The Charismatic movement in the sixties and the
seventies was like no other move of God. Each step of Pentecost
has had its own unique characteristics. One man did more during
this time than any other person. Demos Shakarian became a
facilitator of the Holy Ghost. He was the founder of the Full
Gospel Businessman’s Fellowship 
International. During the sixties these small groups of
men met at hotels around the country to introduce men to the
fullness of the Holy Spirit. It was a unique setting away from the
church. Many of the businessmen who attended these meetings were
already saved in their denominational church but in these settings
hundreds and thousands of individuals received the Pentecostal
infilling of the Holy
Ghost with speaking in tongues. The most
unusual thing about these events was that it introduced the
Baptism in the Holy Ghost into several areas of fundamental faith
where people were not friendly to that type of doctrine filled
with the Spirit of God. During this time there was a civil war of
the new doctrine in Baptist, Presbyterian and Catholic Churches.
The people in charge of these denominations very often found
themselves on the outside looking at what was happening to their
churches. The pastors who received the Baptism in these churches
during this time had two options, they could either take the
entire church into this move or completely separate from their
fundamental doctrine and start and independent work called
Charismatic Fellowships. Many people who left their fundamental
church escaped into the older established Pentecostal
denominations -- the Assemblies of God and the Church of God
received the bounty of this move of God. The older line Assemblies
and Church of God’s were in their third generation of Pentecost
and the fire for the infilling had fallen away. The Charismatic
people who came from he Episcopal, Baptist, Presbyterian and
Catholic denominations to go into the older line Pentecostal
denominations caused a flow of new blood in these churches and the
older line Pentecostal churches had a revival in the Spirit.
Pentecost was on a role with the expectations high.
Demos Sectarian was the secret agent of the Holy
Ghost, he set the table for more to receive. Eleven months after
Demos Shakarian started the Full Gospel Business Men’s Fellowship
34 years ago he was ready to give it up." "After a three and
one-half hour prayer, he had a vision from God. His wife
interpreted the vision and also the words he was hearing from God.
Shakarian, in Denver for a regional meeting of the Fellowship,
said in an interview that the vision showed him men of all nations
being spiritually awakened."
There were other during this time who crossed the
line of Pentecost to go into the other denominations. One of the
most fascinating individuals of the 1970’s was Kathryn Kulhman who
was in a class of her own during the 1970’s. She was fiery women
evangelist from Missouri who rocked the denominations during the
Charismatic Movement. She was gifted in the healing virtue of God
and maintained a fascination over the entire move of God at this
time. On the backside of the deserit in a small Pennsylvania town
she found herself with an unusual gift when she was teaching on
the gifts of the Spirit. A man in the back came to her after her
teaching and told her that he felt a burn go from the top of his
body to his toes while she was teaching, somehow I know that I’ve
been healed. It just didn’t end with this man as her fame as a
healer spread her meetings grew larger. She started with a radio
program in Oil City, Pennsylvania and grew until she could hold no
more people in her building. She moved to Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania
and held meeting at the Presbyterian Church in downtown
Pittsburgh.
Her meetings were powerful with a full choir
singing the Hallelujah Chores is two octaves. The glory would
begin to fall in her meeting and under the direction of the Holy
Ghost people were healed of cancers, blindness, heart disease and
several other illnesses during her time of service. She was
attacked by the media and religious churchmen who claimed her to
be a fraught but the evidence of her healings during service time
was too much to not notice. On young boy who was in the last
stages of a cancerous brain tumor was instantly healed at the
Presbyterian Church in Pittsburgh. Billy Burke was the boy that
was healed and he is actively in ministry today and has a church
in Tampa, Florida. Another memorable healing was the Fire Chief of
Houston, Texas. He came to Los Angeles in the last stages of
cancer and was pointed out in the upper deck of the Shrine
Auditorium in Los Angeles, California. As the gentleman stood up
he felt a burn go from his head to his toes and was completely
healed in an instant. These were the fascinating miracles that
marked her ministry that lasted until Kathryn Kuhlman died on
February 20, 1976. Oral Roberts was sitting by the side of her bed
when she passed. To read more about the Charismatics order The
Remnant, the record of revival by calling 888
755-9145.
LOS ANGELES, CA -- With a flair for
the dramatic which appealed to the movie capital of America in the
glamorous ‘roaring twenties’, Aimee Semple McPherson provided the
best show in town. And with her emphasis on divine healing — many
outstanding miracles were reported under her ministry — it wasn’t
surprising that she drew the
crowds.
People stood in
line for hours hoping for admission to the 5,300-seater Angeles
Temple where her illustrated sermons held audiences spellbound.
From relatively simple beginnings, such as when she dressed as
Little Bo Peep (seeking lost sheep), they grew to spectacular
productions involving the use of elaborate sets and full
orchestras. Having once been stopped by the police for speeding,
she appeared in the Temple on a motorbike dressed in a police
uniform, warning her hearers to stop speeding down the road to
hell! And on a night she announced a new illustrated sermon, the
city provided additional trolley cars and police to control
traffic.
Aimee
Semple McPherson was undoubtedly the most prominent woman leader
Pentecostalism has produced. A strikingly beautiful woman, she was
a colorful and, at times, controversial figure who won the hearts
of a whole generation of American Christians.
Essentially Pentecostal, preaching the ‘Four Square Gospel’ of
Jesus as Savior, Healer, Baptize, and Coming King, she
nevertheless appealed to Christians across the board. At a time
when Pentecostalism was in danger of becoming narrow and
separatist, Aimee used the popular idioms of the day to
communicate the gospel and, in an era devoted to vaudeville,
caught the public imagination. She was way ahead of her time and
also made extensive use of writing and broadcasting.
Born
Aimee Elizabeth Kennedy on a small farm near Ingersoll, Ontario,
Canada, in 1890, she was nurtured in the Christian faith by her
mother Minnie (at that time a Salvationist) and came to a personal
knowledge of Christ at 18 through Pentecostal evangelist Robert
Semple. After receiving the baptism in the Spirit, Aimee married
Robert and the young couple set about pioneering in Canada and the
USA.
Determined
to serve as ‘faith’ missionaries in China, the Semples reached
Hong Kong in June 1910 but within a few weeks Robert died of
malaria, leaving Aimee widowed with a newborn baby at the age of
20.
Recovering
from the shock, she returned to New York where she met and married
aspiring evangelist Harold McPherson. They toured together in
their ‘Gospel Car’ holding evangelistic campaigns. Harold acted as
the advance man while Aimee followed him up with her preaching —
and her striking presence, wonderful powers of communication and
emphasis on healing drew the crowds. In 1917 she launched ‘The
Bridal Call’, a monthly magazine in which she wrote many articles
expounding the essence of her teaching.
Unfortunately Aimee’s success strained her marriage beyond
redemption. Harold seemed unable to accept the fact that his
wife’s ministry far exceeded his own and left Aimee to pursue an
(unsuccessful) evangelistic career of his own. For her part it
appears that Aimee put her own call well before her duties as a
wife and the couple were divorced in 1921.
Dedicated, talented and energetic, and with a burning desire to
see the lost won for Christ, Aimee toured America. Known simply as
‘Sister’ to her many followers, she showed not only formidable
oratory in the pulpit but a deep compassion for people in all
walks of life. She would go anywhere — nightclubs, theatres, dance
halls, jails and even brothels — to tell people of the Savior.
There was no pleading, no fire and brimstone, no criticizing —
just a warm-hearted welcome from a woman who cared. Believing that
people who most needed the gospel were not likely to be found in
church, she visited red-light districts where she hugged, cried
and prayed with the women.
Settling in Los
Angeles, Aimee founded the International Church of the
Foursquare Gospel and the Angeles Temple was
dedicated in 1923. She became the first woman to receive a license
to operate a radio station, and programmers from the Temple
brought the gospel to thousands. (On a visit to Britain in 1928
she met the inventor Marconi and told him that God had raised him
up to enable the masses to hear the gospel.) Seeing the need for
training, she established the Lighthouse for International
Foursquare Evangelism (LIFE) Bible College and also
invested in foreign missions. But her later years were dogged by
controversy. Her mysterious disappearance, believed drowned, in
1926, gave rise to speculation of an affair with a former
employee. But in fact she had been kidnapped in Mexico and such
was the relief at having her back that 50,000 people lined the
streets to welcome her on her return to Los Angeles.
Nevertheless Aimee and her mother
were charged with perjury and ridiculed from pulpit to press.
Ultimately the charges were dropped and the district attorney who
instigated the case was himself sent to prison for
corruption.
A nervous breakdown in 1930 may have
precipitated a disastrous marriage to David L. Hutton in 1931
which alienated some of her contemporaries. But her tremendous
resilience prevailed and during the depression she met the
physical needs of over 1.5 million people regardless of race,
creed or color. A journalist sent to investigate relief efforts
reported, amidst much corruption among charitable organizations,
