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      CALVARY CHAPEL

JESUS PEOPLE MOVEMENT

Participants were called "Jesus People," "Street Christians,” “Psychedelic Evangelists,” and “Jesus Freaks.”

Jesus People was a reaction to the "Hippie Movement."

Common Characteristics – Theological
· Bible as fully inspired and inerrant.
· Literal interpretation of the Bible. Biblical characters as spiritual ancestors.
· Belief that there was an ongoing cosmic battle against Evil.
· Belief that saving souls was of ultimate significance.
· Expectation of a Second Coming of Christ within participants' lifetimes.

Common Characteristics – Social and Religious
· Restorationist Orientation – seeking to return to the way that early Christians lived.
· Simple living and asceticism.
· Strong belief in signs and wonders – Pentecostalism.
· Dramatic conversion testimonies.
· Evangelical and millennial.
· Tendency toward communalism.
· Organization through Christian communes, music festivals, marches, evangelical coffee houses, underground newspapers.
· Daily activities revolved around street evangelization.

1967 Jesus People Movement began with the establishment of the “Living Room,” a “missionary crash pad” in the Haight-Ashbury District of San Francisco.

Established the “House of Acts” as a communal center. Lonnie Frisbee and his fiancé, Connie Bremer, were founding members.

1968 Arthur Blessit, a Southern Baptist minister and the self-proclaimed minister of Sunset Strip, opens His Place as a twenty-four hour teenage ministry. Blessit goes on carry a twelve-foot cross across the country and around the world.

Other groups associated with the movement
· Children of God
· The Way International
· The Tony Alamo Foundation
· Christian World Liberation Front – Started as a Christian response to left-wing groups at Berkeley. Established the Spiritual Counterfeits Project.
· Jesus People Army - Aligned with the Children of God.
· Bethel Tabernacle – Transformed a failing conservative denomination into a haven for ex-drug addicts.   
· Shiloh Youth Revival Centers – 100,000 people in 175 communal houses.

1971 TIME article on Jesus People.

1972 Explo 72 in Dallas sponsored by Campus Crusade for Christ.

1974 Jesus Movement has largely disintegrated. Most participants moved back into established Protestant or Catholic denominations.

Four denominations grew out of the movement
Calvary Chapel
Gospel Outreach
Hope Chapel
Vineyard Churches

 
CALVARY CHAPEL HISTORY

Chuck Smith

1927 – Smith was born in Ventura, California to a Presbyterian father and Baptist mother.

As a youth Smith was very athletic and planned to become a doctor. He had a radical change of direction after attending a Christian youth camp.

1946 – Smith graduated from Lighthouse of International Foursquare Evangelism (L.I.F.E.), a Foursquare Gospel ministerial training center.

Smith began his ministry in the Foursquare Gospel Church where he pastored in a number of churches, with varying degrees of success, for 17 years. He was never comfortable in the Foursquare Gospel left as he found the denominational structure rigid and confining.

1965 - Calvary Chapel in Costa Mesa, California began as a Bible study for shut-ins at a trailer park. The group was struggling, with only 25 members. Smith was invited to pastor the group.

1967 – Calvary Chapel had grown to 2,000.

The fortunes of Calvary Chapel changed dramatically when Smith decided to extend his ministry to “hippies” and specifically to “Jesus Freaks” (Jesus Freaks refers to a Christian subculture associated with the hippie and back-to-the-land movements that emphasized universal love, pacifism, rejection of established religious denominations, a strong relationship with Jesus, and the radical elements of Jesus’ message) in the Jesus Movement.

1968 – Lonnie and Connie Frisbee joined the staff of Calvary Chapel at Smith’s invitation. Lonnie Frisbee was the major force in attracting Jesus Freaks to Community Chapel.

1971 - Frisbee and Smith parted ways because their ideological differences had become too great. Frisbee affiliated with John Wimber, pastor of another Calvary Chapel who was more inclined than Smith toward spiritual gifts and conversions. Chuck Smith estimated that during the Frisbee period the church had baptized 8,000 and converted 20,000.

1974 – The church opened a new 2,300 person sanctuary and held three Sunday services.

Lonnie Frisbee

1950 – Lonnie Frisbee was born in Costa Mesa, California.

1964 - Frisbee began participating in the Laguna Beach drug subculture and gay community.

1965 – Frisbee could not get along with his stepfather and left home.

1967 - Frisbee then moved to San Francisco where he converted to Christianity, joining The Living Room, the first street Christian community.

Frisbee married Connie Bremer, who had previously dabbled in drugs and prostitution.

1968 – Chuck Smith and Lonnie Frisbee meet and Frisbee began evangelizing.

1968 – After members began moving into Smith’s home, Calvary Chapel opened its first “House of Miracles” a communal "crash pad" for hippies who had "accepted the Lord." Subsequently over 20 “community houses” were established.

1971 - Frisbee was ordained as a minister.

1973 - Lonnie and Connie Frisbee divorced in 1973 after Connie had an adulterous relationship with their pastor.

1978 - Frisbee joined with John Wimber, who also was committed to Pentecostalism and at the time was pastoring a small Calvary Chapel church in Yorba Linda. Frisbee had the same kind of impact on the growth of Wimber's church.

Frisbee personally struggled with homosexuality, although he preached that it was evil and sinful. Both Calvary Chapel and the Vineyard ministries later distanced themselves from him because of his homosexuality.

1993 – Frisbee died of AIDS after spending the last two years of his life with Set Free Ministries.


MYTH

Calvary Chapel adhered to most evangelical Christian doctrine:

• The Bible is understood to be the inspired and inerrant word of God.
• Trinitarian theology (God exists in three persons - the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit).
• Jesus is the Messiah and was born of a virgin, crucified, bodily resurrected following the crucifixion, and then ascended to heaven.
• Jesus Christ is believed be both fully human and God and to have died in atonement for the sins of all humanity.
• Christ will personally return in the second coming that will occur prior to the beginning of the millennium (premillennialism).
• Believers will be raptured before the period of tribulation.
• Those who accept Christ and are saved are promised eternal lives in heaven, but humans are free to accept or reject God's grace.
• Heaven is understood to be a literal place.
• Those who do not accept Christ will be eternally consigned to hell. Individuals may be "born again," by repenting from sin and accepting Jesus Christ; this ensures that their sins are forgiven and they will spend eternity in heaven.

The Chapel is also distinctive in a number of ways:
• Calvary Chapel sought middle ground between Pentecostalism and Fundamentalism.
• Calvary Chapel teaches that the Bible is inerrant but not literally true.
• Calvary Chapel accepts speaking in tongues as a spiritual gift as but does not favor such expression in congregational services.
• Smith has consistently sought doctrinal flexibility as a way of promoting Christian unity.
• Smith asserts that love of Christ should be the basis for Christian fellowship and should override denomination and minor doctrinal differences.
• Smith has strongly rejected excluding individuals from Christian fellowship based on their appearance or style of worship.

There was also an element of apocalypticism in early Calvary Chapel doctrine. Smith stated his expectation that the generation born starting in 1948 would be the world's last generation, and he expected that the world would end no later than 1981.


RITUAL

The purpose of worship services at Calvary Chapel is to express love, praise, and thankfulness to God.

There is a general structure to the services, although individual churches vary considerably, that includes segments on greeting, praise and worship, message, and payer.

Inner transformation and not external conformity that the church seeks to achieve. Therefore, services are informal ("come as you are").

Worship services are flexible and open so that they may be guided by the Holy Spirit and encourage the opening of worshipers’ hearts. Therefore, worshipers are not instructed on when to sit, stand, read, or recite.

A significant portion of the service involves music because Calvary Chapel teaches that worship should be inspirational.

Expositional presentation of the Bible. The congregation moves through the Bible from beginning to end, reading each verse and book in order. Teaching rather than preaching.

Calvary Chapel practices baptism and communion. Baptism is not believed to be essential for spiritual salvation but rather is regarded as emblematic of an inner transformation that has occurred.

Calvary Chapel's encourages the exercise of the gifts "decently and in good order," which translates into personal rather than public devotions or expression in "after glow" services.


ORGANIZATION

Chuck Smith founded and has led Calvary Chapel church network since its inception in 1965.

Calvary Chapel grew into a network of several hundred affiliated churches around the country and 1,500
around the world, which refer to themselves as a “fellowship of churches” rather than a denomination.
• Churches typically display the image of a dove within the church.
• Churches usually incorporate Calvary Chapel into the church's name.
• There is no central religious or financial regulatory organization.

The Costa Mesa church moved several time in response to membership growth before building a chapel on 11 acres in Costa Mesa to accommodate the 25,000 members. The main church in Costa Mesa ultimately reached a membership of over 30,000.

The membership base has expanded to include Latino and Korean populations.

Churches generally follow what is termed the " Moses Model” of leadership in which God is the ultimate leader, and each pastor plays the role of Moses, serving directly under godly authority and responsible to God.

Pastors of churches are not required to possess a seminary degree. Smith has ordained those who told him that they had received a call to the ministry and who were dedicated to Smith's ministerial philosophy.

In addition to its network of churches, Calvary Chapel established the Calvary Chapel Bible College (which is not accredited), the Harvest Crusades (combination of a Christian rock concert and platform for testimonies), Maranatha Music (a recording label), and a radio network.

CONTROVERSIES

Calvary Chapel has faced a number of sources of controversy:
• Calvary Chapel maintained some doctrinal differences from Fundamentalists and Pentecostals.
• Conservative Christians disapproved of Calvary Chapel’s casual dress and emotional style of worship.
• Conservative Christians disapproved of the recruitment and inclusion of hippies in the church.
• The Moses Model and Smith's personal power have led to a number of scandals and conflicts within Calvary Chapel (marital infidelity, sexual indiscretions, or financial irregularities).

Calvary Chapel has moved toward the mainstream as numerous other churches adopted its emphasis on informality and music.