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The result of the
organization, however, was a split in the Pentecostal movement between Azuza Street and Parham. That is always the result of an
organization. Organizations and structural governments are always advocated
as the answer to "divisions" in the church; but in fact they are
generally the recognition of a division which already exist; but if no
division exist, the organization or government will create one. One side of
an issue or question will try to seize the governmental apparatus for itself,
as will certain informal associations which already exist, but which are not
threatening to anyone until there is a power mechanism by which it can use to
dominate other groups within the body of a movement. When almost everyone at
the beginning of the Pentecostal movement was against organization, how is it
that they so quickly became expert at organization. Those who met at Hot
Springs in 1914 unanimously passed a resolution against any attempt at a
Constitution or an organization, but less than two years later a "new
issue" had broken out. J. R. Flower the new leader of the Assembly of
God relates: We declared that we were
not a sect and not an organization, and then we turned right around and
organized. Whether we admit it or not we are in a measure a sect. but that
does not mean that we are going to have a sectarian spirit. But, as everyone familiar
with this group knows, they did have quiet a
sectarian spirit, and the very purpose for their organization was to crush
the views of their New Issue brethren. The old issue was the sanctification
schism, but the New Issue was baptism and the Godhead. The New Issue was strongest
in the Midwest. Now, Brother Sowders relates that the New Issue did have quiet a beneficial effect. Before the New Issue the
Pentecostals were not studying their Bible. They hardly knew their Bibles.
Everyone would gather together and read a scripture. And then they would
testify. They didn't study the Bible. They just read a few verses. Brother
Sowders, however, would read the Bible all the time. That's all he wanted to
do, beginning with his conversion. Because he had been reading and studying
in the Spirit he began to get revelation and understanding. But when he would
tell the others what he had gotten from the Lord, they weren't impressed,
because they were comfortable with the understanding that they had inherited
from Christian tradition, and with the new baptism they felt like they had it
all. So they would tell Brother Sowders that he was going into heresy. He was
so intimidated that he quit giving his revelations. But this caused him to loose his anointing. I would go down to our
little place of worship, and maybe one or two or three preachers would be
down there. Every morning at nine o'clock we went into that place for prayer.
I would always have a revelation that I would spring when I got down there.
"Brethren, do you know that you are flesh of my flesh, and bone of my
bone?" They would think, "He is going off into heresy as sure as
you live." I would get another revelation," Say, do you know when
the blood is applied?" And I would tell them when the blood was applied.
And get a rebuking. It got to where I quit reading the Bible. I said, Lord, I
can't see anything else; and what is the use of me reading the Bible when all
these preachers are against me?" I was walking in the Spirit and living
in the Spirit day and night. "Lord, I'm not going to read the Bible
anymore because I am so different from these other preachers, and they are
falling out with me. They are turning against me." And the Spirit left
me. (See, I used that to show you how I was walking in the Spirit.) And I
knew when the Spirit left me. I knew when that covering was pulled off me. I
went home and went down before God saying, "Oh God! Why have you left
me? Why have you forsaken me?" I couldn't pray any more in the Spirit.
"What is the matter, Lord?" One night I was out in
the dark in the back yard praying; and I said, "Lord, tell me so I can
get this thing right, and get back into the Spirit." Right out of a
dark, dark sky the Lord said, "You won't take the word of God as I give
it to you! You want to be like men!" When he said that, I said,
"From now on Lord, I will be just exactly what you want me to be."
When I said that I jumped up in the air and the power of God came as mighty
lighting from heaven." From that night on I never asked one of those
precious men about it. I just held my head up, and went on, and took what God
gave me, and gave it out....Praise his dear name. In the beginning when all
the Pentecostals were hungry for the Lord, a common greeting would be,
"What new revelation have you received from the Lord?" You weren't
very spiritual if you didn't have some new insight or revelation. But after
the organizations got to work, revelations became something of a scandal. To
defend themselves the New Issue brethren really begin to study their Bible.
They also begin to study history. So, today, those with a Oneness background
are more studious than those from Trinitarian backgrounds. But neither of
these studied so hard as those at the School of the Prophets. The Oneness
brothers loved to come to the School of the Prophets because they were
allowed to preach their doctrine whereas most others who weren't Oneness
closed their pulpits to them. Without revelations, God's people perish. When
the organizations started to harden their creeds, revelations started
disappearing. Except in Southern Illinois. There in "Little Egypt."
If God's people were going to get fed they had to go there, where Joseph had
plenty of grain. But that is how God brought his people together. The Evangelist One of the things which his
enemies used to attack him was that Brother Sowders refused evangelism. It
was not that Brother Sowders was against evangelism. To the contrary that is
what he wanted to become, just like Brother Knight. Also, he liked
evangelists, especially women evangelist, though he knew evangelism was a
problem. Once, he let Aimee Semple McPherson hold
him a revival. He believed that women were better evangelist if they were
called by God. But Brother Sowders was like Noah. God gave him instructions
to build an ark. When the ark was finished God would bring them in. But like
Noah, he had to endure a good deal of abuse. When I first started out
back there (in Evansville), Sister McPherson was an outstanding feature among
the women preachers. She was holding meetings that stirred the entire United
States. I had her to hold me a meeting one time. I wondered, if God did not
call women to preach, why was that woman having such success? Then, here
comes another woman along, and I watched her work. I read after her; read
some of her writings. Again, I thought, "Lord, You have called women to
preach." I have heard women say, "God has called me to
preach." But I was in doubt about it. God all the time was telling me
that the women would find their place. There was another one. I had her to
hold me a meeting. I have seen her walk right up to people with large goiters
on their neck, and that goiter vanish. Big goiters vanished right under her
hand. I have seen people all crippled up with rheumatism; and this one
particular man lived right across the street from me. He was helpless. That
man got on the platform and let this woman pray for him, and his hands flew
open and his legs limbered, and he ran and shouted and had a big time. There
was a woman all twisted up with rheumatism. This woman laid her hands on that
afflicted woman, and she ran up and down the aisles and had a big time. I
said, "Lord, you are in that. Men are not doing these things. Why do you
let women do it?" And the Lord said, "I am giving it to the women
because men have put them under their feet. I am letting women have it to
prove to the men that I will honor women as well as I will honor men."
That is very reasonable, isn't it? I thought, "Amen, Lord, if that be
the case surely then women will have a place in the church." And I saw
women put on white dresses and tried to do like these other women did. But
they couldn't do it, but just the women that God ordained to do that. Well, I
began to watch, then, praying much and reading the word of God; and I saw
plainly that God actually calls women to the ministry and makes preachers of
them. In all my ministry women have been used to a better advantage as a
general thing than men. Don't any of you brethren take offense at me! But you
can put a woman up to do things in the church, such as dealing with the
unsaved, and have better affect on them than a man. A woman can woo them. Not
from a natural standpoint. God forbid! I don't mean that at all. I mean in
making an appeal to the unsaved. Some how or other
they just melt under them; more so than they do to a man. Alright, we are
going to make an alter call. Come right on down here. Come right on down
here. Come right on down here, now. But the woman will say, "Won't you
please come. God bless your hearts. It is time to make an alter call. The
Lord Jesus died for you." I have seen too much. I have to believe my own
message if no one else believes it; because I watched the thing. The Pentecostal evangelist
had what they call the four-square gospel, which was formulated by A.B.
Simpson. Jesus was Savior, Healer, Sanctifier(baptism of the Holy Ghost), and
Coming King. So they preached old fashion salvation, healing, the baptism of
the Holy Ghost with speaking in tongues, and the return of Jesus. Just about
anyone led by the Lord could preach that. You didn't need a trained ministry.
Evangelists work with formulae like this; and you can use formulae to feed
babies. You can use some formula, like "seed faith", or
"prosperity", to build a great big religious empire. These are
easier to teach than the full gospel, so they work well when people only have
a little time and a little attention for the gospel. The School of the
Prophets Believing that the women
could do as well as he could at saving individual souls, Brother Sowders came
to understand that the Lord called him to start a school. Because he didn't
have a formula. Those expecting a formula find it disconcerting to find out
what the body of Christ is. They expect to find it summed up in a creed, or
in a long confessional statement. But it would be "Line upon line, and
precept upon precept." Jesus spent quiet a bit
of time with his disciples before he sent them out to preach the good news
that the Kingdom of God was near. By the time of the great experience on the
day of Pentecost they had received a lot more, and they continued to advance
the truth even after the day of Pentecost. That's what they spent most of
those early years at Jerusalem. They weren't just afraid or lazy; but they
were teaching the ways of God to all those converts on the day of Pentecost;
and no doubt they were all learning from one another. Paul didn't immediately
go out preaching, though he already had a lot of training in the Scriptures. The Puritans came to
America in the wake of the Reformation. The Protestants couldn't be saved by
all those Catholic sacraments -- the way we would say it today -- by being
good and going to church. They had to know what they believed, because they
believed that they were saved by believing the correct thing. That is what
was meant then by "justification by faith". They had endured
centuries of Catholic darkness, but now they had to educate a ministry, which
had to educate the people, so they would know enough to be saved. This is how
we got public schools. Even after the Reformation, the Puritans in England
had to endure the dumme dogges, who were prelates, bishops, and priests in
the Anglican Church. Those men were giving flowery sermons; not saying
anything that would feed the soul; but the Puritan ministers were making
sense out of the Scriptures. This infuriated the bishops, but they had a
King, who would harry the Puritans out of the land. The people, however, really
appreciated the Puritan ministers. A whole church in England would follow
their minister to America, and in New England they would all settle in one
town, and they laid out the town with the houses close to the church. They
had to walk a way to get to their fields; but this way they could all be
close to the church. They came over to Massachusetts and no sooner did they
get their log cabins up before they were cutting timbers for a Bible school
in which they would train the ministers, so that the new England would be a
"city on a hill" as a "light for the nations". The Bible
school was called Harvard College. Before long, it became too liberal for
some, so they built another one called Yale; and that one got too liberal so
they built another one called Princeton; and that got too liberal so they
built another one called Westminster, and Fuller, and so on. (When Bible
schools are started as a reaction against liberalism, it isn't long before
they become liberal.) Before the Revolutionary War, and for a long time after
that all schools in America were run by the churches. The first public school
of any type was the University of Virginia started by Thomas Jefferson; and
he made provision for all the churches to build their own seminaries, which
the university would support. At that time, when the churches ran the
schools, the Americans, on the average, were the most educated people that
had ever lived since the beginning of time; but now we are far down the list
of nations. Princeton was started from
William Tennent's log college. Another name for it
was the School of the Prophets; and that name was also used for the ministers
who studied at Jonathan Edwards house; and later for those who studied at
Nathaniel Emmons house, where the New England theology was developed in the
Second Great Awakening. In those schools, Jonathan Edwards taught the
ministers that they should speak extemporaneously, and not read from a text.
To be able to do this and to really have something to say, you need a lot of
study. Parham called his school in Galena, Kansas the School of the Prophets.
God told Brother Sowders to call his school at Evansville and at Elco Hill, the School of the Prophets. After Brother Pennock met Brother Sowders, he also had a School of the
Prophets. I don't know if he adopted the name because of Brother Sowders, or
whether he continued the tradition from his days with Brother Parham in the
same town. |
