The hands of the clock on the railroad station tower were creeping toward 12:00 noon when the train pulled slowly into the Portland, Oregon, depot on Christmas Day, 1906. Perhaps the moment when the travelers disembarked passed into history unnoticed by those going by. However, it was a moment not without importance, for among the passengers that day was a woman named Florence L. Crawford. She brought with her a message that was to transform evangelical Christianity in the northwestern part of the United States—the message that the Pentecostal experience of the baptism of the Holy Ghost could be received by saved and sanctified believers in this era.

What thoughts went through this woman’s mind as the train rumbled toward Portland that day? Perhaps her time of reflection led her back to the day when the Lord had called after her heart as she was dancing on a ballroom floor. How her life had changed when she heard a Voice speak out of Heaven and say, “Daughter, give me thine heart!” Maybe her thoughts drifted back to the craving for more of God which had propelled her into a personal search for a people who preached the Gospel in its fullness. At one time, she had told a friend that if she ever found such a people, she would “follow them to the ends of the earth.”

An amazing revival
No doubt she recalled how she heard of an amazing revival which had broken out in what newspaper reporters called a “tumble-down shack” on Azusa Street in the city of Los Angeles. She was only one of thousands who had traveled to the revival’s epicenter in Los Angeles during that first decade of the new century, but she was one who had come away a changed woman. In the very first meeting she attended, she recognized that the people there had something for which her spirit was hungering. Very probably she had read the newspaper report which commented on a “new sect of fanatics breaking loose.” Possibly she had seen the front-page story in the Los Angeles Daily Times which said, “The devotees of the weird doctrine practice the most fanatical rites, preach the wildest theories, and work themselves into a state of mad excitement in their peculiar zeal.” However, the reports had not discouraged her. Within a few days of her first visit to the Azusa Street meetings, she had received a marvelous experience of sanctification, which she later referred to as “the most choice treasure of my life.” Three days later, in another of the Azusa Street meetings, God had poured out the Pentecostal experience on her life. “The greatest joy in my heart was the knowledge that I had received power to witness for Christ,” she said, “power to tell others what great things God can do in a human life.”

From that time on, her burning desire had been to spread the message that Pentecost—the power and anointing of the Holy Spirit for Christian service—had come. Touched by what has been called the greatest outpouring of the Holy Spirit in history, this dynamic woman, who was an entrepreneur at heart, had found her energy increasingly channeled into Gospel work. Thousands of inquiries had begun coming in from people who wanted to know more about the “Latter Rain” Gospel. So, combining her efforts with those of Clara Lum, another woman in the Azusa Street meetings, Florence Crawford had begun putting the record of what was being said in the meetings into a newspaper format. This publication was called The Apostolic Faith. In addition, she had begun to feel God’s call to travel beyond the boundaries of Los Angeles, taking the Pentecostal message to other areas. At one point she said, “There is no spot on earth so dear to me as this place, but I must go out and tell the story. Souls are perishing far and near . . . God wants us to go out into the highways and hedges and declare this Gospel.”

The trip northward
That call had propelled her northward. She had begun to consecrate and make preparations to fulfill her responsibility, although for a time everything had seemed to be against her leaving Los Angeles. She had become such a vital part of the movement that the minister at the Azusa Street church, William Seymour, had not seen how he could spare her from the meetings. But God had opened the way, and in the middle of December, 1906, with no financial sponsoring, she had boarded a train bound northward. In her heart was a prayer that God would meet her every need and open new doors for Gospel work.

Her first stop had been in Salem, Oregon, where she visited a holiness group whose pastor had traveled to Azusa Street, received the Holy Ghost, and had subsequently requested that someone come from Los Angeles to help his group. Her arrival had been announced in his publication, Light, and the series of meetings she held there had been mightily blessed of God, with many receiving the baptism of the Holy Ghost. One of those in attendance at the Salem meetings was the wife of a Portland pastor. She invited the woman evangelist to visit Portland and hold meetings in her husband’s church on Second and Main Street. His congregation had been dwindling, and the pastor had been praying for something to happen to make a change.

God heard those prayers, and answered them on this Christmas Day 1906, when Florence Crawford stepped from the train, with a message burning in her soul. Just three hours later, she was in her first meeting. The place of worship was far from elegant. The building, which had once been used for a blacksmith shop, had been cleaned up and made into a sanctuary. A few days later, she wrote back to the group in Los Angeles, “The power fell before the meeting was half through, and two received Pentecost; at night, two more . . . The altar is full before the meeting is half over. The house is just packed. Oh, if we only had a larger hall! I cannot tell how God is working here . . .”

In a letter dated a week later, she again told how the crowds were thronging the hall. Every chair was filled, the aisles packed, the doorway jammed, and crowds stood out in the street. City officials became concerned because of the fire hazards, and they took safety measures to limit the number of people entering the place. When an invitation to prayer was given, there were so many who wanted to pray that it was difficult to find room at the altar or elsewhere. All available kneeling space was quickly taken, and sometimes the doors had to be locked in order to keep the crowds away who might disturb those seeking God in prayer.

The message spreads
As the word got out, people began coming from all over the area in such numbers that some had to be turned away. In the first week, thirty-eight received the baptism of the Holy Ghost. And as the revival fire continued to spread, it began reaching the unconverted. One young woman came from Albany and was saved, sanctified, and received her baptism, all in one day. News reporters began to cover the happenings, although they were not the most welcomed people at that time because all available space was needed for those interested in hearing the Word of God. One day a reporter feigned to be a derelict in order to gain entrance to the service. With a bottle in his hip pocket, he made his way to the front and knelt at the place of prayer, hoping for a close-up view of what was happening. He intended to write a derogatory report for the newspaper, but there the hand of God touched him, convicted him of sin, and saved his soul. “God is spreading this Gospel in spite of the devil,” Florence Crawford wrote. “How glad I am that I ever found my way into the dear old mission on Azusa Street!”

On January 8, her initial trip concluded, Florence Crawford returned to Los Angeles. However, by the following April, she was on her way back to Portland. The pastor of the group which met in the old converted blacksmith shop had contacted the owners of property at 12th and Division Street in Portland, wanting to make arrangements to hold a camp meeting there. The owners were initially reluctant, saying that the “tongues of fire” might set the woods ablaze, but they finally consented to let him use the location. After the camp meeting, the Portland congregation moved to a hall on Southwest First and Madison, for they were greatly in need of a larger place of worship. As the Lord continued to bless, the pastor offered to turn his church over to Florence Crawford. It would be her church—the Apostolic Faith Church of Portland, Oregon. During a Gospel outreach trip to Minneapolis, God spoke to her, saying, “If you will go back to Portland, Oregon, and stay there, I will make that place the headquarters of the Apostolic Faith work, and I will raise up the standard of the Gospel in that city.”

Publishing begins in Portland
God’s plan was unmistakable, and in 1908, Florence Crawford gave up her home in Los Angeles and moved to Portland. The Azusa Street ministry turned over the responsibility of publishing The Apostolic Faith paper to her, so she and her co-worker, Clara Lum, brought that work to Portland. Funds were low, but God spoke definitely to her, letting her know that He would provide the way, and experience had taught her that faith plus obedience to the will of God always brings results. She stepped out in faith, with only ten cents on hand, and in July of 1908, the first paper to be issued from the Portland headquarters was published.

In accordance with her belief that God would provide for the work, after accepting the Portland pastorate, “Mother” Crawford, as she came to be known, discontinued the custom of taking collections in the services. The former pastor was amazed, and said, “Who is going to be responsible for the upkeep of this place if no collections are taken?” She firmly answered him, “I will be responsible.” From that day to this, no collections have ever been taken in the Apostolic Faith Church services. Freewill offerings and tithes have met every need.

From that simple beginning back in 1906, a worldwide work sprang. Today, Apostolic Faith churches around the world look back to their roots in a converted blacksmith shop in Portland, Oregon. People on every continent are serving the Lord, rejoicing in the message which Florence Crawford brought to Portland. A literature ministry has covered the globe with Gospel publications produced and mailed out free of charge in more than seventy different languages.

Decades have come and gone since Florence Crawford stepped off the train in Portland, bearing the message that Pentecost had come. No one will ever be able to number all those who were drawn to 312 Azusa Street. No historian will ever calculate the impact of the thousands who were baptized by the power of the Holy Ghost and then scattered to the ends of the earth. But as we trace the way God used one woman who received this experience and followed where God led, we find that the Pentecostal fire which was ignited at the turn of the century in Los Angeles is still burning brightly today.