Church history (was "Rings with a twist")

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> 	I thought the biggest group that we split from was 
> the Pentecostal assemblies of the world?  I am asking this honestly
> because I really thought that was one of the first oneness groups.

My church history is a little fuzzy right now, but In The Begining, the
Oneness Pentecostal movement was fairly united, as were Pentecostals in
general.

Pentecost started out as an effort at revival within the established
denominations, kind of like Promise Keepers today.  But the established
denominations soon let them know that their "new-fangled" spirit
baptism stuff wasn't welcome in their churches, so they organized their
own club.  The Nazarene Church, for example, used to be called the
Pentecostal Nazarene Church, but they changed their name to avoid any
association with them loonies swinging from the chandaliers!

Then the deal about the "New Issue" of Jesus-name baptism came up; that
caused a big stink which culminated in the AofG voting on the issue and
affirming the doctrine of the trinity and continued use of the
traditional "Father, Son, H.G." formula of baptism.  The "Jesus-name"
folks left and formed their own organizations.

Sadly, after a while these groups split along racial lines (most of the
conferences were in the North, which was convenient for the white
ministers -- most of who lived in the North -- but inconvenient for the
often poorer black ministers -- most of who lived in the South at the
time).  To the credit of the ministry, there have been a few
experiments at organizational unity, but these things have (so far) not
worked out.

My own fuzzy recollection from reading the history books...

Richard M.