Vineyard Movement

Background

The Vineyard Movement emerged from the Jesus Movement, which spread among young people in the western United States during the 1970s. Kenn Gulliksen, who had served as an associate pastor at Calvary Chapel, began a Bible study group in Los Angeles in 1974. The group soon grew into a church and took the name "Vineyard," drawn from Isaiah 27:2-3 and John 15:5. The first Vineyard churches were established in 1975.

During the same period, John Wimber, a pastor with a Quaker background, worked at an institute for evangelism and church growth associated with Fuller Theological Seminary. In 1977 he founded a Calvary Chapel church in Yorba Linda, California. Drawing on theologian George Eldon Ladd's theology of the kingdom of God, Wimber taught that the kingdom of God is still manifested today through such works as healing. This teaching, with its emphasis on the ministry of the Holy Spirit, led to conflict with the Calvary Chapel leadership.

Development

• 1982: Wimber's church dropped the Calvary Chapel name and became the Vineyard Christian Fellowship of Anaheim. Gulliksen handed over to Wimber the leadership of the Vineyard churches, which then numbered seven or eight.
• 1982–1985: Wimber taught the course "MC510: Signs, Wonders, and Church Growth" at Fuller Theological Seminary together with C. Peter Wagner. The course became both the most popular and the most controversial at the school, and it was discontinued in early 1986. Wagner called this movement the Third Wave, following Pentecostalism and the charismatic movement.
• 1985: According to the official history published by Vineyard Canada, the loosely affiliated churches became a formal body, the Association of Vineyard Churches, in this year. Some sources give 1982 as the founding date.
• From around 1988: Wimber became closely associated with Paul Cain and others known as the "Kansas City Prophets." These men were known for their prophetic ministry and for a time exerted considerable influence on Wimber and the Vineyard.
• 1994–1995: In January 1994, phenomena such as laughter, shaking, and falling occurred at meetings of the Toronto Airport Vineyard church, events that became known as the Toronto Blessing. Out of concern that the church was placing excessive emphasis on these phenomena, Wimber and the association removed the church from the association in December 1995.
• 1997: Wimber died. He had served as national director until 1994 and remained president of the association until his death.

Results and Influence

The Vineyard describes itself as a movement that unites the high regard for Scripture maintained by evangelicalism with the experience of the Holy Spirit found in the Pentecostal and charismatic traditions. Today it operates as a denomination-like association in the United States, Canada, and elsewhere. Worship songs originating in Vineyard churches are sung in many churches across denominational lines.

In Korea, the movement reportedly became known from the late 1980s onward, as Wimber's books Power Evangelism and Power Healing were translated and Korean pastors attended seminars in the United States and Toronto.

Assessment

Supporters credit the Vineyard with holding together the Word and the experience of the Spirit, and with extending divine healing and the gifts of the Holy Spirit into a ministry practiced by laypeople as well. Wimber criticized cessationism, the view that miracles and spiritual gifts ended with the apostolic age (see Cessationism and Continuationism).

Several Korean Presbyterian and Holiness denominations adopted resolutions cautioning against the movement.

• Presbyterian Church of Korea (Tonghap), 81st General Assembly (1996): The assembly judged that the Vineyard Movement holds a one-sided understanding of the Holy Spirit and His work. It also found that the biblical interpretation used to justify holy laughter, shaking, falling, and similar phenomena was unsound. Accordingly, it directed that Vineyard-style worship not be adopted indiscriminately and that members refrain from participating in the movement.
• Presbyterian Church in Korea (Kosin): In 1996 it resolved to prohibit participation. In 2007 it designated the Vineyard Movement and the New Apostolic movement led by Wagner as unsound movements.
• Presbyterian Church in Korea (Hapdong), 82nd General Assembly (1997): The assembly resolved to discipline participants and sympathizers.
• Korea Evangelical Holiness Church (1998): It resolved that the movement has "cultic tendencies."

The phenomena at issue in these resolutions were especially prominent in the Toronto Blessing. Those sympathetic to the Vineyard point out that the Vineyard association itself removed the Toronto church. They also distinguish the two movements by noting that the groups that later developed into the New Apostolic Reformation left the Vineyard over differences of opinion. Critics, on the other hand, regard the Vineyard as one of the roots of the New Apostolic Reformation.