Countdown to a Counterfeit

Azusa Street: Where it began

Biblical prophecy is crystal clear concerning spirituality and the last days on earth preceding the return of Jesus Christ: There will be no genuine global Christian revival that will begin via signs, wonders and miracles.

Nevertheless, there's a growing segment within the Christian Church that insists a great revival is coming. And despite what scripture says, they continue to predict that this revival is getting close.

First of all, why are some folks within the church predicting a revival? Because they have taken an ancient prophecy recorded by the prophet Joel out of context and have placed it in the very end times. 

Joel recorded his prophecy about 2,800 years ago. For the record, here are the words the Lord spoke to him: "In the last days, I will pour out my Spirit on all people. Your sons and daughters will prophecy, your young men will see visions, your old men will dream dreams. Even on my servants, both men and women, I will pour out my Spirit in those days, and they will prophecy. I will show wonders in the heaven above and signs on the earth below, blood and fire and billows of smoke. The sun will be turned to darkness and the moon to blood before the coming of the great and glorious day of the Lord. And everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved." (Joel 2:28-32)

What's the true meaning of this prophecy? This is a three-dimensional prophecy that speaks of three distinct time periods: The beginning at Pentecost, the beginning of the end during God's judgment of the earth and the very end when Christ returns.

The apostle Peter, who walked with Jesus Christ during Christ's ministry in Israel, understood Joel's prophecy. He recognized the fulfillment of the first part of that prophecy when Christ's 11 disciples had gathered one morning in an upper room in Jerusalem during Pentecost to choose a successor to Judas Iscariot who had betrayed and abandoned their Lord. 

While the disciples were meeting in that room, the Holy Spirit came upon them and they began praising God in different languages or tongues. Many of the people who were outside the building heard the men speaking in the strange tongues and thought that they had been drinking. Peter then spoke to the crowd and informed them that Joel's prophecy had begun to be fulfilled that day. 

From that day on, the Holy Spirit was appropriated to all people who confessed the name of Jesus Christ as Lord and received the Holy Spirit Baptism. And that special baptism brought the power of God into the lives of believers who used that power to spread the Gospel across the world.

Nevertheless, there are those who continue to insist that Joel's prophecy was meant for the very last days. And they insist that we're about to see an explosion of supernatural phenomena that will lead the world to Christ, and then the end will come.

Perhaps the father of end time global revivalism was a preacher named William Seymour who started the Apostolic Faith Mission on Azusa Street in Los Angeles during the early 20th century. Seymour was a student of a controversial and heretical preacher named Charles Parham who stressed that a person really wasn't baptized in the Holy Spirit unless he or she could speak in tongues.

Seymour became obsessed with Pentecostalism, or the necessity for Christians to speak in tongues or perform miracles. Seymour even claimed that God revealed to him that a great revival based upon miraculous signs would break out across the world beginning around 2009.  

Seymour's Apostolic Faith Mission gave birth to such movements as Latter Rain, the Kansas City Prophets, the Word of Faith Movement, the Third Wave Movement and the Vineyard Movement. These are just some of the movements that claim a great revival based upon supernatural events is destined to happen before Christ returns.

In fact, there is a revival coming. And in fact, it will be based upon miraculous signs and wonders. But what will be the spiritual source of this revival? 

In Part II, we'll examine this coming revival and its spiritual source.