Ok as I think back to our coming into relationship with the Vineyard there are a few thoughts I would like to put out there. Barb and I were coming out of a charismatic church that had been quite large at one time and at the time of its closing was still running around 300. As we visited the Vineyard in Cincinnati we found a group doing many of the things we felt the Church should be about. They were feeding the poor, evangelizing, praying for the sick, and loved worship, everything we felt like a church should be about. Our good friend Doug Roe began coming up to start a small group that would be a church plant. He was a mad man...in a good way of course. He and Marci would come up on a Saturday and they would bring groceries that we would take and pass out in some low income housing area. Doug would find the apartment complex for us to go to even though he was not from the area...and I did not know they were there! Then they would drive home and then Sunday afternoon they wold drive back to hold a small group and talk about Vineyard values.
This went on for a few months and we thought they were going to send Doug up to be the pastor...but back in Cinci they changed their mind. At this point one of the conversations we had was about me maybe being the pastor. I shot it down very quick...I did not know much at all about the Vineyard and really did not want to start just another church in the area...sooo they sent another guy up. I still believe I was right to say no at the time...but this did not work out so well. After five years the guy decided he did not want to be in the Vineyard anymore and that caused us some real pain. We did. Long story shortened way up, he pulled the church out (it eventually died) and we began in our home again, to plant another Vineyard Church...this time I said yes. WIth about fifteen to twenty people we started over...but by this time I knew the values of the Vineyard...they were mine also...I could do this...hopefully!
Being a pastor had never been a goal of mine ever...at least not the lead guy...but here I was...well here I am. Now when I said no the first time I said no because I was not interested in the church being just another charismatic church...and that is what I knew. We wanted more than that...not being critical at all but if you go back to the late 70’s into the 80’s there were lots of charismatic churches began...and flourished...for a while. Many of them do not exist today...if they do they are a shadow of their past...and many of them do not even believe in the things that made them charismatic to begin with. That was our problem...many of these churches, including the one we belonged to...did not know what they believed...what their theology was...and they floundered and wandered about trying to find an indentity. Most were independent works with no accountability or structure...chaotic.
As we came into the Vineyard we found a family...one that valued worship, healing the sick, going to the poor, and valued the move of the Spirit today. As we dealt with the first pastor wanting to leave the Vineyard, he wanted to leave because he was no longer comfortable with the idea of the Spirit moving in the church today...at least in things like prophecy, healing, well just signs and wonders in general. So I asked him how he came into the Vineyard in the first place, since these things were so prominent in the Vineyard. He replied, “ I came in because of their church planting focus.” Well I won’t tell you exactly what I said but it was something like, “You are full of....” (you fill in the blank) He had been on mission trips and saw many healed...he had friends that were gifted prophetically...and so much more...and he came in because of the church planting philosophy? Give me a break. Well a big part of the church planting philosophy at the time was signs and wonders and church planting!
I guess the odd part of this story is as a movement the last 10 years or so, after John Wimber passed, we began to hear from the leadership about how we are a church planting movement first and foremost. Hmmm. Same thing this guy told me as he left...he was very uncomfortable with things like the Toronto Blessing and stuff like that. And we as a movement became uncomfortable with it to. So we really became a church planting movement...at least in words...helped diffuse the lack of Holy Spirit movement I suppose..become something else. Now we have always planted churches as a movement, as I said we were a plant from Cincinatti and we ourselves planted a church in Bowling Green. But if you asked guys like my friend Roger Miller from St.Paul’s Lutheran Church he has always viewed the Vineyard as a signs and wonder movement. I hated to burst his bubble.
So I write this to get it off my chest (it is my blog) and to explain a bit why Barb and I so aggressively pursue and defend the move of the Spirit in and around the church today. The need to walk in power...We see no Church without the Spirit moving and touching...we are people of His presence. We don’t pursue manifestations...well other than healing, if that is a manifestation. We do not hype it up or try to fake it...if nothing is happening then we go home. But there is a passion for a genuine move of God...I don’t think it stopped right after Pentecost...or Azusa Street...or the charismatic movement...the Jesus movement. Jesus said in John 5, “My Father is always at work to this very day, and I, too, am working.” I do not think there are stops and starts to God moving among us, rather I think it continues all of the time...we just need not try to control it. Acts 3 talks about “times of refreshing coming from the Lord.” Jesus talked of “streams of living water” flowing from us. Why would I want to stop that?
Now some will question our desire for the lost to come to Jesus...I have two words for them...”Power Evangelism.”
Bill
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