Slide1I will be at Augustine College this afternoon to guest lecture on the topic of Pentecostal and Charismatic Theologies. This is an introduction of sorts which is part of a much larger History of Christian Thought course that is taught by Dr. Brian Butcher. I was quite happy to be invited as a few years back I developed a full course on the topic of Pentecostal/Charismatic Movements which I ended up shelving. I regularly use the Pentecostals as an example of the immanence of the transcendent God in my Trends in Western Thought course at Saint Paul University (HTP1101). In that course each lecture looks at two different ways that movements or theologians take up the tension between immanence and transcendence. But that is about the only place in my current teaching load that I get to speak so directly on Pentecostal and Charismatic theologies.

One of the reasons I think it is important to talk about Pentecostal and Charismatic theologies is that they are a growing influence on global Christian theologies and one that is so often misrepresented and misunderstood. When I started out studies at Saint Paul University I stumbled upon Stephen Land’s Pentecostal Spirituality: A Passion for the Kingdom in our library. It was a beautiful moment for this neo-pentecostal trying to find resources that did academic theological work from the Pentecostal context that formed my own spirituality. Land gave me hope that there was a real alternative to the anti-intellectualism that was so much a part of my early Pentecostal experience. (I highly recommend Rick Nañez’ Full Gospel, Fractured Minds?: A Call to Use God’s Gift of Intellect if you are interested in the shifting that is happening today as Pentecostal and Charismatic movements mature into their insights.) It is with great joy that I found other academic Pentecostal, neo-pentecostal, and charismatic dialogue partners along the way: Wolfgang Vondey, Jamie Smith, Doug Erickson, Derek Morphew, Shane Clifton, and others. The list continues to grow as does my library!

I’ll let you all know how it went.

EDIT: What a keen group of students, the lecture seemed to go very well. Thank you Dr. Butcher for the invite!