The Society for Pentecostal Studies , 40th Annual Meeting, hosted by Memphis Theological Seminary, and All Saints Bible College, Memphis, TN, March 10-12, 2011.
Memphis, Tennessee, the site of the 40th anniversary 2011 Society for Pentecostal Studies meeting, occupies a sacred place in Pentecostal history. It borders on Arkansas where the Assemblies of God were founded, Mississippi where the Church of God in Christ emerged, and is in Tennessee the home of the Church of God, Cleveland, all major contributors to the Pentecostal renewal in the Church. It is the home of the Church of God in Christ, it birthed the interracial ecumenical Pentecostal and Charismatic Churches of North America in 1994, and historic COGIC Mason Temple provided the venue for Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.’s speech the night before he died in 1968.
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Southern history, literature and culture have contributed unique dimensions to Pentecostal history and its missionary influence around the world.
Christians share 2000 years of history, blessed by the anointing of the Holy Spirit. This history also bears deep wounds of division. We, as scholars, serve to heal these divisions in response to Christ’s prayer that all may be one that the world might believe. (Jn 17) In our ministry to the Church, we draw on our variety of disciplines to receive the results of our reconciling scholarship on behalf of God’s future. We are informed by what the Spirit has done in the past, we serve to heal the memories that divide us, and embrace the future to which we are called.
The meeting will be an opportunity to stage research on and to listen to voices from the history of the Church, its long story of the Spirit’s work over two millennia, and the more recent Pentecostal renewal within that journey. It will be an opportunity to listen and learn from the anointed heritage of African American Pentecostalism within the wider ecumenical and Pentecostal movement. Plenary papers will focus on both the longer history and the specific histories that serve our reconciling ministry.
In the emerging global context of Pentecostalism, reconciling history serving racial, ecclesial and theological reconciliation have on their horizon all areas of the world, as well as all ages in the historical journey. One selected area will be a plenary focus, the Hispanic/Latin American context, in which Pentecostal reconciliation is particularly urgent and challenging, and which the Society, as primarily North American, has a special responsibility as scholars and believers.
We hope this meeting will be an opportunity to reflect, historically, on themes of the future and history, blessing and anointing, race and the unity of the human family, mission and common witness; from the standpoint of our variety of disciplines in service of the unity of the Church. It should outline the challenge to receive its painful and hopeful memories on behalf of a future committed to God’s transformation in the world. The meeting will be an occasion to suggest to one another scholarly directions that will bless the churches in their reconciling hope, missionary engagement, and future renewal.
Full story, http://www.sps-usa.org/meetings/home.htm#
2011
Memphis Theological Seminary and All Saints Bible College
Memphis, TN
March 10-12, 2011
2012
Virginia Beach, VA
March 1-3, 2012
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