The Church of the Nazarene is an international evangelical Christian denomination that emerged primarily from within the Wesleyan-Methodist tradition of the 19th century Holiness movement. The denomination is commonly referred to as the Nazarene Church , and its members referred to as Nazarenes . The mission is "to respond to the Great Commission of Christ to ‘go and make disciples of all nations’ (Matthew 28:19)," In December 2006 this was expressed more succinctly as "to make Christlike disciples in the nations." This frames the global mission of the denomination. In 2009 the General Assembly indicated in its revision of Article XI of the Manual the means for accomplishing its mission: "making disciples through evangelism, education, showing compassion, working for justice, and bearing witness to the kingdom of God." Since 2001, the three “core values” of the Church have been identified as “Christian, missional, and holiness.”
At the end of 2008, the Church of the Nazarene had 1,837,393 members in almost 23,000 churches in 155 different "world areas". It has the most Nazarenes in the USA (658,402); Haiti (108,015); and India (59,039). The denomination has the highest percentage presence in the nations of Cape Verde, Samoa, Barbados, Haiti and Swaziland.
The Church of the Nazarene supports 58 undergraduate and graduate educational institutions in 40 countries on six continents around the world.. Since 15 September 2008, the headquarters of the denomination is the Global Ministry Center (GMC) located at 17001 Prairie Star Parkway, Lenexa, Kansas.. The Nazarene Publishing House has been located in Kansas City, Missouri since 1912.
Memberships and affiliations
The Church of the Nazarene is currently a member of the Christian Holiness Partnership, the National Association of Evangelicals, the World Methodist Council, Mission Exchange (formerly the Evangelical Fellowship of Missions Agencies), and the Evangelical Council for Financial Accountability.
Statistics
As of the end of 2008, the Church of the Nazarene had 1,837,393 members (1,655,685 full and 181,679 associate members), (a 5.98 percent gain from the previous year) in almost 23,000 churches from around the world, of which there are 16,209 organized churches, a 5.53 percent net gain. During 2008, total monies paid for all purposes was US$946,777,409. Worldwide per capita giving was US$515.28. Membership in the United States in 2008 was 658,402, the largest of any nation (35.8% of the total church membership), a decline of 4,862 since 2000. The largest number of Nazarenes in other nations are Haiti with over 108,000 members, and India with 59,039 members. There are more total members outside the U.S.A. with 1,178,991 church members in World Mission areas. In 2007, a total of 1,032 new churches were organized, and 156,525 new Nazarenes (with just over 131,000 added by profession of faith) were reported in 2008. Most of that growth took place outside of the U.S.A. (108,553 net increase in church members in 2007). The denomination has the highest percentage presence in the nations of Cape Verde (where its members constitute 2.5% of the population); Samoa (1.88% of the population); Barbados (1.0% of the population); Haiti (0.99% of the population); and Swaziland (0.96% of the population) . In 2000 there was the highest percentage of Nazarene presence in the USA, with 2.25 members for every 1,000 US people (0.25%).
History
Main article: History of the Church of the NazareneThe Church of the Nazarene is the product of a series of mergers that occurred between various holiness churches, associations and denominations throughout the 20th century. The most prominent of these mergers took place at the First and Second General Assemblies, held at Chicago, Illinois, and Pilot Point, Texas in 1907 and 1908 , respectively. The primary architect of these early mergers was C.W. Ruth.
First General Assembly
The First General Assembly held in Chicago, Illinois from 10-17 October 1907 brought together the Eastern and the Western streams. The Western group was the Church of the Nazarene founded in October 1895 in Los Angeles, California by Dr. Phineas F. Bresee, a minister in the Methodist Episcopal Church, and Dr Joseph Pomeroy Widney, a Methodist physician, and the second president of the University of Southern California. The Eastern group was the Association of Pentecostal Churches of America , a denomination formed on 13 April 1897 through the merger of two older bodies: The Central Evangelical Holiness Association (organised 13-14 March 1890) and led by Fred A. Hillery and C. Howard Davis; and three churches organised by William Howard Hoople since January 1894, and formed into the Association of Pentecostal Churches of America . On 12 November 1896, these two groups met in Brooklyn, agreed upon a plan of union, which included retaining the name and Manual of Hoople's group. Prominent leaders included Hiram F. Reynolds, Davis, and Hoople. At the time of its merger with the Church of the Nazarene in 1907, the APCA existed principally from Nova Scotia to Iowa and the northeastern United States. The name of the united body adopted at the First General Assembly was Pentecostal Church of the Nazarene , and Bresee and Reynolds were elected the first general superintendents.
Interim accessions
In April 1908 Bresee accepted Edgar P. Ellyson, president of the Holiness University of Texas of Peniel, Texas, his wife, Mary Emily Ellyson (1869-1943), and many leaders and members of the Holiness Association of Texas into the Pentecostal Church of the Nazarene, with Emily Ellyson elected pastor of the new congregation at Peniel. In September 1908 the Pennsylvania Conference of the Holiness Christian Church under the leadership of Horace G. Trumbauer merged with the Pentecostal Church of the Nazarene.
Second General Assembly
At the Second General Assembly held at Pilot Point, Texas, the Holiness Church of Christ, located in the southern United States, merged with the Pentecostal Nazarenes. The Holiness Church of Christ itself was the merger of the New Testament Church of Christ founded in July 1894 at Milan, Tennessee by R.L. Harris, but soon led by his widow Mary Lee Cagle, and a group (also called the Holiness Church of Christ), that resulted in November 1904 at Rising Star, Texas from the prior merger of The Holiness Church' (founded in 1888 in Texas) and the Independent Holiness Church (formed at Van Alstyne, Texas in 1901, and led by Charles B. Jernigan and J.B. Chapman). The merger of the Holiness Church of Christ in the south and the Pentecostal Church of the Nazarene took place on Tuesday, October 13, 1908, at 10:40 a.m., "amid great shouts of joy and holy enthusiasm." The newly-merged Church of the Nazarene began with 10,034 members, 228 congregations, 11 districts, and 19 missionaries, according to historical records. The latter date marks the "official" founding date. Bresee, Reynolds and Ellyson were elected general superintendents.
Later accessions
Other independent bodies joined at later dates, including the Pentecostal Church of Scotland (founded in 1909 by Rev. George Sharpe) and the Pentecostal Mission (founded in 1898 by J.O. McClurkan), both in 1915. At this point, the Church of the Nazarene now embraced seven previous denominations and significant parts of two other groups. In time, the Church of the Nazarene and the Wesleyan Church would emerge as the two major denominations to gather in the smaller bodies of the 19th century Wesleyan-holiness movement. In subsequent decades, there were new accessions and mergers. In the 1922, more than one thousand members and most of the workers led by Joseph G. Morrison, from the Laymen's Holiness Association (founded in 1917) located in the Dakotas, joined the Church of the Nazarene. In the 1950s, there were mergers with the Hephzibah Faith Missionary Association (founded in 1893 in Tabor, Iowa) in 1950; the International Holiness Mission (founded in London in 1907 by David Thomas) merged on 29 October 1952; the Calvary Holiness Church (founded in Britain 1934 by Maynard James and Jack Ford), united on 11 June 1955; and the Gospel Workers Church of Canada (founded in Ontario in 1918) became part of the Church of the Nazarene on 7 September 1958. On 3 April 1988, an indigenous Church of the Nazarene in Nigeria, established in the 1940s, merged with the denomination.
The 2009 General Assembly authorized a committee with "the responsibility to approach "like-minded churches in the Wesleyan-Holiness tradition in order to pursue closer relations, with a goal of exploring the possibility of a merger or a collaborative relationship."
Separations
Throughout its history, there have been several groups that separated from the Church of the Nazarene to form new denominations. One of the first groups to withdraw from the denomination consisted of seven congregations in Colorado that had comprised the People's Mission Church under the leadership of William Lee, which had united with the Church of the Nazarene in April 1911. However, on 6 January 1912, Lee and his preachers wrote to Bresee indicating their desire to wi
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