Evangelical Church (ECNA)
| Evangelical Church of North America | |
|---|---|
| Classification | Protestant |
| Orientation | Evangelical, Holiness |
| Polity | Congregational-Connectional |
| Associations | Christian Holiness Partnership, National Association of Evangelicals |
| Region | U.S. districts, worldwide missions conferences |
| Origin | 1968 |
| Separated from | Evangelical United Brethren Church (EUB) |
| Merger of | Holiness Methodist Church (1969), Wesleyan Covenant Church (1975) |
| Congregations | 133 |
| Members | 12,475 (2000) |
The Evangelical Church of North America (ECNA) is a Wesleyan-Holiness, Protestant Christian denomination headquartered in Gladstone, Oregon. As of 2000, the Church had 12,475 members in 133 local churches. The Church sponsors missionaries in seven countries.
Its official emblem is composed of a red flame, symbolizing the fire of the Holy Spirit which descended at Pentecost, atop an open Bible. It has published an official magazine, The Evangelical Challenge, and a newsletter, The Heartbeat.
The Evangelical Church of North America was officially born June 4, 1968, in Portland, Oregon. But the origin of The Evangelical Church can be traced back to two earlier movements: the Wesleyan awakening in England under John Wesley, the founder of The Methodist Church, and the United Brethren in Christ movement in Pennsylvania, spearheaded by preachers such as William Otterbein and Martin Boehm.
The early Methodists in England and later North America declared that men can be saved from sin, through repentance and faith in Jesus Christ, and that this experience must be followed by a life of dedication and holiness, or "sanctification."
Meanwhile, the work of the United Brethren in Christ grew rapidly after its first Conference was held in York County, Pennsylvania, in 1789. These brethren believed that God is a God of order, and that where there is no order and no church discipline, the spirit of love and charity will be lost. This stream of Protestantism found much in common with the early American Methodists—a relationship that would eventually lead up to the formation of the Evangelical United Brethren Church (EUB) in 1946.
At its annual session in 1967, the Pacific Northwest Conference of the EUB Church voted by a two-thirds majority to secede from its parent body and continue to operate as a separate denomination. The action was taken in anticipation of the EUB's upcoming merger with the Methodist Church (USA). Dissenters differed with an increasingly Modernist trend in American Methodism over Biblical authority, "the social gospel," and the doctrine of Entire Sanctification.
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