The real Jesus Revolution happened in A.D. 30 when Jesus rose from the dead, and changed all of subsequent world history, including the history of Western Europe and then America. But this movie helpfully chronicles the story of Calvary Church (home of the early Christian band Love Song with Chuck Girard, a band I loved in the 70s), and how it became the Mecca for the hippies who were turning to Christ. The movie is well done, and if that fellow playing Lonnie Frisbie the hippie Jesus preacher looks familiar well, you would be right, since he plays Jesus in the Chosen. What is especially impressive about the acting in this film is the role Kelsey Grammer plays as Church Smith, the pastor of Calvary Church. The time frame covered by the movie is 1968-71, and it was indeed this movement that spawned things like the Vineyard Church and the Harvest Church. And yes, I got involved. Here I am playing guitar, letting my hair grow, and helping lead a small group connected to Inter-Varsity at Carolina in 72-74. 
Back then, I would fit right in in this movie. Here’s the trailer….
It’s actually a good thing that the movie stays laser focused on this particular period, and it’s theme is God can and does use flawed people to get the Gospel out, because of course there are no other kinds of people. I say it’s a good thing because, Lonnie in due course went off the rails, got involved in drugs, he and his lovely wife Connie divorced once he went to Florida, and he eventually died of Aids in the early 90s, though Greg Laurie says that at the very end, he turned back to the Lord and repented of his sins. Both Greg Laurie and Chuck Smith are important figures in this film, and there stories should not be overshadowed by that of Lonnie Frisbie. They have continued to do good ministry to all sorts of people. What I did not know is that Kathleen Kuhlman, the famous faith healer of the 70s and 80s was a part of what was going on at Calvary Church
As for me, after UNC, I went to seminary, and in 1976 my girlfriend Ann Sears and I (soon to be my wife) went to Jesus 76 in the Charlotte Motor speedway and were counselors and saw all kinds of things, including lots of Christians bands like Phil Keaggy and Andre Crouch, and heard my friend Leighton Ford, also from Charlotte, and saw people slain in the Spirit, something I had not witnessed before. I didn’t realize being a counselor entailed catching people as they fell backwards zapped by God.
There are still many of us, who became counter-cultural Christians in that era, and still hold some of the values of that movement, and rightly so, as they are the values Jesus himself espoused. But today is the day to celebrate Jesus’ resurrection, a day when it became very apparent, that God’s YES to life is much louder that death’s NO.
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