Bernt Berntsen (Chinese: , January 1, 1863 – October 16, 1933), also known as Brother B. Berntsen, was a

Norwegian-American Norwegian Americans ( nb, Norskamerikanere, nn, Norskamerikanarar) are Americans with ancestral roots in Norway. Norwegian immigrants went to the United States primarily in the latter half of the 19th century and the first few decades of the ...

Protestant Christian missionary to

China China, officially the People's Republic of China (PRC), is a country in East Asia. It is the world's most populous country, with a population exceeding 1.4 billion, slightly ahead of India. China spans the equivalent of five time zones and ...

. In 1904, Berntsen and his wife Magna were able to preach along with several other

independent Independent or Independents may refer to: Arts, entertainment, and media Artist groups * Independents (artist group), a group of modernist painters based in the New Hope, Pennsylvania, area of the United States during the early 1930s * Independ ...

Norwegian Norwegian, Norwayan, or Norsk may refer to: *Something of, from, or related to Norway, a country in northwestern Europe * Norwegians, both a nation and an ethnic group native to Norway * Demographics of Norway *The Norwegian language, including ...

missionaries in a

mission station A Christian mission is an organized effort for the propagation of the Christian faith. Missions involve sending individuals and groups across boundaries, most commonly geographical boundaries, to carry on evangelism or other activities, such as ...

in Damingfu of

Zhili Province Zhili, alternately romanized as Chihli, was a northern administrative region of China since the 14th-century that lasted through the Ming dynasty and Qing dynasty until 1911, when the region was dissolved, converted to a province, and renamed ...

. Influenced by the 1906

Azusa Street Revival The Azusa Street Revival was a historic series of revival meetings that took place in Los Angeles, California. It was led by William J. Seymour, an African-American preacher. The revival began on April 9, 1906, and continued until roughly 1915. ...

, he later founded the Apostolic Faith Mission in China (later amalgamated with the

Assemblies of God The Assemblies of God (AG), officially the World Assemblies of God Fellowship, is a group of over 144 autonomous self-governing national groupings of churches that together form the world's largest Pentecostal denomination."Assemblies of God". ...

) with a group of American missionaries associated with the

Pentecostal movement Pentecostalism or classical Pentecostalism is a Protestant Charismatic Christian movement

. His evangelism had a profound influence on the early co-workers of the

True Jesus Church The True Jesus Church (TJC) is a non-denominational Christian Church that originated in Beijing, China, during the Pentecostal movement in the early twentieth century. The True Jesus Church is currently one of the largest Christian groups in Ch ...

, namely Zhang Lingsheng and Paul Wei, and he is regarded as one of the early missionary progenitors of Pentecostalism in China.

Early life

Bernt Berntsen was born in

Larvik Larvik () is a List of cities in Norway, town and Municipalities of Norway, municipality in Vestfold in Vestfold og Telemark Counties of Norway, county, Norway. The administrative centre of the municipality is the city of Larvik. The municipality ...

, in

Vestfold Vestfold is a traditional region, a former county and a current electoral district in Eastern Norway. In 2020 the county became part of the much larger county of Vestfold og Telemark. Located on the western shore of the Oslofjord, it bordered t ...

county,

Norway Norway, officially the Kingdom of Norway, is a Nordic country in Northern Europe, the mainland territory of which comprises the western and northernmost portion of the Scandinavian Peninsula. The remote Arctic island of Jan Mayen and t ...

. Married to Magna Berg (1867–1935), he emigrated to the

United States The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 states, a federal district, five major unincorporated territorie ...

in 1893 and was employed as a storekeeper in a local

grocery store A grocery store ( AE), grocery shop ( BE) or simply grocery is a store that primarily retails a general range of food products, which may be fresh or packaged. In everyday U.S. usage, however, "grocery store" is a synonym for supermarket, a ...

.R. G. Tiedemann, ''Handbook of Christianity in China: 1800 to the Present'', p.550 He resided in Chicago,

Illinois Illinois ( ) is a U.S. state, state in the Midwestern United States, Midwestern United States. Its largest metropolitan areas include the Chicago metropolitan area, and the Metro East section, of Greater St. Louis. Other smaller metropolita ...

, for seven years and was naturalized as a

United States citizen Citizenship of the United States is a legal status that entails Americans with specific rights, duties, protections, and benefits in the United States. It serves as a foundation of fundamental rights derived from and protected by the Constituti ...

at the Circuit Court of

Cook County, Illinois Cook County is the most populous county in the U.S. state of Illinois and the second-most-populous county in the United States, after Los Angeles County, California. More than 40% of all residents of Illinois live within Cook County. As of 2 ...

, on September 6, 1904. His son, Henry Berntsen, was born at Chicago in August 1900.

Commitment to service

In 1904, along with his wife and two young boys, Berntsen sailed for China and joined the non-denominational South Zhili Mission which had been founded by Horace William Houlding in Damingfu of

since 1901.

Pentecostal encounter in America

In December 1906, Berntsen came across an early publication of ''The Apostolic Faith'' from Los Angeles which detailed the events of the

. In 1907, he journeyed to the Centennial Missionary Conference in Shanghai with the hope of finding someone who had experienced the Baptism of the Holy Spirit, the people there told him it was the 'work of the devil'. Although he was convinced that there was more to it than what the critics were saying, he nevertheless returned to the place of his ministry. After receiving a letter from a friend in Chicago who wrote that she had received the Baptism of the Holy Spirit, Berntsen sailed back to America to see this revival firsthand. In August 1907, he made a trip to

Seattle Seattle ( ) is a seaport city on the West Coast of the United States. It is the seat of King County, Washington. With a 2020 population of 737,015, it is the largest city in both the state of Washington and the Pacific Northwest regio ...

where he encountered Martin L. Ryan holding group prayer meetings there. Although Berntsen sought for the baptism of the Holy Spirit but did not receive it. He then journeyed to

Oakland, California Oakland is the largest city and the county seat of Alameda County, California, United States. A major West Coast of the United States, West Coast port, Oakland is the largest city in the East Bay region of the San Francisco Bay Area, the third ...

, and attended prayer meetings held by William F. Manley, but again he did not receive it. Berntsen ultimately travelled to Azusa Street Mission in Los Angeles where he received the

Baptism of the Holy Spirit In Christian theology, baptism with the Holy Spirit, also called baptism in the Holy Spirit or baptism in the Holy Ghost, has been interpreted by different Christian denominations and traditions in a variety of ways due to differences in the doctr ...

through

speaking in tongues Speaking in tongues, also known as glossolalia, is a practice in which people utter words or speech-like sounds, often thought by believers to be languages unknown to the speaker. One definition used by linguists is the fluid vocalizing of sp ...

on September 15, 1907. After the Mission leaders heard his testimony, they agreed to give some financial support his missionary work in China. Upon his trip back to Seattle, Berntsen and a group of eleven adult Pentecostal missionaries gathered together to form a non-denominational '' Apostolic Faith Mission''.

Return to China

They sailed to

in 1908 to form the

Zhengding Zhengding (), originally Zhending (), is a county in southwestern Hebei Province, North China, located approximately south of Beijing. It is under the administration of the prefecture-level city of Shijiazhuang, the capital of the province, and h ...

Mission in

Hebei Province Hebei or , (; alternately Hopeh) is a northern province of China. Hebei is China's sixth most populous province, with over 75 million people. Shijiazhuang is the capital city. The province is 96% Han Chinese, 3% Manchu, 0.8% Hui, and 0 ...

. Due to the lack of fluency in the language, four of the missionaries later left for Shanghai to learn the

Chinese language Chinese (, especially when referring to written Chinese) is a group of languages spoken natively by the ethnic Han Chinese majority and many minority ethnic groups in Greater China. About 1.3 billion people (or approximately 16% of the wor ...

whilst Berntsen and his wife along with several others began spreading the Pentecostal message to the local populace. Berntsen encountered considerable resistance from some established missionary groups, nevertheless he always hoped to convince other Western missionaries. He wrote: He rented a store building where he held meetings during the morning and evening, drawing good-sized crowds especially from among the poor. In January 1910, Berntsen had led a number of the poorest people in the region to the Lord and described his work as a "rescue mission". By March that same year, he was caring for thirty orphaned children and a number of people who were disabled, blind, mute, and other outcasts. Between April and November 1910, Berntsen visited Norway, Sweden and Denmark before returning to China directly from Northern Europe.Department Passport Application of Bernt Berntsen, dated September 4, 1919 Berntsen also maintained contacts with the emerging Pentecostal movement in Norway, led by

Thomas Ball Barratt Thomas Ball Barratt, also known as T. B. Barratt, (22 July 1862 – 29 January 1940) was a British-born Norwegian pastor and one of the founding figures of the Pentecostal movement in Europe, bringing the movement, or baptism in the Holy Spirit, ...

and Erik Andersen Nordquelle. His daughter Ruth (1910–1947) was born in

Guangxi Guangxi (; ; Chinese postal romanization, alternately romanized as Kwanghsi; ; za, Gvangjsih, italics=yes), officially the Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region (GZAR), is an Autonomous regions of China, autonomous region of the People's Republic ...

in August 1910. In 1912, they printed a Chinese-language publication named ''Popular Gospel Truths'' which emphasized on the importance of receiving the

baptism of the Holy Spirit In Christian theology, baptism with the Holy Spirit, also called baptism in the Holy Spirit or baptism in the Holy Ghost, has been interpreted by different Christian denominations and traditions in a variety of ways due to differences in the doctr ...

. They remained at the Zhengding Mission until 1916. Among those baptised were Zhang Lingsheng (in 1910) and Paul Wei (in 1916).

Later life

Starting from 1914 onwards, Berntsen and many of the Apostolic Faith Mission missionaries in China became affiliated with the Assemblies of God. During 1916, Berntsen was approached by Zhang Lingsheng, who after having read tracts published by the

Seventh-day Adventists The Seventh-day Adventist Church is an Adventist Protestant Christian denomination which is distinguished by its observance of Saturday, the seventh day of the week in the Christian (Gregorian) and the Hebrew calendar, as the Sabbath, and i ...

, advised Berntsen that he also keep the Seventh-day worship. He agreed to do so and on September 1, 1916, Berntsen announced on the thirteenth edition of the ''Popular Gospel Truth'' publication that they would be holding Seventh-day worship from now on. In 1917, Berntsen published a tract titled "The Viewpoint on Seventh-day Sabbath worship in China", which mentioned that worshipping on the Western Sabbath day is equivalent to worshipping on Sunday in China. He reasons: . However Paul Wei was opposed to keeping the Sabbath on a Sunday and dismissed the tract's viewpoints of the Sabbath as "erroneous". Zhang Lingsheng travelled to Beijing to peacefully persuade Paul to change his stance, but after several discussions together, Zhang himself understood and gradually accepted Paul's viewpoint. Hence in the spring of 1918, Zhang and Paul cooperated as co-workers, announced at the

Tianjin Tianjin (; ; Mandarin: ), alternately romanized as Tientsin (), is a municipality and a coastal metropolis in Northern China on the shore of the Bohai Sea. It is one of the nine national central cities in Mainland China, with a total popu ...

chapel that they were to be keeping the Sabbath worship on a Saturday and thus formed their independent

Pentecostal Pentecostalism or classical Pentecostalism is a Protestant Charismatic Christian movement

Sabbatarian Sabbatarianism advocates the observation of the Sabbath in Christianity, in keeping with the Ten Commandments. The observance of Sunday as a day of worship and rest is a form of first-day Sabbatarianism, a view which was historically heralded ...

''. During the middle of 1919, Berntsen clarified his viewpoint regarding the Sabbath on the ''Popular Gospel Truth'' publication, . By 1919, Berntsen had become affiliated with the Pentecostal Assemblies of the World, Church of God.

Death

Berntsen died at the German Hospital at

Beiping "Beijing" is from pinyin ''Běijīng,'' which is romanized from , the Chinese name for this city. The pinyin system of transliteration was approved by the Chinese government in 1958, but little used until 1979. It was gradually adopted by various ...

, China, on October 16, 1933, due to

heart failure Heart failure (HF), also known as congestive heart failure (CHF), is a syndrome, a group of signs and symptoms caused by an impairment of the heart's blood pumping function. Symptoms typically include shortness of breath, excessive fatigue, a ...

.Death of Mr. Bernt Berntsen in China
See "Report of the Death of an American Citizen", date-stamped on August 27, 1935

Published works

* ''Popular Gospel Truths'' (Chinese: , , 1912)

References, notes and further reading