Talk:Association of Vineyard Churches/Archive 1

Untitled section
The last sentence in the article body was "Some stuff about Enacted Inaugurated Eschatology should go here." I don't know anything about the suggestion itself, it may be a good one, but it ought to be here rather than in the article itself. [Unsigned comment by User:Vonspringer 20:51, 24 April 2005]

Wimber and the Vineyard
This article creates the impression that the Vineyard movement was born of a pre-existing "empowered evangelical" or "radical middle" movement. This is not really the case. Historically, it came about through the tension between Pentecostalism and Evangelicalism that Wimber himself was experiencing. Wimber explains this tension in writings like "Power Healing". Wimber eventually decided upon a form of Pentecostalism where experiencing God and the present Kingdom became his focus. Through his experiences at Fuller Seminary as a teacher, however, he came across theological justifications for his feelings and experiences, thus was born "the radical middle". The combination of transformationalism with the pre-millenialist theology of George Eldon Ladd has shaped the Vineyard movement into what it is today. [Unsigned comment by User:65.93.55.235 08:01, 30 August 2005]

Controversial?
I don't doubt that some of the Vineyard's doctrines are considered controversial by some Conservative and Fundamentalist Christian leaders, but can you delineate more about what those teachings are? A provocative statement like that needs to be further explained instead of being left to "dangle" at the end of a paragraph. Jhortman 07:13, 27 January 2006 (UTC)

Page Redesign
I have completely redesigned the page to include more information and organization. I kept most of the old information that was on the page, but relocated most of it into appropriate sections. To better reflect the proper name of the church today, I have also renamed the page to the Association of Vineyard Churches. --Jhortman 03:45, 28 January 2006 (UTC)

Famous members
I believe, although I'm not positive, that upon his conversion to Christianity, it was to the Vineyard Fellowship that Bob Dylan turned. I'm not going to modify the article for now, as I'd like to check my facts first, but if so, I'd say it merits an inclusion in the famous members section. --Benwilson528 01:24, 6 April 2006 (UTC)


 * I confirmed this and added it to the page with appropriate citations. Thanks for the heads-up!  --Jhortman 06:05, 18 August 2006 (UTC)

Why?
Why is it that I can edit this page when I have nothing to do with this website? so who is in control of content here? [Unsigned comment by User:131.238.124.118 13:55, 24 May 2006]


 * Anyone can edit Wikipedia. It is based on consensus and discussion. You can insert nonsense (as you did - please don't do that again), but by the same token, other editors like myself can come along and correct you. See FAQ for more information. David L Rattigan 14:12, 24 May 2006 (UTC)

USA-centric
The tone of the article is predominantly for Vineyard Churches USA. Maybe that should be the title of the article and there should be an separate article for the International Vineyard Consortium. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Dialsforme (talk • contribs).


 * The tone of the article predominantly discusses the Vineyard USA because that's likely what the experience of most of the authors have been. If you'd like to expand it to include more discussion of the international activities of the Vineyard, please do. If you'd like to create a page talking about the VIC, I have no objection... go for it. I think this page is appropriately titled, though. --Jhortman 20:28, 11 August 2006 (UTC)

"Evangelical Protestant"
Given the fact that User:69.211.220.12 has never posted an edit, I'll bet this is a "hit and run" edit, but I wanted to address these issues, anyway. It seems that in this edit, the user simply added "Evangelical Protestant" to many of the comparisons between the Vineyard and other denominations. Even though the very basic nature of the edits (without explanation) makes them worthy of reversion all by itself, I wanted to address each of the places where the adjectives were added:
 * Sola Scriptura - simply put, it's not just a view held by evangelical denominations, and the tenet of Sola Scriptura is ancient and traditional. Just look at the wikipedia page for it, and the references on that page
 * Worship - think about this one for a minute... yes, it's true that some other evangelical churches were still only using traditional hymns in their service, but it's also true of non-evangelical denominations. Limiting the comparison to only evangelical churches makes it seem as though other churches possibly were already moving towards "more modern" worship.
 * Ordination and statement about vestments - this edit seemed to simply be reworded so the editor could include the adjectives "evangelical protestant," and given the incorrect nature of the other edits, I saw no need to insert an arbitrary "any" in the final sentence that was changed. --Jhortman 04:13, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

Editorial changes
OK. I made some enhancements to some of the text; I hope it's acceptable. --Mdoc7 02:07, 10 September 2006 (UTC)


 * Everything looks ok to me, except the first sentence of the "History" section. I changed it again to attempt to make it sound a little less confusing. Thanks for helping to improve this page! --Jhortman 03:24, 18 September 2006 (UTC)

Lonnie Frisbee
It seems to me that someone saw the documentary that was released a couple of years ago about Lonnie Frisbee and posted some of the information that was contained in that movie without properly citing it. As such, I have removed it. If you do additional research about Lonnie Frisbee's role in the Calvary Chapel and Vineyard movements, you will see that he did have a substantial role in the churches in Costa Mesa and Yorba Linda, but not to the extent that is claimed in the edits to this article. (I have not seen the movie, so I can not speak to the movie's claims.) Here's a link to an article from the OC Weekly in 2005 that discusses the movie and Lonnie frisbee. Here's another link to a discussion of Lonnie Fribee on apologeticsindex.org.

Simply put, while Fribee was an important character in the early development of the Vineyard movement, it is not appropriate to say that he "founded" the Vineyard, nor that he came up with the Vineyard name. (Kenn Gullickson's church and bible study groups had been using the Vineyard name before they ever met John Wimber, and it was with Wimber that Frisbee became involved in the Vineyard.) I have nothing personally against Lonnie Frisbee, and I personally doubt that he's been "erased" from Vineyard history just because he had issues with homosexuality and died from AIDS (as the movie apparently claims). If those claims are going to be made in the Wikipedia article however, along with claims about his historical participation in the early founding of the Vineyard church, then those claims must be properly cited. The previous content was not. --Jhortman 22:03, 13 February 2007 (UTC)

Removing Famous People
Frankly I just did not find this section to be helpful or academic. Unless you can justify to me why these particular leaders/members (Dylan is not a member) ought to be recognized on this page I will delete them every time I get on.

I also made some insignificant word order changes in the heresy claims section. I thought the changes made for clearer syntax.

Thanks to all for your helpful contributions. 63.252.247.46 04:01, 16 February 2007 (UTC)ak


 * Your edit summary states that you find this section to be "in poor taste and purely opinion." That is not a sufficient reason for removing material from Wikipedia. I see that someone else has already reverted your edit. In the future, you should create a username before removing an entire section of a page... that will tend to give your edit more credibility.  At any rate, naming well-known members/followers of the Vineyard Movement is perfectly acceptable per Wikipedia guidelines, as long as they meet the standard of notability.  I think every person currently listed (as of 2/16/07) meets that criteria. --Jhortman 03:21, 17 February 2007 (UTC)

Reverted Edits from User:24.192.97.254
I have twice reverted edits related to the Toronto Airport Vineyard that were added by User:24.192.97.254. The reason I have removed this information is twofold:

First, the quotation made about the TAVCF is not relevant to the discussion in the "Claims of Heresy" section. Quoting a passage about how John Wimber came to the point of "expelling" the Toronto Airport Vineyard (and doesn't even really get to the point until the very end) is not a positive addition to this section.

Second, the article this information is cited from is 9 years old, and every statistical piece of information in the cited article is out-of-date. Such an outdated piece of material is not appropriate for inclusion as a cited source, IMO.

Please respond on this talk page before re-adding the section in question. --Jhortman 07:38, 18 March 2007 (UTC)

should this be box be added?
This box seen on other pages with Christianity articles...

"Part of a series of articles on Christianity Christianity

Foundations Jesus Christ Church · Christian Theology New Covenant · Supersessionism Dispensationalism Apostles · Kingdom · Gospel History of Christianity · Timeline......"

I find these boxes helpful, i'd like to see it properly incorporated into the page 24.106.68.233 04:58, 26 April 2007 (UTC)


 * No Argument from me... feel free to include it if you'd like. If I "get around to it," I might do it later myself.  --Jhortman 17:30, 5 May 2007 (UTC)


 * I've been looking into the different Christianity boxes, and I don't know that this article definitely fits into any of them neatly. Certainly the Christianity box would apply broadly, but none of the (very many) links in that box links directly to The Vineyard. (The only one that indirectly links would be the "denominations" link.) I don't know that any of the other Christianity-themed boxes that are out there provide a direct link to this page, either... anybody have any suggestions?  (Here's the "Christianity" box) --Jhortman 19:20, 5 May 2007 (UTC)

Removal of External Links
I've removed 3 external links that were added by Teune. I did not remove them because they present a critical view of the Vineyard... I removed them because they don't meet the external link requirements set forth in the Wikipedia Links Policy. I've pasted a few pertinent points of the policy below that I believe these links don't meet.

What should be linked

 * Articles about any organization, person, web site, or other entity should link to the official site if any.
 * Sites that contain neutral and accurate material that cannot be integrated into the Wikipedia article due to copyright issues, amount of detail (such as professional athlete statistics, movie or television credits, interview transcripts, or online textbooks) or other reasons.
 * Sites with other meaningful, relevant content that is not suitable for inclusion in an article, such as reviews and interviews.

Links normally to be avoided
Except for a link to a page that is the subject of the article or an official page of the article subject—and not prohibited by restrictions on linking—one should avoid:
 * Any site that does not provide a unique resource beyond what the article would contain if it became a Featured article.
 * Any site that misleads the reader by use of factually inaccurate material or unverifiable research. See Reliable sources.
 * Links to blogs and personal web pages, except those written by a recognized authority.

If those links can be included as cited sources for information that is added to the article, that would be a more preferable use for them. --Jhortman 17:44, 5 May 2007 (UTC)

Larry Norman
IP editor 71.155.212.206 has made significant changes multiple times to this article that claim that Larry Norman is the "original founder" of the Vineyard. I have no doubt that it is appropriate to list Larry Norman as a key original member of the Vineyard, or maybe even as "one of the founders" of the Vineyard. I have not seen any reliable information, however, that points to this one person as the one person that, all by himself, founded the Vineyard. (I don't think that 2 sentences on his bio on his own personal website counts as reliable, verifiable information.) We seem to have people come along relatively regularly and argue that x person is the "real founder" of the Vineyard (including Lonnie Frisbee and Kenn Gullickson), when the truth is that the Vineyard started as a group of people getting together, and it grew outward from there. Not only that, but the Larry Norman bio page was sloppily cited on this page (and you managed to insert your user signature, also). When adding sources in the future, please cite things properly. I'm not trying to bite the newcomer... just trying to encourage you to learn how to do things "right" and discuss controversial changes before you make them. I'm open to any differing opinion anyone might have.--Jhortman 19:07, 25 June 2007 (UTC)


 * if i cited larry norman's bio sloppily, i apologize... however, you did not cite the changes you made to my good faith edits at all... saying that "John Wimber is considered the leading founder and evangelist of the movement" or "Prior to Wimber's involvement, the Vineyard Movement was primarily a group of bible studies that met at multiple homes in Los Angeles" is only pov if not cited... where's your proof? in addition, your edit was also sloppy, as "Bible" should always be capitalized.


 * note that the church's web site says only that wimber was "a" founding member, not "the" founding member as you claim... so if you have a source that says he was "the" founding member, let's see it


 * the church's web site states that the vineyard was started by the gulliksens... not wimber... i suppose that would be a source for someone other than norman starting the church, but it predates wimber by several years, and is a source that wimber was not "the" founding leader


 * i have just emailed several sources (larry norman, the chruch, others) to see if i can find out the "real" story and i'll keep you posted... i think the story goes like this: bible study started at larry norman's house, which grew to other bible studies... in 1974 gulliksen left calvary chapel and started a church that drew from these bible studies and named it vineyard; this grew into a "small group" of vineyard churches (according to vineyard web site) by 1982 when wimber left calvary chapel and joined up with gulliksen. [Unsigned comment by User:71.156.166.51 22:10, 25 June 2007]


 * At the risk of sounding rude... do you see that little 1 at the end of the sentence stating that John Wimber is considered a founding leader of the Vineyard Movement? That's a citation.  It points to the official Vineyard history on their website, which is considered a reliable source since it's not an individual page and is the official website of the entity being written about.  As for the word "a" instead of "the"... you're probably right. I'll also gladly remove the sentence about the Vineyard primarily existing as home churches or home bible studies, since I added it in deference to your previous edits, and it's an observation that probably falls under the no original research rule. As for the bible/Bible thing... I'm not going to argue English grammar with you and whether "bible study" is a proper noun or not.


 * no such citation existed at the end of that sentence when i made my edits and pointed out that it was unsourced--you added it in afterwards so that you could make a personal attack by implying that i'm stupid... shame on you, and yes, it is rude. the fact is that I was the first one to source that material [Unsigned comment added by User:71.156.166.51 18:05, 28 June 2007]


 * no need to argue - the word "Bible", when referring to the christian holy book, is always capitalized - look it up wiktionary.org [Unsigned comment added by User:71.156.166.51 17:39, 28 June 2007]


 * Really, it seems to me like you're trying to nit-pick me simply because I critized your edits that, like so many others, seems to hint at this "vast conspiracy" within the Vineyard to "wipe out" all of its "real history." Of course, you have no verifiable, reliable citations to provide in support of this, so you just get mad when someone asks for it. Don't get upset and petty and try to tell me I should capitalize things... find reliable, verifiable sources of information and reference them appropriately in the article.  That's what building an encyclopedia is about. Wikipedia is not an online rumor mill or conspiracy theory outpost... it's an encyclopedia. --Jhortman 15:04, 28 June 2007 (UTC)


 * nitpick? you just made the 3 changes i suggested, so i guess you thought they were valid suggestions, not nitpicks...nitpicking would be me telling you that nitpick is not a hyphenated word [Unsigned comment added by User:71.156.166.51 02:04, 30 June 2007]


 * i did source my content--you just didn't like the source [Unsigned comment added by User:71.156.166.51 17:39, 28 June 2007]

Got an email from Larry Norman
he said that he started the church in 1974 and that kenn gulliksen took it over in 1977 when larry was on his world tour--and wrote larry out of the church history. when wimber took control in 1982, he wrote gulliksen out. --71.156.166.51 00:00, 28 June 2007 (UTC)

and it's interesting -- vineyard is celebrating their 25th anniversary this year, which means they consider the church to have started in 1982, when wimber took over... everything before that has been written out [Unsigned comment by User:71.156.166.51 00:03, 28 June 2007]


 * I'm going to assume that you're the same editor as 71.155.212.206, since this appears to be a reply to the previous section. Once again, with the "vast conspiracy theory"... wonderful. This is great and all, but it is also original research, which is not a reliable, verifiable source of information for Wikipedia.  Please check out the page that describes what Wikipedia is not. I'm not a "member of the conspiracy"... I don't care who started what, when, how it worked out, and who's trying to rub whom out of history. I just want the Wikipedia rules to be upheld, and for this to be as high-quality an encyclopedic article as possible. There's certainly a lot of room for improvement, and if you can find the proper sources to support your claim, then more power to you.  Until then, please don't bring the religious crusade with you.


 * i have never suggested a vast conspiracy; i have only tried to include information on the church that pre-dates 1982... i believe your accusation is demeaning and a personal attack [Unsigned comment added by User:71.156.166.51 17:48, 28 June 2007]


 * again, i sourced the information i put in the article--you simply did not like the source. but, as you're bringing up my comments on this discussion page, are saying that original research was not allowed on a discussion page?  i think you'd be wrong about that [Unsigned comment added by User:71.156.166.51 21:33, 29 June 2007]


 * I don't care who started the church, either; i was trying to get it right by including information about the church prior to 1982... i know nothing of any vast conspiracy; by definition a conspiracy requires more than one person and a vast conspiracy would imply many... regarding this i have no idea what you are talking about and wonder if you're just making it up [Unsigned comment added by User:71.156.166.51 21:33, 29 June 2007]


 * again, my edits were source;you just didn't like the source [Unsigned comment added by User:71.156.166.51 21:33, 29 June 2007]


 * again with the personal attack in violation of wiki policy; what's next, you're going to call me a nazi? you should be ashamed and refrain from such conduct [Unsigned comment added by User:71.156.166.51 21:33, 29 June 2007]


 * Forgive me if this is trite and rude, but please try to understand the Wikipedia rules when editing. And by the way... good faith does not mean that you're right and that your edits are automatically valid.  It means that everyone assumes you're trying to improve the article in good faith.  If your edits don't follow the rules (especially for edits that are controversial, such as these), they aren't automatically granted privileged status because they're "good faith." They have to conform to the Wikipedia policy guidelines. --Jhortman 15:28, 28 June 2007 (UTC)


 * i will not [Unsigned comment added by User:71.156.166.51 17:48, 28 June 2007]


 * A simple viewing of the Lonnie Frisbee video, and an understanding of Wimber's involvement with Calvary Chapel would put this discussion to rest. --Walter Görlitz (talk) 23:56, 18 March 2010 (UTC)
 * Your statement might be true, and I never disputed the claims made by the IP poster regarding Larry Norman. In fact, when does their own research on the facts (as you state), his claims regarding Larry Norman seem to be reasonable and believable. Wikipedia has a strict policy regarding original research, however.  Any claims added to an article must be backed by reliable, verifiable sources.  The previous IP poster never provided this information. If reliable, verifiable sources can be found to support these claims, I would not contest their addition to the Vineyard article.  They're not my rules... they're Wikipedia's rules.  Jhortman (talk) 00:36, 28 March 2010 (UTC)

Focus on Worship
I notice that another user changed the wording of this section to de-emphasize the role that worship plays in the typical Vineyard service. While I would accept that strictly equal amounts of time are not devoted to both worship and Bible study in every single Vineyard, it is definitely the normal mode of operation. In the Vineyard Genetic Code document on the Vineyard website, "Contemporary worship in the freedom of the Holy spirit" is listed as the second item on the list, behind "Clear, accurate Biblical teaching." In addition, I haven't seen any official document from the Vineyard that indicates that worship time is supposed to be a "lead-in" to one-on-one ministry time, which would imply that worship is of lesser importance than prayer and ministry time. The statement made would also seem to imply that prayer and ministry time is the most important part of the service, including more important than the Bible study/Biblical teaching time, which is certainly not the case, according to the official Vineyard documents.

Don't get me wrong... I'm not suggesting that Prayer and one-on-one ministry are of lesser importance than worship or Bible study/teaching time to the Vineyard... all of the documentation I've seen thus far seems to indicate that all of these things are supposed to be of equal importance.

I think that the change made was a bit misleading as to the purpose of Vineyard services and how most Vineyard churches run their programs, so I reverted the change. I would accept that the current statement might also not be the most correct way to word it, either, though... if anyone has additional suggestions as to how to improve the article, they are welcomed. --Jhortman 18:48, 24 September 2007 (UTC)


 * I am very glad to add to this info on the Vineyard. I attended a bible study that started at Chuck Girard's home and is where I personally witnessed the beginning of the Vineyard. It grew from there to the Beverly Hills womans club, then to a gymnasium behind a Nazerene Church, after we outgrew the gym we met on the beach in Santa Monica for 1 year, from there we moved to a large Church building in Encino,Ca. At that point was when we started small home groups which eventually became Vineyard churches and so there it is. Chuck Girard can also verify this(www.chuck.org) I hope this may help some people to know the true facts of all this. God Bless--jim [Unsigned comment added by User:Jamesco59 07:11, 18 November 2008]

Clergy
Clergy ... almost never wear ceremonial vestments. Are there any verifiable instances of Vineyard pastors wearing any sort of clerical dress? I'll eat my hat if there are! I'd suggest the word almost should be deleted. Sidefall (talk) 08:43, 8 May 2008 (UTC)


 * Done it. Hyper3 (talk) 13:21, 30 December 2008 (UTC)

Related books
On what basis should these be added? I think we should be conservative in creating a list of books that might give a good introduction to the Vineyard as a movement, rather than listing all possible books by Vineyard authors on any subject. Hyper3 (talk) 11:58, 30 December 2008 (UTC)

Famous...
I think we should restrict the famous members section to people known well throughout the Vineyard and beyond, for whatever reason. Hyper3 (talk) 11:59, 30 December 2008 (UTC)


 * I think the standard should be, that they have their own page on wikipedia to justify notability... Hyper3 (talk) 12:20, 30 December 2008 (UTC)

Distinctive practices
I think there should be a section outlining how the Vineyard approach to church life is different for others. What practices might be mentioned in this context? Hyper3 (talk) 13:23, 30 December 2008 (UTC)

Organisation
The organisation section is very US-centric, and gives information of marginal value that could be looked up on the main website. This needs improving, with a better description of how the Vineyard operate around the world.Hyper3 (talk) 14:08, 30 December 2008 (UTC)


 * we go to church at a vineyard nearby and would like to thank the authors of this article for their work on this topic it is a topic near and dear to my heart my place of employment had no idea there every was a vineyard movement now i can tell tnem were to go to get a good write up on this topic —Preceding unsigned comment added by 205.200.78.195 (talk) 13:05, 10 April 2009 (UTC)