This Week in AG History -- May 18, 1946

What is the distinctive feature in a Pentecostal worship service? The answer, according to a 1946 Pentecostal Evangel article by P. S. Jones, is "the prominence given to the prayer room."

Early Pentecostal churches usually dedicated a room to prayer, where earnest believers would intercede during the preaching service and where prayer would continue long after the benediction had been pronounced. Jones asserted, "Pentecostal prayer rooms are truly the power-houses of the assemblies. Everything else can be counted of secondary importance in the church's program."

According to Jones, the success of a ministry is proportionate to the prayer life of those involved in the ministry. The "urgent necessity" of every pastor, he wrote, "is to see that the prayer life of his people is maintained at white heat."

Jones described how an active private prayer life is essential if Christians are to effectively engage in spiritual warfare. The "treasures of heaven," he wrote, are often only gained by spending hours in "hot, animated, boiling-over prayer."

What happens when a church neglects prayer? Jones warned, "When the thrill and throb of the Holy Ghost are lost through prayerlessness, all kinds of substitutes will be tried," including social functions, entertaining preaching, and other amusements. He described these as mere "camouflages" that attempt to hide "the fact that the real thing has been lost."

According to Jones, "Pentecost can very well do without the carnal decorations and the tinsel of this pleasure-crazed world, but it can never do without its prayer room, its prayer-loving pastor, and its prayer warriors."

Read Jones' article, "A Unique Pentecostal Feature," in the May 18, 1946, issue of the Pentecostal Evangel.

Also featured in this issue:

• "A Hidden Power Now Revealed: Lessons from the Discovery of the Atomic Bomb," by Leslie Barrowcliff

• "The Pentecostal Movement," by Howard Carter

• "A Russian Jew's Testimony," by Moses Prostchansky

And many more!

Click here to read this issue now.

Pentecostal Evangel archived editions courtesy of Flower Pentecostal Heritage Center.

Darrin J. Rodgers

Darrin J. Rodgers has served as director of the Flower Pentecostal Heritage Center (FPHC) since 2005. He earned a master's degree in theological studies from Assemblies of God Theological Seminary and a juris doctorate from the University of North Dakota School of Law. He previously served at the David du Plessis Archive and the McAlister Library at Fuller Theological Seminary. He is the author of Northern Harvest , a history of Pentecostalism in North Dakota. His FPHC portfolio includes acquisitions, editing Assemblies of God Heritage magazine, and conducting oral history interviews. His wife, Desiree, is an ordained AG minister.