Oneness Pentecostals baptise in the name of Jesus alone and understand God as one person rather than three.
Oneness Pentecostal teaching emerged in the early twentieth century around baptism in Jesus' name and a non-Trinitarian understanding of God. Disagreement over these teachings led ministers to leave the Assemblies of God in 1916. The Pentecostal Assemblies of the World and the United Pentecostal Church International (formed in 1945) are two important Oneness bodies.
The tree's references for this branch: Britannica: Pentecostalism · Wikipedia: Oneness Pentecostalism.
Lineage: Israel and Judah: the First Temple›Second Temple Judaism›The early, undivided Church›Catholic Church›Church of England (Anglican)›Methodist›Holiness movement›Pentecostal›Oneness Pentecostal
Oneness Pentecostals are the Pentecostals who baptise in the name of Jesus Christ rather than in the words Father, Son and Holy Spirit, and who understand God to be absolutely one rather than three persons. They are sometimes called Apostolic or Jesus Name Pentecostals. The largest bodies are the United Pentecostal Church International and the Pentecostal Assemblies of the World.
The question arose at a camp meeting. In 1913 at Arroyo Seco in California, a preacher noted in passing that the apostles in Acts always baptised in the name of Jesus rather than in the three-fold formula of Matthew 28:19. Within a year Frank Ewart and Glenn Cook had concluded that the apostolic wording was the right one and had rebaptised each other, and the question spread through the young Pentecostal movement faster than anyone could contain it. Pentecostals called it the New Issue 12.
It came to a head in the Assemblies of God, then two years old. The General Council discussed it in 1914 and again in 1915, appealing for tolerance. At the fourth General Council in October 1916 the mostly trinitarian leadership adopted the Statement of Fundamental Truths, which settled the matter against the Oneness position, and something like a third of the Assemblies' ministers left 11,12,19. They went into bodies of their own. The oldest of them, the Pentecostal Assemblies of the World, dates itself from 1906 and took its present shape in a 1917 merger whose first chairman was a white minister and whose first secretary was Garfield Thomas Haywood, the leading Black pastor of early Pentecostalism 8,14. The United Pentecostal Church International was formed at St Louis in 1945 out of two earlier bodies 13.
The Pentecostal Assemblies of the World was genuinely interracial for nine years after its 1917 merger, at a time when almost nothing else in American religion was, with a white chairman and a Black secretary. It could not hold. Segregation and Jim Crow law meant no integrated meeting could be held anywhere in the South, so every convention had to be in a northern city, and in 1924 most of the white ministers withdrew to form bodies of their own 14. The organisations that eventually became the UPCI trace back through that withdrawal.
See it on the family treeThe doctrine is best given in the church's own words. The UPCI's statement about God reads: There is one God, who has revealed Himself as Father; through His Son, in redemption; and as the Holy Spirit, by emanation. Jesus Christ is God manifested in flesh. He is both God and man 2. Oneness teaching is not that the Father and the Spirit do not exist, and the old nickname Jesus Only misleads on exactly that point 12. It is that the one God is one being who has made himself known in these ways, and that the fullness of that God is in Jesus.
The other load-bearing doctrine is what Oneness Pentecostals call the new birth, and it comes straight out of Peter's answer on the day of Pentecost. The UPCI puts it this way: we obey the gospel by repentance, which is death to sin; water baptism in the name of Jesus Christ, which is burial; and the baptism of the Holy Spirit with the initial sign of speaking in tongues, which is resurrection 2. Baptism is therefore in the name of Jesus Christ rather than in the trinitarian formula, and it is understood as part of how a person comes into salvation rather than only as a sign of it.
This is where Oneness Pentecostals part company with almost every other Christian body, including other Pentecostals, and neither side treats the difference as small. What the church itself says about people who have not received the whole of what it teaches is worth quoting: we do not reject those who have not received the complete New Testament experience, but we encourage them to receive everything God has for them 3. Alongside this the UPCI teaches that Scripture is the infallible Word of God, that salvation comes by grace through faith on the basis of Christ's atoning sacrifice, that believers should live a holy life inwardly and outwardly, and that the gifts of the Spirit including healing are for the church today 2. The Pentecostal Assemblies of the World states its own aim in the same register, to glorify Christ and to lift the fallen, visit the sick, strengthen the weak and point the lost to the way of salvation 7.
Worship in an Apostolic church is Pentecostal and loud. Singing goes on a long time, hands are raised, people pray aloud together and speak in tongues, and the preaching expects a response at the front. Testimony has a place, and so does prayer for healing. Music is a serious matter in these churches, and much of the gospel music tradition of Black Pentecostalism runs through Oneness congregations.
Baptism is by immersion and the words spoken over the candidate are in the name of Jesus Christ. Congregations expect people who are seeking to stay at the altar until they receive the Spirit, and speaking in tongues is understood as the sign that it has happened. Many Oneness churches, and the UPCI in particular, also teach visible standards of holiness in dress and conduct, which its beliefs statement puts as living a holy life inwardly and outwardly 2. The UPCI is governed by a general conference that determines articles of faith and elects a general superintendent 13; the PAW is episcopal, governed by a board of bishops with a presiding bishop 8,9. Both bodies publish their positions rather than leaving them to be inferred, the UPCI in a standing archive of its statements 4,5.
Oneness Pentecostals read the whole Bible through a small number of texts and follow them without softening. Deuteronomy 6:4, that the LORD our God is one, is read as meaning exactly that. Colossians 2:9, that in Christ dwells all the fullness of the Godhead bodily, and 1 Timothy 3:16, that God was manifest in the flesh, are read as identifying who Jesus is. Acts 2:38 is read as the pattern of conversion rather than as one episode among several, and the baptisms in Acts 8, 10 and 19 as confirming it 2,3.
The King James Version is the Bible of most of these congregations, and its wording is embedded in how the doctrine is stated: the phrases God was manifest in the flesh and the fulness of the Godhead bodily belong to that translation. The verses below are given in it.
Free to read here: Berean Standard Bible, King James Version, Reina-Valera 1909, Bíblia Livre, Neno: Maandiko Matakatifu, Bíbélì Mímọ́, Baịbụlụ Nsọ, Littafi Mai Tsarki. The full note on which Bible Oneness Pentecostal use, with sources ›
These passages illustrate themes discussed in this profile; they are not a survey of members' favorite verses. Each is quoted from the King James (Authorized) Version and links to its chapter. You can explore the text for study or personal reflection; memorization is optional.
Then Peter said unto them, Repent, and be baptized every one of you in the name of Jesus Christ for the remission of sins, and ye shall receive the gift of the Holy Ghost.
Peter's answer to the crowd, and the single most important verse in these churches. Repentance, baptism in the name of Jesus Christ, and the gift of the Holy Ghost, read as one pattern.
Hear, O Israel: The LORD our God is one LORD:
Ten words that Oneness Pentecostals take at face value, and the first text cited in the UPCI's own statement about God.
For in him dwelleth all the fulness of the Godhead bodily.
All the fulness of the Godhead bodily. If it is all in Christ, Oneness teaching argues, it is not divided among three persons.
And without controversy great is the mystery of godliness: God was manifest in the flesh, justified in the Spirit, seen of angels, preached unto the Gentiles, believed on in the world, received up into glory.
God was manifest in the flesh. The King James wording of this verse has carried a great deal of Oneness preaching.
Oneness Pentecostalism is a global movement now generally estimated at around 30 million people 12. The United Pentecostal Church International reports that it grew from 521 churches in 1945 to more than 5,100 churches, 12,315 ministers and a constituency of about 1,102,000 in the United States and Canada by 2025, with a worldwide membership it puts above six million across more than 45,000 congregations 1,13. Those are the church's own figures. The Pentecostal Assemblies of the World reports roughly 4,000 congregations and about two million members 6,14.
The movement is heavily but not exclusively African American in the United States, and it is growing fastest outside it, in Africa, Latin America, South Asia and the Philippines. Women serve as bishops in the Pentecostal Assemblies of the World, which in August 2022 elected the first woman to its Executive Bishops' Council 9,10. The UPCI runs Urshan College and Urshan Graduate School of Theology, and its theologians publish, which is a recent development for a movement whose early leaders were mostly evangelists rather than scholars 1,2.
No, and the old nickname Jesus Only gives the wrong impression 12. The UPCI's statement is that there is one God who has revealed Himself as Father, through His Son in redemption, and as the Holy Spirit by emanation, and that Jesus Christ is God manifested in flesh 2. The disagreement with other Christians is about whether God is three persons in one being, which Oneness teaching denies, not about whether the Father and the Spirit are real.
Because that is the wording used every time a baptism is described in Acts, and Oneness Pentecostals hold that the apostles knew what Jesus meant in Matthew 28:19 better than later generations did. They understand the name in that command to be the name of Jesus. Baptism is by immersion, and the words spoken are in the name of Jesus Christ 2,3.
They share the Pentecostal experience, including speaking in tongues, healing and expressive worship, and they came from the same revival. They differ on two things that other Pentecostals consider fundamental: the nature of God and the words used at baptism. That difference produced a permanent separation in 1916 and it has not closed 11,12.
They hold the same doctrine and are separate organisations with different histories and governments. The Pentecostal Assemblies of the World is the older body, is episcopal, is governed by a board of bishops, and is historically and predominantly African American. The United Pentecostal Church International was formed in 1945 from two other bodies, is governed by a general conference and a general superintendent, and is the larger of the two 6,8,13.
Their written position is more careful than the reputation. The UPCI states that it does not reject those who have not received the complete New Testament experience, but encourages them to receive everything God has for them, and it holds that each person is accountable to God for their own response of faith 3. It is also true that the church teaches Acts 2:38 as the pattern of the new birth, which other Christians hear as a claim about who is inside and outside. Both things are true at once, and how they are held together varies from preacher to preacher.
Numbered references link the account above to its sources. These include the tradition's own documents and outside reference works. The review status below distinguishes source checking from completed member and scholarly review.
BibleVerse. “Oneness Pentecostal: where they came from, what they hold, and the Bible they read.” bibleverse.site, version 2026-09-07, https://bibleverse.site/denominations/oneness/
Awaiting review by a member of the tradition. First published 2026-09-07; last changed 2026-09-07. Years before the common era are written BC, and later years plainly, as the site's Christian pages do.
Found something wrong? Send it through the contact page. A correction checked against two sources is made within a week and logged in this page's change history.
How this page was made, and the standards it was held to: How these pages were made.
One verse, taken as an instruction rather than as a description, and a movement of thirty million people organised around obeying it exactly.
Then Peter said unto them, Repent, and be baptized every one of you in the name of Jesus Christ for the remission of sins, and ye shall receive the gift of the Holy Ghost.