VICE PRESIDENT
6.1 Scholars’ Definition of Pentecostals and Pentecostalism
Scholars and researchers have, depending on their geographical areas of interest, defined Pentecostalism in its universal and African forms in general, and in its Nigerian forms in particular. These definitions are now outlined.
Wayne A. Grudem describes a Pentecostal church or ministry as:
Any denomination or group that traces its historical origin back to the Pentecostal revival that began in the United States in 1901 and that holds the following doctrines:
(1) All the gifts of the Holy Spirit mentioned in the New Testament are intended for today; (2) baptism in the Holy Spirit is an empowering experience subsequent to conversion and should be sought by Christians today; and (3) when baptism in the Holy Spirit occurs, people will speak in tongues as a “sign” that they have received this experience.330
He describes Charismatics as:
Any groups (or people) that trace their origin to the charismatic renewal movement of the 1960s and 1970s and that seek to practice all the gifts mentioned in the New Testament (including prophecy, healing, miracles, tongues, interpretation and distinguishing between spirits). Among charismatics there are differing viewpoints on whether baptism in the Holy Spirit is subsequent to conversion and whether speaking
330 Grudem, Wayne A.1996. Are Miraculous Gifts for Today? Grand Rapids, Michigan: Zondervan Publishing House, p11.
in tongues are a sign of baptism in the Spirit. Charismatics by and large have refrained from forming their own denominations, but view themselves as a force for renewal within existing Protestant and Roman Catholic churches.331
Vinson Synan, a historian and author in the Pentecostal movement, published 16 books, 15 of which are related to Pentecostal and Charismatic history. He is a professor of Church History, Dean Emeritus at Regent University, Virginia Beach, Virginia, and he has co-founded the Society for Pentecostal Studies in 1970. As a historian and a Pentecostal himself, Synan stands out for being an authority in this field with all its ramifications. His book, “Aspects of Pentecostal/Charismatic Origins”, and some of his writings provide a behind-the-scenes assessment of Pentecostalism. His analyses are scholarly, historically correct and easily understandable. The most helpful part of his analysis of the origins and development of Pentecostalism is his breaking up of the history into periods. It helps in putting events into perspective. Synan states that the various Pentecostal churches or movements are all, in one way or another, part “…of one Holy Spirit movement with one common factor of Spirit Baptism, accompanied by glossolalia and/or other gifts of the Spirit.”332 He confirms that the earliest phase of Pentecostalism “…was essentially Wesleyan in its theology, worship, and hymnody.”333
Synan outlines the main historical phases of Pentecostalism as follows:
i. The “Holiness” Pentecostal movement began with Charles Parham in 1901 and included the Azusa Street revival of William Seymour from 1906 to 1909.
ii. The “Finished Work” Pentecostal movement began with William
Durham from Chicago in 1910 and includes the Assemblies of God and most of the Pentecostal groups organized after 1914.
iii. The “Oneness” or Pentecostal Unitarian movement began in 1913 and caused a major schism in the Assemblies of God in 1916.
iv. The Protestant “neo-Pentecostal” movement dates from about 1960, and v. The “Catholic charismatic” Pentecostal movement traces its beginning to 1966.334
331 Grudem, 1996, p. 11.
332 Vinson Synan. 1975. Aspects of Pentecostal-Charismatic Origins. Plainfield Plainfield, NJ: Logos International, p.2. .
333 Vinson Synan. 1975, p.2.
334 Vinson Synan. 1975, pp.2-3.
There are differences between universal and African typologies of Pentecostal movements. The universal movements can be seen as having broken clear of traditional churches in theology and outlook. Their roots, as described above, are found in older holiness movements in Europe and the United States. Some of these became prototypes for African Pentecostal movements who had asked them for assistance and who eventually adopted the names and styles of their European or American examples. Some African movements however were started in Africa, without European or American assistance, and did later link up with foreign partners. Others steered clear of foreign influence altogether, because they wanted to remain African, or they claimed to be Africa's contribution to Christianity.
Anderson defines African Pentecostalism in various contexts. There are the mission churches, established by missionaries from Pentecostal denominations in North America and Europe, such as the Assemblies of God Church and the Apostolic Church. They are classified as „Classical Pentecostals‟. There are also Charismatic movements in the mainstream non- Pentecostal denominations. These are independent schismatic offshoots of the mission churches. In addition, there are wholly indigenous movements.335
Also Ogbu U. Kalu denotes subdivisions in African Pentecostalism. They comprise inter-denominational fellowships (e.g. Full Gospel Business Men‟s Fellowship International and Women‟s Aglow), evangelistic ministries (Deeper Life Bible Church), deliverance ministries (specializing in exorcisms), prosperity or faith ministries (sometimes tending toward positive thinking), and Intercessors (part of Intercessors Africa). He furthermore identifies Bible distribution agencies (Gideon Bible International, accepting only born-again members) and the classical Pentecostals (Four Square Gospel Church, Assemblies of God Church).336
Matthew Ojo recognizes three streams in the course of more than five decades of Pentecostalist development in Nigeria. The first consists of classical Pentecostal churches which are products of the activities of Western missionaries in Nigeria. The second stream includes indigenous Pentecostal churches which owe their origin to visionary experiences and activities of specific men and women between the 1940s and the 1960s. The third strand of Pentecostalism consists of the newer charismatic churches that started flourishing in Nigeria from the mid-1970s and that were the products of university circles.337
The classification of Anderson seems easy to work with as it neatly fits the Pentecostal landscape in Nigeria. Kalu‟s classification is rather detailed and some of the
335Anderson, R.M. 1986. The Encyclopaedia of Religion. New York: Macmillan Publishing Company, pp.229- 235.
336 Kalu, 1998, p.9.
337 Ojo, 1988, pp. 175-192.
groups can easily be clustered together. For example, the first division can be combined with the fifth and the sixth, while the second, third and fourth divisions can be considered as one.
The seventh strand stands alone. Ojo, on the other hand, defines three strands, but in his classification, the second strand is not easily identifiable. His recent contribution is apt and most important our understanding of the type of pentecostals that operate in Adamawa State.
This is discussed below on pages 172 and 173. Adamawa Pentecostalism despite all its present traits today, started as a Reformist movement that failed in its bid to reform the Lutheran, EYN and Catholic churches in the state, ended up as schismatic groups of independent Pentecostal movements all over the state. They actually copied from other parts of Nigeria and the world, what Pentecostals practice and teach.
The present research has identified three strands of Pentecostal groups in Nigeria, and in Adamawa State in particular. The following subdivisions will be employed for the purpose of this thesis. They are:
i. First strand: Classical Pentecostals;
ii. Second strand: Wholly Indigenous/Neo-Pentecostals; and
iii. Third strand: Charismatic Movements in the Mainline Churches.
As noted earlier, Pentecostal denominations in Nigeria, though independent of one another, maintain close networking links. They support each other and meet under the umbrella of an organization known as the Pentecostal Fellowship of Nigeria (PFN). All the strands of Nigerian Pentecostalism can be found in Adamawa State. For the purpose of the current research, some Pentecostal churches in Adamawa had to be visited by proxies who observed activities and interviewed members and pastors. The general aim was to determine to which type of Pentecostalism the churches belong and how they relate to each other. Two sets of assistants were sent out, first in April 2009 and again in August 2009. The assistants were pastors themselves and understood what the research was about. They had to find out inter alia (a) the doctrinal emphasis, (b) operational methods, (c) founding dates and (d) particular type of the Pentecostal churches concerned. The use of proxies was necessitated by the fact that the researcher is a Lutheran which made some of the Pentecostal pastors hesitant to grant interviews. The material gathered through assistants was analysed and collated to produce the chart below. The researcher found that Adamawa state, like other regions on Nigeria, has its own, locally developed charismatic movements that exist side by side with mainstream Pentecostal churches. In some circumstances such charismatic groups are loosely associated with older, and more nationally spread, Pentecostal denominations. They are therefore listed under the second strand (numbers 18-22) in the table.
Table: 4 A working Classification of Some Pentecostal Churches in Nigeria and Adamawa State.
1st Strand 2nd Strand 3rd Strand Founding Date
Doctrinal Emphasis Operational Method 1.
Assemblies of God
1934/1939 Holiness Church
Planting
2.Four Square Gospel Church
- Holiness Church
Planting
3.Christ Apostolic Church
1944 Adamawa State
Holiness Church
Planting
4. Apostolic Church
1930s Holiness Church
Planting 5.New
Apostolic Church
Holiness Church
Planting
Redeemed Christian Church of God (RCCG)
1952 Holiness and Prosperity
Crusades and Camps
Living Faith 1970s Prosperity
Crusades and Camps Church of God
Mission
1968 Prosperity Crusades Redeemed
People‟s Mission
1976 Holiness/Prosperity Crusades Deeper Life Bible
Church
1982 Holiness
Crusades and Camps Mountain of Fire
and
Miracles(MFM)
1989 Deliverance Crusades and Camps
Christ Embassy 1992 Prosperity
Televangelism Fountain of Life
Ministries
1992 Prosperity Crusades
House on the Rock
1994 Prosperity Crusades
Daystar Christian Centre
1995 Prosperity Crusades
Full Gospel Business Men‟s Fellowship
- Holiness
Fellowship and Prayer Meetings Women
Aglow
- Holiness
Fellowship and Prayer Meetings Gideon‟s
International
1987 (In Adamawa State)
Holiness Bible
Distribution Catholic
Charismatics
1966/1970 Holiness/Prosperity Fellowship Meetings Upper Room
Cathedral
1988 Prosperity Crusades
Praise Chapel for All Nations
1988 Prosperity Crusades
Truth Foundation Ministries/Grace Cathedral
1990 Holiness/
Prosperity
Crusades
Global Church 1990 Prosperity Crusades
Life Spring Ministries
1993 Prosperity Crusades
Rhema Bible Church
Holiness Teaching
. 1994 Holiness/Miracles Evangelism
Spirit Life Power Embassy
2008 Prosperity Splitting
While the presentation of the historical development and the present proliferation of Pentecostal churches in this tabular form may appear to be reductionist, these generalisations are useful in analysing the movements. The research findings of the present study have confirmed the above classifications. Besides, a typology of Charismatic movements as supplied by Mathew Ojo in his paper Pentecostalism and African Christianity in Historical
Perspectives provide us with a useful analysis of the movement in Nigeria in general and Adamawa in particular. I find it suitable because it goes into greater details and agrees with the chart above from a scholarly angle.
Ojo‟s six established typology on Pentecostal and Charismatic movements in Nigeria are:
i. Faith Seekers: These believe in the acquisition of power by in dividuals to establish a relationship with God through conversion,
ii. Faith Builders: They emphasize the realization of the potentials in individuals to overcome contemporary difficulties of life or to achieve rapid social mobility through the acquisition of material comfort or societal recognition, iii. Faith Transformers: They seek to alter the socio-cultural and religious milieu
of large groups of people, frequently along ethnic or national lines,
iv. Reformers: These are individuals and sectarian groups within the mainline Protestant denominations seeking to rekindle revival and renewal on the basis of Pentecostal spirituality,
v. Deliverance Churches: They are preoccupied with liberating or extricating Christians from their traditional past, which they consider as stumbling blocks to a fulfilling life in the contemporary world, they also try to resolve the dilemma of the traditional past within a modern westernized context but not fully a rational empirical context, and
vi. Modernists: These churches have adopted or are trying to adopt the religious style of the Charismatics and Pentecostals. Their preoccupation is how to present the old “Zionist or Aladura religion to the modern world of the educated.338
Ojo‟s typology describes in full the type of Pentecostal groups found in Adamawa State, however type four was the initial prevalent type in Adamawa. The socio-economic and socio-cultural arguments or the pre-modern and modernity arguments for the growth of Pentecostalism applied to Adamawa only after their reformist agenda failed.
338 Ojo, M. A., Pentecostalism and African Christianity in Historical Perspectives, Department of Religious Studies, Obafemi Awolowo University, Ile-Ife, Nigeria. A Paper Presented at the Theological Education in Africa (TEA) conference, held at the Theological College of Northern Nigeria, Bukuru, Jos Plateau State, Nigeria, August 8:2012, pp.6-7.
6.2 Prominent New Pentecostal Churches in Adamawa State and their Organizational