Generally, Pentecostal spirituality of today is healthy, but not so vibrant, expressive and with less real personalized live experience and the outpouring of the Holy Spirit as encountered in the first outburst of Pentecostalism of the early 1900s!
In fact many of the established Pentecostals had institutionalized their organizations in the manner of worships, prayers, spiritual discernments and the manifestation of the Holy Spirit in tongues.
The fire of evangelism was not as fervent as in the 1st wave for the early Pentecostals were strongly convicted of the eschatology of the last days of the second coming of Christ.
Congregations of today are less passionate in committing their all to evangelism and sacrificing their haves for God’s kingdom.
Phenomenal outburst and great revivals are less heard of in the present days especially in the interpretation of tongues.
The present socio status and the upbringing of the young generation with no knowledge and experience of hardship, is in no way prepared to make great personal sacrifices for the kingdom of God.
In conclusion there is no significant cutting edge of Pentecostal spirituality of today but with the recent tsunamis politically, economically and the natural calamities which may be construed as God’s hand in shaking the world globally are awakening the people of the second coming of the Lord.
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Hi Mike,
ReplyDeleteWelcome to the group! My first comment is that you said Pentecostals are generally healthy but from your article presented it speaks otherwise. Nevertheless I agree with your comment that it has loss the touch of yester-years. Post-modernism thoughts have infiltrated into church-life and posted great danger and threat to Pentecostal-Christians today. The me-centered feeling or feel-good has caused many Pentecostal churches to loose interest on lost-souls, missions and altered many church-centered activities. What would you suggest can help to arrest the rot in such a situation?
you mentioned: Generally, Pentecostal spirituality of today is healthy, but not so vibrant, expressive and with less real personalized live experience and the outpouring of the Holy Spirit as encountered in the first outburst of Pentecostalism of the early 1900s!
ReplyDeleteWhat do you mean by healthy yet not vibrant? please explain
secondly How then can you revive the vibrancy of Pentecostalism in your own local churches and bring it to a cutting edge leval?
thirdly is the cutting edge term for Pentecostal SPirituality a possibility or it may not be possible in our generation?
Hi Mike,
ReplyDeleteJust to ask for your opinion, is your article adressed more to Malaysia only or does it apply globally? if taking it globally, would you say that pentecostal spirituality is healthy, vibrant, cutting-edge or not?
Hi Mike,
ReplyDeleteYou have stated "Generally, Pentecostal spirituality of today is healthy, but not so vibrant, expressive and with less real personalized live experience and the outpouring of the Holy Spirit as encountered in the first outburst of Pentecostalism of the early 1900s!"
Well, the way you put it doesn't it sounds degrading in itself? Do you think that if we maintain this kind of level of spirituality it will sooner degrade and therefore it will not be healthy in the years to come? To what extend by saying less vibrancy, expressiveness with less real live experience are you talking about(how do you weigh)?:)
Quote:
ReplyDeleteThe present socio status and the upbringing of the young generation with no knowledge and experience of hardship, is in no way prepared to make great personal sacrifices for the kingdom of God.
In other words, would I be right be saying that in order to prepare the younger generation to make great personal sacrifices for the Kingdom of God, we must make them experience hardship? I believe that the times have changed from the past. What then, would be your measure of 'hardship' for them? In other words, how would we prepare these Pentecostal next generation for the kingdom of God?
so structionalism is healthy? really?
ReplyDeleteI feel you do contradict yourself a little in what you rite, maybe its too brief. its hard to gather your thoughts through short snipets of your post. care to elaborate further on your point: In fact many of the established Pentecostals had institutionalized their organizations in the manner of worships, prayers, spiritual discernments and the manifestation of the Holy Spirit in tongues.
honestly it maybe be the early hours of the morning, but your post is contradictory in many ways, and it holds not enough information for us to understand and weare infering mening on you which is dangerous. please care to elaborae your thoughts further
Hi Freddie,
ReplyDeleteI think it is healthy but not vibrant.The state of affairs for modern Pentecostals may not deem to be rotting but may open the doors for their believers to loose part or more of their first love for God, and also that of the burning fire & passion for spiritualism which were fervently taking place in the inception of Pentecostalism of the early 1900s.
I believe there should be a paradigm shift for the Pentecostals to realign themselves in focusing their core activities surrendering totally their spirituality to the Spirit, in areas of sanctification, holiness, worship, prayer, and fervently seeking for the gifts of the Spirit. They are to be more sensitive to the moving of the Spirit and allowing flexibility in the outpouring of the spirits which appears to be not strictly adherent to the laid out procedures. Rekindle the fire for the baptism of the Spirit, the burning desires for missions and evangelism. There should not be great concern of stumbling new believers of the "unconventional forms of vocal worship" and be less compromising with the temptations of materialism, modernism and contentment.
Jase
ReplyDeleteIt applies as a whole, globally and domestically.
The vibrancy and the cutting of edges are applicable more for the established Pentecostals and of the developed countries.
Lionel
ReplyDeleteWhat do you mean by structionalism?
Bryan
ReplyDeleteI agree with you that present times have changed greatly from the past as discipline was the order of the day when the young respected the elders with fear and unquestioned obedience. The present generation is blessed by their parents with love and are spared of the hardship that the latter have experienced. Thus without any of the hardship experience the present generations will be ill-prepared when they are exposed to challenges and sacrifices in the mission fields especially in third world countries. This would be different if they have voluntarily gone into it at early ages and are filled with great compassion for those who have not heard of the Gospel.
Kenrick
ReplyDeleteIt is vibrant as the days of old when many were truly filled with the Holy Spirit with individual experience. People were flocking to places of revival with many venturing to mission fields as they were on fire for evangelism and convicted of the eschatological urgency to witness before the second coming of Jesus Christ.
My view of less vibrancy comes from the contentment, materialism, church growth merely numerically instead of growth from the conviction by the Spirit, the outpouring of the spiritual gifts that impact the transformation of God's people. Submission to the spirit through His channels even by the leadership may at times constrained with some Pentecostals instituting the procedures thus limiting the outflow of the Spirit. I believe that there is no prominent degrading in the level of spirituality compared with that of the 1st wave of Pentecostalism.
Charity
ReplyDeleteSpirituality is alive! but its growth is not as vibrant as of the early days in the 1900s.The pulse of vibrancy can be regenerated with the rekindling of the fire of the Spirit, yielding our all and allowing the Spirit to work in us as His vessels. Let us die to self, pray for spiritual gifts to revitalize more of the present level of spirituality. It can be a cutting edge for present generation if the Pentecostal leadership can forge in unity corporately in seeing it through with prayers and fervent seeking of the Spirit.
How can we leaders forge in unity ...
ReplyDeletewhen so many of us pentecostals leaders have different stands in pentecostalism...
SHould we have like a standard formula to be a Penetcostal then maybe we can unite and then revive the church together
Hi Mike,
ReplyDeleteI'm really trying to understand you point of view, but I'm a bit confused. You replied:
"My view of less vibrancy comes from the contentment, materialism, church growth merely numerically instead of growth from the conviction by the Spirit, the outpouring of the spiritual gifts that impact the transformation of God's people. Submission to the spirit through His channels even by the leadership may at times constrained with some Pentecostals instituting the procedures thus limiting the outflow of the Spirit."
Meaning to say that with all this negative influences you've mentioned above did not really affect the spirituality of the church? Do you really think that the health of the church can still be maintain in such a state? Please clarify.
Hi Mike,
ReplyDeleteThanks for reply. I am in agreement to your opinion on a paradigm shift back to the purpose of Pentecostalism of the early years. But I find it difficult to understand your point on the the church today is still healthy and yet not vibrant. Does not these two inseparable?
This was your post:
ReplyDeleteGenerally, Pentecostal spirituality of today is healthy, but not so vibrant, expressive and with less real personalized live experience and the outpouring of the Holy Spirit as encountered in the first outburst of Pentecostalism of the early 1900s!
In fact many of the established Pentecostals had institutionalized their organizations in the manner of worships, prayers, spiritual discernments and the manifestation of the Holy Spirit in tongues.
Well not only is it very disjointed, but it says that the strutural organisation of the Pentecostal movement is healthy. please clarify.
And on the side the post was very disjointed and hard to grasp.
Quote:
ReplyDeleteGenerally, Pentecostal spirituality of today is healthy, but not so vibrant, expressive and with less real personalized live experience and the outpouring of the Holy Spirit as encountered in the first outburst of Pentecostalism of the early 1900s!
Would a less real personalized live experience and the outpouring of the Holy Spirit be an indicator of Pentecostalism being healthy? Quite to the contrary, wouldn't it show that it is actually becoming unhealthy?
Hi Mike,
ReplyDeleteYou make an interesting comment on the younger generation who do not know the real meaning of hardship and are not prepared to make sacrifices for the Kingdom of God. In your opinion besides parents who love and spoil their children, what other reasons do you think has caused the younger generation to become lukewarm and complacent spiritually?
Are there differences among your church leaders? If there are, so no unity lah?
ReplyDeleteIdeally we should have one but would it work?
Freddie
ReplyDeleteIt is only generally or satisfactorily healthy but less vibrant. Agree with you if indifference is to prevail, it would lead to it being unhealthy.
Bryan Boo
ReplyDeleteThey are not indicators of Pentecostal spirituality being healthy but adverse factors affecting its vibrancy
Thank you for the judgmental view of the posting of being disjointed and hard to grasp.
ReplyDeletePerhaps the first word of the post, 'GENERALLY' might not sink into you that Pentecostal spirituality was healthy in GENERAL or SATISFACTORILY healthy. There would be no end in its clarification if this does not seem to be satisfactory. It was never said that what were being structured were healthy but it only affected the vibrancy of spirituality.