The Association of Vineyard Churches, also known as the Vineyard Movement, is an international neocharismatic evangelical Christian association of churches.
The charismatic movement in Christianity is a movement within established or mainstream Christian denominations to adopt beliefs and practices of Charismatic Christianity, with an emphasis on baptism with the Holy Spirit, and the use of spiritual gifts (charismata). It has affected most denominations in the United States, and has spread widely across the world.
Lonnie Ray Frisbee was an American Charismatic evangelist in the late 1960s and in the 1970s; he was a self-described "seeing prophet". He was known for his hippie appearance. He was notable as a minister and evangelist in the Jesus movement.
Hendrik "Hank" Hanegraaff, also known as the "Bible Answer Man", is an American Christian author and radio talk-show host. Formerly an evangelical Protestant, he joined the Eastern Orthodox Church in 2017. He is an outspoken figure within the Christian countercult movement, where he has established a reputation for his critiques of non-Christian religions, new religious movements, and cults, as well as heresy in Christianity. He is also an apologist on doctrinal and cultural issues.
John Richard Wimber was an American pastor, Christian author and musician. Initially ordained as a Quaker minister, he became an early, pioneering pastor of charismatic congregations, and a popular thought leader in modern Christian publications on the third person of the Christian Trinity, the Holy Spirit, and the Holy Spirit's action in modern churches through miraculous phenomena referred to as miracles, or signs and wonders. Wimber was a founding leader of the Vineyard Movement, a Christian movement that Kenn Gulliksen began in the United States and that later became a wider denomination.
The Toronto Blessing, a term coined by British newspapers, refers to the Christian revival and associated phenomena that began in January 1994 at the Toronto Airport Vineyard church (TAV), which was renamed in 1996 to Toronto Airport Christian Fellowship (TACF) and then later in 2010 renamed to Catch the Fire Toronto. It is categorized as a neo-charismatic Evangelical Christian church and is located in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. The revival impacted charismatic Christian culture through an increase in popularity and international reach and intensified criticism and denominational disputes. Criticism primarily centered around disagreements about charismatic doctrine, the Latter Rain Movement, and whether or not the physical manifestations people experienced were in line with biblical doctrine or were actually heretical practices.
The Latter Rain, also known as the New Order or the New Order of the Latter Rain, was a post-World War II movement within Pentecostal Christianity which remains controversial. The movement saw itself as a continuation of the restorationism of early Pentecostalism. The movement began with major revivals between 1948 and 1952 and became established as a large semi-organized movement by 1952. It continued into the 1960s. The movement had a profound impact on subsequent movements as its participants dispersed throughout the broader charismatic and Pentecostal movements beginning in the 1960s.
Slain in the Spirit or slaying in the Spirit are terms used by Pentecostal and charismatic Christians to describe a form of prostration in which an individual falls to the floor while experiencing religious ecstasy. Believers attribute this behavior to the power of the Holy Spirit. Other terms used to describe the experience include falling under the power, overcome by the Spirit, and resting in the Spirit. The practice is associated with faith healing because individuals are often slain while seeking prayer for illness.
Signs and wonders refers to experiences that are perceived to be miraculous as being normative in the modern Christian experience, and is a phrase associated with groups that are a part of modern charismatic movements and Pentecostalism. This phrase is seen multiple times throughout the Bible to describe the activities of the early church, and is historically recorded as continuing, at least in practice, since the time of Christ. The phrase is primarily derived from Old and New Testament references and is now used in the Christian and mainstream press and in scholarly religious discourse to communicate a strong emphasis on recognizing perceived manifestations of the Holy Spirit in the contemporary lives of Christian believers. It also communicates a focus on the expectation that divine action would be experienced in the individual and corporate life of the modern Christian church, and a further insistence that followers actively seek the "gifts of the Spirit".
Rodney Morgan Howard-Browne is a South African-born American evangelist and a conspiracy theorist. He has resided in Tampa, Florida since the mid-1990s and is pastor of The River Church in Tampa Bay. The River is a Pentecostal church with revival meetings, led by Howard-Browne, known for those in the audience breaking into "holy laughter" and experiencing other pentecostal and charismatic phenomena. Howard-Browne is the head of Revival Ministries International, a ministry he and his wife founded in 1997.
The Neo-charismaticmovement is a movement within evangelical Protestant Christianity that is composed of a diverse range of independent churches and organizations that emphasize the current availability of gifts of the Holy Spirit, such as speaking in tongues and faith healing. The Neo-charismatic movement is considered to be the "third wave" of the Charismatic Christian tradition which began with Pentecostalism, and was furthered by the Charismatic movement. As a result of the growth of postdenominational and independent charismatic groups, Neo-charismatics are now believed to be more numerous than the first and second wave categories. As of 2002, some 19,000 denominations or groups, with approximately 295 million individual adherents, were identified as Neo-charismatic.
Michael Leroy Bickle is an American evangelical leader and founder of the International House of Prayer (IHOPKC). Once the leader of IHOPKC, Bickle oversaw several ministries and a Bible school until his dismissal in December 2023 after confessing to sexual misconduct. Bickle has written a number of books and served as the pastor of multiple churches.
Direct revelation is a term used by some Christian churches to express their belief in a communication from God to a person by words, impression, visions, dreams, or actual appearance. Direct revelation is believed to be an open communication between God and man, or the Holy Spirit and man, without any other exterior (secondary) means. Direct revelation from evil spirits can also occur.
Jack Deere is an American charismatic pastor and theologian.
The Lakeland Revival, or Florida Healing Outpouring, was a Pentecostal revival which took place from April until October 2008 in Lakeland, Florida, United States. The revival began on April 2, 2008, when evangelist Todd Bentley of Fresh Fire Ministries Canada was invited by Stephen Strader, pastor of Lakeland's Ignited Church, to lead a one-week revival, but remained there for over four months.
A revivalist or evangelist is a person who holds or presides over religious revivals. Revival services are an integral part of the Conservative Anabaptist, Free Will Baptist and Methodist traditions, among other branches of Christianity. Revivals are defined as "a period of heightened spiritual activity in a section of the church, brought about by a renewing and empowering work of the Holy Spirit, bringing a new sense of the presence of God, especially in his holiness, resulting in a deeper awareness of sin in the lives of believers, followed by new joy as sin is confessed and forgiven." Common jargon for these meetings or series of meetings can include "having a revival meeting" or "to hold a revival." The meetings and gatherings can last for days, several weeks, or for many years on rare occasions.
Holy laughter is a term used within charismatic Christianity that describes a religious behaviour in which individuals spontaneously laugh during church meetings. It has occurred in many revivals throughout church history, but it became normative in the early 1990s in Neo-charismatic churches and the Third Wave of the Holy Spirit. Many people claimed to experience this phenomenon at a large revival in Toronto, Ontario, Canada known as the Toronto Blessing.
Bill Johnson is the senior leader of Bethel Church, a charismatic megachurch in Redding, California. The congregation has grown in membership from 2,000 when he joined in 1996, to over 11,000 in 2019. Johnson has taken public conservative positions on same-sex marriage, abortion, open borders, and many other topics. He is an author, functions as an itinerant speaker and has been featured in various media.
Independent Network Charismatic (INC) Christianity is a movement within evangelical charismatic Christianity which is focused on the authority of charismatic apostles and seeks the wholesale transformation of society. The term was first used in 2017 by sociologists Brad Christerson and Richard Flory in their book The Rise of Network Christianity: How Independent Leaders are Changing the Religious Landscape to describe the rapid growth of a form of Protestant Christianity from 1970 to 2010, and has since been adopted by other commentators. The movement is distinguished from other forms of Christianity by its use of network governance, based on networks of charismatic apostles, rather than more traditional church structures and hierarchies. These networks are sustained by the use of new communications technologies such as social media, which both facilitates communication between leaders in the network and enables leaders to build a following which is not tied to a geographical area. It is characterised by belief in and encouragement of the use of the supernatural gifts of the Holy Spirit, along with a focus on the transformation of society according to Christian values through prayer and by Christians reaching positions of leadership in the areas of business, government, media, arts and entertainment, education, family, and religion. INC Christianity tends to be politically conservative and, in the US, associated with support for Republican politicians.
Randy Clark is an American apostolic evangelist, living in Saint Louis.
