The Jesus movement was an awakening to Christ, which most believe started among American West Coast youth in the late 1960ss. It spread across North and Central America, as well as Europe. The movement changed the face of evangelical Christianity.
What Set the Stage for the Jesus Movement?
In the 1960s-70s, American youth searched for and created countercultural ways of life, contrary to what they saw in their parents (often predictable and traditional) lives. Hitler’s defeat had brought idealism after World War II, but the Vietnam War replaced that optimism with disappointment. Many youths became angry with “the establishment,” staging anti-war protests on college campuses and major cities.
American society was undergoing drastic upheaval—much of it leading to good, but sometimes mixed, results. This period saw the rise of the American civil rights movement inspired by Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Women’s rights and feminism’s growing popularity impacted families nationwide. The charismatic movement affected many churches. Change was in the air everywhere.
For many teens and young adults, these two decades presented an opportunity to break free from conventions. They experimented with psychedelic drugs, free love, and communal living. They sought to “turn on, tune in, and drop out,” a phrase often attributed to Timothy Leary in 1966.
These were the years of the Beatles, Woodstock, love-ins, flower power, LSD, pot, hippies, and “make love, not war.” San Francisco’s Height-Ashbury neighborhood was a central destination for teens running away from home and hitchhiking across the country to find out if they could make better lives. They got involved in causes and communes offering “peace, love, dove.”
While these young people were initially disillusioned with their parents’ way of life, their countercultural journeys didn’t provide the answers either. After several years of seeking their own solutions, they found sexual abandon, bare feet, bellbottoms, and substance use weren’t leading them to healthier lives. Amid the guitar playing, garden growing, and shared living, there were sexually transmitted diseases, homelessness, and overdoses. Bobby Kennedy and Dr. King were assassinated. Cults like Jonestown sprang up, often ending in tragedy.
Some youths realized they hadn’t found a better way of life, just a different one, and looked for answers in Jesus. Some noted how “hippie-like” Jesus looked in popular images with his long hair. They hoped focusing on Him and the Bible would free them from both their struggles and their parents’ legalistic trappings. As Billy Graham, Bill Bright, and others held stadium-size events preaching the gospel of Jesus Christ, young people began to respond.
Especially concentrated in California, young hippies finding Jesus began what is known as the Jesus movement.
When Did the Jesus Movement Start?
Many trace the beginning of the Jesus movement to 1969 and the “summer of love.” According to The Conversation, as tens of thousands of hippies descended on San Francisco’s Haight-Ashbury district, specific efforts were designed to minister to and share the gospel with these lost children resulting in a sub-culture called “Jesus freaks” or “Jesus people.” The Jesus Revolution, or the movement of Jesus freaks, made the cover of Time Magazine in 1971, so it’s fair to say that between 1968 and 1971, the energy of those finding new life in Jesus grew large enough to make a national impact.
The Jesus Revolution movie, released in 2023, focuses attention on the story of Chuck Smith beginning in 1968. He was the pastor of a languishing church, and his encounter with Jesus-preaching hippie Lonnie Frisbee is often credited as the movement’s birthplace.
That’s not to say other locations weren’t experiencing the movement of the spirit among the youth. The Belmont Avenue Church of Christ in Nashville, the Fellowship House Church movement in South Carolina, the Jesus People in Chicago, and Explo 72 in Dallas all saw similar growth.
While some depict the Jesus revolution as happening among primarily white youth, it continued the Civil Rights Movement’s work in the context of salvation. The Gospel Coalition contributor Paula Rinehart reports:
“Nearly 100,000 kids filled the Cotton Bowl in Dallas at Explo ’72. We lit candles and sang along with Andrae Crouch, ‘How can I say thanks?’ This generation grew up in segregated schools. The Jesus movement was our first taste of the power of the gospel to bring black people and white people into a working communion, with all its challenges. There was so much hope.”
How Many People Became Christians Through the Jesus Movement?
Premier Christianity states, “now seems a good time to reflect on a movement which leading scholar Larry Eskridge estimates saw at least 250,000 people become Christians.” A Baptist Paper article on spiritual awakenings since 1700 reports that Teen Challenge founder David Wilkerson “estimated that the movement eventually included 300,000 people.”
It’s hard to quantify how many people came to faith in Christ during this movement. Who can know how many family members were impacted by the Jesus freaks’ testimonies? Still, it undeniably changed the topography of the American church and ministry forever. It brought a revolution in Christian music, creating what we now call Contemporary Christian Music. It changed parachurch organizations—founding many new ones that are famous today. In these areas and others, the Jesus movement left a lasting impact.
What Were Some of the Jesus Movement’s Key Figures?
Those of us who grew up and found our faith through the Jesus movement will tell you the KEY figure at work during this time was Jesus Christ. Jesus and His Gospel were central for everyone who came to faith at the time. There was a strong emphasis on stripping church down to its central element, and Jesus was that.
There is no one leader credited with the Jesus movement, but some of the key figures included the following:
In the late 50s, several church leaders were laying a foundation of preaching combined with teaching, mission, and organization—notably Billy Graham (Billy Graham Crusades), Bill Bright (Cru), and Loren Cunningham (YWAM). Their ministries blossomed during the sixties. David Wilkerson also played a key role—his 1962 book The Cross and the Switchblade, detailing his street ministry with NYC gangs, sold over 50 million copies. One of his converts, former gang leader Nicky Cruz, became a famous evangelist in his own right. Torrey Johnson came even earlier than these groups—he started a group in 1944 that became Youth for Christ ministries.
Chuck Smith and Lonnie Frisbee, whose story is documented by Greg Laurie and shown in the film The Jesus Revolution, were at the heart of the movement’s emergence. Another California pastor, John Wimber, founded the Vineyard Church, which started the larger Vineyard Movement.
Duane Pederson was an Eastern Orthodox priest who became a Jesus freak and founded a prison ministry. He later recorded his memories of the Jesus movement in Larger Than Ourselves: The Early Beginnings of the Jesus People.
Francis Schaeffer founded L’Abri, a Christian community in Switzerland. Many Jesus hippies credited his example and writings with getting them to think seriously about the Christian life and how to live it in community.
Arthur Blessitt was a young man who, in 1968, heard God tell him to carry a physical cross around the world—and he did. In the United States, it was known as the “Jesus March.”
Andrae Crouch and Keith Green were key figures in the “Jesus music” that eventually became the genre we call Contemporary Christian Music. However, they were more than musicians. They took a pastoral role in their ministries and demonstrated a new way of “doing church” that emerged from the movement.
How Did Christian Rock Come Out of the Jesus Movement?
Just as there is no separating the 1960s-70s from folk and rock music, there’s no separating the Jesus movement from the explosion of new music created at that time. There was even crossover when Noel Paul Stookey of Peter, Paul, and Mary became a Christian in 1967, and Bob Dylan released an album of Christian music after his conversion in the late 1970s.
For many, the music of the times was the heart of the cultural revolution. Folk music and rock had taken hold of the youth, so they brought the music with them when they came to Christ. Teens across the U.S. who hadn’t dropped out and would never dream of running away to California were nonetheless affected by the new music and brought it into their churches through youth groups, “special” music, and camp retreats.
Chuck Girard founded Love Song in 1970, becoming one of the first popular Christian rock bands. Bands like Second Chapter of Acts and Petra soon followed.
Two of the most famous Christian rock musicians at the time were Larry Norman (one of the first to put Christian lyrics to rock tunes) and his protégé Randy Stonehill (who pioneered contemporary Christian music with a more acoustic/folk style). Others included Barry McGuire, John Michael Talbot, Michael Card, and Tom Howard.
Movies like Godspell, Jesus Christ Superstar, Time to Run, and Brother Sun, Sister Moon continued to combine rock and roll with religious subjects, their hit soundtracks amplifying each film’s Jesus message.
The artists who emphasized acoustic and folk-inspired music found it easier to fit in with the established church than the ones who embraced rock and roll. Still, young people embraced it all. Fifty years later, Christian rock is an established part of many American worship services.
What Is the Jesus Movement’s Legacy Today?
The Jesus movement was so impactful that when the recent Asbury revival began, hundreds remembered the seminary’s 1970 revival and traveled to witness it anew. The children of the Jesus movement now see their children reaching their teens or young adulthoods, many struggling with faith and the church’s failures. They pray that these young souls can have the same encounter with Jesus that rocked their worlds.
The Jesus movement forever changed the music of worship. House churches and coffee houses that sprang during this time continue their ministries today. The focus on Jesus’ imminent return (accentuated by movies like The Late Great Planet Earth, A Thief in the Night, and A Distant Thunder) continues to be a central conversation for many Christians.
The movement kept the Bible central and emphasized inclusive ministry, getting outside the church’s walls, stripping extra cultural trappings off the gospel, simple living, and valuing every individual. Those values continue to be hallmarks of contemporary faith.
The few thousand young people who encountered Jesus in the 60s and 70s changed the world for good, and their legacy continues.
Photo Credit: Getty Images/myshkovsky
