Apostolic Faith Missions

And the So-Called Second Pentecost

IN the month of April, 1906, a little band composed chiefly of colored people were praying together in a mission-hall on Azusa Street in Los Angeles, Cal. Some of them had heard of a recent peculiar happening in Kansas where a strange power had taken possession of a man, and he had been apparently made to speak in “tongues.” Day after day and night after night these people, who thought they recognized in this a sign of a second Pentecost, cried earnestly to God for a similar manifestation, and at last the “power” fell. One by one they were taken possession of by a superhuman energy that made them at times insensible to all around, and caused them to pour forth a torrent of strange sounds, often monosyllabic gibberish; and again somewhat connected expressions that seemed to be in strange languages. Their joy knew no bounds. To them had been committed, so they believed, the ushering in of the “Latter Rain” dispensation—the final Pentecost to close up the present age.