Click to join the conversation with over 500,000 Pentecostal believers and scholars
Click to get our FREE MOBILE APP and stay connected
| PentecostalTheology.com
171
ARTICLES
The Limits of Acculturation: Thomas
Hampton Gourley
American Pentecostalism
and
James
R.
Goff,
Jr.
Throughout
much of its short
history,
Pentecostalism has been about the business of
impressing
outsiders. The
impulse
comes from two sources. On the one
hand,
there is concern for the Great Commission. If Pentecostalism is God’s answer for the end time-and Pentecostals have held that tenet in common in some form or other since the movement’s
beginnings-then
believers should be
responsible
for getting
the
message
out. Over the
years, rapid growth
has thus been a mark of
pride
for Pentecostal
worshipers. Growing
numbers seemed to validate their
unique place
in God’s
plan
for
humanity.
On the other hand,
the
compulsion
to
gloat
over numbers has also resulted from a darker side-one that
represented
Pentecostals’ innate
inferiority complex.
Drawn from
poorer working
class
stock,
or from the “other side of the tracks” as first
generation
Pentecostals were fond of recalling,
adherents
joined
the fold confident that
they-rather
than the socially prominent
and
powerful-were
the inheritors of God’s prophetic gifts
and that
they
would be instruments in the
glorious unfolding
of God’s will in the last
days.
It was a kind of reverse conceit;
those without
suddenly
became the
only
ones with an abundance. The
message
functioned as a kind of “neat
trick,” turning social outcasts into a
spiritual elite,
and the
resulting
zeal served the movement well as
generations
of Pentecostals reversed liabilities into assets and turned criticism into assurance of their
spiritual
wealth.’ 1
Yet the
inferiority-turned-superiority complex
was not
quite
as strong
as Pentecostal leaders
might
have
hoped.
On second
glance,
the actions of Pentecostals revealed an immense concern with what the rest of the world
thought and,
as a
result, adherents, especially
second generation Pentecostals,
charted a course for
respectability. They
‘This theme
is,
of
course,
not a new one and most recent histories of the movement make some allowance for it. I referred to it previously in a short piece on what children experience growing up in a Pentecostal environment. See “Brother Westbrook Shouted, ‘Glory,’ and Mother Spoke in
16 October
Tongues,” Christianity Today,
1987, 18-19.
‘
1
172
copied
the denominational
success of other Protestant
educational
structures,
dangerous
organization arguably
resisters,
with
why
Pentecostalism
independent-even chaotic-spirit
players
Evangelicals, institutions,
and
building religious
to
later
and, indeed,
the names and activities of
key
presses. They prided
themselves on their decorum and
relegated “wild fire”
any
Pentecostal who tended to
step
out of line. The
process was not a conscious one nor one which mainstream onlookers
readily identified
but, steadily,
over the
period
after
1910,
Pentecostals successfully
went about the business of
harnessing
the
energy
that had been so chaotic in the
dynamic days
from Charles Parham’s New Year’s
Day
revival in
Topeka
in 1901
through
the first three
years
of William
Seymour’s reign
at Azusa. There was
irony here;
Pentecostal leaders
recognized
that the
very power
which created their
vitality threatened to
destroy
their
fragile organizations, yet they
themselves had
sprung
into existence on the
very premise
that institutions were
because
they
threatened the free
working
of God’s
Spirit. The result was an uncomfortable coexistence of
organizers
and
a
good sprinkling
of those who were
both at the same time. No doubt the
duality
is one reason
why the Charismatic movement was so controversial within the older Pentecostal denominations a
couple
of
generations
in general is such a fascinating historical
subject.
In the midst of the
story
of Pentecostal denomination
building,
an
endured both inside and outside the fold of the
organizations. Unfortunately,
outside the denominations are less familiar to historians if for no other reason than that
they
seldom left records or
followings
sufficient to
promote
their
story.
Yet the fact remains that it is the unacculturated who have a story to tell as well, in many
ways
a story which is closer to the foundations of Pentecostalism than the
neatly packaged story
of the successful
organizers.
Bom in
Peru,
Indiana in
1862,
Thomas
Hampton
story
sounds
remarkably
like that of
many
other Pentecostal
He moved several times in his
youth,
due to his father’s
as a Methodist minister. The
family
moved to Pawnee
City,
Nebraska
by
the
early
1870s
and,
after a brief
stay, moved on to
Farragut,
Iowa.2
Gourley spent
his
young
adulthood
in several different
occupations. By 1885,
he was
working
in
well
driller;
two
years
later he relocated to
nearby
Kansas
where he formed a loose
partnership
with his
Will
Hawkins,
and the two men tried their hand
alternately at
carpentry
and
police
work. With other
family members,
the two even speculated
a bit in local real estate. A dramatic
change
seems to have
in 1894 when
Gourley
was converted under the
ministry
of his
part-time occupation
involved Topeka
as a City,
Missouri half-brother,
come
Gourley’s early
pioneers.
at least
2Infonnation on
Gourley’s
childhood is sketchy, though his father’s affiliation with the Methodist Church (presumably the Methodist Episcopal Church, North) is confirmed by family records which include a newspaper obituary and by Gourley’s recollections himself. See Nfjdnjght Cry (Seattle) 1 (March-April 1908): 4.
2
William
Tasker,
173
an ordained
minister in the United
brother-in-law Brethren evangelist Congregational, 3 area.3
Church. Within a
year, Gourley
was
serving
as an itinerant himself and
holding
revivals in a series of United
Brethren,
and
Baptist
churches in the Kansas
City
Methodist,
health
problems brought young
beginning
Family
tradition holds that the conversion had been
sparked by
dire
on
by
a severe
drinking
habit
begun
when the
man served a three
year
stint as a Kansas
City police
constable
in 1890. Similar to Parham and a host of other Pentecostal icons, Gourley
claimed dramatic and instant
healing
from an
array
of stomach disorders that had come to
plague
him and believed that the
his
spiritual healing
and decision to
a
physical
relief came
alongside follow God’s
successful revival
Effie
Masden,
embarked
together spurred
young
bride’s
poor
health.’
leading
into the
ministry.4
Late in 1896
following
in Norton
County
in western
Kansas,
he married
a local school teacher from Lenora.
Soon,
the newlyweds
no doubt
by youth
and boundless faith but
complicated by
the
emotional affairs
on an adventure
as tent
evangelists,
decision to set off on the
were
highly
Spirit.
In
Lawrence when
students-Gourley proponents to
destroy
the tent.6
Gourley’s
Whatever the circumstances of
Gourley’s
sawdust
trail,
several
things
become clear with
only
a cursory glance at his
preaching
in the 1890s.
Gourley
was
heavily
influenced
by
the radical
wing
of the holiness movement and distanced himself from the mainstream
organizations
of his
day.
His
meetings
which
emphasized
the
moving
of God’s
addition,
he evoked
controversy easily, sparking
a local
upheaval
in
he
brought
his tent revival to town in 1897 and local
6
labeled them
“hoodlums”-proceeded
expedition
to Lawrence
local newsmen
reporting
“a
good
attendance and
[that]
interest was
great.”‘
But as the extended
began peacefully enough
with
revival
continued,
the harmonious
relationship
between
Evangelist Gourley
and the citizens of Lawrence
‘
Gourley. Gourley autobiographical
‘Much of this information comes as a result of
family genealogical
work conducted by Gourley’s grandson, Ted Hampton Gourley of Healdsburg, California. It is substantiated by a variety of sources, including birth certificates, miscellaneous news
clippings,
and
family
interviews. Thomas
Hampton Gourley Family Collection, c/o Ted Gourley, 2355 W. Dry Creek Rd.,
4This information comes via
Healdsburg, CA 95448.
family
interview with Ted
Gourley’s uncle,
Phil
Ted Gourley Interview, 16 January 1996, and Biographical Sketch in the
Collection. It is substantiated somewhat by what
appears to be
a rare
note from Thomas
Gourley himself. See Midnight Cry
1
(May 1908):
1.
‘ Effie
Gourley’s obituary would report that, by her death at age 27,
she had suffered from “an illness that has been growing upon her for the last sixteen or 13
years
more.” See Lawrence World,
July 1899, 4. (‘See “Tore Down the
Tent,”
Lawrence World (Lawrence, KS), 28
September 1897, 3.
7lawrence World, 29 July 1897, 6.
3
174
was
badly
strained.
By
late
September, spurred
in
part by
the resumption
of the academic term at the
University
of
Kansas, tempers over
late-night
noise resulted in a row
which, beginning
at 10:00
p.m. disrupted
the
prayer meeting
and
destroyed
the tent.
Newspapers
from nearby Topeka
focused on the accusation of
hypnotism against Gourley, claiming
that the attack was a coordinated effort on the
part of three hundred “conservative
University
students and
law-abiding citizens … to drive the
objectionable
character from town.” The
paper showed little
restraint, describing Gourley
as “a ‘reformed
policeman’ of uncouth
appearance, dress,
and
language”
with “no
personal
charms except
this
power
to throw his convert into a
cataleptic
state.” Accusing
the
evangelist
of
focusing
his efforts on
susceptible young girls,
the
reporter
then described the tumultuous scene.
The mob gathered quickly and reached the tent just as a great part of the audience had gone and the evangelist had a few persons on the mourners benches under his spell. A rush was made on the big tent and when this completely was completely demolished, his living tent was tom thread from thread and his furniture broken and cooking utensils scattered to the four comers. It is not
thought
that he will return and
general
satisfaction is being expressed
that the town is rid of him.’
But
Gourley
was not so
easily displaced; according
to news
reports, he continued to face
opposition
and was forced to move his
meetings to the outskirts of the
city.
Given
sympathetic support
from the local Lawrence World which blasted both
university
and
city officials, Gourley
was allowed to
complete
his revival in a local
sporting
“rink.” The debacle devolved
quickly
into a town and
gown dispute,
with editorials
alternately blaming
the
impotency
of the local
police force, the students and administration for
denying any responsibility,
the
press for
exaggerating
the extent of the
damage
and ill will, and local citizens for their
inability
to abide
by
the
spirit
of First Amendment
rights.’ Gourley
remained a resident of Lawrence for another two
years, moving only
after the death of his wife in July, 1899.’°
Effie
Gourley’s
death seems to have created a brief
period
of turmoil for her widowed husband. He moved to Kansas
City
where he
again worked
briefly
as a
carpenter.
But
Gourley
did not abandon the call to preach.
He continued to
preach
in the Kansas-Missouri area for another four
years
and remarried in
January
of 1901. He and his new
bride,
8 See “Three Hundred Lawrence
People
Rise in
Indignation,” Topeka Daily Capital,
28
September 1897,
1. See also the Kansas
City Daily Journal,
28 September 1897,
1. Cf. the more moderate account
World, 28
given in the local Lawrence
September 1897, 3. Lawrence
9 Cf. World, 30 September 1897, 7; 7 October 1897, 2; and 14 October 1897, 2;
with Kansas
University Weekly, 2 October 1897, 2, 4; and, Kansas City Journal, 8 October 1897, editorial page. Clippings from Gourley Collection. 10 Lawrence World, 13
which
July 1899, 4. Cf Lawrence Weekly Journal, 15 July 1899, 6,
attributes Mrs.
Gourley’s
death to an
operation, presumably to fight
her long-standing
bout with poor health.
4
175
Mary
Elizabeth
Neff,
became
parents
of a son,
John,
bom in Topeka in July
of 1902.
By
the time their second
son, James, was bom
in May of 1904,
the
family
had relocated to Los
Angeles
where
Gourley presumably
continued his career as an
evangelist.”
By December, 1906, Gourley’s
whereabouts and activities become clearer. Readers of the “News Section” of the Seattle
Daily
Times were greeted
with
giant
headlines on
Sunday,
December 2nd which proclaimed
“WILD NIGHT IN CHURCH OF HOLY ROLLERS!” Indeed,
the
description
of events was
quite astounding
even
given
the hyped press
other
reporters
of the
day gave
to holiness and Pentecostal assemblies. The
highlight
of the
evening, during
which
worshipers could be heard-the
paper
claimed-a full block
away,
was the
firing of a bullet
through
the
glass
window of the front of the downtown mission
building.
No one was hurt but
police
officers were called to investigate
and remained on
duty
to see that no further incidents occurred.
Reporters
also made much of the inclusion of a “colored female deacon” as one of the
principal
leaders
though
the audience seems to have been
predominately
white.
Despite
the tumultuous welcome and
perhaps
because of
it, Gourley stayed
in Seattle; within a year
he
began publishing
a
religious paper,
The
Midnight Cry,
and operating
a Bible School from his
headquarters
mission at 1617 Seventh Avenue.”
By
now the interest of Pentecostal historians in the little-known Gourley
should have been
piqued.
He was in the
Topeka-Kansas City area in
January
1901 and in Los
Angeles
from 1904
perhaps through the summer of 1906. What
part,
if
any,
did he
play
in the
pivotal revivals led
by
Parham and
Seymour
and was the revival in Seattle an extension of either of those revivals? In
fact,
there is evidence that the maverick
preacher
met on at least one occasion with the
younger holiness
preacher,
Charles F. Parham. In
May
of
1899,
when Parham was
operating
the Beth-el
Healing
Home in
Topeka, Gourley accompanied
his first
wife, Effie,
in a short
stay
in
response
to her worsening
health. There is
only speculation
as to what the two men might
have shared and the
meeting
occurred more than a
year
before Parham’s celebrated New Year’s
Day
revival at Stone’s
Folly.”
Even so,
the visit occurred at an
opportune
time.
Only
two weeks
earlier, Parham’s
Apostolic
Faith had
first introduced the idea of
glossolalia for
missionary purposes-recounting
the
story
of Jennie
Glassey,
a St. Louis native who
had, according
to another holiness
periodical,
‘ ` Family records are very sketchy at this point, though the marriage and births are confirmed by documentary evidence. Gourley Collection.
12″will Night in Church of Holly Rollers!” Seattle
that
Daily Times, 2 December 1906, 17. Newspaper reports seem to confirm this downtown mission on Seventh Avenue was the same location from which Gourley would start The Midnight Cry a year
later.
“Apostolic Faith (Topeka), 17 May 1899, 8.
5
176
received
tongues
in answer to
prayer
and had
gone
to find her
place
in the mission field. 14
Any
formal connection
Gourley might
have been
tempted
to
make, however,
was
probably
muted
by
Effie
Gourley’s
death
only
two months after the
stay
at Parham’s
healing
home.
Nevertheless, coincidences continue.
Gourley’s marriage
to Elizabeth Neff in
January, 1901 was conducted in
Topeka, certifying Gourley’s presence
in the city
at the time of Parham’s Bible School
“tongues
revival.” Given the press
the Bethel students
generated
and
Gourley’s
obvious interest in this
type religious encounter,
it is
unlikely
that the event
escaped
his notice even with the distraction in his
personal
life.”
There is also no concrete evidence to tie
Gourley
to Azusa or
Seymour.
In
fact,
the evidence
suggests that,
while
Gourley may
have been aware of the activities of the
Pentecostals,
he himself had not
yet climbed aboard when he
initially journeyed
to Seattle. When the news reports
of his December 1906 Seattle revival
appeared, they
failed to mention
anything
about
tongues,
a fact no
reporter
worth his salt would have omitted.
Giving
further credence is the fact that when news of M. L.
Ryan’s
Pentecostal
meetings
in
Salem, Oregon
made the Seattle papers only
ten
days
after
Gourley’s
revival
did,
the
theology
and practice
of glossolalia
played
a prime role in the
story.”
At some
point during
the first ten months of
1907, however, Gourley adopted
the Pentecostal
theology coming
out of the Azusa Street Mission. The contact
probably
came
through
an affiliation with Thomas Junk who seems to have traveled from Azusa to Seattle at about the time of
Gourley’s
arrival in the fall of 1906 and
reported
the Pentecostal
progress
in the
city
back to William
Seymour
and others at the mission in Los
Angeles
as
early
as December of 1906. Late in the fall of
1907,
both
Gourley
and Junk were affiliated with the same mission on Seventh Avenue. 17
“Apostolic
Faith
(Topeka), 3 May 1899, 5. Cf
also page 8 where the same (or perhaps
a similar?) account is told without naming the young lady.
“Family
records date the to January
17, 1901, in Topeka; that would place
the
wedding just
eleven marriage
days
after local
reporters
broke the
story
of the Fields White Unto Harvest: Charles F. Parham and the
Topeka
revival. Gourley Collection. On the Topeka revival, see James R
Goff, Jr., Pentecostalism
Missionary Origins of
(Fayetteville, AR: University of Arkansas Press, 1988), 62-86.
“New Sect Invades Salem,” Seattle Times, 12 December 1906, 5. See also “Ryan
‘6 Cf.
Leader of a Peculiar Sect,” Seattle Daily
Post-Intelligencier,
3
September 1907,4.
“Little is known about Junk other than the articles he contributed to the Azusa
Street
newspaper. Cf. Apostolic
Faith
(Los Angeles;
December
1906): 3;
and Apostolic
Faith
(January 1907): 1. Earlier references to Junk tie him to a “band of seven” who left Azusa in the fall of 1906 to north and work in Oakland, Salem, and Seattle. Included in the was Florence Crawford go group
work in Portland. See “Spreading
who, shortly thereafter, founded the
Apostolic Faith
the Full
Gospel,” Apostolic
Faith
(November 1906): 1; and,
“Vision of Hell,”
Apostolic
Faith (November 1906):
4.
6
177
While in
Seattle, however, Gourley
failed to
develop strong
ties with others who were
spreading
the Pentecostal
message, though
he did seem to
accept
without
question
the
validity
of the Charismatic
gifts. Always suspicious
of the
leadership qualifications
of
others,
he seems to have been
especially put
off
by
the divisions that
plagued
the movement almost from the
beginning.
The first issues of the
Midnight Cry loosely
tied the
paper
to Azusa
by reporting
on other Pentecostal activities on the West Coast that had their
genesis
in Los
Angeles.
The inaugural
edition
noted,
with
apparent support,
the recent
departure from Seattle of M. L.
Ryan
and a band of Pentecostal missionaries who had
gone
to
Tokyo, opened
a mission, and
begun
a religious
newspaper there.” The second issue of the
paper
also
reported
on Pentecostal work
elsewhere, complete
with names and addresses of other sister missions.”‘
Nevertheless,
that second
paper
contained a word of warning
that “a
great
deal of trouble is
coming
to the
`Apostolic
Faith Movement,’
on account of the different
teachings
on divorce and marriage” though
the
paper
did not elaborate
except
to state its own view that divorce was allowed on the biblical
principle
of Matthew 19:9 but
remarriage
was not so
long
as the initial
partner
remained alive.2°
The third issue of the Midnight Cry,
appearing
in February
1908,
was momentous for two
changes.
William
Welch,
whose name had been listed as the
correspondence person
in the first two
offerings, abruptly disappeared
without
any explanation and,
for the first
time,
a voice appeared
which
challenged
the dominant
interpretation
of Azusa. The role of the
paper
from the
beginning
had been
vague,
with the
inaugural issue
explaining
its
goal
as both
evangelistic
and instructive. The theology
was in
sympathy
with that of Azusa as with that of Parham’s work in the
Midwest, including
a firm belief in
salvation, healing, sanctification,
and the
Baptism
with the
“Holy
Ghost and with fire. ,,21 But with Welch’s
disappearance
came a
streamlining
of the
paper’s mission to
publish
the truth as relates to “the fulfillment of the prophecies pertaining
to
[Christ’s coming] kingdom,
and the
scriptures showing
the
day
in which we
live. ,,22 along
with words that detailed a growing
division
among
the ranks of West Coast Pentecostals.
Some, who have received what passes current upon the coast for with
baptism
the
Holy Ghost, have written and preached extensivly [sic] upon
the fire; some ridiculing it, others saying the Holy Ghost was for Christians but the
fire for sinners. But remember, when you are
teaching
Pentecostal Baptism,
the fire APPEARED UNTO THEM. Acts 2:3. We don’t believe they
were sinners but a specially prepared people.
“Under
“Personals,” Midnight Cry 1 (November 1907): 2.
1 (December 1907): 2-3.
“See 2′
19 Midnight Cry
“Gospel Separation,” Midnight Cry 1 (December See “A
1
1907): 4.
Foreword,” Midnight Cry (November 1907): 1.
22 “The Purpose of This Paper,” Midnight Cry 1 (January-February 1908): 3.
7
178
So, brethren, don’t mistake the Word and warp it to fit your experience and ideas, but having received an anointing, go on and God. And we will assure you that, when God His seal of fire keep seeking it will abide and
puts upon your baptism,
you will find yourself
an
holy offering
unto the Lord before His Fire ever touches you.”
Given the
language
and consistent use of the
term fire
as far back as the 1897 revival in
Lawrence, Kansas,
it is obvious that
Gourley
was trying
to reconcile his own belief in the
baptism
of fire-a tenet he no doubt
picked up
from some of
Benjamin
Irwin’s followers in the Midwest-with the new doctrine of Holy Spirit baptism.’`4 A front
page article in the same issue
sought
to
explain Gourley’s
own
interpretation of the matter.
Noting
the
“extravagant
claims of
some,
and the absence of the real
power
claimed” and
referring specifically
to Los
Angeles
a year earlier,
the
evangelist argued
that
Holy Spirit baptism-and tongues
in particular-was not “the enduement with
power, spoken
of by
Jesus.”
Rather, Gourley argued,
…
tongues are for a sign and that for a witness and no farther, as we see in this latter
are the operations of the Spirit, and we have to tarry until we are
day. The baptism is the filling with the Holy Ghost; the or gifts
endued with power
power. This will never come until all of self is gone and we are
willing to be used of God as He will. 25
Quite frankly, Gourley
failed to see in much of Pentecostalism the kind of end time saintliness he
expected.
In
May 1908,
an
open indictment of mainstream Pentecostalism and the
leadership squabbles within the movement
appeared, noting
the ambitions of
“Parham, Seymore [sic], Ryan
and a host of other self
styled apostles.”
The result, Gourley argued,
was that Pentecostals were
going
the
way
of other
denominations, “bringing
their sectism in the Pentecostal
work, misunderstanding
and divisions.”26
Together
with the
mysterious disappearance
of Welch three months
earlier,
the
antagonistic
tone suggests
that
Gourley, always
the most
important figure
behind the newspaper
and the most
generous contributor,
had
simply
wrestled control of the
paper away
from whatever
cooperative
effort had launched it. The
theory
receives
support
from the fact that the
May issue also noted a move to 711 Olive
Street,
a site not far off Seventh Avenue.”
Ironically,
the issue also noted the visit of Frank Bartleman
and Christian Experience,” Midnight Cry 1 (January-February 1908): 3. ” “Baptism
24 On Irwin and the prevalence of the doctrine among Parham’s
early followers in Kansas
and Missouri, see Goff, Fields White Unto Harvest, 54-57.
‘5 “The Baptism With the Holy Ghost and Fire,”.itdidnight Cry 1 (January-February 1908):
1.
1 (May 1908): 4. The previous issue had also made reference to the three 26 Midnight Cry
men, though in a more neutral light. (y Midnight Cry 1 4. (March-April 1908): 27 Cf Midnight Cry 1 (May 1908): 1-2, note addresses for the paper and Gourley’s school, and Midnight Cry 1 (November 1907): 2. No mention is made in the paper
8
179
from Los
Angeles, concluding cheerily
that Bartleman should “come again.””
While Bartleman’s visit establishes
Gourley’s
continued link with
Pentecostalism, subsequent
issues include few
names other than Gourley’s
and
decidedly
fewer references connect it to
Azusa or other Pentecostal work.29
Gourley
was not
unique
in
denouncing
the evils of
organization;
.
virtually
all
early
Pentecostal writers and
speakers officially deplored the sectarian
spirit
which rallied
groups
of followers around the Charismatic
leadership
of individuals. Yet in
practice,
most continued that
very
trend.
Indeed,
men like Parham decried the sectarianism and denied
any personal
ambition
only
to
spend
the rest of their careers pointing
out the
important
role that
they
had held in bringing about the true Pentecostal movement.3°
Gourley
seems to have
actually
received a letter from Parham while in
Seattle, noting
in
August
1908 that he had “not
long ago…
received a letter from a
self-styled projector
of the Faith, signed: your
Father in the
Gospel.”3′
Like other
early Pentecostals, Gourley, however,
was not
receptive
to Parham’s claim of
authority
and
urged
his readers that God “rub our heads down to their normal
size,
before we delude
very many
more soft-headed and fearful-hearted Christians into
following
men and women.”32
Yet
Gourley was,
in
fact,
different from the bulk of those who accepted
a
theology
of Pentecostal charismata for the end time. He remained more
caustic, separating
Pentecostalism from other churches to a
greater degree
and he and his followers from Pentecostalism as
of the change in address. Adding weight to the interpretation of an
is the
unacknowledged split following wording of “Notice” which seems to separate the first two issues from those which
appeared subsequently: “Back
numbers of The
Numbers 1 &
Midnight Cry (except 2) can always be had by addressing this office.” See 2.
page
28 Midnight Cry
1
(May 1908):
2. While it is
possible
that the move was coincidental and did not
represent
a
split
in
leadership,
it is
unlikely
that a harmonious move would have been made without recognizing the
See also Bartleman’s mention of the visit in Frank
change openly.
Bartleman, Azusa Street: The Roots
of Modern-Day Pentecost,
ed. Vinson Synan (Plainfield, NJ:
118. It is unclear whether Bartleman visited the mission on Seventh Logos,
1980),
Avenue or on Olive Street. Bartleman notes that he preached at “Brother Gourley’s mission” in Seattle and makes no mention of any rival work there.
would be the announcement of William “Latter Rain Convention” that
exceptions Piper’s
appeared
in the
September
1908 issue and
Gourley’s
own announcement of a “Pentecostal to be held the following year alongside
Seattle’s World’s Fair. See Camp Meeting”
Midnight Cry
I
(August 1908): 2
and 1-
1908): 2. Gourley’s plans for a camp meeting were also announced in the Midwest by J. R Flower. See “Apostolic Faith Directory,” The Pentecost (September
(July 1909): 12.
3° On Parham’s
struggle with the issue of organization, see Goff, Fields White Unto Harvest, 140-146.
31 ivlidnight Cry
1 (August 1908): 3. The title is one that Parham used during this period. See Goff, Fields White Unto Harvest,
106-135.
32lvlidnight Cry
1 (August 1908): 3.
‘
9
180
away
well. In March of
1911,
he led a band of a hundred and
fifty people
from the base in Seattle and relocated to
Lopez Island,
a twelve-mile
long
member of the San Juan chain of islands in the
Puget Sound.33
highlighted by
beginning
of the nearness of
the
beginning
of the last
The move was
predicated upon
his
understanding
the
end,
a common belief
among
Pentecostals then and now but one which
Gourley
viewed in a unique
way.
Like other
Pentecostals,
he was fascinated with the idea that the
dawning
of human
history’s
seventh millennium would
bring
the end
time,
thus
following
a divine
plan
a series of sevens-a
plan
initiated in the
seven-day creation account
explained
in Genesis.
Equally
a part of his
eschatology was the belief that the
outpouring
of Charismatic
gifts signaled
the
of the end
or,
more
precisely,
millennium described in Revelation 20. As a
result,
he bombarded readers with an elaborate sketch of human
history
outlined on a full
to the
Midnight Cry.
The
supplement
included notes inside a set of wheels overlaid with a
drawing
of the veil inside the Jewish
Temple.
The notes described the
progress
of human
history
and
page supplement
included
Gourley’s interpretation
included numerical calculations
have believed
of a set of visions recorded in the
that
Bay,
a remote
book of
Ezekiel, chapters
one and
ten;
the
parallel
article on
page
one
suggesting
the time of Christ’s Second
Coming
must be at hand.’
Initially, Gourley
theorized that the Pentecostal
outpouring represented
the first three and a half
years
of the tribulation
period
and thus foreshadowed the final three and a half years
of destruction and evil that would follow. As a result, he seems to
that the evil
period
would
begin
sometime around 1910 or
1911-perhaps
an
underlying
reason for his removal to
Lopez Island-and that the end of the tribulation would come at some
point over the next few
years.35
Life on
Lopez
Island was not a
completely
isolated one for
Gourley
They eventually
settled on Hunter’s
but had occasional contact with the seven hundred or so settlers who lived in the three other small towns on the island.
Marriage and
family
life continued as before but certain
functions,
were ordered
by the colony,
thus
freeing up
extra time for Bible
study
and
prayer.
A communal
bakery
and
dining
hall were adjoined by
a school house for the
younger
members of the
colony;
and his followers. location,
meals and
work,
explanation. Midnight Cry
particularly
Be “Gourley’s
island commune is treated in an article by Charles P. LeWame, “`And
Ye The Island of Thomas in Northwest Themes: Historical Separate’:
Lopez Colony Gourley,” Pacific
Essays in Honor of Keith A. Murray,
ed. James W. Scott (Bellingham, WA: Center for Pacific Northwest Studies, 1978), 83-97. “The
supplement appeared in the third issue 1 of Midnight Cry along with a detailed
(January-February 1908): 1,4,
and
Supplement
A smaller rendition of the
supplement sketch had already appeared
in the
1
previous issue, Midnight Cry (December 1907): 1.
“See “The
Coming Kingdom,” Midnight Cry
1 (March-April
1908): 1; and,
1
3.
(September 1908):
10
181
private
residences were
usually
tent structures
complete
with wooden floors and
adjacent
lean-tos. Workers were oftentimes farmed out to the mainland where
they
received food and
supplies
in lieu of
wages and the
colony
even ran an occasional
ferry
service for both
passengers and
goods coming
to the island. The land itself was
apparently
used rent free in an
arrangement Gourley
secured with the landowner.
Though
other islanders were no doubt
suspicious
of the
sect,
some did frequent
the
Sunday
services and
partake
of the colonists’
hospitality
in after-church dinners.36
Disputes
were
few, though
the
colony
did have at least one
publicized legal problem
with remote
family
members after an estate was willed to the
colony upon
a member’s death.”
From his remote
position
in the
Lopez
Island
commune, Gourley moved further and further
away
from the
experience
and
theology
of the bulk of the Pentecostal movement. Even as he
did,
he remained fervent in the belief that
he,
not
they,
understood the full
meaning
of God’s
outpouring
of end time
gifts
and wonders. In
fact,
in occasional issues of the
Midnight Cry,
he chided Pentecostals for their failure to follow the letter of Acts 2. Denominational ministers were content to teach their followers “to believe what Jesus
said;
but
[that]
it was not necessary
to do, or observe it. ,,38 As a
result,
true or “full Pentecost” had not
yet
come. When it
did, Gourley
was convinced that a radical departure
would
occur,
similar to that which he had
inaugurated
on Lopez
Island.
When Pentecost fully comes to us… we will live as those did to whom the faith was first delivered. We will see people forsake all they have; and all that believe will live together, and have all common, and no one will call that which he possesses his own. “And all that things believed were
and had all
things common;”
This is the best evidence in the Bible of belief in eternal life. Here is belief which this so-called ‘Pentecost’ together,
has not given us. “And sold their possessions and goods, and parted them to all men, as every man had need.” Acts 2:44, 45.”
World War I no doubt enhanced
Gourley’s
belief in the soon
coming end,
even as the
passing
of
years
forced him to
adjust
his timetable. Like other
Pentecostals,
he viewed the war
with suspicion
and
expected
“For a description of life on the island, see LeWame, “‘And Be Ye Separate,”‘ 86-91. Also Margaret
Marshall,
“The
Solitary Settler at Hunter’s Bay,”
Seattle Times, 4 December 1955), 11.
“The most extensive problem in this regard was the case of Leslie Crim, whose death in 1911 left an undetermined value in stock to the colony. The court case found in favor of Crim’s relatives. See
subsequent
LeWarne,
“‘And Be Ye Separate,”‘
89-90.
38 Midnight Cry (Port Stanley, WA), Lesson No. 15:2. These later editions of the are
newspaper
smaller
easily distinguished
from the earlier
run; they were
on
size
printed
paper
and were not dated. Each issue included a
single, sometimes continuing,
article by Gourley. Only a handful survive in family hands.
‘9Midnight Cry (Port Stanley),
Lesson No. 13:3.
11
182
degree
that it would
prompt
the outbreak of
Armageddon. 40
Yet
again,
the
of
Gourley’s opposition
and zeal was
unique, leading
to his trial for
violating
the Sedition Act of
May
1918. Based on statements he made in a
July 28,
1918 sermon at
Richardson,
a small town located across the island from his
colony, Gourley
was
charged
and
brought before a
jury
in
January,
1919.
Specifically,
he was
charged
on five counts of
making
seditious remarks and
interfering
with the sale of
Bonds and war
stamps.
Local news
reports quoted
witnesses as
that
Gourley publicly
stated that
Liberty saying
The
government
is
taking
our
boys
and
putting
them in
camps
and cantonments and will send them back to us but libertines and
This war is not fought to make the world a
nothing
decent place to live
but in order that the capitalists may make more money. I will not buy
bonds, and I advise you patriots not to do so.41
gamblers. in, Liberty
acquittal,
surprisingly,
Pentecostals,
structures.
Having
claiming specifically
his amazement might
refuse its
validity, Gourley
state of Presumably
the
The
testimony
of witnesses was
vague enough, coupled
with
Gourley’s testimony
that his statements were taken out of
context,
to result in an
but the
widely publicized
and well-attended trial no doubt figured
in Gourley’s decision to leave the island the
following year. 42
After the sedition trial and his decision to leave
Lopez, Gourley returned to an earlier theme-the
redemption
of the
body;
not
he found his
place
back
among
the ranks of the
though again
outside the dominant denominational
cited the
redemption
that Pentecostals
doctrine as
early
as
1908,
of all
people
now created a brief furor
by health
might
and should be attained.43
Gourley
was later chastised in his
obituary by
a belittling press with no
apparent understanding
proclaiming
that a perfect
imminent Second
Coming figured
into his belief that a person
would not
die, though
as “the man who said he would never die”
of the
theological subtlety
involved.”
“For Parham’s views on World War
I,
see
Goff, Fields White Unto Harvest, 156-157.
WA), passed
Body,” Midnight Cry (Seattle)
Post-Dispatch,
“”Government Closes Case
Against Gourley,” American
Reville
10
(Bellingham,
January 1919, 4. Though
news reports referred to the Espionage
Act,
June 15, 1917, Gourley was actually tried according to revisions added in the Sedition Act of May 16, 1918.
42 See
See also “Many
Witnesses Heard at Trial,” American Reveille, 11 January
1919, 6.
LeWarne,
“‘And Be Ye 91-92. The
but
Separate,”‘ colony continued briefly after Gourley’s departure was abandoned sometime in 1922.
4’For an
early explanation
of the
by
doctrine
by Gourley, see “Redemption of the 1
(September 1908): 3.
44 See “Pastor, Who Said He’d Live Forever on Earth, Buried,” St. Louis
2 March 1923): 3. An earlier article confirmed that Gourley and his entire
“St. Louis family
(he and Mary ultimately had five sons) now resided in St. Louis. See
Evangelist Was Killed in Georgia Wreck,” St. Louis Post-Dispatch,
27
20. Gourley supporters maintained that the evangelist claimed he
February 1923):
12
183
At
any rate,
it was the doctrine of perpetual health that seems to have taken
Gourley
and his
family
to St. Louis in
1921,
enhanced
by the fact at
that, age 60,
he still
enjoyed
remarkable health and
testified that he had not been sick a
day
in his life since his remarkable
healing
and conversion back in 1894.45 Again, connections are difficult to
pin down, but
Gourley
established a
relationship
with the Pentecostal mission run by
Mother
Mary
Moise
and,
for a brief
time,
served as leader of her mission.’ It was this
relationship
that no doubt introduced him to J. R. Moseley,
an eccentric Pentecostal who
sponsored
the
evangelist’s
visit to
Macon, Georgia
and defended him before the
press.
In
February 1923, Moseley accompanied Gourley
via train from Macon en route to St. Louis when
tragedy
struck. The Dixie
Flyer
derailed near
Calhoun, Georgia
and
Gourley
and one other
passenger
were killed in the wreck. Moseley’s
recollection of the event is eerie
though
he
mysteriously never refers to
Gourley by
name:
A few miles below
Calhoun, Georgia,
the train
moving at the track. I was seated high speed jumped
as best I could
by my friend
the bosom of the unseen
[Gourley]. I closed and threw my eyes as a little
myself upon
child in time of throws itself the bosom Companion, of a A friend who danger
upon parent.
[unknown] kept his eyes open told me afterward that I was bounced like a ball. When I felt the
coach slowing up, I opened my eyes. I found
myself perched upon
the wood and steel bar between the fragile glass
windows of the car. It furnished a safe strong
place for
me. As I looked through the windows of the car (it was perched up some distance from the ground), I saw one man who had fallen through glass. He was badly
wounded and bleeding. I also saw the body of my Saint Louis the head
friend,
severed from it and not in
head on a platter, it reminded me of the
sight. When the undertaker came and out
brought
of John the
my friend’s experience
Baptist, who prophecied [sic] of the Kingdom nigh at hand that he failed to enter while in the
flesh.”
would ,s not die from sickness, thus leaving him vulnerable only to accidents.
Gourley’s
remarkable health was a
legend
even among the settlers at Island. When the Spanish flu afflicted the
Lopez
colony in 1918, only Gourley and
one other man were unaffected. Transcript of Interview With Peter
Thomas
Hampton Gourley,
Gourley’s son, by Irma Margaret Gourley, 1984, is confirmed
J. R
Gourley Collection. The testimony Moseley, Manifest
and A Testimony,
Revised Ed. (New York, NY: Harper and Brothers, 1947), 115-116.
by Victory: A Quest 46This is the clear insinuation of Moseley, who visited Moise’s home
after
immediately
Gourley’s death. See Moseley, Manifest Victory, 118-119. On Moise and her
of this doctrine, see Wayne Warner, “Mother Moise of St. Louis,” Assemblies
acceptance
of God Heritage
6
(Spring 1986): 6-7, 118-119.
13-14. Mary
41 Moseley, Manifest Victory, According to this accouni Gourley was in of the
charge
After the
ministry at the Moise home at 2829 Washington
Avenue in St. Louis.
tragic wreck,
Moise
attempted
to
replace Gourley with Moseley
but Moseley refused, citing a specific warning from the Holy Spirit
not to take such a position. Moseley informed Moise that the Spirit had told him that Gourley was to have no successor and that “we are all to be taught of the Lord and led by His Spirit” (119). For news coverage of the wreck, see “Gourley Interested in Religious Work,”
Atlanta Constitution, 27
February 1923,
1 and “T. H.
Dead in
Gourley, Carpenter-Preacher, Wreck,” Macon Daily Telegraph, 27 February 1923,
.
13
184
Gourley’s
death
brought
an end to
any
substantial influence he
might have established on Pentecostalism in the South and Midwest. The redemption
of the
body
doctrine
played only
a minor role in the movement in the
1920s, though
in various forms it would be revived among
Pentecostals in years to corner
Nevertheless,
there is enough to suggest
that
Gourley
was at least a minor
player
in the
early spread
of Pentecostalism. He embraced the arrival of Pentecostal charismata and added them to his collection of holiness doctrines and
practices.
But he refused to accommodate those beliefs to the
dogma
of the
majority. That refusal and his continued belief in the immediate dawn of another dramatic
restructuring
of God’s
people kept
him out of the mainstream of Pentecostal denominations.
Though
his
legacy
did not survive as an organization
and his
tragic
death
spelled
a quick end to what
promised to be a
larger
influence in the
Midwest,
he remains
important
as a representation
of the
degree
of division and chaos
among early Pentecostalism.
Always
caustic and
unbending,
he failed to acculturate his views to that of the
growing
number of Pentecostal
organizations. To the
end,
he
preferred
to find God’s voice on the extreme
edge
of Pentecostalism. It is instructive that Tom
Gourley always
found an audience;
it is
likely that,
on that same
edge,
historians will find much of the rest of Pentecostalism as well.
1. The Macon paper claims Moseley, et al. planned to write a book on
The reference to John the
Gourley’s theology. Baptist also
made the St. Louis see
Who Said He’d Live Forever on
papers; “Pastor, Earth, Buried,” St. Louis Post-Dispatch, 2 March
1923, 3. The article further suggests that
created a brief division between Moise and Ben another
Gourley
Pemberton,
minister at the mission.
48The connection with similar doctrine among Word of Faith followers in the last two decades is intriguing, though there is no apparent direct link with
of see James R “The Faith That
Gourley. On Word Faith, Goff, Jr., Claims,” Christianity Today, 19 February 1990, 18-21.
14
