Pentecost. & Dispen. Teach.

Pentecostalism and Dispensational Teaching

Excerpted from "Dispensationalism and the Everlasting Gospel"

The Pentecostal faith was drawn from Millennialist aspirations. Two substantive issues provided the impetus for these hopes. On one side was the ominous threat posed to the American culture by Modernism. On the other, was the spiritual condition of the main-line churches. John N. Darby in the late 1800s called conservatives to leave the mainline denominations because he viewed them as apostate. At the turn of the 20th century, the world was experiencing the onslaught of advancing secularism brought on by the Enlightenment. German rationalism attacked the inspiration of Scripture. Freud was advancing a radical view of human nature contrary to that of the Bible. Science was seen as a rival authority to religion in answering life's questions. Darwinism was presented as a replacement for supernatural Creation. Accelerated technological advancement created a confidence in human ability and potential, leaving less room for dependence on supernatural assistance. Industrialism, borne out of esteem for hard work and material success, challenged populist Christian values. The social pessimism that followed the Civil War created a "widespread loss of confidence in the powers of community."

"Wiebe describes the zeitgeist, specifying how "countless citizens in towns and cities across the land sensed that something fundamentally was happening to their lives, something they did not want, they responded by striking out at whatever enemies their view of the world allowed them to see." [Randall J. Stephens, More Recovered: A Review of Recent Historical Literature on Evangelicalism in the Late Victorian Era, Quodlibet Online Journal of Christian Theology and Philosophy, Winter 2001 Issue, p. 4, Accessed 18 June 2001 At: http://www.quodlibet.net/stephens-victorian.shtml]

The Civil War all but destroyed the mainline denomination's post-millennial optimism and confidence that Christianity would advance until the whole world was converted and the Kingdom of Christ was ushered in. Modernism offered a humanistic approach to a better life now, as a substitute for the Christian hope of suffering now for other-worldly or eternal life. One of the results of this cultural shift in America was that most mainline denominations (because of the post-millennial paradigm) embraced Modernism in the form of Christian Liberalism.

"These Protestants attempted to find new interpretations of religious experience and an understanding of history that could accommodate the implications of the theory of evolution and discoveries in psychology, archaeology, and ancient history." ["Modernism (religion)," Microsoft® Encarta® Encyclopedia 2000. © 1993-1999 Microsoft Corporation. All rights reserved.]

This was done partly because it was believed that the tools of Modernism could be used to produce the Kingdom of Christ on the earth. Other liberals abandoned hope of "pie-in-the-sky" and saw fulfillment in Christ as "this worldly." Thus, the Social Gospel replaced THE Gospel as was traditionally held by orthodox evangelical Christians. At this time, J. Gresham Machen, who left Princeton and founded Westminster Theological Seminary, wrote his famous book Christianity & Liberalism. He denounced the accommodation of mainline churches to Modernism, defending orthodox Christianity and the Gospel. From this Modernist controversy, Fundamentalism emerged as a violent reaction to Modernism and Theological Liberalism. Fundamentalists saw the mainline denominations as compromising the Gospel to the secular world through liberalism. They believed that these denominations were apostate and called for the ouster of liberal theologians and leaders from orthodox Protestantism.

Pentecostalism and Fundamentalism were sibling branches of conservative Protestantism. Their roots overlapped and intertwined. They were both deeply troubled by the impact of secularism on America and their churches. Both saw the beginning of the twentieth century as a time of great crisis for the American culture. Rather than hope in a reformation of the visible culture or the conversion of American society, they looked for God to end the present era of time in judgment, and usher in His millennial Kingdom on the Earth. Thus, premillenialism became a way of understanding the place of the Church in chaotic times:

"Evangelicals, now prone to see history spiraling into chaos and destruction before Jesus' return, widely accepted the theology of premillenialism." [Stephens, Op. Cit., p. 4.]

Whereas Fundamentalists fought against Modern Science and the intellectual issues of the culture, Pentecostals were Christians of simpler means and were not motivated to give intellectual answers to the threat of Modernism. Rather, being descendants of revivalistic and pietistic groups, they sought assurance in experience and personal piety. Their particular answer took the form of an individual, personal, ecstatic experience of the Holy Spirit, which to them, signaled the imminent return of Christ, and the end of the world in its present state:

"Some turned inward, losing interest in societal reform, some flocked to the countless new Holiness and Pentecostal sects, others practiced and promoted a religion of the Holy Spirit (advocating healing of the body and soul)." [Stephens, Op. Cit., p. 4.]

Rather than challenge the skeptics with biblical arguments, Pentecostals sought to transcend the debate by claiming an irrefutable experience as confirming the Bible. They denounced skepticism and retreated from secular society or the "world." Theirs was a mystic reaction to the threat of the world. Rather than embrace Modernism, as did Liberalism, or fight Modernism for the minds of the culture, as did Fundamentalism, Pentecostals looked to escape Modernism's advance by obtaining, what they termed, the promised outpouring of the Spirit on the Church. This would herald the end of the culture, the Judgment of God, and usher in the Second Coming of Christ.

From their reading of Scripture, Pentecostals determined that Christ could not return until the "everlasting gospel" (Rev. 14:6-7) or "full" Gospel, was preached to the whole world. Pentecostals saw their mission as two-fold: 1.) Preach the gospel to the whole world; 2.) Announce the Second Coming of Christ. They concluded that the weak spiritual condition of the visible Church was the reason the gospel had not reached the whole world. The Church was considered too spiritually impoverished to fulfill its mission. Logically, they asserted that the Church had to be restored before it could obey Christ's call to take his gospel to the whole world. Thus, Pentecostalism was driven irresistibly by a restorationist yearning and mind set.

Latter Rain

In holding to both restorationism and dispensationalism, Pentecostals had to face conflicting ideas. Dispensationalism taught that the gifts such as prophecy and speaking with tongues were not for this latter part of the Church Age. These, in stark contrast, were the hallmarks of Pentecostal distinctives. This forced Pentecostals to modify their dispensationalism to fit their Pentecostal experience and faith. This was accomplished through the use of what is called the "Latter Rain" motif.

"While they unquestioningly embraced most of Darby's view of history, early Pentecostals rejected his insistence that the "gifts" had been withdrawn. They introduced into his system their own dispensational setting where the gifts could again operate in the church: The device through which they legitimated those gifts was their teaching on the latter rain." [Edith L. Blumhofer, The Assemblies of God: A Chapter in the Story of American Pentecostalism, Vol. 1 – To 1941, (Springfield, MO: Gospel Publishing House, 1989), p. 153.]

"Latter Rain" was one of the chief metaphors from restorationism adopted by Pentecostals. Taken from Deuteronomy 11:10-15, the "latter rain" was the promise of Yahweh, that, if Israel would serve Him with all their heart and soul, He would give them rain for their land in its seasons. This included both the "early" and the "latter rain." The result would be a bountiful harvest. Holiness-Pentecostals saw this as a Old Testament type for the Church. If the Church was truly serving God with all its heart and soul, God would give them a spiritual latter rain or revival. Some taught that the latter rain would match the first or early rain in intensity. Since they interpreted the Book of Acts as recording the "early rain" of the Holy Spirit upon the earliest Church, then the "latter rain" must logically be a recreation or recapitulation of the phenomena of the Book of Acts.

It was this teaching of the latter rain, and its Pentecostal implications, which separated most Pentecostals from Fundamentalists. "It was the Pentecostal view of their place in history that most basically set Pentecostals apart from most other Protestants." David Wesley Myland appears to be the first to articulate the importance of the latter rain concept in Pentecostal thought. His explanations, written in his book The Latter Rain Covenant (1910), became one of the first defenses of Pentecostalism within the Dispensational framework. While Pentecostals held to most of Scofield's dispensational scheme, Fundamentalists reacted quite vigorously to the Pentecostal distortion of it in the "latter rain" doctrine:

"Dispensationalism, as articulated by Scofield, understood the gifts of the Spirit to have been withdrawn from the Church. Rejecting the latter rain views by which Pentecostals legitimated their place in God's plan, dispensationalists effectively eliminated the biblical basis for Pentecostal theology; and although Pentecostals embraced most of Scofield's ideas (and enthusiastically promoted the Scofield Reference Bible in their periodicals), they remained irrevocably distanced from fundamentalists by their teaching on the place of spiritual gifts in the contemporary church." [Blumhofer, Ibid.]

The fact that Fundamentalist-Dispensationalist teachers rejected the Pentecostal modifications, does not change the fact that their system of interpreting biblical history played a major role at the inception of Pentecostal eschatological thought. If the Kingdom of God was to come, it would not be through the present apostate Church. It would have to come through the work of a restored, apostolic Church, empowered by the "latter rain" outpouring of the Spirit. Then, enabled by the gifts of the Spirit, with manifestations of healing and power, this Church would be enabled to reach the whole world with the "full" Gospel.