Shane Clifton is an Australian theologian.
Clifton was the Dean of Theology at Alphacrucis College (Sydney, New South Wales, Australia, resigning in 2019.). [1] He received his PhD from the Australian Catholic University. In addition to his role with Alphacrucis, Clifton is the editor of the Australasian Pentecostal Studies journal. [2] His 2005 dissertation and subsequent book (published 2009) was entitled Pentecostal Churches in Transition. [3] [4] He has co-written Globalization and the Mission of the Church [5] with ACU's Professor Neil Ormerod. After a serious accident, in October 2010, [6] that left him a quadriplegic, Shane has focused his scholarly work on exploring the intersection between disability and various conceptions of the good life. [1]
Pentecostalism or classical Pentecostalism is a Protestant Charismatic Christian movement that emphasizes direct personal experience of God through baptism with the Holy Spirit. The term Pentecostal is derived from Pentecost, an event that commemorates the descent of the Holy Spirit upon the Apostles and other followers of Jesus Christ while they were in Jerusalem celebrating the Feast of Weeks, as described in the Acts of the Apostles.
The Church of the Nazarene is a Christian denomination that emerged in North America from the 19th-century Wesleyan-Holiness movement within Methodism. It is headquartered in Lenexa, Kansas. With its members commonly referred to as Nazarenes, it is the largest denomination in the world aligned with the Wesleyan-Holiness movement and is a member of the World Methodist Council.
A megachurch is a church with an unusually large membership that also offers a variety of educational and social activities, usually Protestant, including Evangelical. The Hartford Institute for Religion Research defines a megachurch as any Protestant Christian church having 2,000 or more people in average weekend attendance. The megachurch is an organization type rather than a denomination.
The Elim Pentecostal Church is a UK-based Pentecostal Christian denomination.
Tabor College is an Australian Christian tertiary college offering a range of liberal arts courses from certificate to post-graduate studies in the areas of counselling, education, ministry, performing arts, mission, youth studies and humanities. The college is based in Adelaide, South Australia with a campus in Perth, Western Australia. The Adelaide campus, formerly including the national headquarters, is housed in heritage listed buildings in Millswood, which were formerly the Goodwood Orphanage and more recently an education centre.
Prosperity theology is a religious belief among some Protestant Christians that financial blessing and physical well-being are always the will of God for them, and that faith, positive speech, and donations to religious causes will increase one's material wealth. Material and especially financial success is seen as a sign of divine favor.
Alphacrucis University College is a tertiary Christian liberal arts college. In addition to being the largest self-accrediting Christian liberal arts College in Australia, it is the official training college of Australian Christian Churches, the Assemblies of God in Australia. The College has campuses in every state capital city in Australia, campuses in Auckland and in Finland, and registered sites of offer in other places. Its main campus in Parramatta, New South Wales, Australia. The College has programmes running in various colleges and churches around Australia. The College was founded in 1948 with the vision of being a "Spirit-empowered, church-planting, missions-sending, outreach-focused, distinctly Australian college that would contribute its efforts towards changing the world".
Hillsong Church, commonly known as Hillsong, is a charismatic Christian megachurch based in Australia. The original church was established in Baulkham Hills, New South Wales, as Hills Christian Life Centre by Brian Houston and his wife Bobbie in 1983. Hillsong was a member of the Australian Christian Churches – the Australian branch of the US-based Assemblies of God – until 2018, when they separated to form a new denomination. The church is known for its contemporary worship music, with groups such as Hillsong Worship, Hillsong United and Hillsong Young & Free with many musical credits and hits.
Christianity in Africa first arrived in Egypt in approximately 50 AD. By the end of the 2nd century it had reached the region around Carthage. In the 4th century, the Aksumite empire in modern-day Ethiopia and Eritrea became one of the first regions in the world to adopt Christianity as its official religion. The Nubian kingdoms of Nobatia, Makuria and Alodia followed two centuries later. Important Africans who influenced the early development of Christianity include Tertullian, Perpetua, Felicity, Clement of Alexandria, Origen of Alexandria, Cyprian, Athanasius and Augustine of Hippo.
The Australian Christian Churches (ACC), formerly Assemblies of God in Australia, is a network of Pentecostal churches in Australia affiliated with the World Assemblies of God Fellowship, which is the largest Pentecostal denomination in the world.
The Assemblies of God USA (AG), officially the General Council of the Assemblies of God, is a Pentecostal Christian denomination in the United States. The Assemblies of God is the U.S. branch of the World Assemblies of God Fellowship, the world's largest Pentecostal body. With a constituency of over 3 million in 2011, the Assemblies of God was the ninth largest Christian denomination and the second largest Pentecostal denomination in the United States before declining to 2,932,466 in 2021.
Bible colleges affiliated with Australian Christian Churches refers to Bible colleges that are registered with Australian Christian Churches, a Pentecostal denomination. Australian Christian Churches currently has eight registered Bible colleges, that train aspiring ACC pastors, leaders, evangelists and missionaries as well as people from other denominations and other aspirations. Alphacrucis is the official ministry training college of the denomination.
Amos Yong is a Malaysian-American Pentecostal theologian and Professor of Theology and Mission at Fuller Theological Seminary. He has been Dean of School of Theology and School of Intercultural Studies at Fuller Seminary, since July 1, 2019.
Pentecostalism in Australia is a large and growing Christian movement. Pentecostalism is a renewal movement within Protestant Christianity that places special emphasis on a direct personal experience of God through baptism with the Holy Spirit. It emerged from 19th century precursors between 1870 and 1910, taking denominational form from c. 1927. From the early 1930s, Pentecostal denominations multiplied, and there are now several dozen, the largest of which relate to one another through conferences and organisations such as the Australian Pentecostal Ministers Fellowship. The Australian Christian Churches, formerly known as the Australian Assemblies of God, is the oldest and longest lasting Pentecostal organisation in Australia. The AOG/ACC is also the largest Pentecostal organisation in Australia with over 300,000 members in 2018. Until 2018, Hillsong Church was one of 10 megachurches in Australia associated with the ACC that have at least 2,000 members weekly. According to the church, over 100,000 people attend services each week at the church or one of its 80 affiliated churches located worldwide.
Harvest Bible College was the first Pentecostal theological college accredited by the Australian government. In 2018 it merged with Alphacrucis College.
World Christianity or global Christianity has been defined both as a term that attempts to convey the global nature of the Christian religion and an academic field of study that encompasses analysis of the histories, practices, and discourses of Christianity as a world religion and its various forms as they are found on the six continents. However, the term often focuses on "non-Western Christianity" which "comprises instances of Christian faith in 'the global South', in Asia, Africa, and Latin America." It also includes Indigenous or diasporic forms of Christianity in the Caribbean, South America, Western Europe, and North America.
Charismatic Christianity is a form of Christianity that emphasizes the work of the Holy Spirit and spiritual gifts as an everyday part of a believer's life. It has a global presence in the Christian community. Practitioners are often called Charismatic Christians or Renewalists. Although there is considerable overlap, Charismatic Christianity is often categorized into three separate groups: Pentecostalism, the Charismatic movement, and the Neo-charismatic movement.
Denise A. Austin is an Australian Pentecostal historian, particularly focused on Australia and the Asia-Pacific region.
Sarah Jane Lancaster was the leader of Australia's first Pentecostal congregation. An evangelist and administrator, she established a printing press in her meeting hall to produce evangelistic tracts and pamphlets. Lancaster also published Australia's first Pentecostal magazine, Good News. Lancaster became president of the nation's earliest attempt to organise Pentecostalism into a denomination, the Apostolic Faith Mission of Australasia. Although she is recognised as the founder of Australian Pentecostalism and contributed to the unique prominence of women in the founding of Australian Pentecostal congregations, many of her doctrinal ideas were quickly abandoned as the movement developed.
Pentecostal Saint Thomas Christians, also called Pentecostal Syrian Christians, are the ethnic Saint Thomas Christians (Nasranis) affiliated to various Pentecostal and independent Neo-Charismatic churches. Sometimes, the Kerala Brethren are also erroneously lumped together with Pentecostals. The community is native to the Indian state of Kerala, and shares in the legacy of early Christianity in the region, traditionally traced to the missionary activities of Saint Thomas the Apostle in the first century. Prior to their conversion to Pentecostalism, they belonged to traditional Saint Thomas Christian denominations.