Wednesday, December 21, 2016

The "New Issue": Doctrinal Development

Doctrinally, the New Issue did not mature as a unified front. Although uniformly attacking Pentecostal Trinitarianism with their new understanding of the "absolute deity" of Jesus,1 the New Issue thinkers demonstrated exegetical inconsistency, misunderstandings and misrepresentations of their opponents' positions, and varying degrees of moderation and sectarianism. New Issue theology developed in two stages: the 1913 attempts to harmonize the triune and apostolic baptismal formulas and the later radical revisions of the doctrines of God and salvation which the 1913 discussions precipitated.

The restorationist drive for the pristine Christianity of the New Testament pattern, so common to American evangelical religion, lies at the roots of Oneness thought. Advancing the rhetoric of the Azusa revival which proclaimed the restoration of the original apostolic church in the practice of glossolalia, New Issue proponents argued that "latter day" Christianity was "fully" restored with the revelation of the divine name and the uncovering of the "mystery" of the Godhead. G. T. Haywood explained that the "mystery" of the Godhead had been "folded away in God's infinite wisdom, awaiting the day appointed, when in the dispensation of the fullness of times all things were to be gathered in Christ."2 For Frank J. Ewart, the supposed "introduction" of the Trinity doctrine at the Nicene Council (325 A.D.) resulted in the plunge of Christianity into the "Papal Darkness" of the middle ages.3 Only a latter day restoration of the divine person and name could overcome this apostasy.

The doctrine of the Trinity in its introduction as a fundamental of faith, in the third century, kept very bad company. Transubstantiation, indulgences, Mariolatry, infallibility of the Pope, purgatory, and many others companied with the Trinity. These tenets of the Roman Catholic creed held the field with Constantine to Luther. Subsequent to Luther, Protestants have refuted all the fundamentals of the Catholic Church, with the noted exception of the doctrine called the Holy Trinity . . . In 1914 God made his final move to raise up a people to restore the One Body or Church to the Apostolic Age [referring to the "revelation" of the Jesus name baptismal formula].4

This unique blending of restorationism and millennarian hope perfectly paralleled the expectations of the Azusa believers.

This restorationist, or "latter rain," mentality (as Oneness Pentecostals call it) served as an apologetic for the novelty of the doctrine. Clearly begging the question, the novelty of the doctrine became its greatest proof in light of "end time revelation." References to "more light" and additional religious insight which permeated Oneness periodicals prompted Trinitarian opponents to charge New Issue believers with capricious subjectivism and extremes in doctrine and practice.5 Indeed, some statements, apparently deriding biblical authority, left the new doctrine open to attack. Carl Brumback quoted Howard Goss as saying, "Oh, you'll never get this by studying it out like some other doctrine. This comes by 'revelation.'"6 Haywood, in his own writings, contrasts literal human interpretation of the Scriptures with the power of the Oneness "revelation."

No man can know who the Father, nor the Son is, except it be revealed. . . .Almost anyone that is able to read can take up the Bible and see, what is apparently, "three persons," the common view held by Catholic and all other denominations, but is Jesus revealing this to them? I tell you "NAY." God has taken the wise in their own craftiness.7

But such passages were isolated and such attacks unfounded. As a whole, the New Issue thinkers showed a more moderate, although often unstated, understanding of the Oneness "revelation." Andrew D. Urshan, a latecomer to Oneness ranks in 1919, clarified the meaning of "revelation" in Oneness writings.

By the word "revelation" . . . we mean, the Holy Ghost illuminating our hearts and minds to actually understand certain Scriptures. He [the Holy Spirit], the blessed Spirit of truth, is also the Spirit of wisdom and revelation. When he enters the true believer's heart and mind, he begins his blessed work of illuminating, revealing and unfolding the infinite love and majestic personality of the One God of Israel in the Name and Person of his son, Jesus Christ.8

The real distinctions between Trinitarian doctrine and Oneness "revelation" arose from the content, not the method, of this "revelation." Redefining the biblical category of the "mystery" of God's transcendence, the Oneness thinkers perceived Jesus as "God's revealed mystery"—not God revealed in mystery, but rather God revealed such that mystery is altogether eliminated. New Issue writers replaced the Trinitarian "mystery" with a "common sense hermeneutic" which drew literalist conclusions from biblical texts. This appeal to "common sense," which assumed that anything contrary to simple reason must necessarily be false, preceded all Oneness investigations of the scriptures and served as a catch-all defense against any difficult Trinitarian argument. Thus Ewart argued that "the normal mind revolts against the thought of there existing from eternity more than ONE CREATOR, First-cause, Redeemer, or Saviour."9 Trinitarianism was mere human speculation; whereas Oneness doctrine was God's revelation.10 To Oneness sectarian eyes, Christendom had settled for less than God's full truth in revelation.

The New Issue began and ended in the act of baptism in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ. Significantly, the controversy did not grow from an academic debate concerning the doctrines of God or salvation, but rather sprang from efforts to harmonize the Matthean and Acts baptismal formulas. Initially, the secondary role allotted water baptism in general Pentecostal circles kept this discussion on a non-divisive level. Early toleration ceased only when the debate spread beyond these simple harmonizing attempts. Then, rebaptism, the ultimate act of submission to the new position, became the most obvious point of schism.

As early as the spring of 1913, R. E. McAlister offered the first harmonizing attempt by equating the terms "Father, Son, and Holy Spirit" and the terms "Lord, Jesus, Christ."11 In this, McAlister evidently retained orthodox Trinitarianism, although his influence on Ewart produced more heterodox results. Ewart expounded his early "theology of the Name" in simple, common-sense arguments. First, the singular word "name" in Matthew 28:19 anticipated the singular name "Jesus" in Acts 2:38. Secondly, Ewart held that the apostles' practice of baptizing in the name of Jesus should serve as a key for interpreting the intent of Jesus' words in Matthew 28:19. Had Jesus intended that the titles "Father, Son, and Holy Ghost" be used in the baptismal ceremony, Matthew 28:19 would have to read "names" and the Acts of the Apostles would have recorded baptisms using the triune formula.

Later Oneness thinkers developed this "theology of the Name" as "the key that unlocked the door to the nature and the person of God himself."12 These efforts usually began with lengthy studies of the Old Testament names for God and always concluded that God's primary revelatory mechanism has always been the divine name.13 To know God's name meant to understand God. Oneness thinkers correctly recognized that references to divine names (especially the Jehovahistic titles) in the biblical acts of salvation history served as interpretive revelation. "It was the purpose of God to make himself known to his people," Haywood declared, but then clarified how this was to be done: "His name was to be declared among the brethren."14 The biblical witness progressively enriches human understanding of God through additional names, titles, and descriptions. The "overplus" of "name revelation" in the Old Testament pointed to the need for a single, easily understood revelation of the divine name which would sum up the totality of God's characteristics.15 The Old Testament itself carried a motif which pointed beyond its limited revelation: the "secrecy of the divine name."16 Haywood argued that the "secret name" restructured the Old Testament eschatological hope around the ultimate revelation of the divine name in the great age prior to the consummation. Obviously, to Haywood, that age had arrived and the eschatological name was Jesus.17 In the last days, Jesus had been "rediscovered" as the Jehovah of the Old Testament, the ultimate revelation of God in both person and name.

The "rediscovery" of Jesus as the Jehovah of the Old Testament brought a great reaffirmation of Hebrew monotheism. References to the Shema became the watchword of the New Issue. The "oneness" of God became radicalized with the application of the Old Testament language to the person of Jesus and resulted in the rejection of any position which failed to appreciate the "absolute deity" of Jesus (e.g., Trinitarianism as misunderstood by the Oneness believers). The God who revealed himself throughout the Old Testament in multiplied theophanic manifestations was fully and quantitatively incarnate in Jesus Christ.18

Resting on the "common sense" hermeneutic, the New Issue attack on Trinitarianism failed to comprehend the language or purposes of the early Trinitarian creeds. To Oneness thinkers, Trinitarianism meant only that God was divided into three separate, distinct persons, each eternal in heaven, with the second person, at a point in time leaving the other two in heaven, to be incarnate in Jesus, born of Mary in Bethlehem.19 Three strata of arguments were raised against this "straw man" definition. First, Trinitarianism was Tritheism barely disguised. Haywood stated succinctly, "If the Father, Son and Holy Spirit are separate Persons, Spirits, Personalities, we have on our hands three separate Gods."20 Such a view was seen to "divide the Deity" and "perpetuate Catholic dogma."21 Kenneth Reeves, a later Oneness defender, defined Trinitarianism as "a merger of Tritheism (belief in three Gods) with Monotheism (belief in one God), which is neither Monotheism nor Tritheism in its purest form."22 Secondly, Trinitarians based their doctrines on non-biblical terminology, such as trinity, three persons in the Godhead, God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit.23 Lastly, Oneness writers alluded to religious and moral problems among Trinitarians who rejected the Oneness doctrine, "who gave only lip service to God," without true sincerity, who choose "traditions over the Word of God."24 Any sincere Christian who was open to the biblical message and the work of the Holy Spirit should also be open to the Oneness doctrine.

Although Oneness thinkers denied a trinity of "three separate, distinct persons," they recognized an obvious biblical "threeness" concerning God.25 This "threeness" was understood, not in terms of three ontological persons, but rather as three historical manifestations—three modes of God's revelation rather than three static divisions in God's person. Haywood stated

There is but one God and He has been manifested in a three-fold manner. And this three-fold manifestation was not intended to establish a three- person God idea, but instead, it was to reveal to mankind that there was a true and living God who loved them with an everlasting love.26

Ewart added, "God is one in essence but three in manifestations."27

When this notion of God's "threeness" was combined with the radical "oneness" of God in Jesus Christ, the essence of the Oneness conception of God emerged.

That there is but one Holy, Eternal Spirit of God is clearly set forth in the Word of God. . . .The apostles were in no wise divided over this matter, but all recognized that the Spirit of the Father, the Spirit, the Holy Spirit, and the Spirit of His Son were different expressions of the one and self-same Spirit.28

This position consistently affirmed God's absolute unity and explained all diversity in terms of function, variety of terminology, and revelatory action.

The assertion of the "absolute deity" of Jesus led Oneness leaders to depict Jesus as the quantitative incarnation of God's whole being.29 Quoting two proof texts—Colossians 2:9,"For in him dwells all the fullness of the Godhead bodily" and John 14:10 with Christ speaking, "The Father who dwells in me does the work"—the New Issue writers balanced their understanding of the radical "oneness" of God in Christ and the Father-Son (divine-human) Christology.30

The Oneness preoccupation with the person of Christ drew a barrage of accusations. Hostile Trinitarians labeled Oneness believers as "Jesus only" and charged them with "denying the Father." This attack encouraged Oneness writers to further clarify their definition of the "Father, Son, and Holy Spirit" in terms of the Father-Son Christology. Haywood stated

To acknowledge the Father and the Son does not necessarily mean to believe in "three persons in the Godhead." Those who are baptized in Jesus name acknowledge the Father and Son in Christ Jesus. . . The Fatherhood of God is found only in the Son, who was God manifest in the flesh. The only way a person can really "deny the father" is to fail to acknowledge that Jesus is the true and only living God.31

The Father and the Holy Spirit came to be seen, not as separate and distinct from the Son, but as expressions of the divine-human interplay within the incarnate God, Jesus Christ. The Father was the eternal indivisible Spirit which was in Christ.32 The Holy Spirit was that self-same Spirit in Christ which flowed forth from him to create and sustain the church. Traditional hypostatic distinctions between the divine persons were forgotten: "the deity in Jesus Christ was that of the Father, not [the] hypostatically distinct 'eternal God the Son.'"33

The Father-Son Christology distinguished the Christological titles "son of God" as divinity and "son of Man" as humanity. The sonship of Christ was limited to his human existence, while the Fatherhood of Christ meant only his divine nature.34 Some even equated the term "Son" with "body."35 Oneness writers depicted Christ's body as the habitation of God,36 the "visible portion of his substance," "God's headquarters" while on earth,37 and "the meeting place for the God who is a Spirit and the souls of lost men."38 Christ's humanity served as a vehicle, a tool, an agency for the eternal Spirit which indwelled it. Succinctly, the man Christ acted as the "Eternal Spirit's right hand man."39 Christ's humanity was the "veil of flesh" assumed by the Mighty God. In the flesh, he was the Son of man and the Son of God. As a man, he walked, wept, prayed, suffered, and died. As God He raised himself from the dead and showed forth in the radiance of eternal glory.40

Christ as the Father was the eternal God, but his sonship "began when he was begotten [through Mary]."41 Oneness theology offered no parallel for the Trinitarian eternal Son.

Oneness thinkers explained the pre-existence of Christ in terms of God's foreknowledge: Christ eternally existed in the mind or plan of God as "the lamb slain from the foundations of the world." Christ's temporal sonship found real existence only when the eternal plan reached its fruition in the incarnation.42 Ewart stated, "When it is claimed that Jesus' sonship existed eternally in any other sense than in the predetermined purpose of God, the claim is invalid from a Scriptural standpoint."43

As long as the implications of the Oneness reinterpretation of the name and nature of God for the doctrine of salvation were not explicitly discussed, the New Issue remained secondary and academic. But when these doctrines were directly applied to the practical imperatives of Christian salvation, open hostility and even schism followed. A cycle of criticism and defense led to deepening sectarianism and admitted exclusivism among some Oneness adherents. With finality, Urshan stated, "The sure foundation of the 'New birth' or the birth of the Spirit is the accepting and believing in the Lord Jesus as God [in context, the Oneness understanding of God].44

As in the beginning, Acts 2:38 reemerged as the crisis point of the debate. For Oneness proponents, Acts 2:38 offered "the gospel in miniature,"45 a three-step "plan of salvation" involving (1) repentance, (2) water baptism administered in the name of Jesus (evidently including acceptance of the Oneness understanding of God and his name), and (3) the Holy Spirit baptism evidenced by glossolalia. This threefold plan was portrayed as the final restoration of the true apostolic church in the last days.46 The imperative of the Acts 2:38 plan demanded that Oneness thinkers expound baptismal regeneration and redefine the purposes and functions of Holy Spirit baptism.

These thinkers came to equate the imperatives of water and Spirit baptism of Acts 2:38 with the New Birth of water and Spirit of John 3:3-5. Terms such as "full salvation," "Bible salvation," and "New Testament salvation" emerged as the New Issue writers sought to differentiate the true essentials of Christian salvation from the lesser standards held by most Christians. Haywood pointed out that "to be born of 'water and the Spirit' and 'believe and is baptized' (John 3:5 and Mark 16:16) are proved to be synonymous terms."47 Again he stated concerning Christ's command to be "born again of water and the Spirit," "there is no record in the Acts of the Apostles that his instructions were ever carried out, except by being baptized in water and the Holy Ghost."48 In rebuttal, the Assemblies of God "Statement of Fundamental Truths" presented the "New Birth" as the product of repentance and a faith experience in Christ, with baptism functioning as an "outward symbol of cleansing" and the Holy Spirit baptism as an "enduement of power for life and service."49 To dismiss any ambiguity, the statement adds, "This wonderful experience [Holy Spirit baptism] is distinct from and subsequent to the experience of the New Birth."50

The Oneness equating of conversion and the "full" Acts 2:38 experience rested upon the whole-hearted acceptance of popular commentator Adam Clarke's exegesis of the New Birth passage. Clarke equated the terms "birth" and "baptism"—therefore, to be "born of water and the Spirit" means to be "baptized with water and the Spirit" and Acts 2:38 and John 3:5 are equivalent sayings.51

Oneness Pentecostals, seeking to show the essentiality of water baptism in the name of Jesus, made a mental leap from the command of baptism in Acts 2 to the statements regarding the exclusion from God's kingdom of those not "born of water" in John 3. A second leap necessarily followed: the Holy Spirit baptism of Acts 2 was linked with the "birth of the Spirit" of John 3, demanding the essentiality of the Pentecostal experience for salvation. Going beyond the normal Pentecostal notion of the subsequence of Spirit baptism to conversion, the Oneness believers held Spirit baptism as the climactic moment of a single "work of grace" and therefore necessary for "full salvation.52 Similarly, water baptism correctly administered by immersion in "Jesus name" was also a part of this single "work of grace." Haywood, commenting on "baptism as a saving medium," argued that salvation did not simply occur through the ceremonial act or any virtue in the water, but rather through the application of Christ's blood and name through the act: "To be saved by water baptism it must be administered in the Name of Jesus, for there is 'no other name under heaven given among men whereby we must be saved.'"53

 The Acts 2:38 "plan of salvation," consistently applied, excludes all Christians except Oneness Pentecostals from Christian salvation and fellowship. This sectarian position excludes non-Pentecostals for lacking the baptism of the Holy Spirit and Trinitarian Pentecostals for their failure to understand God and accept his name in baptism. Some Oneness Pentecostals apparently embraced the extremity of this position.

If you take away the absolute DEITY and the incarnation of the DIVINE BEING (God, the Spirit) from the Lord Jesus Christ, then you cause the Bible to crumble and our HOPE OF SALVATION to perish.54

But others struggled for a more moderate position recognizing at least a limited acceptance for Christians with lesser experiences. One such struggle, best expressed in Haywood's writings and propagated by instructor S. G. Norris at Apostolic Bible Institute, drew a distinction between those Christians "born of the Spirit" and those "begotten by the Word."

A child is first "begotten" by the Word (I Cor. 4:15) of the Gospel before he can be born of the Spirit. . . . No child can ever be born until it is first begotten, but many were never born into the world. So it is with the Spirit . . . . There are multitudes who are in this state today.55

Accordingly, Haywood differentiated two stages in the resurrection of the dead following the dispensational division of the "secret rapture" and the final, general resurrection. Those partaking in the Acts 2:38 experience would escape the "Great Tribulation" via the "rapture;" whereas those "righteous men of all ages who walked in all the light they were given" would participate in the general resurrection.56 Haywood's final statement anticipated an even more moderate assessment of the status of non-Oneness Christians: the "Light Doctrine." This position argued that God required of men only that which had been "revealed" to them. Repentance and faith were enough if the "light" of water and Spirit baptism had not been understood.57

In summary, Oneness doctrine developed at a time of crisis in the fledgling Assemblies of God and spawned a greater and more lasting controversy. Despite Oneness claims, this novel position, although well documented, has never displayed consistency and uniformity. Failing to grasp the functions and implications of historical Trinitarianism, Oneness writers, driven by a desire to exalt the person and name of Jesus, produced an alternate, somewhat one-sided understanding of God. This effort, beginning as an intense Scriptural search, ended in a sectarian claim of exclusivism.

Urshan likened the Oneness message to "a two-edged sword" that "tests the faith of the believers" and "reveals and separates the true from the false."58 Ewart summed up the Oneness sectarian attitude in no uncertain terms.

It is extremely dangerous in these last days, when apostasy abounds on every hand, to deny the necessity of the name of the LORD JESUS CHRIST. A church, denomination, organization, or assembly which refuses to take the name of the Lord-Jesus- Christ in Christian baptism could never have a place in His Bride.59

It was this sectarian spirit that forced the exclusion of the New Issue men from the Assemblies of God. Following three years of struggle with developing doctrine, organizational tension, and leadership rivalry, the New Issue crushed the spirit of liberality upon which the Assemblies had been founded. The Assemblies of God officially formed a new organizational orthodoxy and catapulted the New Issue ministers on the path toward formation of new Oneness bodies.
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1Oneness thinkers rejected the notion of Christ as the incarnation of the eternal Son of the Trinity, choosing rather to affirm the "absolute deity" of Christ as the quantitative embodiment of the entirety of the Godhead.

2G. T.Haywood, Divine Names and Titles of Jehovah, (Indianapolis: Christ Temple, n.d.), p. 18.

3Better informed contemporary Oneness scholars do not resort to such non-historical assertions. Compare David K. Bernard, The Oneness of God (Hazelwood, Mo.: Word Aflame Press, 1983) and William B. Chalfant, Ancient Champions of Oneness: A History of the True Church of Jesus Christ (Hazelwood, Mo.: Word Aflame Press, 1979).

4Frank J.Ewart, The Revelation of Jesus Christ (St. Louis: Pentecostal Publishing House, 1965), pp. 26-27. See also S. C. McClain, Student's Handbook on the Facts of Church History (St. Louis: Pentecostal Publishing House, n.d.).

5Carl Brumback, Suddenly from Heaven (Springfield, Mo.: Gospel Publishing House, 1961), p. 203.

6Ibid., p. 202.

7G. T. Haywood, The Victim of the Flaming Sword (Indianapolis: Christ Temple, n.d.), pp. 46-48.

8Andrew D. Urshan, The Life of Andrew Bar David Urshan: An Autobiography (Stockton, Ca.: Apostolic Press, 1967), p. 137.

9Ewart, The Revelation, p. 15.

10Ibid., p. 10.

11Compare McAlister's view with that of William Phillips Hall, Remarkable Biblical Discovery Of "The Name" of God According to the Scriptures, 3rd ed., (New York: American Tract Society, 1931).

12David A. Reed, "Origins and Developments of the Theology of Oneness Pentecostalism in the United States" (Ph.D. dissertation, Boston University, 1978), p. 150.

13See Haywood, Divine Names, Ewart, The Revelation, Andrew D. Urshan, The Almighty God in the Lord Jesus Christ (Portland, Ore.: Apostolic Book Corner, 1919).

14Haywood, Divine Names, pp. 6-8.

15Ibid., p. 9.

16Ibid., p. 10. Here Haywood lists five Old Testament instances of the "withholding" of the divine name: Jacob wrestling with the angel and his desire to know God's secret name, the annunciation of Samuel's birth and Manoah's desire to know the secret name, God's insufficient reply to Moses' request to know his name ("I am that I am"), Isaiah's insufficient titles for the Messianic king (Isaiah 9:6), and the mysterious "Angel of the Lord" in whom God's name dwells (Exodus 23:21).

17Ibid., p. 11.

18Ibid., p. 3.

19Ewart, The Revelation, p. 26.

20Haywood, The Victim, p. 58.

21Ewart, The Revelation, p. 7.

22Kenneth V. Reeves, The Godhead (Granite City, Ill.: By the Author, 1971), p. 6.

23This attack diminishes amidst the similar non- biblical language of Oneness believers: "manifestations," "tri-unity," "three-in-one," "three-one God." Ewart calls on all in the debate to "dismiss unscriptural words" and "use 'tri-unity' instead of 'trinity,' 'substance' instead of 'person,' and 'entities' instead of 'persons'" (See Ewart, The Revelation, p. 25). The fact that Ewart fails to perceive the contradiction of his proposals captures much of the quality of the New Issue debate.

24Haywood, The Victim, p. 55.

25Ewart, The Revelation, p. 14.

26Haywood, The Victim, p. 12.

27Ewart, The Revelation, p. 18.

28Haywood, Divine Names, p. 12.

29Several Oneness thinkers realized the impact that this teaching might have on the doctrine of God's transcendence (e.g., Haywood, The Victim, p. 16; Paul Fergeson, God In Christ Jesus, (Elgin, Ill.: Real Truth Publications, 1963), p. 21; and Melvin R. Springfield, Jesus—The Almighty (Portland, Ore.: By the Author, 1972), pp. 24-25). But these all perceive the problem in purely spatial terms and therefore offer no real solutions.

30Note Haywood's reinterpretation of the event of incarnation as the depositing of the divine name within the womb of Mary. Thus, the supreme function of Christ was as bearer of the divine name, the ultimate act of revelation. See Haywood, Divine Names, pp. 10-11.

31Haywood, The Victim, pp. 51-54.

32Later Oneness thinkers sometimes revised this definition of the Father to avoid any denial of divine transcendence. Fergeson, God In Christ Jesus, p. 21 states that "The Father was the divinity which was not incarnate in contrast to the visible image which was." Reeves, The Godhead, p. 5 argues that "The omnipresence of the Son is the Father." But this retreat from the "absolute deity" of Christ undermines the appeal to John 14:10 and the Father- Son Christology and therefore limits rather than aids the Oneness presentation.

33Reed, "Origins and Developments," pp. 163-64.

34A clear Nestorian tendency permeates this Christology.

35S. G. Norris, The Mighty God in Christ (St. Paul: Apostolic Bible Institute, n.d.), p. 20.

36Oliver F. Fauss, Buy the Truth and Sell It Not (St. Louis: Pentecostal Publishing House, 1965), p. 23.

37Fergeson, God In Christ Jesus, p. 17.

38Fauss, Buy the Truth, p. 31.

39Haywood, The Victim, p. 45.

40Ibid., p. 48.

41Fauss, Buy the Truth, p. 41.

42Haywood, The Victim, p. 44.

43Ewart, The Revelation, p. 34.

44Urshan, The Almighty God, p. 22.

45Reed, "Origins and Developments," p. 167.

46Fauss, Buy the Truth, p. 6.

47G. T. Haywood, The Birth of the Spirit and the Mystery of the Godhead, (Indianapolis: Christ Temple, n.d.), p. 5.

48Ibid., p. 4.

49Assemblies of God, Minutes of the General Council, 1916, pp. 10-11. (Typewritten.)

50Ibid., p. 11.

51Adam Clarke, The Holy Bible: A Commentary, Vol. V (Matthew to Romans) (New York: Funk and Wagnall's, n.d.). (This work is not paginated.)

52The term "full salvation" differentiates the full Acts 2:38 experience from lesser, and therefore inferior and insufficient, experiences.

53Haywood, The Birth of the Spirit, p. 24.

54Norris, The Mighty God in Christ, p. 26.

55Haywood, The Birth of the Spirit, pp. 10-11.

56Ibid., p. 12.

57Fred J. Foster, Their Story: Twentieth Century Pentecostals (Hazelwood, Mo.: Word Aflame Press, 1981), pp. 143-144.

58Urshan, The Almighty God, p. 21.

59Ewart, The Revelation, p. 42.

1 comment:

  1. Radical "holiness" three-step oneness pentecostalism definitely seemed a "line upon line" progression to its present incarnation. What have you researched on the "uncut women's hair or hell" position in the early 20th century, let's say 1920s-1950s? I haven't researched it deeply, but I'm going to presume that this sprang from societal mores regarding the "flapper" of the 1920s, but I don't think this was fully articulated into a "heaven or hell" issue until Murray Burr's mid-1950s "No Bobbed Hair in the Bride" article in the Pentecostal Herald. Oscar Vouga and LH Hardwick stated that the article "was not worth the paper it was written on." My impression is their sentiment was not an organizational carryover--a PCI-PAJC conflict, but ministers across PAJC/PCI lines in the infant UPC looked askance at Burr's position. Of course, many were all too happy to accept it. Rather odd to include a "holiness" issue with a study of salvation, but the radical "three steppers" have made it a salvation issue, thus it becomes soteriological.

    Hair and three-step salvation doctrine are intertwined. Just as HR Haldeman claimed that "without Vietnam, there would be no Watergate," without three-step doctrine, there would be no uncut-hair-or-hell.

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