B.H. Clendennen was one of the first three preachers to appear on American television preaching Christ and travelled widely across the USA preaching crusades. In 1980 he was invited to minister in Yugoslavia, Hungry, and Romania. Every church was filled to overflowing and people were standing out in the freezing cold looking in through the windows. In 1981 he returned to Bulgaria and Romania to find the Spirit of the Lord still moving and the churches growing. The church he founded, Victory Temple in Beaumont, was always a ‘Missions church’. Through the six hundred saints that faithfully and consistently tithed, the Gospel was carried across the world.
In October 1991 he went on a fact finding mission to Russia to see how he could help this country which had been bound under 75 years of atheism. He knew that God was sending him to Russia and that he would move there. On the last day of his visit God confirmed the call. He was ministering to a small congregation on the edge of Moscow. As he preached about prayer, the Spirit of God broke in on those gathered. The entire group fell on their faces and began to pray. As he prayed he felt a hand upon his arm. When he looked up it was an elderly woman prophesying to him. His interpreter, Igor, translated the message, “All that you have ever suffered, all that you have ever learned, all that you have ever done was to prepare you for what I will do with you in this country.” He later found out that this woman’s husband had been a Pentecostal preacher who was murdered by the KGB. She now spent all her time in the church praying and this was the first time any of them had known her to prophesy. He resigned the Church which he had founded and Pastored for 35 years
and returned to Russia in December for three weeks. On the first Sunday in Moscow he preached in an underground church to about a thousand people. Among them were the Bishops of the Pentecostal Church of all the USSR. They asked him to minister in their churches and train their preachers. He purchased and distributed 30,000 New Testaments and “Books of Life.” The Mayor of Kiev (now Ukraine) asked that he give a Bible to every student in school. For one hour he was interviewed on one of the most powerful radio stations in Russia which had an audience of approximately nine million people and local papers carried articles about the crusades. He preached in cities of hundreds of thousands that had no church. In the Caucasus region he preached to 1,700 people, of those 1,600 came forward to get saved. When he left them there was no shepherd to look after these new saints. He then knew what God would have him do. All this was
God’s way to bring him to birth the School of Christ International.
Concerning this time he says, “The vision of a three month Bible school was born…my mind was carried back to the outbreak of World War II. I had just graduated from High School when the news broke. In a short time I joined the U.S. Marines, and in one week I was in what they called ‘boot camp.’ For twelve weeks I went through the most intense discipline and training I ever dreamed possible. What were they doing? Transforming young men fresh out of school; fresh from the farm and the city, into men of war. And they meant to do it in twelve weeks. This became the pattern for the School of Christ.” In February 1992 he was back once again in Russia preaching crusades and making arrangements for a building. On September 21st, along with his wife
he moved to Moscow and prepared for the opening of the first School. On October 1st, classes began at the International Pentecostal Bible College of Moscow with 102 students from all over Russia and the Ukraine. The students were brought to the school, and for three months they did not leave unless there was an emergency. For three months they were totally immersed in prayer and the Word of God. The prayer meeting began before day light every morning, and was the last act in the evening. The fact was constantly driven home that you only learn prayer by praying. Without prayer, Bible Schools are merely doctrine. Three months later 100 students graduated and were sent forth into cities and villages to plant the churches. These students had become pregnant with the life of God. As they moved out into the communities they birthed this life; men were saved, bodies were healed, demons cast out and multitudes filled with the Holy Ghost. The results were such that just two years later the leader of the Russian Orthodox Church over radio broadcast warned the people that B.H. Clendennen, was ‘the most dangerous man in all Russia.’ Literally thousands of new churches were birthed across these lands in the next few short years. Initially he had only thought in terms of the School in Russia and had expected to maybe spend the next several years pouring himself out in this land, but soon this School naturally and quickly spread with a life of its own beyond any expectation of the mind of man. The school then went to South America, then China and today the School has students in about 150 countries of the world who have planted tens of thousands of new churches. Every nation in South America, right across China, in prisons across the world and even penetrating the Muslim world this message of Pentecost has been preached afresh in recent times. Labourers have been raised up in each continent who are running the School amongst their own people and who are pressing forward with the commission of Christ.
Brother Clendennen went to be with the Lord in December 2009 having laboured tirelessly to the very last weeks of his life to see the forging a vessel of recovery and with a fervent desire to see a Pentecostal Revival come to each nation. His wife Jannice is still alive and living in their Beaumont home. Pray for this wonderful woman of God
In October 1991 he went on a fact finding mission to Russia to see how he could help this country which had been bound under 75 years of atheism. He knew that God was sending him to Russia and that he would move there. On the last day of his visit God confirmed the call. He was ministering to a small congregation on the edge of Moscow. As he preached about prayer, the Spirit of God broke in on those gathered. The entire group fell on their faces and began to pray. As he prayed he felt a hand upon his arm. When he looked up it was an elderly woman prophesying to him. His interpreter, Igor, translated the message, “All that you have ever suffered, all that you have ever learned, all that you have ever done was to prepare you for what I will do with you in this country.” He later found out that this woman’s husband had been a Pentecostal preacher who was murdered by the KGB. She now spent all her time in the church praying and this was the first time any of them had known her to prophesy. He resigned the Church which he had founded and Pastored for 35 years
and returned to Russia in December for three weeks. On the first Sunday in Moscow he preached in an underground church to about a thousand people. Among them were the Bishops of the Pentecostal Church of all the USSR. They asked him to minister in their churches and train their preachers. He purchased and distributed 30,000 New Testaments and “Books of Life.” The Mayor of Kiev (now Ukraine) asked that he give a Bible to every student in school. For one hour he was interviewed on one of the most powerful radio stations in Russia which had an audience of approximately nine million people and local papers carried articles about the crusades. He preached in cities of hundreds of thousands that had no church. In the Caucasus region he preached to 1,700 people, of those 1,600 came forward to get saved. When he left them there was no shepherd to look after these new saints. He then knew what God would have him do. All this was
God’s way to bring him to birth the School of Christ International.
Concerning this time he says, “The vision of a three month Bible school was born…my mind was carried back to the outbreak of World War II. I had just graduated from High School when the news broke. In a short time I joined the U.S. Marines, and in one week I was in what they called ‘boot camp.’ For twelve weeks I went through the most intense discipline and training I ever dreamed possible. What were they doing? Transforming young men fresh out of school; fresh from the farm and the city, into men of war. And they meant to do it in twelve weeks. This became the pattern for the School of Christ.” In February 1992 he was back once again in Russia preaching crusades and making arrangements for a building. On September 21st, along with his wife
he moved to Moscow and prepared for the opening of the first School. On October 1st, classes began at the International Pentecostal Bible College of Moscow with 102 students from all over Russia and the Ukraine. The students were brought to the school, and for three months they did not leave unless there was an emergency. For three months they were totally immersed in prayer and the Word of God. The prayer meeting began before day light every morning, and was the last act in the evening. The fact was constantly driven home that you only learn prayer by praying. Without prayer, Bible Schools are merely doctrine. Three months later 100 students graduated and were sent forth into cities and villages to plant the churches. These students had become pregnant with the life of God. As they moved out into the communities they birthed this life; men were saved, bodies were healed, demons cast out and multitudes filled with the Holy Ghost. The results were such that just two years later the leader of the Russian Orthodox Church over radio broadcast warned the people that B.H. Clendennen, was ‘the most dangerous man in all Russia.’ Literally thousands of new churches were birthed across these lands in the next few short years. Initially he had only thought in terms of the School in Russia and had expected to maybe spend the next several years pouring himself out in this land, but soon this School naturally and quickly spread with a life of its own beyond any expectation of the mind of man. The school then went to South America, then China and today the School has students in about 150 countries of the world who have planted tens of thousands of new churches. Every nation in South America, right across China, in prisons across the world and even penetrating the Muslim world this message of Pentecost has been preached afresh in recent times. Labourers have been raised up in each continent who are running the School amongst their own people and who are pressing forward with the commission of Christ.
Brother Clendennen went to be with the Lord in December 2009 having laboured tirelessly to the very last weeks of his life to see the forging a vessel of recovery and with a fervent desire to see a Pentecostal Revival come to each nation. His wife Jannice is still alive and living in their Beaumont home. Pray for this wonderful woman of God
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