers, but later mostly by Latinos and Christians of European origin.

influence

According to the American religious scholar John Gordon Melton, the need for harmony between the ethnic groups is considered to be a main reason for the movement's growth, although in the decades after its founding, the movement was increasingly characterized by segregation . The Azusa Street Revival gained influence in the widespread, African-American Church of God in Christ and the two important Pentecostal churches Assemblies of God and Church of God (Cleveland) .

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b Randall Herbert Balmer: Azusa Street Revival . In: Encyclopedia of Evangelicalism . Baylor University Press, Waco 2004, ISBN 1-932792-04-X , pp. 47 (English).
  2. ↑ a b c J. Gordon Melton: Azusa Street Revival . In: Encyclopedia of World Religions . Encyclopedia of Protestantism, No. 6 . Facts of File, New York 2005, ISBN 978-0-8160-5456-5 , pp. 60 (English).
  3. ↑ Frank Bartleman: Fire falls in Los Angeles. Fliß, Hamburg 1983, ISBN 3-922349-12-9 , p. 74.