Jesus movement

Source: Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.
For the music album, see Danny Gokey discography. For the community, see Jesus People USA. For the film, see Jesus People: The Movie. For the first century movement which focused on Jesus of Nazareth, see Early Christianity.

Jesus movement in Amsterdam

The Jesus movement was an evangelical Christian movement that began on the West Coast of the United States in the late 1960s and early 1970s and primarily spread throughout North America, Europe, Central America, Australia and New Zealand, before it subsided in the late 1980s. Members of the movement were called Jesus people or Jesus freaks.

Its predecessor, the

speaking in tongues.The two movements similarly believed that they were calling the church back to a more biblically accurate version of Christianity. Furthermore, they believed that these changes would result in the restoration of spiritual gift to the church.[1]

The Jesus movement left a legacy that included the formation of various denominations as well as other Christian organizations, and it also influenced the development of both the contemporary Christian right and Christian left. It was foundational in several ongoing Christian cultural movements, including Jesus music's impact on contemporary Christian music, and the development of Christian media as a radio and film industry.[2][3]

History

Origins

The terms Jesus movement and Jesus people were popularized by Duane Pederson in his writings for the Hollywood Free Paper. In an interview with Sean Dietrich which took place on August 19, 2006, Pederson explained that he did not coin the phrase "Jesus People"; moreover, he credited a magazine/television interviewer who asked him if he was part of the "Jesus People". As a result, Pederson was credited to be the phrase's founder.[4]

The term Jesus People is used to describe the group of originally outcasts, drug-obsessed, and all-around anti-religious who during the 1960s and 1970s turned towards the Christian faith and Jesus. They took the Bible and Jesus and began to understand it in their own lives and reformed their lifestyles for the better.[5]

During the 1970s, many younger generations were pulled away from the average structured lifestyle they were told to live, and instead turned to lifestyles that were referred to as counterculture. This new lifestyle consisted of exploring various drugs, paths of spirituality and religions. Despite the growing popularity of the counterculture, many young adults became confused, which led them to turn towards the church. People who identified as hippies came forward sharing their testimonies and the peace they found after turning towards the Jesus lifestyle .[6]

Growth and decline

Secular and Christian media exposure in 1971 and 1972 caused the Jesus movement to explode across the United States, which attracted evangelical youth eager to identify with the movement.While many other communes and fellowships sprang up, the

Children of God
communities attracted more new believers.

The Explo 72' was an event organized by the

Campus Crusade for Christ which was held at the Cotton Bowl Stadium in Dallas, and involved such conservative leaders as Bill Bright and Billy Graham
. Many of the 80,000 young Jesus People attending Explo '72 discovered for the first time these and other traditional avenues of Christian worship and experience. Although Explo '72 marked the high-water mark of media interest, the Jesus movement continued at a grass roots level with smaller individual groups and communities.

The movement began to subside, largely concluding by the late 1980s,[7] but left a major influence in Christian music, youth and church life.[8]

Legacy

Although the Jesus movement lasted no more than a decade (except for the

Calvary Chapel, Hope Chapel Churches, Victory Outreach, and the Vineyard Churches, trace their roots directly back to the Jesus movement, as do parachurch organizations like Jews for Jesus and the contemporary Christian music industry.[9][10] Perhaps the most significant and lasting influence, however, was the growth of an emerging strand within evangelical Christianity that appealed to the contemporary youth culture.[11]

Hillsong in both America and the UK.[12] This also led to the inclusion of new musical instruments in churches all over the world, such as guitars and drums, in addition to traditional musical instruments such as pianos and organs. Music in other parts of the world was also greatly influenced by the Jesus Movement, such as music in Central America and the UK. In Central America, Pentecostal churches under the charismatic movement began to compose spiritual music called coros (fast-paced hymns) which is normally accompanied by dancing as worship.[13]

The topic was the subject of the 2023 film Jesus Revolution.

Beliefs and practices

The Jesus movement was

Holy Spirit. For example, a revival at Asbury College in 1970 grabbed the attention of the mainstream news media and became known nationwide.[14][15]

The movement tended towards evangelism and millennialism. Some of the most read books by those within the movement included Ron Sider's Rich Christians in an Age of Hunger and Hal Lindsey's The Late Great Planet Earth.[16]

The Jesus movement frequently had a communal aspect. Many Jesus people lived in

communes.[citation needed] The commune of Graham Pulkingham
was described in his book They Left Their Nets.

Jesus music

Main article: Jesus music
Barry McGuire
Keith Green

There has been a long legacy of Christian music connected to the Jesus movement. Jesus music, also known as gospel beat music in the UK, primarily began when street musicians of the late 1960s and early 1970s converted to Christianity.

Peter, Paul, and Mary; Randy Stonehill, Randy Matthews, Andraé Crouch (and the Disciples), Nancy Honeytree, Keith Green, and Larry Norman. The Joyful Noise Band traveled with a Christian community throughout the U.S. and Europe, performing in festivals held underneath giant tents. In the UK, Malcolm and Alwyn
were the most notable agents of the gospel beat.

According to The Jesus People: Old-Time Religion in the Age of Aquarius by Enroth, Ericson, and Peters,

better source needed
]

Organizations

Belmont Avenue Church of Christ

Don Finto became involved with the Belmont Avenue Church of Christ (now simply Belmont Church), an ailing old inner city church in Nashville, Tennessee, YUS on Music Row between the public housing and several universities: Peabody, Vanderbilt and Belmont College etc. By the summer of 1971, the membership roll had dropped to about 75 elderly members. The church had mainstream roots in the Churches of Christ, but was transformed and firmly placed in the Jesus movement by an influx of countercultural Christians.

Seating ran out, with people sitting on the window sills or on the stage. It was not uncommon to find them walking the worst parts[

Don Francisco, Fireworks, Annie and Steve Chapman, Clay In The Potter's Hand and many others.[citation needed
]

Calvary Chapel

Chuck Smith, founder and pastor of

International Church of the Foursquare Gospel
, a church movement based in Los Angeles where Smith received his early theological training.

Fellowship House Church

Steve Freeman and others opened the Kingdom Come Christian Coffee House in Greenville, South Carolina, in 1971. Each Saturday night Jesus People gathered for worship, songs and fellowship. In 1972, several people who were highly involved in the Kingdom Come graduated from high schools and dispersed in several colleges and universities throughout the Southeastern United States and started a Fellowship House Church. Maynard Pittendreigh, Jay Holmes, and Freeman each established one at Erskine College, the University of South Carolina, and Furman University respectively. Leadership moved from Steve Freeman to a charismatic preacher named Erskine Holt, a self-described apostle of the movement who lived in Florida. By 1973, nearly every campus throughout Florida, South Carolina, North Carolina, and Georgia had Fellowship House Churches. These generally died out by 1977, with many of the members moving to more traditional campus ministries. However, many moved onto similar ministries in such organizations as Calvary Chapel.

Jesus Army

In the UK, the Jesus Army (also known as the Jesus Fellowship Church and the Bugbrooke Community) was among the groups most influenced by the Jesus movement, embracing (former) hippies, bikers and drug addicts, among others.

Leaders and members of the Jesus Fellowship committed abuse of children and vulnerable adults, with several receiving custodial sentences.[22]

The Jesus Fellowship Community Trust closed in December 2020 following the scandal, and issued a Closure Statement including an unreserved apology for the abuse that occurred in the Jesus Fellowship Church (JFC) and the residential New Creation Christian Community (NCCC).[23]

Shiloh Youth Revival Centers

The Shiloh Youth Revival Centers movement was the largest Jesus People communal movement in the United States in the 1970s. Founded by John Higgins in 1968 as a small communal house in Costa Mesa, California, the movement quickly grew into a very large movement catering mostly to disaffected college-age youth. There were 100,000 people involved and 175 communal houses established during its lifespan.[citation needed] Two years after the movement's founding, Higgins and some of the core members of the movement bought 90 acres (360,000 m2) of land near Dexter, Oregon and built a new headquarters which they called "The Land".[citation needed]

See also

  • Operation Mobilization

References

  1. ^ Sherrill, John and Elizabeth, They Speak with Other Tongues, Chosen Books, 2011
  2. ^ Sahms, Jacob (September 27, 2021). "The Jesus Music: Revolutionizing How Church Music Works". Dove.org. Retrieved March 1, 2023.
  3. ^ "NRB Members Speak to the Culture Through Film". NRB. May 19, 2022. Retrieved March 1, 2023.
  4. ^ "The Hollywood Free Paper". hollywoodfreepaper.org. Archived from the original on October 11, 2007. Retrieved March 6, 2018.
  5. ^ Prothero, Stephen. "Mikkelsen Library | Augustana University". augie.idm.oclc.org. Retrieved March 8, 2024.
  6. ^ Williams, Christina (2002). "W & M Scholar Works". Retrieved April 2, 2024.
  7. ^ David Horn, John Shepherd, Continuum Encyclopedia of Popular Music of the World Volume 8: Genres: North America, Continuum International Publishing Group, USA, 2012, p. 139
  8. ^ Larry Eskridge, God's Forever Family: The Jesus People Movement in America, Oxford University Press, USA, 2013, p. 266-267
  9. ^ Stella Lau, Popular Music in Evangelical Youth Culture, Routledge, Abingdon-on-Thames, 2013, p. 33
  10. ^ Bruce David Forbes, Jeffrey H. Mahan, Religion and Popular Culture in America, University of California Press, USA, 2005, p. 103
  11. ISBN 0-520-25596-8
    "
  12. ^ "A Brief History of Contemporary Christian Music". schooloftherock.com. Retrieved March 6, 2018.
  13. ^ "Manifestations of the Spirit". Archived from the original on July 26, 2009. Retrieved August 26, 2010.
  14. ^ "A Revival Account Asbury 1970". The Forerunner. March 2008. Archived from the original on July 19, 2011. Retrieved October 26, 2012.
  15. ISBN 9781885224002
    .
  16. ISBN 978-0-8028-2415-8
    . ... the popularity of books like Hal Lindsey's Late Great Planet Earth (1970) mirrored hippie perceptions of the apocalyptic direction of modern America
  17. ^ Don Cusic, Encyclopedia of Contemporary Christian Music: Pop, Rock, and Worship: Pop, Rock, and Worship, ABC-CLIO, USA, 2009, p. 269
  18. ^ Paul Noel Stookey's 1968 conversion. Archived April 17, 2009, at the Wayback Machine
  19. ^ "Superstar", Hollywood Free Paper 2:23 (December 1, 1970), http://www.hollywoodfreepaper.org/archive.php?id=29 Archived July 6, 2009, at the Wayback Machine
  20. ^ "Born Twice". Archived from the original on July 20, 2011. Retrieved May 17, 2010.
  21. ^ While it is claimed that Norman borrowed $3,000 from Pat Boone to start One Way Records (see Randy Stonehill in Chris Willman, "RANDY STONEHILL: TURNING TWENTY", CCM (August 1990), http://www.nifty-music.com/stonehill/ccm0890.html), Norman denied this explicitly. (See Larry Norman, linear notes, Bootleg (2005 CDR Release-"Red Letter Edition").)
  22. ^ Lynch, Paul (September 18, 2017). "SPECIAL REPORT: Alleged victim of historic abuse reveals traumatic childhood growing up in Jesus Army". Northampton Chronicle. Retrieved July 19, 2019.
  23. ^ Martin Desborough, Chair of Trustees (November 2021). Closure Statement (PDF) (Report). Jesus Fellowship Community Trust. Archived from the original (PDF) on January 19, 2022. Retrieved July 16, 2022.

Bibliography

  • Di Sabatino, David. The Jesus People Movement: An Annotated Bibliography and General Resource (Westport, CT: Greenwood Press, 1999).
  • Duchesne, Jean. Jesus Revolution: Made in U.S.A. (Paris: Éditions du Cerf, 1972)
  • Graham, Billy. The Jesus Generation (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 1971).
  • Jensen, Lori Jolene (2000). (Re)discovering fundamentalism in the cultural margins: Calvary Chapel congregations as sites of cultural resistance and religious transformation. University of Southern California.
  • Isaacson, Lynne Marie (1996). Delicate balances: Rearticulating gender ideology and rules for sexuality in a Jesus People communal movement. University of Oregon.
  • Smith, Kevin John, D.Miss. (2003). The origins, nature, and significance of the Jesus Movement as a revitalization movement. Asbury Theological Seminary.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link)
  • Ridout-Stewart, Caroline (1974). Communitas to structure: a dynamic social network analysis of an urban Jesus People Community. McGill University.
  • Shires, Preston David (2002). Hippies of the religious Right: The counterculture and American evangelicalism in the 1960s and 1970s. University of Nebraska, Lincoln.
  • Gordon, David Frederick, Ph.D. (1978). A Comparison of the effects of urban and suburban location on structure and identity in two Jesus people groups. University of Chicago.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link)
  • Bookman, Sally Dobson Ph.D. (1974). Jesus People: a religious movement in a mid-western city. University of California, Berkeley.
  • Wagner, Frederick Norman (1971). A theological and historical assessment of the Jesus people phenomenon. Fuller Theological Seminary.
  • Griffith, Jack Garrison Jr. (2004). Press coverage of four twentieth-century evangelical religious movements, 1967–1997. University of Southern Mississippi.
  • Chrasta, Michael James (1998). Jesus people to Promise Keepers: A revival sequence and its effect on late twentieth-century evangelical ideas of masculinity. University of Texas at Dallas.
  • Robinson, James (2001). The origins, development and nature of Pentecostalism in Ulster, 1907 – c. 1925: A study in historical and theological contextualisation. Queen's University of Belfast.
  • Smalridge, Scott (1999). Early American Pentecostalism and the issues of race, gender, war, and poverty: A history of the belief system and social witness of early twentieth century Pentecostalism and its nineteenth century holiness roots. McGill University.
  • Dayton, Donald Wilbrr (1983). Theological roots of pentecostalism. University of Chicago.
  • Ronald M. Enroth, Edward E. Ericson and C. Breckinridge Peters, The Jesus People: Old-Time Religion in the Age of Aquarius (Grand Rapids: William B. Eerdmans, 1972).
    ISBN 0-8028-1443-3
  • Larry Eskridge, "Jesus People" in Erwin Fahlbusch, Geoffrey William Bromiley, David B. Barrett, Encyclopedia of Christianity (Grand Rapids:William B. Eerdmans, 1999).
    ISBN 0-8028-2415-3
  • Donald Heinz, "The Christian World Liberation Front," in The New Religious Consciousness, Charles Y. Glock and
    ISBN 0-520-03083-4
  • Edward E. Plowman, The Jesus Movement (London: Hodder and Stoughton, 1972).
    ISBN 0-340-16125-6

External links
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