evangelical 360°

Ep. 28 / Waves of Awakening: From Azusa Street to Gen Z Revival ► Billy Wilson

• Host Brian Stiller • Season 1 • Episode 28

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A spiritual wildfire that began in a humble livery stable on Azusa Street has transformed into a global movement of over 700 million believers. How did an obscure, often misunderstood expression of Christianity become the fastest-growing religious movement of the 20th century?

Dr. Billy Wilson, President of Oral Roberts University and Chair of the Pentecostal World Fellowship, takes us on a fascinating journey through the remarkable history of the Pentecostal and Charismatic movement. From its roots in the American Holiness movement to the pivotal Azusa Street Revival of 1906, Wilson reveals how a hunger for divine empowerment sparked a revival that would ultimately touch every nation on earth.

What makes this conversation particularly illuminating is Wilson's explanation of how Pentecostalism bridged two worlds within Christianity—combining the cerebral, scripture-focused faith of the Reformation with the mysterious, experiential elements that had been more associated with Catholicism. This synthesis helps explain why the movement spread so rapidly across diverse cultural contexts, particularly in the Global South.

The conversation explores several "waves" of Spirit-empowerment: classical Pentecostalism, the Charismatic Renewal that crossed denominational boundaries in the 1960s-70s, and the emergence of global networks and new expressions. Most exciting is Wilson's perspective on what may be a fourth wave emerging today—a movement led by young people hungry for authentic spiritual experience without performance or hype, connected through global youth culture and technology.

Against misconceptions that Pentecostals focus solely on spiritual experiences while neglecting social concerns, Wilson highlights the movement's long history of community engagement, from disaster relief to addiction recovery programs. He also shares how diverse streams within the movement are finding new unity through relationship-building and shared mission, particularly around reaching every person with the gospel by 2033.

Whether you're deeply familiar with Pentecostal/Charismatic Christianity or curious about this influential movement, this episode offers rich historical context, theological insights, and a compelling vision for Spirit-empowered faith in the 21st century. 

You can learn more from Dr. Billy Wilson through his books and find him on Facebook and Instagram. 

And you can share this episode using hashtag #Evangelical360 and join the conversation online! 

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Brain Stiller:

Hello and welcome to Evangelical 360. I'm your host, brian Stiller, and I'm pleased to share with you another conversation with leaders, changemakers, influencers impacting Christian life around the world. We'd love for you to be a part of the podcast by sharing this episode using hashtag Evangelical360 and by joining the conversation on YouTube in the comments below. My guest today is Dr Billy Wilson, president of Oral Roberts University and Chair of the Pentecostal World Fellowship and Empowered 21, a global Pentecostal charismatic network. In just over a century, what began as an uneducated and obscure Christian community quickly caught fire and multiplied around the world, becoming the primary influence of 20th century Protestantism, which begs the question how did the Pentecostal and Charismatic movement come about? What historical void or vacancy led the Church to such a unique emphasis on the Holy Spirit and the empowerment of millions of Christians worldwide? Listen in as Dr Wilson shares with us the remarkable history and heritage. Dr Billy Wilson, what a joy to have you on Evangelical 360 today. Welcome.

Billy Wilson:

Yeah, thank you, brian. It's great to be with you and we're just honored. I appreciate your leadership so very much over the years, and so I'm excited about our conversation today.

Brain Stiller:

Well, billy, you have just by your leadership. In my view you're kind of Mr Pentecost globally, president of Oral Roberts University, chair of major Pentecostal networks and associations, works and associations. But I'm interested in knowing what happened a little over a century ago that brought into being this world Pentecostal charismatic movement which, next to the Roman Catholics, would be the largest single grouping within the world Christian community. How did that happen?

Billy Wilson:

Well, obviously it was sovereign work of God, I think, brian, but some of the historical details you know in the 1800s and 19th century, what would have been termed by theologians, sociologists, etc. Especially religious sociologists, would have been the holiness movement Sweeping across America and around the world really was a focus on holiness, accompanied by camp meetings and a lot of different ministries that came into focus. During that day, a lot of things happened. A great evangelist rose, missionary movements were happening, etc. And out of that began to grow a desire for more of God, more of the Holy Spirit, more power from God.

Billy Wilson:

And then, emerging from the 1800s to the 1900s, 19th century to the 20th century, a number of things began to take place. A teacher by the name of Charles Parham and a group of students that were in a school that he was leading in Topeka, kansas, began to do a study. The study really focused around what happens when a person is filled with the Holy Spirit and how do we know really know that we're full of the Holy Spirit? The students did a study, Parham himself was doing a study and they arrived on the whole idea of subsequent baptism to conversion tongue speech as one of the prominent signs of being baptized with the Holy Spirit. They laid hands on a young lady the very first day of 1901, and she received this gift and began to speak in other languages, and Parham's teaching then began to spread. In fact, there was a partially blind black gentleman in Houston, texas. That was his Parham school. There he sat in the hallway because of Jim Crow laws and prejudiced against Somewhat uneducated but very hungry for God. His name was William Seymour. Seymour heard this message that there is a fullness of the Holy Spirit, that subsequent to conversion and knowing Christ, you can be made holy and you can be filled with the Holy Spirit, and when you are, you'll experience this glossolalia tongue speech or zelalalia, even speaking in some known language that you have never heard before or don't know before.

Billy Wilson:

Seymour picked that message up and adopted it as his own and was called to a church in Los Angeles, a Baptist church, actually, to be their pastor. When he got to the Baptist church in Los Angeles, he started preaching this message from Charles Parham's teaching and the church sort of flipped out. In fact, after a couple of services with Seymour, they locked him out of the building. They changed the locks on the doors and though he was named pastor, he couldn't get back in the building. So he and about 10 people from that congregation that had heard his message and believed that there was more of God and that they wanted this power of the Holy Spirit began to meet in a home. The home was on a street called Bonnie Bray Street in Los Angeles. The home is still standing there today, by the way. It's a museum that's curated by the Church of God in Christ, and they began to pray together. They went on a 10-day fast and in the middle of that 10-day fast one of the young ladies asked Seymour and others to pray for her to receive this gift and she began to speak in tongues. During that time, seymour himself received the baptism of the Holy Spirit and began to speak in tongues, and the revival really was on.

Billy Wilson:

People began to gather from the community into the yard of Bonnie Bray Street. They would come up on the porch. They made the porch their altar and they would pray there. And while they were filling the porch up as their altar, seeking their own personal Pentecost, the porch fell through. It wasn't too strong and Seymour said we've got to do something else, we've got to find a building. So they went down the road about a mile mile and a half and they found what was then a livery stable. It had been an AME church before and it turned into a barn. Animals were there and Seymour's team asked if they could possibly rent this space and they gave them permission. They swept all of the refuse out of the building, they made some little makeshift pews, they put two milk cartons together in the center of the room and made a semicircle at 312 Azusa Street in Los Angeles.

Billy Wilson:

This facility then became the home of the Apostolic Faith Mission, or the Azusa Street Mission, and became the home of a revival that really changed the world, that we know today as the Azusa Street Revival. So when you say, how did this happen? In many ways the epicenter of the movement, the explosive moment of the movement, happened at Azusa Street, though there was a lot of other things going on in the world, a lot of people experiencing more of God, a lot of people experiencing spirit baptism literally all over the globe but it took on a focal point at Azusa Street and in the 20th century I think it was Life Magazine or Time or one of those magazines said that the Azusa Street revival was the most substantial and the most important religious event of the 20th century, and I believe that's true. Out of the Azusa Street Revival people came from all over the world to experience their personal Pentecost. Now, the Azusa Street Revival taught holiness, again out of the holiness movement. They taught justification by faith. They taught that God wanted us to love the world and that we needed to find power to be effective evangelists in their day. And it drove them to their knees. It drove them to their face and it drove them to their knees. It drove them to their face and it drove them to this experience of spirit baptism. So people received their own personal Pentecost and the revival was on.

Billy Wilson:

And the revival spread all over the world, to Europe, to Asia, to Latin America and across the United States.

Billy Wilson:

Denominations, entire denominations, like the denomination I come from, the Church of God, were swept up into the revival when their leader received the baptism.

Billy Wilson:

There's like the Pentecostal holiness the same. Some denominations rejected this tongue speech thing and some received it, and those that did became really the foundation of what we know today as the Pentecostal movement. Growing out of that, after just a few years, grew the Assemblies of God and many other movements around the world, all believing that we are justified by faith, that we can be made holy by the blood of Jesus Christ and that there is a subsequent baptism of the Holy Spirit accompanied by speaking in tongues. And that message then became sort of the propulsion for this movement that is now numbers about 600 to 700 million the last counts Brian and people all over the world. Every nation in the world touched by this moving of the Holy Spirit, ultimately the charismatic renewal, and we can talk about some of that. But it all really started, or really came to head at the Azusa Street Revival and we've seen this amazing move of God for now 120 years.

Brain Stiller:

But that began the early part of the 20th century. I guess the obvious question to ask Billy is why was this absent for 1900 years within the church? What caused the delay, or was there a particular reason why the delay was appropriate in the history of the church?

Billy Wilson:

Well, you know a good question, brian. Actually, you know, if you study deeply, it wasn't absent in the history of the church. You'll find even in the Middle Ages people experienced tongue speech. They healed the sick, they prophesied. It just wasn't a prominent thing but it was going on. There was a thin line, I guess you could say, of the spirits moving through the church all through the ages.

Billy Wilson:

Ultimately, of course, the Reformation began to build the basis of what would end up being the Pentecostal charismatic movement, when Luther stood forward and said we can't keep going like we're going. In many ways Luther was, and the Reformation was a reaction against the mystery and superstition of Catholicism of his day. And so the Reformation became very cerebral, brian, just to be honest, for evangelicals, you know, grace alone, faith alone and the scripture alone. And it became a very cerebral faith, a faith built on scripture, built on faith, but not a huge amount of emotion, whereas Catholicism of the day was steeped in tradition and emotion and mystery and even superstition. So Luther reacted against that. Well, out of the Reformation, of course, god moved all over the world, and thank God for that. Then of course we get into all of the different elements of the Reformation and things that God did. Wesley then became very key, and one of the things Wesley did is he went back and studied the early church fathers, and Wesley began to recapture a little bit of the mystery. So not as much just cerebral but also visceral would be a term used in the first great awakening, where people's hearts were warmed and people's hearts were changed. Wesley himself would say that his heart was strangely warm, and so emotion began to be a little more a part of the Christian experience.

Billy Wilson:

Well then, what happened as the holiness movement happened? It built a foundation, and I think really providentially, brian that Pentecostalism would not be what it is at all without a hundred years of the holiness movement, especially in America. This preaching on holiness and righteous living and godly living built a foundation on which, then, people could receive this ecstatic experience, this over-the-top kind of experience of Pentecost, and still understand you have to live right and be a real Christian to be able to carry God's anointing. Well, in many ways, then, pentecostalism is somewhat of a middle ground. You have the Mysterium, even the experiential, of the early Catholicism in the Middle Ages.

Billy Wilson:

You have the Reformation, which was very cerebral, and in many ways the Pentecostal movement brings those two worlds together, so to speak. This is why Pentecostalism is so powerful in Latin America, because Catholicism. It helps people that have been steeped in Catholicism not lose the experiential part, while helping them catch up with their minds the cerebral part okay and build their understanding on faith and grace alone. So what I've seen happen in Pentecostalism again is it took the Reformation and all of its wonderful elements, the holiness movement, what John Wesley discovered, even from the early church fathers, and it brought it together again with the mystery, with the supernatural, with the miraculous, with the experiential, so that not only could you know about God and not only could you believe in God, you could experience God, and not only did you have a mind change when you repented and changed your mind, you could have a heart change that really changed your life. And so that's really what Pentecostalism is about it's Bible and experience at the same time.

Brain Stiller:

Billy. So these denominations grow in the early part of the 20th century, but we come to the 60s and all of a sudden, this message, which has been resisted by other denominations and by Catholic and Orthodox, the message, breaks out. How did that happen?

Billy Wilson:

Well, I mean, it happened in a number of ways. Of course you can't stop the Holy Spirit, brian, that's what we would say. He found his way over doors, under doors, around doors. One of the things that happened really is the leader of the university that I lead.

Billy Wilson:

Oral Roberts had a prolific healing ministry in the middle part of the 20th century. He was great friends with Billy Graham. Billy helped dedicate Oral Roberts University and Oral began to bring the cameras into his crusade and so he began to literally televise the miraculous. Okay, and people began to see, hey, pentecostals, people that are full of the Holy Spirit, they're not all crazy, they know how to do things well, with high excellence. And Orwell would invite all of these denominations to come to his healing crusades. Well, everybody loves healing and people were hungry to be touched by God. And then they began to experience the Holy Spirit.

Billy Wilson:

And then, in 1961, dennis Bennett, the rector of the Episcopal Church in Van Nuys, california, was filled with the Holy Spirit and spoken tongues and told his congregation on Easter Sunday he had received the baptism of the Holy Spirit and spoken tongue, an Episcopal priest, and it sort of set this ricochet across the kingdom that, hey, you could be in a church that was not Pentecostal and still receive this experience. And then in the 60s and 70s we had the charismatic renewal. In many ways Oral Roberts came from a Pentecostal holiness background but bridged the gap and became sort of a spiritual father to many of the charismatic expressions that would happen, including in the Catholic Church. Today, when we talk about six to 700 people around the world that are full of the Holy Spirit and have experienced spirit-empowered Christianity, about 150 million of them are charismatic Catholics. So the charismatic renewal in the Catholic Church took off like a rocket in many ways. We just, you know, a few years ago celebrated the 50-year anniversary of that and God began to move in unusual ways in churches that heretofore had not accepted tongues, prophecy healing and the miraculous they started experiencing.

Billy Wilson:

I became a Christian in the 1970s and was filled with the Holy Spirit in a church of God church of God, a prophecy church in a little town in Owensboro, kentucky, and it was a wonderful experience for me. I was a very lost teenager and really got saved. But in our town the charismatic renewal was happening in the Catholic church, so I was able to go to some of their meetings and I was fascinated because I was raised in a Catholic community and here Catholics were baptizing in water, praying for the sick, prophesying having dreams and visions and talking about being born again, and so God was moving in some very unusual ways. So we ended up with charismatic Catholics, charismatic Baptists, charismatic Presbyterians, charismatic Mennonites, charismatic Methodists, and on and on the list went on as people in all of these movements began to experience the Holy Spirit. But one of the things that did that was television, allowing them to see God at work and knowing that you don't have to be weird to be filled with the Holy Spirit.

Brain Stiller:

Billy, you use the word empower. In fact, one of your global networks is Empowered21. You use that word empowered by the Spirit. Can you unwrap that for us?

Billy Wilson:

Yeah, we use it, brian, as sort of an umbrella term, just to be honest. That covers Pentecostals Charismatics, new kinds of Pentecostals, new kinds of Charismatics that don't fit any of the things we've talked about so far, and people that believe in the fullness of the Spirit, in other words, people that believe that God still does today what we see in the book of Acts. So it's an umbrella term of living a spirit-empowered life. Now, of course, one of our theme scriptures is Acts 1 and 8. You shall receive power after the Holy Spirit comes upon you and you'll be witnesses, literally around the world.

Billy Wilson:

We believe that the Holy Spirit empowers us in our Christian living to live a full life for Christ and be a strong witness for him, and so we think what happened in the early churches? They were empowered by the Holy Spirit, their witness was empowered and their living was empowered. They were empowered to see the supernatural, but they were also empowered to proclaim the good news of Jesus to their generation. And the 21 in Empire 21 means 21st century. So we want to know what does it look like to be empowered by the Holy Spirit in the 21st century? And we talk a lot about that in the network.

Brain Stiller:

And what's that looking like to you today? Now we're into the first quarter of the 21st century. Is the Spirit empowering us differently or much the same way as you saw last century?

Billy Wilson:

Well, I think you know the Spirit should always empower us biblically. Brian is one of the things I would say. During the Azusa Street revival, it was such chaos I mean, anytime there's a revival it's messy People were falling out, you know. People were getting healed and delivered and demons were being cast out. And in the middle of it all, people were getting healed and delivered and demons were being cast out. And in the middle of it all, seymour held up the Bible and he said this no-transcript, and if it's not in here, we don't want it. So I think, through it all, we've got to be guided by Scripture, that we want what's in the Bible. But let me say I believe there are some new expressions happening. The most exciting expression I see happening in 2025 is among young people, and I'm in a living laboratory here at ORU and I can tell you Generation Z is hungry for more of God. They want the supernatural, but they don't want it on the stage, they don't want it trumped up, they don't want it to be a performance. They want authentic, spiritual New Testament Christianity and they want it in their daily lives and they are hungry for that. Our prayer movement this year has more people involved than ever before. We have a prayer room in our prayer tower at ORU, and this is happening all over America. We're hearing, of course, echoes of this on college campuses literally across America, and then anywhere I go in the world. It's a new generation that is really hungry for God.

Billy Wilson:

You know, a Christian sociologist in the study movements would tell you that so far there have been basically three waves, brian. We've mentioned two of them. The first was Pentecostalism, which is sort of historic or classical Pentecostalism Assemblies of God, church of God, those denominations. The second wave then was the charismatic renewal in the 60s, 70s and 80s of denominational people that were not part of those denominations receiving the baptism of the Holy Spirit. The third wave then is sort of a new expression that has been going on for about 30 years now of new Pentecostal, new charismatic churches that form networks. You hear this a lot. There's a network around a megachurch and they have churches all over the world. They say they're not a denomination, but they're sort of a denomination, and so a lot of that has been going on.

Billy Wilson:

I believe we're on the precipice, and maybe at the edge, brian, of what could be a fourth wave. This fourth wave is going to be very much young. It's going to involve technology in new ways and it's going to involve global culture in a way we have never seen before. What is happening in youth culture today is a lot of the barriers are broken down, and so I just came from Manila. Last night, people in Philippines, young people in Philippines, listen to the same music, watch the same movies, as young people in the United States, as young people in Buenos Aires, argentina, as young people in Zimbabwe, africa, and so this global youth culture that is happening is giving us the possibility for a global awakening and revival like we've never seen before, and I think in that we're going to see a thrust for the Great Commission at a level we've never seen before, and it's going to be led by brave, courageous, authentic, spiritually hungry new generation of young men and women.

Billy Wilson:

Now, I don't know what that's going to do to the church. I don't know what it's going to look like. You know, 20 years from now, what it will do to Christianity. I just know that this generation is going to make a profound difference in Christianity, and I think it's going to be great, so I'm very proud of them. Difference in Christianity, and I think it's going to be great. So I'm very proud of them, I'm excited for them, and we may be Brian in what could be a fourth wave of Holy Spirit expression. It's a little early to tell, but I think we may be in the edge of it right now.

Brain Stiller:

Let me ask you a question about a couple of things. One thing about how does the spiritual focus of the Pentecostal charismatic movement and the empowerment of the individual, how does that work its way out into social issues of poverty and need, rather than just isolated within the individual?

Billy Wilson:

I think that's a great question, always been a question. You know, pentecostal charismatics have been accused of not being too socially active. Actually, that's a falsism. If you go back, even out of Azusa Street, they were helping people. They were feeding the hungry, they were doing clothes for people, they were taking up offerings to help people do things and get home and go to the mission field Very socially active from the very beginning.

Billy Wilson:

And Pentecostal Charismatics in many places in the world, brian, are on the cutting edge really of disaster relief, of community development, of helping people with addiction and all kinds of things that are going on. The Teen Challenge came from a person that was filled with the Holy Spirit, and you can just go down the list through time. Right now in America, the Pentecostal Spirit-Empired Church, pentecostal Charismatic Church, is very active, especially in relief, development and community development and transformation of communities. There's a lot of talk in our movement that we have all these people full of the Holy Spirit. It should make a bigger difference in societies. Africa has experienced a great revival and yet it's a place of great corruption, and so there's a move of God going on to help rectify some of that and help see the work of the Holy Spirit lived out in a way that transforms society.

Billy Wilson:

Wesley gave us a great model of that. He believed in transforming society as much as we could and as the gospel was shared and as God's work was done. And so, like, for instance, in the Pentecostal World Fellowship I chair this group. We have a World Missions Commission, but part of that World Missions Commission is a relief and development arm. That relief and development arm has a meeting every year and we have 40 to 80 groups from the Pentecostal movement around the world, from the Swedish Pentecostals, finnish Pentecostals to Convoy of Hope here in the United States, to all kinds of entities that are doing relief, development, support of the poor and the hungry, and so Pentecostal Charismatics have always been very involved. And as we do that, we also bring the gospel with us and we bring the miraculous with us. We believe God can really touch people as we're feeding them, as we're clothing them and as we're helping them in the midst of disaster.

Brain Stiller:

The other issue relates to the division that naturally occurs within religious communities, but the Pentecostalismatic Movement has spawned a whole variety of denominations and networks and congregations. How does the message of Jesus that we be one work its way into the activity of the Spirit in today's manifestation?

Billy Wilson:

I think, great question, brian. We are, you know, the Spirit-empowered movement, pentecostal Charismatic, maybe the most diverse movement in the history of the world. We're the fastest growing part of Christianity. Some believe we're the fastest growing religious movement on the planet, and we are super diverse. I use the scripture from the Old Testament. There is the river of God and the streams thereof make glad the city of God. We've got a lot of streams in our movement. We've got the healing stream, prophetic stream, denominational stream. You just go on, and on, and on and on.

Billy Wilson:

Now I believe in our day that in many ways this diversity has helped us reach people. Maybe we would not have reached otherwise, but I believe what we're finding is a new energy toward unity. In fact, that's what I'm spending my life on, brian. A lot of what I've done over the last few years in bringing people together has been built around the vision that, yes, we are many streams, but what happens when these streams begin to converge together is a flood of God's presence and glory. And so we're building networks, really on the principle of John 17 and Jesus' prayer, that Christian unity must first be relational. Jesus prayed that we would be one as he and the Father are one that we would share. In this relationship we would love one another, we would tolerate one another, we would embrace one another. So we do a lot of relationship building in our movement now and the 20 empire, 21 and the Pentecostal world fellowship, but also that our unity is missional. So we're not only relational, but Jesus said that they may be one so that the world may believe, and so one of the big things we are doing together is we are working toward reaching every person on earth with the good news of Jesus Christ by 2033. We're trying to do something so big that no one group can do it by themselves, and that's drawing us together not only with Pentecostals and Charismatics, but Rick Warren and I are convening a new group called the 2033 Roundtable.

Billy Wilson:

We were in New York this year. We had about 30 ministries that have 2033 initiatives, so it's really capturing the imagination of Christianity. The World Baptist Union, for instance the World Baptist Organization, just launched a 2033 initiative. Assembly of God has a 2033 initiative. Luson World Evangelical Alliance is launching a 2033 initiative. We even had the World Council of Churches executive leader, jerry Pillay, with us, and they want to be more evangelistic in this day.

Billy Wilson:

So the mission of God is calling us together in unity. So the Christian unity must be relational, first missional, and then it must be spiritual. Jesus prayed in John 17. He said I give them the glory you've given me so that they may be one.

Billy Wilson:

So ultimately, the Holy Spirit is at work, bringing us together and giving him place among us. We'll draw our hearts together the warmer we get. The warmer we get with God, the more we are melted down by God's presence, the more we will come together in Christ, relationally and missionally, to change the world. I believe we're in a great day for this, brian. I see a lot of amazing signs happening, not only in the Spirit Empowered Movement but across Christianity. Because of some of the things I get to serve, I'm with all kinds of believers in all kinds of environments and I'm just really excited that when I meet a brother and sister, the labels in our day tend to be secondary to the main label that they believe in Jesus Christ as their Savior and therefore they are my brother or my sister, which means I can relate to them and we can do something together to bring the good news of Jesus to our generation.

Brain Stiller:

Billy, the variety of people who are listening to our podcast would include those who may be a bit nervous because of an experience or what they've heard about this Pentecostal message, or maybe someone and this is the first time they've heard about it. What would you say to encourage them to move forward in opening their lives to the work of the Spirit and the empowerment message that you have articulated?

Billy Wilson:

Revival has always been messy. If you go to the Cain Ridge revival you know it was an evangelical revival, but boy, it was a messy revival with all kinds of extremes going on. So there are extremes in our movement. I admit that I grieve over it sometimes. And yet people are hungry for God and trying to experience him in his fullness. So I would say don't judge us on those extremes. Go back to the Bible and as we look at the New Testament we see a church that's really on fire, brian. They are full of God. They've become a habitation of God through the Holy Spirit, both as individuals and as a corporate body. And that's what I want. I want to be that kind of church because we live in a world that needs the work of the Holy Spirit more than first century world did in the early church.

Billy Wilson:

I don't believe things stopped with the last apostle. I've experienced every miracle I've ever seen in the book of Acts, except one Philip being transported supernaturally. I haven't seen that, but I've seen the dead raised. I've seen people healed. I've seen prophecies given. I've seen the miraculous happen, usually not like I expect it, but God is at work in the world, all over the world, bringing the good news of Jesus to the world, and I think what drove people at Azusa Street that should drive us today is what will it take to be effective in my generation? So I think the real question is are you an effective witness and do you want to be a more effective witness? If so, god promises that he will empower you when the Holy Spirit comes on you to be a witness. So the Holy Spirit comes not just for all these miracle signs and some of the extremes we see sometimes. He fills us up so we can be more effective at sharing Jesus with the world in which we live. And if you're hungry for that, the Holy Spirit will help you do that. So don't be afraid. You don't have to be afraid. I meet people all the time that are afraid until they get into the fullness of the Spirit and they say, boy, that was easy, that wasn't so difficult after all. And let the Holy Spirit lead you step by step.

Billy Wilson:

Study the Bible. Look at all the occasions. There are five major occasions in the book of Acts where people received the baptism of the Holy Spirit as a subsequent experience to being converted Acts chapter 2, acts chapter 9,. When Saul of Tarsus receives the Holy Spirit after surrendering to Jesus Christ on the road to Damascus. Acts 10, where it sort of all happened at the same time at Cornelius' house. And then Acts 8, where, at Samaria, people are converted to Christ. Peter and John come down and lay their hands on them and they receive the baptism of the Holy Spirit. And then, of course, acts 19, the disciples of John, who Paul explains about the Holy Spirit to them and they receive the Holy Spirit and prophesy and speak in tongues.

Billy Wilson:

And these five occasions people experience something that's dramatic, something that's significant, something that empowers them for witness. And you can experience the same. So thank you, brian, for opening that door, and I just pray for those that are listening. Join us, join us in reaching the world for Jesus Christ. As we relate together, as we love one another, the Holy Spirit will do his work among us and he'll do his work in your life.

Brain Stiller:

Dr Billy Wilson, thank you so much for your time and for your unwrapping of this marvelous movement of the last century.

Billy Wilson:

Thanks again for joining us, thank you, brian, great to be with you, appreciate all you're doing. You're such a great friend and a great ambassador for our movement and for Christianity around the world. God bless you and God bless this podcast.

Brain Stiller:

Thanks, billy. Thank you, dr Wilson, for joining us today and for helping us understand this powerful and historic witness within the global church, and thank you for being a part of the podcast. Be sure to share this episode using hashtag Evangelical360 and join in on the conversation on YouTube. If you'd like to learn more about today's guest, be sure to check the show notes for links and info, and if you haven't already received my free e-book and newsletter, just go to brianstillercom. Thanks again, until next time, don't miss. Until next time.