Vineyard Comments
Russell Sutherland
Last Thursday (April 7, 1994) I attended the airport VCF assembly in Toronto. A fellow on the net had informed me that "revival" was occurring. Being local and having a great interest in the effusion of the Holy Spirit I visited the meeting with my father-in-law.
The meeting started at 7:30 with the auditorium (capacity ~ 300) half full. A "worship team" style group performed a variety of choruses for just over 60 minutes. It did not take the audience long to get into the spirit of things. People were encouraged to let themselves go and get excited, which they did. People were clapping, raising and shaking their hands and raising their arms throughout the worship time. Most folk stayed on their feet for the entire hour. The music was quite good mixing folk and rock and roll style (emphasis on the latter). During some short quieter times, people were speaking and singing in tongues. At one point one of the female vocalists gave what I take to be a word of prophecy through song. Her words were in English and quite understandable. The content was nothing extra-ordinary. "I love you, I want to be close to you.."
After the musicians had cleared the stage a fellow took the platform who I assumed was the head pastor. He made a few light and humorous remarks, almost entirely focusing on the person of the Holy Spirit. People then were asked to come forward to share what the Holy Spirit had been doing in their lives. An assortment of people came up, most of them from the first few rows of chairs:
In almost all cases the person shared some emotional experience with the Holy Spirit and then was given the "slain in the Spirit" drill:
The interesting cases were the fellows from Grand Rapids and Denver.
The CR pastor told how an "angel" had persisted with him the night before in "getting the joy of the Lord". Quite a humorous story. A lady from the audience (the angel) then arose to assist in the "filling" process. In short time he was on the floor laughing hilariously... for at least 20 minutes straight. This was so loud that it was very difficult to hear the pastor or the people he was interviewing.
The priest told of his spiritual pilgrimage and then how in recent years he had developed a relationship with a "kinship" VCF group. When his turn came to receive the Spirit, another lady came to assist. (She had been dancing in the aisle during the first hour and shaking violently at times.) Well he took a long time to get the "filling". His hands were shaking and his body was teetering for a long time. The women was doing some kind of weird hand movements, that looked very much like karate chops, around his head. The pastor kept putting his hand up as if to "straight arm" the fellow. Eventually he went down.
Another fellow (I assume an assistant pastor) took the stage and made some general comments about revival. In particular he compared what was going on that evening with what had occurred in eighteenth century New England under the ministry of the likes of Jonathan Edwards. This lasted for about ten minutes but was very difficult to hear because of the rather loud background noise of people in the audience and the fellow on the floor belly laughing.
The main pastor then began an informal sermon from a wide variety of Bible passages demonstrating that these manifestations of the Spirit were perfectly Biblical and normal.
In the meantime my father-in-law was talking at the back of the room with a young man who was in the final process of divorce. (I am not sure how this topic came up. He initially was concerned with the people who were shaking their hands continually.) I joined in to listen and a young fellow asked me to show him from the bible where God said that divorce was wrong. We talked for a bit and as I was showing him some Scripture from Mark 10 three men approached me and asked me to stop talking to this man. They said I had no authority to teach in their church. I readily complied and the young person left. This disturbed me somewhat so I told them the background and content of the conversation. I asked them if they considered what I had said erroneous. Their reply was that it did not matter what I had said. I did not have this authority in their church and that some people were being upset by us being there. One of the people who approached me was an "approved" VCF ministry person. The other two seemed to be visiting pastors from other local churches.
It was 10:30 pm and from talking to others who had been coming regularly since the revival broke out in mid January I knew that the meetings go on into the early hours of the morning. We were encouraged to stay and listen if we liked but not to talk to anyone. Due to other domestic responsibilities we had to depart.
After close to a week of thinking and relecting about the evening here are my present conclusions:
Last Thursday (April 7, 1994) I attended the airport VCF assembly in Toronto. A fellow on the net had informed me that "revival" was occurring. Being local and having a great interest in the effusion of the Holy Spirit I visited the meeting with my father-in-law.
The meeting started at 7:30 with the auditorium (capacity ~ 300) half full. A "worship team" style group performed a variety of choruses for just over 60 minutes. It did not take the audience long to get into the spirit of things. People were encouraged to let themselves go and get excited, which they did. People were clapping, raising and shaking their hands and raising their arms throughout the worship time. Most folk stayed on their feet for the entire hour. The music was quite good mixing folk and rock and roll style (emphasis on the latter). During some short quieter times, people were speaking and singing in tongues. At one point one of the female vocalists gave what I take to be a word of prophecy through song. Her words were in English and quite understandable. The content was nothing extra-ordinary. "I love you, I want to be close to you.."
After the musicians had cleared the stage a fellow took the platform who I assumed was the head pastor. He made a few light and humorous remarks, almost entirely focusing on the person of the Holy Spirit. People then were asked to come forward to share what the Holy Spirit had been doing in their lives. An assortment of people came up, most of them from the first few rows of chairs:
- A Christian Reformed minister from Grand Rapids, Michigan
- A youth pastor from New York State
- An Episcopalian priest from Denver, Colorado
- A woman from St. Catharines, Ontario
- A woman from Sarnia, Ontario
In almost all cases the person shared some emotional experience with the Holy Spirit and then was given the "slain in the Spirit" drill:
- pastor prays for the Holy Spirit to come upon the person
- another person gets ready for the catch
- person eventually falls back and assumes a prone position on the floor
The interesting cases were the fellows from Grand Rapids and Denver.
The CR pastor told how an "angel" had persisted with him the night before in "getting the joy of the Lord". Quite a humorous story. A lady from the audience (the angel) then arose to assist in the "filling" process. In short time he was on the floor laughing hilariously... for at least 20 minutes straight. This was so loud that it was very difficult to hear the pastor or the people he was interviewing.
The priest told of his spiritual pilgrimage and then how in recent years he had developed a relationship with a "kinship" VCF group. When his turn came to receive the Spirit, another lady came to assist. (She had been dancing in the aisle during the first hour and shaking violently at times.) Well he took a long time to get the "filling". His hands were shaking and his body was teetering for a long time. The women was doing some kind of weird hand movements, that looked very much like karate chops, around his head. The pastor kept putting his hand up as if to "straight arm" the fellow. Eventually he went down.
Another fellow (I assume an assistant pastor) took the stage and made some general comments about revival. In particular he compared what was going on that evening with what had occurred in eighteenth century New England under the ministry of the likes of Jonathan Edwards. This lasted for about ten minutes but was very difficult to hear because of the rather loud background noise of people in the audience and the fellow on the floor belly laughing.
The main pastor then began an informal sermon from a wide variety of Bible passages demonstrating that these manifestations of the Spirit were perfectly Biblical and normal.
In the meantime my father-in-law was talking at the back of the room with a young man who was in the final process of divorce. (I am not sure how this topic came up. He initially was concerned with the people who were shaking their hands continually.) I joined in to listen and a young fellow asked me to show him from the bible where God said that divorce was wrong. We talked for a bit and as I was showing him some Scripture from Mark 10 three men approached me and asked me to stop talking to this man. They said I had no authority to teach in their church. I readily complied and the young person left. This disturbed me somewhat so I told them the background and content of the conversation. I asked them if they considered what I had said erroneous. Their reply was that it did not matter what I had said. I did not have this authority in their church and that some people were being upset by us being there. One of the people who approached me was an "approved" VCF ministry person. The other two seemed to be visiting pastors from other local churches.
It was 10:30 pm and from talking to others who had been coming regularly since the revival broke out in mid January I knew that the meetings go on into the early hours of the morning. We were encouraged to stay and listen if we liked but not to talk to anyone. Due to other domestic responsibilities we had to depart.
After close to a week of thinking and relecting about the evening here are my present conclusions:
- Something does appear to be going on at the Airport VCF. They meet every night of the week, save Monday and people are traveling great distances to "catch the wave".
- What I observed was classical "Pentacostalism" with the exception of the continual "shaking of the hands" phenomena.
- If what I observed is the true "blowing of the Spirit" then I am ashamed to say that I am disappointed with the "real thing".
- It is a great injustice to compare what I saw last Thursday with the effusion of the Spirit of God that occurred in the times of Jonathan Edwards. These men would agree with very little of Edward's theology. People in his day were turning to God for fear of their souls from death, hell and eternal torment. (After speaking to the person who made this comparison he granted me this point. In addition he preferred to call what was occurring at VCF renewal rather than revival).
- The VCF has a very strict authority structure which to my thinking is not on.
