John Winebrenner

John Winebrenner (March 25, 1797 – September 11, 1860) was a Christian pastor, author and religious reformer who founded the Churches of God General Conference.

Life
Winebrenner was born in Walkersville, Maryland. He studied at Dickinson College, Carlisle, Pennsylvania, and was ordained in the German Reformed Church in 1820. He pastored at Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, where his revival preaching and his Revival Hymn-Book (1825) brought about a break between his followers and the Reformed Church.

His Christian testimony can be found in the book The Testimony of a Hundred Witnesses (1858) edited by John Frederick Weishampel. In 1830, he and five other ministers founded the Church of God (whose members are sometimes called "Winebrennerians"). He served as speaker at the first eldership and subsequently edited and published the Church of God paper, first called The Gospel Publisher (1835–1845) and later The Church Advocate (beginning in 1845).

In January 1836, he established the first Anti-Slavery Society of Harrisburg, where he became an ardent abolitionist and represented his society at the State Convention, and later served as its Corresponding Secretary.

Winebrenner was also a pacifist, seeing no justification for war except in cases of self-defense. This opinion put him and his nascent denomination in accord with the Peace Churches movement in the United States. He was particularly outspoken in his opposition to the Mexican War of 1846-1848.

He died from cholera in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania and was interred at Harrisburg Cemetery.