Reviewing the Larry Eskridge’s God’s Forever Family: The Jesus People Movement in America, John G. Turner concludes that “Jesus People” of the 1960s and ’70s “had the same basic beliefs as other evangelicals, but with an added fervency, literalism, and—in many cases—sweetness”:
Eskridge begins his story in the Bay Area, the birthplace of both the counterculture and the Jesus Movement. Skillfully capturing the cultural and intergenerational tension among the Christians of this era, he introduces Baptist pastor John MacDonald and a young hippie couple, Ted and Elizabeth “Liz” Wise. Liz attends MacDonald’s church “while coming down from the previous night’s acid trip.” Eventually, her excitement about Jesus proves contagious to her philandering and oft-stoned husband. Soon, he was telling his fellow joint-smoking friends, “Jesus is my Lord.” Then Wise went to MacDonald’s church and told the congregation, “He is back.” Wise did not explain what he meant by that statement, other than to share that the Lord had told him to tell it to everyone he met.
Although the Jesus People movement petered out, Turner says its influence lives on:
If executives eventually commercialized the Jesus generation’s music, the children of the long 1960s introduced “praise music” into countless American churches. More generally, they reminded evangelical leaders that it could be more effective to sacralize rather than to shun popular culture.
Eskridge, associate director of Wheaton College’s Institute for the Study of American Evangelicals, recently compiled a guide to “some of the most popular music acts of the 1970s that many American youth of that era never heard of,” including “grandfather of Christian rock” Larry Norman (above).
The Dish 