A History of Christian Doctrine #3 - Online Christian Library

A History of Christian Doctrine
and held at Arroyo Seco near Los Angeles, on a campground
used by the Azusa Street Mission. The month-long
meeting began on April 15, 1913, and perhaps two thousand
people attended.
The main speaker was Maria Woodworth-Etter (1844-
1924), a well-known Holiness evangelist who had
embraced the Pentecostal message. Expectations were
high, and they were fulfilled, for 364 people received the
Holy Spirit. Many miracles of healing took place as
Woodworth-Etter prayed “in the name of Jesus.”
Of particular significance to the future of Oneness
Pentecostalism was the message of Robert E. McAlister
(1880-1953), a Canadian preacher who had received the
Holy Spirit at Azusa Street in 1906. Speaking at a baptismal
service, he explained that single immersion was
the proper mode for baptism, not triple immersion as
some people practiced. As proof he cited the baptismal
accounts in the Book of Acts. The apostles baptized in the
name of the Lord Jesus Christ; they never baptized using
the words “Father, Son, and Holy Ghost,” as triple immersion
requires.
At this, “an inaudible shudder” swept over the congregation,
and McAlister fell momentarily silent. 66 A missionary
to China named Frank Denny leaped to the
platform, pulled McAlister aside and asked him not to
teach this doctrine, because it would associate him with a
certain minister named Sykes who was currently baptizing
in that manner. (See chapter 1.) McAlister then
explained that it was not wrong to baptize using the
words of Matthew 28:19.
McAlister’s observation that the apostles always baptized
in Jesus’ name planted a seed in the minds of sev-
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