Gloria and I are both privileged to have had a very rich foundational Christian Heritage based on Gods Word through The Foursquare Gospel Church's solid as a rock beliefs of Jesus The Saviour - Jesus The Healer - Jesus The Baptizer in The Holy Spirit - Jesus The Soon Coming King.
Through these fundamentals we were able to appreciate the very Personal and Powerful relationship that was available to a believer.
Little did we know it at the time [early 1960's] but we were part of a renewal era where God was again restoring to His people a fresh and mighty move of the miraculous. Miracles were "the norm" and no catchers were part of the program, in actual fact we had never heard of such until our return from PNG in the late 70's.
The servants whom GOD was using at the time were held in suspicion and accusations deriding them was common, both through Christian and secular media.
Aime Semple MacPherson, Oral Roberts, T.L&Daisy Osborn were among those with whom we had a measure of exposure followed by others such as
A S Worley, Kenneth Hagin Snr. and the like, too numerous to mention.
So; on looking back we were highly privileged to commence our Christian walk in such an era with solid Biblical teaching and a move of GOD, the like we have not seen yet.
Those of that era were marked as the Pentecostals who were considered The Radicals of the church and were constantly berated as those of the devil, chandelier swingers or holy rollers but, The power of GOD was the norm.
People baptised in The Holy Spirit and speaking in tongues - as The Spirit gave utterance Acts 2:4
Miracles were the norm with not a catcher in sight ..Mark 16:17-18
The gifts of The Spirit were in constant operation within the meetings 1Cor. 12:4-11 and were subject to Biblical interpretation 1Cor.14:28 & 1Cor.5:19
This period resulted in two distinctions in The Body of Christ, those of the Pentecostal and the rest.
Due to this segregation and as a new convert my understanding of The Body of Christ was not active outside of The Pentecostal framework [regrettably, even today many Christians are locked into their particular denominational stream be it Mainstream, Pentecost or Charismatic] and it wasn't until our call to PNG that I became aware of the broader base that GOD works out of under the multiplicity of denominational frameworks.
This era continued during the early 60's through to the 70's and during which time The Spirit of God had found His way into some of the "mainstream" churches and as a result of that The Pentecostals became accepted and moderated their position to fit more comfortably with this continuance of such a move.
Charisma - charismatic became the softer version and outworking more acceptable to the mainstream denominations who had previously had a hard time of accepting anything so radical as The Pentecostals. REGRETTABLY, in my opinion, Pentecostals in adapting to acceptability became the tail that wags the dog rather than the dog that wags the tail, resulting in compromise and comfort to the point that much of the move of GOD in their midst was lost to the point of quenching the Spirit 1Thess.5:19 as pulpit ministry became more predominant at the expense of body ministry.
Even as I write now in 2013 Body Ministry in relation to exercising of the gifts [if in operation at all] has been subjected to requesting permission rather than responding to The Unction of The Holy Spirit.
However, small pockets within HIS BODY are finding again the liberty in which GOD desires His Body to function 2Cor.3:17 & John 8:36
Through these fundamentals we were able to appreciate the very Personal and Powerful relationship that was available to a believer.
Little did we know it at the time [early 1960's] but we were part of a renewal era where God was again restoring to His people a fresh and mighty move of the miraculous. Miracles were "the norm" and no catchers were part of the program, in actual fact we had never heard of such until our return from PNG in the late 70's.
The servants whom GOD was using at the time were held in suspicion and accusations deriding them was common, both through Christian and secular media.
Aime Semple MacPherson, Oral Roberts, T.L&Daisy Osborn were among those with whom we had a measure of exposure followed by others such as
A S Worley, Kenneth Hagin Snr. and the like, too numerous to mention.
So; on looking back we were highly privileged to commence our Christian walk in such an era with solid Biblical teaching and a move of GOD, the like we have not seen yet.
Those of that era were marked as the Pentecostals who were considered The Radicals of the church and were constantly berated as those of the devil, chandelier swingers or holy rollers but, The power of GOD was the norm.
People baptised in The Holy Spirit and speaking in tongues - as The Spirit gave utterance Acts 2:4
Miracles were the norm with not a catcher in sight ..Mark 16:17-18
The gifts of The Spirit were in constant operation within the meetings 1Cor. 12:4-11 and were subject to Biblical interpretation 1Cor.14:28 & 1Cor.5:19
This period resulted in two distinctions in The Body of Christ, those of the Pentecostal and the rest.
Due to this segregation and as a new convert my understanding of The Body of Christ was not active outside of The Pentecostal framework [regrettably, even today many Christians are locked into their particular denominational stream be it Mainstream, Pentecost or Charismatic] and it wasn't until our call to PNG that I became aware of the broader base that GOD works out of under the multiplicity of denominational frameworks.
This era continued during the early 60's through to the 70's and during which time The Spirit of God had found His way into some of the "mainstream" churches and as a result of that The Pentecostals became accepted and moderated their position to fit more comfortably with this continuance of such a move.
Charisma - charismatic became the softer version and outworking more acceptable to the mainstream denominations who had previously had a hard time of accepting anything so radical as The Pentecostals. REGRETTABLY, in my opinion, Pentecostals in adapting to acceptability became the tail that wags the dog rather than the dog that wags the tail, resulting in compromise and comfort to the point that much of the move of GOD in their midst was lost to the point of quenching the Spirit 1Thess.5:19 as pulpit ministry became more predominant at the expense of body ministry.
Even as I write now in 2013 Body Ministry in relation to exercising of the gifts [if in operation at all] has been subjected to requesting permission rather than responding to The Unction of The Holy Spirit.
However, small pockets within HIS BODY are finding again the liberty in which GOD desires His Body to function 2Cor.3:17 & John 8:36