The origins of Pentecostalism in Venezuela can be traced back to the following initiatives: The pioneer efforts of G.F. Bender and his wife Christine from 1919 to 1942 and secondly, the 1946 establishment of three national districts within the Assemblies of God with a National Convention in 1947.

The first Pentecostal missionary in Barquisimeto in the state of Lara was G.F. Bender, a German American pastor. While still living in New York, Bender was converted in a Holiness congregation of the Evangelical United Brethren in 1902, was baptized in the Holy Spirit at a Christian and Missi…