Carol Wimber on John, the history of the Vineyard, and "creaturely activity"

[Music] yeah so why don't you really quickly introduce yourself and tell us where we are we are at Debbie and Dave King palace and I'm Carol winter awesome who's David in Debbie King are they crazy they're part of the family yeah they're crazy part of the part of the family awesome okay so hey for those who aren't familiar with child labor and his impact on the church could you just give us a snapshot of like who who is John member who was John member John member was a very very good musician and he'd studied a long time and had his degrees in music and then God called him and he took all these music to the dump and they didn't even have a job for about six months or so you don't remember you were a baby whimpers daughter here so he went got some day gig and started telling people about Jesus and gathering up groups and you know we worked for a collection agency it's a Salesman so he would go into doctor's office and talk to the nurses and everybody and then pretty soon there'd be a Bible study in that neighborhood everybody would arrange our lunch hours so when John came by and so that's kind of how it started so he had groups or he had groups all over Orange County and then eventually the pastor down at the Quaker Church a friend's church asked him to come on staff which he eventually did he was at fuller at that time studying well actually it was sociology Oh and he was back in he was a fat man with red hair yeah that's right people would say you know we had lots of Catholics who would come and they'd say father father and he said don't call me father I'm just a fat man of my way they happen so that's kind of how that started yeah and basically it just kind of stayed that way he but he never felt like he was any different than anybody else and he felt like we're all just here victims of God's love and plan and we're all we're all going to the same place and we're just one no he just he didn't have any background ever make him he had had never been in church before except our little Playford Church and they are a little bit different too they didn't have a high value for who's who's a pastor I mean everybody there wasn't a first person in South of God and they're thinking like every person was a part of the body of Christ and and and it was important that they do what God had given them to do it's individuals so it's kind of a nice theology nice understanding yes other structure of the church and that would be like so Protestants would call that the priesthood of all believers but they don't always do it and the vineyard had Windler John came up with this saying everybody gets to play right right but that actually comes right from your previous church experience and a quicker tradition right we had a great great teacher when we were first Christians brand-new baby Christians Lawrence pain and he was a welder and lived in Yorba Linda and went to this little church and was doing a Bible study at our good friend the joiner decaying and his wife Lynn who had advised invited us to a Bible study so that was part of a Gunners Gunners point of view about how it is and we just got absorbed it like we're all just people and he loves us all and we're all we all have our part to play in the body of Christ and were obligated to do that not try to do somebody else's afterlife so what it was a simple little theology that we could understand his baby Christensen he went on to get educated more and went to faller for couple years and tell god and peter Wagner suggested he started church know cool that's John Wimber in a nutshell that's John Wimber yeah cool so in your you know opinion you were married to John and you saw all the crazy stuff that God did over the course of all of that time you know what would you say is the most important thing that John Wimber taught and did because I think John clearly believed that it wasn't just about work work words it was words it works right like it was both Proclamation and demonstration so for you what would be the lasting legacy that he left was John was obedient God called him and he was a reluctant disciple like if he had been an apostle and Jesus would have said that John come he would have said hey I can I've got a gig tonight it's really important you know this is a big did that that's who he was by once he heard once he knew he heard God then he would obey it no matter what it cost him I mean he laid down his whole career just just as it was taken off and just as he was getting the chances that he'd been working for all those years musically and he just walked away for him because out of obedience not because he was tired of that life but just it was it was obedience it drove him and he didn't always enjoy it I mean it wasn't really what he enjoyed but and I told him once I said John you're like one of the two brothers where the first one said he would do it and didn't do it and the second one that said he wouldn't do it he did it hurt listen you were The Reluctant yeah but that's what he was that very few people understand that about him and they think he was ambition but no he was like anti ambitious and and he loved it when the Lord started telling you know giving him songs again giving him songs to write they love that when he when he died he was writing an opera about the Apostles in Jesus and tell tell me more about about the cost you know well his famous sermon I think is his testimony that I'm a fool for Christ yeah it was full you know instead like you talked about how he was reluctant he wasn't an ambitious man and I know that John took a lot of heat you know and there was a lot of criticism and I mean like a lot of people I think that would be almost too much it'd be like what's the points okay you know help us understand that you know like what was some of the cost that John had other than you know not having the fame and fortune of you know continuing on with the Righteous Brothers and becoming a big producer and making lots of money in Hollywood potentially what's the other cost that he had well it's hard to it's hard for the normal person to understand what drove John he was a father grew up a fatherless boy but he had he loved his grandfather and knows raised by his Jewish grandmother and his grandfather and he want to be obedient do you want to do and the end the difference is he could hear the voice of God you know like who wanted to talk to God like friend was that molasses or mm-hmm talk to him like a friend and not very many people have that kind of relationship he didn't have any religious thoughts mixed up with it so God he told him to do this thing and just do it he tells him to do and they'll play it by ear as I go along so he said okay and first thing he did was he got rid of all of his music just you know and that was hard because that's what he was a musician's at that's how we ate and we lived through that and then started going to fall her and then I became I don't even know how to put it yeah you know it's not like I'd say he's like so-and-so because I don't I've never known another person like him I'm not that obedient mm-hm you know I I don't I don't know for sure when God's talking but I think probably he was so single-minded when he was writing and composing and arranging but he was he was a leader too you know it's like he was always as a leader of the band like whoever they were putting up front just be the singers or so on he's the one that wrote the arrangements and compulsive things and and that explains a lot about him he was a leader of the band he had it so when when it all happened around us and the church happened around us he could only do it his way hmm you know and his way was not really the way that many other people could understand because he was going by it was like he had a director in his head hmm just telling him what and that's how it was you know like he'd hear to voice a you know that woman's heart is you know she had a heart attack loud you say cancer and so on so he'd just say it out now I would spend ten minutes thinking that my thought or is that God but he didn't because he didn't have those kind of thoughts he only had thoughts like music and Nerine gene and so on so that kind of a odd thought comes in about body parts or some thing that's wrong he knew it wasn't him so he would just say it out and he never he never did think like what if it isn't true he wasted no time worrying about what if it isn't true like he thought what am I doing here I'm not here for my sake you know I'm not you know I gave up I walked away from what I wanted and this is what we're doing and I'm gonna do it because I know it's important and so he was not confused and all but also he wouldn't let people tell him how to do what his job was he would get get real kind of cranky with the board when they said don't you think the way out it was like you know who are you guys just you know I gotta do it this way I already know how to do it the way I have to do it and he had a good sense about you know it's a good leader he had a good just natural sense about that but he would get impatient with people which was his weakness because I think he was always a little bit cantankerous because yeah after a while he didn't feel good and he was getting sick with all those different things and so on but you know it all happened so fast just and but it wasn't it didn't seem so fast to him the Holy Spirit was he looked at it like okay he's given us a job description I keep in mind he never read the Bible before so he's pouring over the New Testament and and and scene where Jesus sends out the disciples to heal the sick to cleanse the lepers to feed the hungry to the law raised the dead when necessary and to preach the good news to the poor and he saw it as a job description he didn't think about it as a story of what happened never never never thought that was for back then I mean it that never entered his mind that that was for back that just didn't make sense he didn't he didn't read commentaries on me that sounded absurd to him why would it be for back then when people are still sick and hungry and poor and naked and blind and ignorant of the good news so he didn't think like I thought you know I was all I grew up in the Catholic Church and do all the martyr stories and the miracles and you know all that kind of stuff but he didn't yeah I mean um it was and it was an advantage in his case yeah yeah so you know he wasn't in one sense he knew what his call was he was he was called to put the sames he was a change agent I asked him once what do you think your gifts are John you actually could do so many different things he said I think I'm a change agent and and when I look back right yeah you know changed the whole face of the worship type of music I mean Calvary Chapel was already around they were doing it and it was beautiful but you know he took it a little further and yeah he was he was hoping for a big band that's what he was going for at the end there okay let me ask you this so there are there's vineyard folklore and there's all these legends about how it happened and you wrote a book because you were there did you write that three depe of course I track right now is the best assignment I do have a video like sign my book but yeah so I think they even I was talking to Bob about how Bob Fulton about how we were just talking about how you know John Wood would study something he might have an opinion he would study something and changes in your based off of like oh I actually found that a better position remember right right yeah so there's there's video folklore about how it happened and how started and whatnot in your opinion you know like based on your experience you know like how would you describe the beginning of the vineyard like what the lovely understand they were already 13 or 14 vineyards the chem gullickson was that had started up and down the California coast and they were already there and John had studied that group when he was at fuller so ken was kind enough to let us use his name the beginning of it well it's difficult because the beginning of it help happened in so many people at the same time so they all have a different beginning it was kind of like a move of the Holy Spirit you know what God had to do to me was I had been reading that Catholic Charismatic book I forget the name of it I had it memorized at one time anyhow he had to straighten me out first so I had been on the Quaker Church I had you know I was teaching classes and and John was of course but John then left that to go to fuller and be with a peter Wagner and studied the church and movements Church of movements in sociology not happen well I was still of course they had the church although we went still went to the Quaker Church on Sunday but I had been anti charismatic and been working on that you know for a long time and then out of nowhere I had a visitation while I was asleep and I in my in my dream I was teaching about the gifts of the Spirit in Hell hell you know I had it all cut down into percentages and 10% of the people speak in tongues and person you know trying to give the charismatic something so 10% of the people speak in tongues and I was going on and on about it and then all of a sudden in my dream like a hot force of wind hit me in the face or it almost knocked me off I was standing on a little box and preaching to this little group and then like when in my mouth doubts through my body and then out my mouth and I was speaking in tongues uncontrollably and that's how I woke up you know just just and I in it like scared me and puzzled me and I won't join up I said did you hear that [Laughter] no but anyhow he John had had an experience with the Holy Spirit about seven years before walking along the old irrigation ditch in Yorba Linda when yoruba Linda was way out in the country and his dilemma was that Gunnar our teacher was going to move away and now who's going to take care of all these Bible studies that John had started and and was teaching but we always counted on Gunnar in the background and he was he was praying about a Lord I don't know what to do Gunners leaving and all of a sudden John was speaking in tongues and and he came home and he told me he said I was just praying and all of a sudden I couldn't understand what I was saying and my I thought oh no because there had been a big split in the church about a year before and I said we better call we better call a pastor so he called Sheldon Newkirk over and they camel came over to our house and John told them what happened and the and Sheldon cried because they just got my church back together and strong after a you know charismatic split and so John just kind of put it aside I think for my sake because I mean I was with Sheldon and that I mean you know I didn't I just wasn't there anyhow and that was seven years before and there except that had happened seven years before so like John didn't see a whole lot of value in it you know he hadn't he's just doing what he wanted to do and traveling you know like with Peter and learning about the church and how people move and start and how they thrive and how they end and just kind of forgot about it anyhow then during that time I knew and I knew not to talk to John at all about my own experience of that visitation and the night but I went into a deep repentance kind of thing I knew that when John had left to go to Fuller and work but peter Wagner that the whole church attendance just started drying up dying back and I'm and I was you know it's kind of broken hearted I said yeah you know it shouldn't depend on one man you know I love that little charity shouldn't it shouldn't depend on one man and then I saw then I remembered you know how I discouraged John in his own experience and he'll really as a church we had needed the Holy Spirit didn't happen and consequently you know now it's shrinking up and so I mean I saw it as a grievous as it was the sin of pride and everything else so I did some heavy heavy repenting to the point where I couldn't even leave the house because I couldn't you series are going down my cheeks for weeks and weeks and and I just I thought it was too late and then one day I was out trimming the avocado trees and I knew it wasn't too late I knew it was gonna happen and I'm you know tears dried up I was all happy but but but the Holy Spirit told me keep your mouth shut you know you go you goofed you know you goofed him up the first time keep your mouth shut you know I'm gonna do what I was I was going to do it's not too late and I was so happy you know and I did I did real good I didn't and he would tell me like oh I one time he said something but oh I love this type of church and need to explain it to me so we ever started church again Carol I wanted to be like this but I said no it's not gonna be like that because I do I already saw what it was gonna be so then I think he'd say why do you know those kind of things but but all in all I was very disciplined I kept my mouth shut and then a little group that Bob and Penny had started done it requires house has started up and I knew that was the church I don't think it's gonna happen now and just like this and we didn't even go at first and then John came once when it was about three months into it and he said it's not good anymore does Nana be leaders you know there's not enough leadership so he was just studying it like sociology you know yeah analyzing it that kind of thing Molly how that was the beginning of the vineyard and eventually that grew grew too to the point where the French church felt it necessary to ask us to leave and John at that time was on the board of on the board and the Quaker denomination so as a church growth expert so the pastor the early meeting pastor had to call John in and say John in the or Belinda Church we have a situation where a group of people are are being opened open to the gifts and it's growing and and John said well what's your goal here you want to incorporate it because we thought we need the gifts of the Holy Spirit today people are still sick people are still parked we need the gifts of the Holy Spirit we need to know how to heal people and we don't know how you know anyhow so and and the yearly meeting director knew it was John in the group but John was giving his opinion he said well you won't be able to stamp it out because I believe it's of the Holy Spirit but you can have him leave that would probably be your best bet to keep the status quo so then he said well John you know who I'm talking about but you have which put have the families involved I'll be the families that are involved with it sign their name and ask to be released and then will will release you and and John said we're not going without your blessing they said look bless you I think there were wonderful people you know wonderful sweet people so they wrote us a letter with their blessing and they actually had prayed for us and release us to do what we felt we needed to do but the Holy Spirit was leading us to do and I think I think there were twelve families as saying but they didn't count the young people you show that church with eighty four five percent young people and then so we started off with you know a hundred fifty people or something maybe two hundred people and young people and this is just for any of the viewers this is detailed a lot in your book the way it was I wish yeah yeah I remember you good long time ago and the others broke in my memory part of my brain so there's a so for those who are watching is there's a link in the description so I can purchase your book and I hope you get millions of dollars from all the new sales it's not it's not even in print anymore it's on Amazon yeah in print well I don't well I mean you I think you can get a Kindle to me okay can I'm getting a Kendall I saw the paper copy I don't know Kindle okay so we talked a little about the history of the vineyard and so there is in again the vineyard folklore there's these names that kind of pop up so Donner pains one of them dick and win Hein or another couple that there would be no vineyard if there wasn't a goner there would be no vineyard if there wasn't a dick inland your pinion who do you think has been not forgotten but maybe overlooked or because John was such a larger-than-life personality and has such a big impact you know but we were talking earlier he was not the founder of the vineyard no so your opinion who's somebody that would be kin Gullickson bothered me for a long time but you know I'm not in position to do anything about it you are now because I have said that your grandfather's health system was around and had been planting vineyards and what we loved about him and what John he was studying the bid wonder the people groups he would when he was a follower that's what he was study was studying a new group of the men on the beach or in palaces and called the vineyard they wrote their own songs and that they they just more casual California clothes and baptized in the ocean and I mean it just sounds so practical and so right and then as time went on well we met Ken and we just were such good friends all of us all at once and we all traveled together and he and his jockey introduced John to all of his vineyards and the they went traveling all over the world with us and so we just had wonderful wonderful years but the people because John you know it's made such a big noise now I mean I didn't do it on purpose God made John a big No but anyhow it's like people think John Webber started the vineyard John Wimber did not start the vineyard John Wimber didn't start anything we didn't even have a name when when when the the French church asked us kindly to leave and that they would bless us and they blessed us we just didn't know what to call ourselves and one of the calvary chapels up in the mountains said we'll call yourself a Calvary that was dawn McClure and so he called her selves Calvary until it got strange and chuck was not comfortable with with the what was happening the manifestations of the Holy Spirit and I think he felt we were taking it too far and I mean because John John had no there were no barriers to keep anybody out and he didn't have to have a position in the church to be you know it was a wide-open thing which was fun but anyhow it wasn't fun for Chuck because he was having to answer questions about us in what way or so he asked us to change our name and then Ken Gullickson who had been at that same Meeny meeting said on the way down from mountain and that meeting with Chuck and and their board well why don't you just call yourself vineyard you know and John said he said well I don't know what he said yeah call yourself vineyard John said well I will do that canon but I don't want to change my name again I'm happy to change my name everything so I don't want to ever change my name again so it could his name could have been Quaker Calvary vineyard though at this point right well well yeah I mean we were definitely I mean the Jesus people movement Calvary Chapel I mean that was one of the huge groups that John had been studying in fuller I mean it was just all so wonderful so he told can I'm not I'm not changing my yeah I'm never changing my name again if you get fed up with me you know which people did a minute after a bit of time you know I'm not going to change my name ever again and if if that's okay then okay I'll use your name so but anyhow I would like to make clear ken had many many churches already and they were all very successful churches because ken knows how to choose leaders it's just a gift so we but and then he moved to Texas once and started three Jesus chapels and then came back here and started more vineyards again so I mean ken Gullickson is a church planter and he's but I don't know how many there are now I I can't remember what Joanie said the last time we talked but they're all over all over United States it's wonderful I mean he is it like a living moving Church blender mm-hmm he's not well enough now to do that but so he somebody got people in the vineyard and people who value the vineyard need to honor oh yeah right right and then I ended up to it that our church now Ellen honored him and and I'm grateful and thought on him and and we see him every once in a while but he's not he's not real well I'm hoping that when he gets well enough he'll he'll go to the Anaheim yeah and when he gets well enough I need to meet with him oh yeah tell me your secrets that's alone yeah yeah really you know he's a wonderful man and so funny hmm that's just such a humor good awesome okay okay so here's the I'd love to know like you kind of hinted at this but what was John members main thing he John was a church planter John was a conference speaker John was an equipped on was a pastor a father he is a he was a theologian I think he was a very smart guy who has all these different titles and he wore all these different hats over the course of his life but for you what was his main thing like if you had to summarize John remember was all about this what have you I asked him that once I said John what do you think you're you know what do you think your gift is your man gift because he did a little bit of all of it you know yeah he said I I I'm gonna change changes I you know I'm a change agent I come in and things are different afterwards he said that's that that's what I can see that that has happened and that's true God uses him that way I mean I'm thinking about it now like we came here you're Belinda all those years ago and have been closed Anaheim churches really you know we drive in from Yorba Linda but do all the churches in town now have a food pantry I mean he's the one like we we feed the hungry you know we we heal the sick I mean it was it so much and we worship well it was so much a part of that what a Christian is I mean you can't be a Christian without without weight and ignore the poor you I mean it can't be done I mean it seems so plain to him but of course he was reading it like the first time ever as if it was written just to him this is what this is what you do so so he was and he saw the church isn't doing it the church has to be equipped we need to ask the Holy Spirit to equip the church and so that's what it was all about that's what those conferences are all about so they would understand what the church was and and the job of the church and God let God equip them so it was really a pretty simple formula get filled with the Holy Spirit wasn't like for our own pleasure the so we could do this stuff he told us to do because we can't do it you know and it was kind of like that but the story that Jesus told about the man who had the people coming for food and and they had you have nothing to give him and have to go to the neighbor and wake him up and and I have nothing to give me and we were in that place people would hear about you know I remember praying Lord you know they hear about your great name we don't have anything unless you show up and uh I mean we mend it like we could we'd go to places not even knowing or preparing because how do you prepare the whole thing the whole thing is what if she just gonna do what is somebody spirit going to do then you go with what he's going to do and and so that mean there's no service and that's why a couple of times I've seen Jon McClure do it perfectly he he spoke about whatever the lecture was and then he said I'm gonna invite the Holy Spirit to come now and then you say Holy Spirit would you come now on Minister the people I need wait you know anyway didn't you it wait is it well I guess he's I guess he's not going to come today and all these people know a job but even John McLaurys would be very honest yeah if so John had a couple little things well I guess not you know hey if any was just totally honest like if he doesn't show up but there's nothing going on buddy but most always and also john biebe right in the middle of a lecture and then he'd stop take off his glasses and like all the the young people knew that oh he's taking his glasses off hey I think the Lord wants to miniature ministers and people now wow you know it's like the middle of a sentence you know so God would break in and tell John what do you want to do and then John would start that you know there's a person over there you know the Holy Spirit's on you and then he was teaching the congregation how to see the Holy Spirit how to tell how to encourage what God's doing and not interfere with Anna the human step never using emotion or excitement I mean he considered that strange fires when people like try to whip people up into an emotional state yeah anything no manipulation back to no music you know hey it like he do it would be dead silent somebody told me that one of the things that they really loved about John is that he was always downloaded down yeah alright but turn the lights on now try it yeah he'd send people out when it felt the emotional levels getting too high in the church just through their worship he would send him out for a coffee break then they'd be coming back and still chewing their cookies yeah and he'd start calling off the words of knowledge and Holy Spirit would fall a little bit later yeah so I mean very much he was suspicious and like it's like emotional whipping up and or like sad stories or anything that would make people emotional was discouraged yeah he'd never do it so and he wouldn't put down people that did but he would never do it like it was like the Lord is coming and and the Lord is gonna do what he wants to do and he does not need our to stirring up and and I do you know the Quakers the old Quakers uses call that creaturely activity when people would you get all excited and say things in the flesh and then think it was a spirit they wouldn't know it was creaturely activity just human well I liked that word so we in the vineyard are suspect of creaturely activity [Laughter] [Music]

Channel: Luke Geraty

Views: 6,808

Rating: 4.9289942 out of 5

Keywords: Carol Wimber, John Wimber, Come Holy Spirit, Vineyard Movement, Wimber Legacy, Vineyard Church, Wimber

Id: IxTsx4FR11Y

Length: 38min 54sec (2334 seconds)

Published: Wed Jun 10 2020