Gov. Sarah Palin spent a good deal of time in the Assemblies of God, just about the largest Pentecostal denomination around the world. This is the denomination I started attending during my senior year in college, and with whom I spent the next 8 years working as a campus pastor in their campus ministries.
I departed this Christian expression in1992 for Anglicanism in 1992 1994 - I saw what was coming in the politicization of American-Evangelicalism. I'm glad I grew up Pentecostal - my developmental years where spent in The Foursquare Church, which being based in Los Angeles is a little more laid back and, well, "hip" I guess - the A/G is based in the Springfield, Missouri in the Ozarks. Hillbilly vs. Southern California. I am so glad I am not there, now!
A lot of people find it very easy to dismiss the Assemblies of God. That is a mistake. In Anglican Land, we brag about being the third largest expression of Christianity in the world with our 38 autonomous provinces and 77 million adherents.
Um, consider this:
"An Assemblies of God study from 2006 found 60 million adherents in more than 300,000 churches worldwide. About 2.8 million of these are in the U.S."
I believe it. This one denomination (with cooperative agreements in many nations with indigenous churches that came out of their missionary endeavors) is just about as large as the whole Anglican Communion! It is larger than The Episcopal Church in the U.S.
