This is an article from pages four and fifteen of the January 1946 Pentecostal Herald. It is titled “The Last Theophany” and was written by Frank J. Ewart. This would have been the second issue of the Herald after the forming of the United Pentecostal Church. I don’t know if the article was taken from some of his earlier writings or if it was submitted for publication in the new UPC magazine, but it is an example of early Oneness Pentecostal writing on the subject of the Deity or “Godhead.”
According to a reference book I have which is titled “Dictionary of Pentecostal and Charismatic Movements” copyright 1988, Frank Ewart was “one of the most influential spokesmen for the Oneness movement in its early years.” This reference work states that F.J. Ewart was born in 1876 in Australia, began his ministry in the Baptist church as a bush missionary and in 1903 he immigratied to Canada and served as a pastor of a Baptist church. After he received the baptism in the Holy Spirit in 1908 he was dismissed by the Baptist organization. In 1911 he became the assistant pastor to William H. Durham in Los Angeles, and assumed the pastorate in 1912 when Durham died. In 1913 he heard R.E. McAlister preach on water baptism in the name of Jesus Christ at the Arroyo Seco camp meeting, and the following year he openly began preaching the Jesus’ Name message and rebaptizing Pentecostals. He is said to be one of the first Pentecostals to teach the Oneness of God rather than the doctrine of the Trinity. In 1919 he founded a church in Belvedere, CA which he pastored until his death in 1947. He was a minister in the United Pentecostal church and the author of at least eight books.
In the April 2006 issue of The Pentecostal Herald, Bro. Ken Haney mentions two outstanding books on the Azusa Street revival, and one of these is “The Phenomenon of Pentecost” by Frank. Ewart. Bro. Haney also mentions that Frank Ewart was a pastor who greatly influenced his father and mother, Clyde and Olive Haney.
The Last Theophany
by Frank J. Ewart
Our word theophany means God in a body. There are about ten theophanys in the Old Testament. They all point forward and typified Christ. He was the last Theophany; For “God, who at sundry times and in diverse manners spake in times past unto the fathers by the prophets, hath in these days spoken unto us by His Son.” The literal Greek reads, out of a Son.
The Burning bush was a striking theophany. In Hebrew, bush means secrecy. God secreted himself in a bush as a fire. He gave Moses the ineffable name, which is lost, but its meaning is preserved in I Am that I Am, The self existent One, who would unfold Himself. That I Am was Christ, who was the Burning Bush that took the fire into His humanity, and was not consumed. There is a statement about the Lord possessing Gideon for the battle against Midian, and the best marginal reading is: And the Lord clothed Himself with Gideon. So every theophany was an index finger --the finger of God-- pointing direct to Christ, the God-man. The Scriptures call Christ the image of the invisible God. The thought is that the Invisible God, by conception and birth, made a human image and got into it or hid himself in it. So the Son of God, became the Visible Deity. Dr. Weymouth translates it: The visible representation of the Invisible God.
It is of the utmost significance that the word Person is never used about God.
Heb 1:3 is a mistranslation. The palpable point is, that Christ Jesus was God’s permanent visible person. God, --The Eternal-- may never be seen apart from Jesus. The declaration that He was the Son of God was made at the resurrection (
Rom 1:4). Through the resurrection Jesus was glorified. This glorified body or Person became God’s dwelling place. Paul declares that, In Him dwelleth (not has dwelt or will dwell) all the fulness of the Deity bodily. This is an inscrutable mystery, however, we must all believe it without question; for it is foolish to try and be wiser than the Word of God.
to be continued in part 2
Threaded Mode
