the founder of the Metropolitan
Ecclesiastical Jurisdiction, the late
Bishop Benjamin J. Crouch, and
the late, Int'l Evangelist, Mother
Reatha Herndon.
The Church of God in Christ
Memphis, Tennessee to spread the Pentecostal fire in the Church of God in
Christ. Mason and the church he founded were made up of African-Americans
only one generation removed from slavery. (The parents of both Seymour and
Mason had been born as southern slaves).
Christ experienced such explosive growth that by 1993, it was by far the largest
Pentecostal denomination in North America, claiming some 5,500,000 members
in 15,300 local churches.
tongues experience at Azusa Street in 1907, he returned to Chicago, where he
led thousands of mid-western Americans and Canadians into the Pentecostal
movement. His "finished work" theology of gradual progressive sanctification,
which he announced in 1910, led to the formation of the Assemblies of God in
1914.
beginnings of the Assemblies of God was also partially a racial separation. In
time the Assemblies of God church was destined to become the largest
Pentecostal denominational church in the world, claiming by 1993 over
2,000,000 members in the U.S. and some 25,000,000 adherents in 150 nations of
the world
2004
