This thesis explores the Azusa Street Revival’s distinctive experience of Christian community as a theological and communal outworking of the vision of koinonia as it is depicted in the book of Acts. The thesis will argue that koinonia is best understood as the corporate evidence of Spirit baptism. It will argue that Pentecostal ecclesiology should be defined more by the communal and social fruits of the Azusa Street Revival than by miraculous signs such as tongues-speaking.

Spirit baptism, evidenced by tongues-speaking, is considered a distinctive feature of the famous Azusa Street Revival (1906–1908); however, it was the social cohesion of the culturally integrated fellowship that often caught the attention of observers at the time. In contrast to American society at the time, the Azusa Street congregation was marked by inclusiveness, reconciliation, and racial integration. The early Pentecostals believed they were living in, and thus living out of, the book of Acts in their own time. The record of the early church in Acts provided a pattern for a simple, practical, and powerful Christian movement. The Azusa Street leaders and congregants believed that Jerusalem had come to Los Angeles; Pentecost had arrived (Acts 2:4). The Holy Spirit had empowered individuals with spiritual gifts and had gathered a new community of believers of ‘one heart and mind’ (Acts 4:32) who would witness to Christ from Los Angeles to the ‘ends of the earth’ (Acts 1:8).

The thesis contributes to a Pentecostal theology of the church by offering a fresh account of the nature of the church, as seen through the two prisms of the book of Acts and the Azusa Street Revival. Using the concept of koinonia, the thesis will map out a Pentecostal theology of the church that centres on communal and social transformation. The thesis will argue that neither an idealistic theology of harmonious koinonia nor a purely sociological description of the Christian community can embrace the full depth and complexity of what it means to be the church. What Pentecostal theology needs is an ecclesiology that is broad and flexible enough to accommodate experiences of conflict and challenge while also being grounded in a positive vision of the Spirit’s work—the Spirit who calls, gathers, and empowers the people of God to participate in God’s mission for the world. By combining an analysis of early Pentecostalism with a reading of the book of Acts, this thesis will seek to contribute to such a re-evaluation of Pentecostal ecclesiology.