132 Twentieth Century American Christianity (Five Hundred 15)

In this last episode of our 500 class, we’ll cover a bunch of 20th century American groups including Christian Science, the Evangelicals, Plymouth Brethren, Pentecostals, Calvary Chapel, Vineyard Churches, Christian and Missionary Alliance, the Way International, the Worldwide Church of God, Scientology, the Moonies, and Megachurches (Rick Warren, Craig Groeschel, and Joel Osteen).  It’s a whirlwind, but it should aid you in making some interesting and helpful connections between present day Christian groups and their past.

This is lecture 15 of a history of Christianity class called Five Hundred: From Martin Luther to Joel Osteen.

All the notes are available here as a pdf.

—— Notes ——

Christian Science (a.k.a. Church of Christ, Scientist) (85,000)

• 1866 – Mary Baker Eddy (1821-1910) experienced healing from back pain after studying the Gospels and devoted her life to studying healing
• 1875 – published findings in Science and Health
• early 20th century had major growth but declined towards the end

 

Evangelicals/Born Again Christians (similar to fundamentalists, but different focus)

• National Association of Evangelicals[1] defines an evangelical as someone who believes in
  • The need for everyone to have a “born again” experience
  • The engagement in missionary and social reform efforts
  • The obedience to the Bible as ultimate authority
  • Sacrifice of Christ on the cross as a central focus

 

Plymouth Brethren (1 million)

• 1827 meeting in Dublin, Ireland by John Nelson Darby (1800-1882)
• Father of dispensationalism including pre-tribulational rapture
  • Dallas Theological Seminary’s Professor Dr. Chafer’s 1948 Systematic Theology
  • I. Scofield Bible’s 1909 Study Bible
  • W. Bullinger’s 1909 Companion Bible (finished in 1922)
  • Hal Lindsey’s 1970 Late Great Planet Earth (a Dallas Theological Seminary graduate)
  • Tim LaHaye and Jerry Jenkins’ 1995 Left Behind 12-part series
• Met together in the name of the Lord without reference to a denomination
• 1831 – first meeting held in England at Plymouth; 1845 – assembly at Plymouth had 1,000 people
• Distinctives
  • Avoidance of traditional symbols (no crosses, unembellished rooms, no stained glass)
  • No membership, what matters is who is written in the Lamb’s book of life in heaven
  • No clergy, but they have elders and sometimes support a “full-time worker”
  • Weekly communion as a separate meeting from worship service (Quaker feel)

 

Pentecostals (279 million)

• Holiness Movement
  • Asa Mahan (1799-1889), Charles Finney (1792-1875), Phoebe Palmer (1807-1874)
  • 1881 – Church of God (Anderson, Indiana) founded (currently 1.2 million)
  • 1895 – Church of the Nazarene founded (currently 2 million)
• Charles Parham (1873-1922), a holiness preacher, formulated the doctrine of “initial evidence”
  • 1901 – During a service, a woman asked for prayer and the laying on hands to be filled with the holy spirit and started speaking in tongues.
• William Seymour (1870-1922)
  • One of Parham’s students, an African American
  • 1906 – Seymour went to LA and ignited the Azusa Street Revival, which lasted until 1915
  • People came from all over to see/experience tongues, including Europe