Pentecostal People are Orthodox

The following excerpt testifies of the strong orthodoxy there was in the 1940’s in Pentecostal circles:

“Among Pentecostal people there is not the slightest wavering concerning the divine authorship of Scriptures. There is not one doubter among them concerning the creation of the world and all life by the fiat of God, as over against the popular heresy of evolution. The eternal deity of Christ, the only begotten Son of God; His virgin birth; His miracles; His vicarious death on Calvary; His physical resurrection from the dead, are all firmly believed by all Pentecostal people. The one defection that has come to our ranks has grown out of an over-emphasis of the doctrine of the deity of Christ. There is a group which is Pentecostal which now holds that there is only one Person in the Godhead and His name is Jesus. This departure from orthodoxy is deplored by the great majority of Pentecostal people and fellowship has been withdrawn from this erring group. With this one exception; the Pentecostal ranks have been kept pure and unsullied by variation from standard orthodoxy; and the Pentecostal people can be said to be most intense and wholehearted in their worship, in their separation from the world, and in their evangelistic and missionary zeal.”

Source: Ralph M. Riggs, The Spirit Himself (1949), Introduction, Pentecostal People are Orthodox, p. xii-xiii.