Journal: Bibliotheca Sacra
Volume: BSAC 140:557 (Jan 1983)
Article: Periodical Reviews
Author: Anonymous

BSac 140:557 (Jan 83) p. 71

Periodical Reviews

“Signs and Wonders Today” (theme for a series of articles), Christian Life, October 1982.

Except for the advertisements and a few regular features, this entire issue of Christian Life is related to “MC510: Signs, Wonders and Church Growth,” a new course at Fuller School of World Missions offered in the winter quarter, 1982. That course was taught by John Wimber, an adjunct professor at the school and pastor of Vineyard Christian Fellowship of Yorba City, California. The course was not only an endorsement of the charismatic position that the sign gifts of 1 Corinthians 12 are operative today but also a practice of it because each session was followed by a voluntary “ministry time” in which the sign gifts were supposedly exercised.

Wimber’s own article, “Zip to 3,000 in 5 Years,” is the story of Vineyard Christian Fellowship, the church he pastors. His emphasis is on the ministry of healing. He says, “Today we see 50 to 100 people a week healed in our services. Many more are healed as we pray for them in hospitals, on the streets and in homes. The blind are seeing. The lame are walking. The deaf are hearing. Cancers are disappearing.” And this is not only the result of his ministry but also of his people. He says, “Today in our church of over 3,000, I would estimate that as many as 20 percent regularly see someone healed through their prayers” (p. 20). But other things occur which Wimber considers evidence of God’s power. He says, “Quaking, shaking, falling under the power of God, and the public exercise of spiritual gifts such as words of knowledge and prophecy are commonplace.” And Wimber considers these “signs and wonders” as the reason for the phenomenal growth of his church. He explains that after this began to happen, “The fact was that over the next two months we

BSac 140:557 (Jan 83) p. 72

baptized 700 new converts as a result of this mighty empowering work of the Holy Spirit” (p. 21).

In their articles of support and explanation for the new course C. Peter Wagner and Donald A. McGavran point out that Third World peoples live in an atmosphere of the supernatural, and so to make an impact on them and win them to Christ the church must practice “signs and wonders” too. They also emphasize the fact (true to a degree but not without counterbalancing evidence) that in Third World countries Pentecostal and charismatic churches are experiencing the greatest church growth. The conclusion they draw is that evangelical missionaries must therefore meet pagan supernaturalism with biblical supernaturalism and must perform “signs and wonders” in order to produce maximum church growth.

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