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By Andy Butcher One of the ministry training schools born
out of the Brownsville Revival that touched thousands around
the world is on the move -- leaving its Florida home and opening
a second base elsewhere. The group is also to start another campus in New York City, to train for service volunteers recruited through The Call prayer movement that has organized large-scale prayer events in Washington, D.C., and Boston. Two training schools forged from the Brownsville Revival have operated not far from each other in Pensacola, Fla., since January last year. That was when Michael Brown founded FSM after being fired as president of the Brownsville Revival School of Ministry (BRSM), started by the church in 1996. Brown's departure -- over different visions for the future of BRSM -- was followed by most of the faculty and several hundred students. Relations between the two camps have been strained since, but Brown said that he hoped FSM's relocation might help "speed the reconciliation process." Announcing the changes, FSM leaders said that the new direction was being taken on "unexpected" guidance from God and follows the graduation this month of the last class that had begun their training with BRSM. The FSM will operate in Pensacola for the next year and then relocate to somewhere else in the Southeast -- possibly Charlotte, N.C., according to Brown -- in the fall of 2003. The Call School New York is to be the name of the campus FSM will open there this fall. The three-year training program will offer "our key FIRE faculty" and carry "the unique FIRE flavor and DNA," the announcement said. The campus will also be used as a base for FIRE's Jewish ministry outreach. Brown said that the New York initiative had grown out of a deepening relationship with The Call movement. Earlier this year, FIRE became part of Harvest International Ministries led by Ché Ahn, the pastor of Harvest Rock Church in Pasadena, Calif., who is a leading figure in The Call movement. Thousands of people are expected to attend The Call New York City on June 29, when the new school will be formally announced. "Over a year ago God laid on our hearts to develop a deep relationship with The Call," Brown said. "We knew we were called to serve in training The Call generation. Even as the FIRE School of Ministry, we had a very special relationship with The Call." More than 100 FSM graduates are currently serving in 20 countries, as well as in church-planting teams in different parts of the United States. The school's program features two years of study with an optional third-year, hands-on internship. BRSM now has around 430 students, from more than 20 countries. Former faculty has been replaced with local ministers who serve as adjunct instructors. Revival services once running four nights a week at Brownsville Assembly are now held only on Fridays. Although people no longer line up outside the church to get in, as they prepare to mark the seventh anniversary of the revival on Father's Day (June 16), church leaders say they are expecting God to do a new thing.
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