William J. Seymour
William Joseph Seymour ( born 2 May 1870 in Centerville, Louisiana, † September 28, 1922 ) was an African-American American preacher and essential co-founder of the Pentecostal Azusa Street Revival ( 1906-1909 ).
Life
Seymour was the son of Simon and Phyllis Seymour, former slaves, and was raised Baptist. The local environment was characterized by the Ku Klux Klan and the Jim Crow segregative acting legislation.
With 25 years (1895 ) he moved to Indianapolis. At that time, leaving only about a tenth of the black population to the south. In Indianapolis, he joined the Simpson Chapel Methodist Episcopal Church. Because of the increasing racism Seymour moved on.
From 1900 to 1902 Seymour lived in Cincinnati, where he came into contact with Martin Wells Knapp and the Church of God Reformation Movement joined whose views of sanctification and the outpouring of the Holy Spirit before the second coming of Jesus Christ responded respect him. Through a smallpox infection he went blind in one eye. He decided to become a pastor.
In 1903, Seymour moved to Houston (Texas ), where he made the acquaintance of Charles Fox Parham, from whom he learned about the baptism with the Holy Spirit and speaking in tongues.
After completing his training at the Bible school of Charles Fox Parham Seymour in 1906 to a pastorate in Los Angeles, but was excluded from the community after he wanted there to introduce their own beliefs.
As of February 1906 Seymour began to celebrate 214 services in the private home of Richard D. Asberry in the Bonnie Brae Avenue. The faithful came from very different social backgrounds.
Due to the acute space problems the young community came in April 1906, the Azusa Street 312 in the industrial area of Los Angeles. They found an abandoned Methodist church, which was renovated with the active support of Christians of different denominations. There emerged from this Azusa Street Revival movement, the Azusa Street Mission. Published by Seymour journal The Apostolic Faith was subscribed in September 1906 in an edition of 20,000 people, a year later, twice as many.
In 1908, Seymour Jennie Evans Moore married.
Two community members, Clara Lum and Florence Crawford, stolen in the same year, the address file of Seymour and founded a rival community in Portland ( Oregon). The community center in the Azusa Street could not recover from the loss of members to the revival at Azusa Street came to an end. By spin-offs due to various beliefs (so-called Finished Work Controversy ) within the Pentecostal churches in Los Angeles the work of Seymour continued to lose importance, so that towards the end of 1915 only a minority of his former followers had remained in his community.
Seymour published an order of worship under the title The Doctrines and Discipline of the Azusa Street Apostolic Faith Mission of Los Angeles and called himself henceforth even as a bishop. He began a travel activity that led him on several occasions together with Charles Harrison Mason, founder of the Church of God in Christ, and founded several churches, some of them in Virginia.
On September 28, 1922 William J. Seymour died in the line of duty of a heart attack. His wife took over the leadership of the community in Los Angeles. Jennie Seymour died on 2 July 1936.