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 Mason (1866-1961) was licensed to preach as a Missionary Baptist in 1893. However, his message of holiness eventually caused the Baptists to disassociate him, and in 1897, he and Charles P. Jones (1865-1949) formed the Church of God in Christ. In early 1907, he visited Azusa Street seeking the baptism in the Holy Spirit.
“When I opened my mouth to say ‘Glory,’ a flame touched my tongue which ran down me. My language changed and no word could I speak in my own tongue. Oh! I was filled with the Glory of the Lord. My soul was then satisfied.” (Ithiel Clemmons, C.H. Mason and the Church of God in Christ, p.146)
When Mason returned from Azusa Street, many of his church leaders (including Jones) would not accept his new experience. They formed another denomination (The Church of Christ Holiness USA) while the COGIC became thoroughly Pentecostal.
Because the COGIC was already organized as an official church body, they became the main source of ordination for both white and black Pentecostal churches until the Assembly of God Church was formed in 1914.
The COGIC began primarily as a southern church, but as vast numbers of blacks began to migrate north and west, the COGIC followed them.
“Mason’s strategy of sending evangelists to accompany the northerly migration of African Americans and of charging bishops with the establishment of new jurisdictions in such metropolitan areas as New York, Philadelphia, Detroit, and Chicago resulted in COGIC becoming predominantly an urban church.” (C. Eric Lincoln, The Black Church in the African American Experience, p. 82)
Today the COGIC is the largest Pentecostal denomination in America, with 5,500,000 members in 15,300 churches. It is the only black denomination that does not trace its roots from a white church. (A Glimpse of the Kingdom of Heaven: The Azusa Revival, www.pbs.org)
“The Pentecostal phenomena was every bit a black movement as a white one.” (Gaustad & Schmidt, The Religious History of America, p 284)
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