Wednesday, February 25, 2026

It is the 25th of February 2026. Welcome to the Christian History Almanac, brought to you by 1517 at 1517.org; I’m Dan van Voorhis.

It is very hard to tell the story of the modern global church without finding its origins in the peculiar revival that took place in my backyard in the last century. From the Azusa Street revival to the Jesus People movement, this show has told the stories of the “new evangelicals”, Calvary Chapel, and Saddleback to the Vineyard and the modern Pentecostal movement. To parallel the Reformation (as these churches are also born out of the 16th century), we might see the events of the last century in the evangelical and charismatic world as a kind of “radical” revival with all the concomitant characteristics and new church bodies.

Today we remember the story of one of its unlikely architects- the 4th generation pagan, the Vegas musician who came to Christ through a desert experience, and then charismatic preacher and church planter- he was John Wimber. Wimber was born on the 25th of February in 1934 in Missouri. Born the only child to Basil and Genevieve, old Basil ditched the family and Genevieve, and John made their way to the West Coast. In Orange County in the postwar year John made a name for himself as a multi-instrumentalist and singer. In 1955, he married Carol, a lapsed Catholic, and they had three children before the couple split in 1961. John would head to Vegas to look into an annulment and found work with the music group that would come to be the Righteous Brothers. He played with them and managed them until a desert experience led to the first inklings of a conversion to Christianity. Carol had similar experiences, and the family reunited. But Vegas wasn’t conducive to the newly converted couple, and they moved back to California, where John studied the Bible at Azusa Pacific and began to work at his brother-in-law’s Quaker church in Yorba Linda.

He was a popular bible teacher from 1970 but felt increasingly uncomfortable with Quaker doctrine. He would be invited to be the founding director of the department of Church Growth out of Fuller Seminary, where Peter Wagner had recently been exploring tenets of what would become “Third Wave Pentecostalism”- that’s a story for another time- BUT, in all of it, Wimber became convinced of the gifts of the Holy Spirit in the present.

It is another parallel to the 16th century radical movements that they took as paradigmatic for the modern church the teaching of Jesus that his followers will do “even greater things” (John 14:12). John would famously preach that when he “worked for the devil” he got to “do this things” but in the church he was initially told that they didn’t get to “do the stuff’. “Doing the Stuff” became a catchphrase for his ministry and a pretty good encapsulation of what the Third Wave Pentecostal movement was trying to emphasize.

The Wimbers would have a house church that would eventually become the Calvary Chapel of Yorba Linda. But Chuck Smith and Wimber would have disagreements over the role of spiritual gifts in the church- not a question of whether they were present- but “how”. Smith’s criticism of what he called “Charismania” saw Wimber’s church leave the Calvary movement and unite with another former Calvary plant in Los Angeles led by Ken Gullickson. Wimber would join Gullickson’s “Vineyard” fellowship, and the Anaheim Vineyard would soon become the jewel of the denomination.

Gullickson would cede to Wimber as the face and voice of the movement, and with the general excitement of late 20th-century Jesus People excitement and VERY IMPORTANTLY Vineyard music, the movement would explode. Whatever your own church situation, the story of Pentecostalism is the story of the spread of the church globally in the past century- and the Vineyard is as inextricable a part of that movement as any. But, with parallels to other loosely affiliated charismatic believers, there is a tendency towards following personal charisma and division. The story of the Vineyard is for another time- but just as the Vineyard is part of the broader story, the story of Wimber is essential for the Vineyard.

He admittedly worked himself hard- constant travel and a less-than-healthy diet saw his ministry slowing down by the late 80s, and as the movement grew, new faces and leaders emerged. John suffered health problems that culminated in a massive hemorrhage in 1997. John Wimber was survived by his wife, three sons, and a daughter. Born on this day in 1934, John Wimber was 63 years old.

The Last word for today comes from the daily lectionary and the parable of the lost sheep:

12 “What do you think? If a man owns a hundred sheep, and one of them wanders away, will he not leave the ninety-nine on the hills and go to look for the one that wandered off? 13 And if he finds it, truly I tell you, he is happier about that one sheep than about the ninety-nine that did not wander off. 14 In the same way your Father in heaven is not willing that any of these little ones should perish.

This has been the Christian History Almanac for the 25th of February 2026, brought to you by 1517 at 1517.org.

The show is produced by a man who knows Wimber worked for the Righteous Brothers, but was looking for a “different kind of Righteousness”- he is Christopher Gillespie.

The show is written and read by a man who couldn’t unsee that bad pun early on, I’m sorry.. I’m Dan van Voorhis.

You can catch us here every day- and remember that the rumors of grace, forgiveness, and the redemption of all things are true…. Everything is going to be ok.