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Published online by Cambridge University Press: 05 May 2025
The charismatic renewal in the early 1960s was a significant development in global Christianity, creating theological and pastoral debates and disagreements with both local and international dimensions. This article sets the controversy between the leading Anglicans John Stott and Michael Harper within the wider cultural context that impacted the initial rise of the charismatic movement, and its subsequent growing global acceptance. The Stott-Harper debates contributed notably to the long-term domestication of the charismatic movement within an established Church, keeping most charismatic Anglicans within the Evangelical tradition. Conservative Evangelicals were enabled to adjust constructively to the growing ‘charismatisation’ of global Evangelicalism.
Particular thanks are due to David MacInnes, John Maiden, Andrew Atherstone, Ian Randall and Richard Turnbull for their comments and help in accessing a number of the sources used in this article.
1 B. Stanley, Global diffusion of Evangelicalism: the age of Billy Graham and John Stott, Leicester 2013, 181; D. Bebbington, Evangelicalism in modern Britain, London 1989, 229.
2 The label ‘charismatic’ was first attached to the movement in the United States in 1962: P. Hocken, Streams of renewal: the origins and early development of the charismatic movement in Great Britain, Exeter 1986, 184.
3 H. McLeod, The religious crisis of the 1960s, Oxford 2007, 82.
4 Ibid. 67–8.
5 See K. Ward, Losing our religion? Changing patterns of believing and belonging in secular Western societies, Eugene, Or 2013, 9, and C. Brown, Religion and the demographic revolution: women and secularization in Canada, Ireland, UK and USA since the 1960s, Woodbridge 2012, esp. ch. iii. The reasons for this decline are debated in C. Brown, The death of Christian Britain: understanding secularisation, 1800–2000, London 2001.
6 Brown, Death, 188.
7 McLeod, Crisis, 61–6.
8 Ibid. 73.
9 Ibid. 69.
10 Ibid. 1–5, 81.
11 A. F. Walls, The missionary movement in Christian history: studies in the transmission of faith, New York 1996, 27.
12 Bebbington, Evangelicalism, 248.
13 M. Harper, As at the beginning, London 1965, repr. 1966, 84.
14 D. Bebbington, ‘Epilogue: charismatics, Pentecostals, and contemporary culture’, in A. Atherstone, J. Maiden and M. P. Hutchinson (eds), Transatlantic charismatic renewal, c.1950–2000, Leiden 2021, 240–4. There are significant debates about areas of continuity and also differences between Pentecostalism and the charismatic movement.
15 Bebbington, Evangelicalism, 233.
16 Ibid. 246.
17 McLeod, Crisis, 72, 139.
18 M. Smith, ‘Evangelical parish ministry in the twentieth century’, in A. Atherstone and J. Maiden (eds), Evangelicalism and the Church of England in the twentieth century: reform, resistance and renewal, Woodbridge 2014, 206–26.
19 Billy Graham in ‘The Time 100’, Time Magazine, 18 Apr. 2005. This listed Stott as among the one hundred most influential people in the world.
20 E. Thomas, ‘Directors corners’, Sharing of Ministries Abroad USA x/1 (1995), 1, quoted in A. Atherstone and J. Maiden, ‘Anglican Evangelicalism in the twentieth century: identities and contexts’, in Atherstone and Maiden, Evangelicalism and the Church of England, 45.
21 T. Dudley-Smith, John Stott: the making of a leader: the early years, Downers Grove, Il 1999, 273. This refers to comments from John Collins, an All Souls curate for six years.
22 See idem, John Stott: a global ministry: the later years, Downers Grove, Il 2001, 27–9.
23 Harper, Beginning, 96.
24 J. Stott, The message of Acts, Downers Grove, Il 1990, 60.
25 A. Chapman, Godly ambition: John Stott and the Evangelical movement, Oxford 2011, 72.
26 J. Stott, ‘Rekindling the inner fire’, All Souls (Jan. 1960), 13–14.
27 Idem, handwritten notes, 19 Oct 1962, John Stott papers, Lambeth Palace Library, London (hereinafter cited as LPL), on Pentecostalism 1962–95, 5/22, fos 231–3. Stott's notes correspond closely with the account of Michael Harper's experience given in Jeanne Harper, Visited by God: the story of Michael Harper's 48 year long ministry, Cambridge 2013, 6, and R. Low, ‘An interview with Michael Harper’, New Directions (Oct. 1966), in Dudley-Smith, Later years, 21.
28 Stott, handwritten notes, 19 Oct. 1962, Stott papers, 5/22.
29 Dudley-Smith, Later years, 22, 3.
30 J. Harper, Visited by God, 6–7.
31 J. Maiden, Age of spirit: charismatic renewal, the Anglo world, and global Christianity, 1945–1980, Oxford 2023, 50–2. See also D. J. Bennett, Nine o'clock in the morning, Plainfield, NJ 1970.
32 Stanley, Global diffusion, 188.
33 P. E. Hughes, ‘Editorial’, Churchman lxxvi/3 (1962), 113–35; Dudley-Smith, Later years, 37. See also A. Atherstone, D. C. Jones and W. K. Kay, ‘Lloyd-Jones and the charismatic controversy’, in A. Atherstone and D. C. Jones, Engaging with Martyn-Lloyd Jones: the life and legacy of ‘The Doctor’, Nottingham 2011, 115.
34 I. Murray, Martyn Lloyd-Jones: the fight of faith, 1939–81, Edinburgh 1990, 475, 477.
35 D. Watson, You are my God, London 1983, 56.
36 Dudley-Smith, Later years, 22. This is based on a taped interview with Harper on 27 July 1994. Iain Murray relies on Watson's account in his biography of Lloyd-Jones: Lloyd-Jones, ii. 477. See also I. M. Randall, ‘Lloyd-Jones and revival’, in Atherstone and Jones, Martyn Lloyd-Jones, 91–113.
37 Harper, Beginning.
38 From handwritten notes taken by the Revd David MacInnes on 9 April 1963, during the meeting, and shared with the author in correspondence, 5, 27 Oct. 2016.
39 Ibid.
40 Murray, Lloyd-Jones, ii. 487.
41 Hocken, Streams, 10, 11, 14.
42 Watson, You are my God, 54.
43 Ibid. 74–106.
44 Stanley, World, 192.
45 Harper, Beginning. The book is replete with references to Evangelicals such as John Wesley, Charles Finney and D. L. Moody.
46 Ibid. 20–2.
47 M. Harper, ‘Editorial: ministry of encouragement’, Renewal xix (Feb.–Mar. 1969), 2–3, quoted in Maiden, Age of the Spirit, 102.
48 P. E. Hughes to I. Murray, in Murray, Lloyd-Jones, ii. 478.
49 Ibid. ii. 491–2; David G. Lillie, of Devon, to M. Harper, 23 Aug. 1964, ibid; Murray, Lloyd-Jones, ii. 483.
50 Ibid. ii. 492. After this charismatic foothold was created in London in 1963, a steady stream of American literature and personnel expanded and consolidated the movement: Hocken, Streams, 115–27.
51 See D. W. Bebbington, Holiness in nineteenth-century England, Carlisle 2000, 81; J. Kent, Holding the fort: studies in Victorian revivalism, London 1978, 78.
52 S. Barabas, So great salvation: the history and message of the Keswick Convention, London 1952; C. W. Price and I. M. Randall, Transforming Keswick: the Keswick convention past, present and future, Carlisle 2000, 105–26; O. C. Karmawan, ‘The impact of the Keswick and Cambridge holiness movement on British Protestant missions in Asia (1881–1906)’, unpubl. PhD diss, Edinburgh 2020.
53 T. Saunders and H. Samson, David Watson: a biography, London 1992, 71–2.
54 J. R. Ziefle, ‘Missionary of the Holy Spirit: David du Plessis and the historic denominations’, in Atherstone, Maiden and Hutchinson, Charismatic renewal, 27. On du Plessis see also J. R. Ziefle, David du Plessis and the Assemblies of God: the struggle for the soul of a movement, Leiden 2013.
55 Murray, Lloyd-Jones, ii. 479–82.
56 On du Plessis see Ziefle, ‘Missionary of the Holy Spirit’, 19–36.
57 Murray quotes extensively from Lloyd-Jones's annual address to the Evangelical Library, 5 Dec. 1963: Lloyd-Jones, ii. 469–83.
58 Dudley-Smith, Later years, 37.
59 Ibid. 23.
60 R. Low, ‘An interview with Michael Harper’, New Directions (Oct. 1966), quoted ibid. 21.
61 Dudley-Smith interview with Harper, 27 July 1994, ibid.
62 Harper, quoted ibid. 23.
63 Dudley-Smith taped interview with Stott, 9 Sept. 1992, and letter, 24 Oct. 1994, ibid. 22.
64 Harper, Beginning, 98, 107.
65 D. Pytches, Living at the edge: the autobiography of David Pytches, Bath 2002, 145. In 1977 Pytches became vicar of St Andrews, Chorleywood, Herts, which was to be another ‘model’ charismatic Anglican parish, especially after the visit of John Wimber and his ministry team in 1981.
66 J. Stott to Edward Doring, 29 Oct. 1995, quoted in Dudley-Smith, Later years, 38.
67 Harper, Visited by God, 8; Dudley-Smith, Later years, 36–7.
68 In his December 1963 address to the annual meeting of the Evangelical Library, Lloyd-Jones used the unusual phrase ‘the recrudescence, if you like, of interest in the gifts of the Holy Spirit’: Murray, Lloyd-Jones, ii. 480.
69 J. Stott, The baptism and fullness of the Holy Spirit, London 1964, 4, 5, 6, 7, 13, 19, 35.
70 Stott to Harper, ‘Bank Holiday’, Aug. 1964, Michael Harper papers, LPL, correspondence for 1964, letters ff5, items 1, 2, pp. 1, 2.
71 Harper to Stott, 9 Aug. 1964, Stott papers, on Pentecostalism, 5/22, fo. 220.
72 Stott to Harper, 14 Aug. 1964, Harper papers, correspondence for 1964, 1964/46: Letters, Stott, ff5; Stott to Harper, Aug. 1964, Stott papers, on Pentecostalism, 5/22, fo. 219, item 3.
73 Harper to Stott, 21 Aug. 1964, Stott papers, on Pentecostalism, 1962–95, 5/22, fo. 217.
74 Stott to Harper, 28 Aug. 1964, Harper papers, correspondence for 1964, 1964/46, item 4.
75 Harper to Stott, 7 Sept. 1964, Stott papers, on Pentecostalism, 1962–95, 5/22, fo. 215.
76 For example, Oliver Barclay to Harper, 14 Oct. 1964, ibid. fo. 212.
77 Harper to Barclay (copy), 21 Oct. 1964, ibid. fo. 207. Harper acknowledged there had been some division in one Christian union, and wrote that ‘The admirable spirit of John Stott's booklet which urges Christians not to condemn others who have had “experiences” seems the right approach where we are frankly puzzled.’ But, he believed that denying the exercise of the gifts completely would only encourage ‘fanatical elements which spoil all God's gifts’.
78 Barclay to Harper (copy), 4 Dec. 1964, Stott papers, on Pentecostalism, 1962–95, 5/22.
79 Stephen Crisp (Committee of the London Intervarsity Christian Union), 25 Nov. 1964, and Stott's reply, 4 Dec. 1964, ibid. fo. 200.
80 S. Baldock to Stott, 28 Apr. 1965, ibid. fo. 197. On the impact of the charismatic movement at Cambridge see I. M. Randall, ‘Charismatic renewal in Cambridge from the 1960s to the 1980s’, in Atherstone, Maiden and Hutchinson, Charismatic renewal, 123–43.
81 Saunders and Sansom, Watson, 66, 75. The vicar of the Round Church, Mark Ruston, had urged his curate to keep the experience as a private matter.
82 Collins to Harper, 7 Feb. 1963, Harper papers, 1963/4, 7.
83 Stott to Baldock, 12 May 1965, Stott papers, on Pentecostalism, 1962–95, 5/22, 1965.
84 J. Stott, One people: clergy and laity in God's Church, London 1969, 46.
85 Nottingham statement of NEAC, 35.
86 Harper to Stott, 14 Oct. 1964, Stott papers, on Pentecostalism, 1962–95, 5/22, fo. 211.
87 Personal correspondence from David MacInnes to the author, 27 Oct. 2016. MacInnes remembered Dick Lucas at St Helen's being willing for him to teach and preach on the fullness of the Spirit, but preferred him only to speak of the gift of tongues in one-to-one pastoral work. Lucas later became more opposed to the movement.
88 Harper, Visited, 8. On the Fountain Trust see M. Harper, Power for the body of Christ, London 1969.
89 Maiden, Age of Spirit, 98–105.
90 Bebbington, Evangelicalism, 230.
91 Harper, Power, 36–7.
92 Idem, Beginning, 120. On the characteristics of Evangelicalism see Bebbington, Evangelicalism, 5–17.
93 Harper, Beginning, 125.
94 Bebbington, Evangelicalism, 249.
95 Stott to Harper (handwritten), 21 Dec. 1967, Harper papers, correspondence for 1968, 1968/32.
96 On this incident see Bebbington, Evangelicalism, 267; Murray, Lloyd-Jones, ii. 522–8; and Dudley-Smith, Later years, 65–71.
97 M. Harper, None can guess, London, 1975, 121.
98 H. Y. Au, ‘Grassroots unity and the Fountain Trust International Conferences: a study of ecumenism in the charismatic renewal’, unpubl. PhD diss. Birmingham 2008, 63.
99 Maiden, Age of Spirit, 172.
100 Ibid. 177.
101 See M. Harper, editorial: ‘A narrowing of the divide’, Renewal lx (Feb.–Mar. 1975), 3.
102 On Stott's understanding of Evangelicalism see J. Stott, Evangelical truth, Leicester 1999. The role of the Holy Spirit is discussed at pp. 97–128.
103 I. M. Randall, ‘John R. W. Stott’, in T. A. Noble and J. S. Sexton (eds), British Evangelical theologians of the twentieth century, London 2022, 155–75. This dialogue was subsequently published as B. Meeking and J. Stott (eds), The Evangelical-Roman Catholic dialogue on mission, 1977–1984: a report, Grand Rapids, Mi 1986.
104 Dudley-Smith, Later years, 180, 188; Stanley, Global diffusion, 24.
105 Quoted in W. S. Mooneyham, ‘Acts of the Holy Spirit ’74’, in J. D. Douglas (ed.), Let the earth hear his voice: International Congress on World Evangelization, Lausanne, Switzerland, Minneapolis, Mn 1975, 445.
106 ‘The power of the Holy Spirit’, section 14, the Lausanne Covenant, in Douglas, Let the earth hear, 8.
107 ‘Co-operation in evangelism’, section 7, ibid. 5.
108 Bebbington, Evangelicalism, 231.
109 Hocken, Streams, 144; Maiden, Age of Spirit, 100–2.
110 J. Ward, ‘Pentecostal theology and the charismatic movement’, in D. Martin and P. Mullen (eds), Strange gifts? A guide to charismatic renewal, Oxford 1984, 192–207.
111 Stott to Harper, 20 Nov. 1974, Harper papers, correspondence for 1974, 1974/68.
112 J. Stott, ‘The maturity of love’: part of Stott's address published in The Church of England Newspaper, 13 Dec. 1974.
113 Idem, Baptism and fullness: the work of the Holy Spirit today, London 1975, Downers Grove, Il 1976 (quotations are from the 1976 edition). For Stott's explanations for the revisions see Dudley-Smith, Later years, 40.
114 Stott, Baptism and fullness, 9–10, 11, 21, 25.
115 See J. Maiden, ‘Evangelical and Anglo-Catholic relations, 1928–1983’, in Atherstone and Maiden, Evangelicalism and Church of England, 136–61 at p. 157.
116 Personal recollections of David MacInnes and John Collins shared in correspondence with the author, 5 Oct. 2016.
117 Church of England Evangelical Council and the Fountain Trust, Gospel and Spirit: a joint statement prepared and agreed by a group nominated by the Fountain Trust and the Church of Evangelical Council, Esher 1977, Stott papers, 3/8/7.
118 ‘Evangelical/Charismatic Dialogue’, press statement, March 1976, Stott papers, on Pentecostalism, 1962–95, collection of documents about the charismatic movement, 5/22/2.
119 Gospel and Spirit, 4; J. Stott, ‘Evangelical/charismatic dialogue’: notes for suggested revision to agreed statement, 23 Nov. 1976, Stott papers, on Pentecostalism, 1962–95, 5/22/5.
120 Gospel and Spirit, 5.
121 Dudley-Smith, Later years, ii. 155.
122 Taped interview with Harper, 27 July 1994, ibid.
123 Ibid. ii. 156.
124 J. Gunstone, Pentecostal Anglicans, London 1982, 84.
125 M. Harper, ‘Waving goodbye to charismatic divide’, Church of England Newspaper, 20 May 1977, 11.
126 Idem, None can guess, 8.
127 Ibid. 143.
128 Ziefle, ‘Missionary’, 36.
129 For debates from the period see C. Craston, Biblical headship and the ordination of women, Nottingham 1986; D. Spanner, ‘Men, women and God’, in Melvin Tinker, The Anglican Evangelical crisis, Fearn 1995, 72–93; and J. Martin, Gospel people: Evangelicals and the future of Anglicanism, London 1997, 109–16.
130 Faith in the city: a call for action by Church and nation, London 1985. All three Evangelical bishops (David Sheppard [a significant contributor to Faith in the city], Maurice Wood and Roy Williamson), interviewed in 1986, referred positively to the duty of the Church to make social and political comment: F. Longford, The bishops: a study of leaders in the Church today, London 1986, 55–71. Stott himself published Issues facing Christians today (Basingstoke 1984), setting out a conservative Evangelical response to social and moral questions.
131 Stanley, Global diffusion, 209.
132 I. J. Shaw, ‘“Enthusiasm”, “Passion”, and religious conversion in the Scottish Enlightenment’, Journal of Religious History (2021) at <https://doi.org/10.1111/1467-9809.12740>.
133 Oliver Barclay letter, Church of England Newspaper, 2 Jan. 2009; W. Jones, Evangelical theology: past and present, Cambridge 2017, 21–4.
134 Harper, Beginning, 94.
135 I. Bunting, Evangelical Anglican way: charismatic and radical, 1967–1988 at <https://www.academia.edu/40664696/> accessed 29 April 2024, 4.
136 C. Buchanan, The charismatic movement in the Church of England, London 1981.
137 P. Herriot, Warfare and waves: Calvinists and charismatics in the Church of England, Eugene, Or 2016, 20–1.
138 Stanley, Global diffusion, 200.
139 A. Walker, ‘Thoroughly modern: sociological reflections on the charismatic movement from the end of the twentieth century’, in S. Hunt, M. Hamilton and T. Walker (eds), Charismatic Christianity: sociological perspectives, Basingstoke–London 1997, 30.
140 D. Tomlinson, The post-Evangelical, London 1995, 14–17. Tomlinson was a house church leader who became an Anglican priest.
141 B. Hopkinson, ‘The foci of identity amongst younger Evangelical Anglican clergy 1980’, unpubl. paper based on a survey of the Eclectics, Dec. 1980, questions 1, 4, 5 (no page numbers).
142 P. Brierley, The tide is running out: what the English church attendance survey reveals, London 2000, 146; <https://www.christian-research.org/reports/archives-and-statistics>; Herriot, Warfare, 4.
143 A. Village and L. J. Francis, The mind of the Anglican clergy, Lampeter 2009, 29.
144 Church Times, 25 Jan. 2002, 36. Alpha grew out of the leading charismatic Anglican Church, Holy Trinity, Brompton. See S. Hunt, ‘The Alpha program: charismatic evangelism for the contemporary age’, PNEUMA: The Journal of the Society for Pentecostal Studies xxvii/1 (2005), 65–82.
145 Village and Francis, Anglican clergy, 49–50; A. Village, The Church of England in the first decade of the 21st Century, Cham 2018, 61, 254; T. Harrison, ‘Raising the Church of England's Spirit level’, Church Times, 17 May 2013. Of ordinands interviewed between 2001 and 2007, 42% reported some form of personal charismatic experience.
146 R. Burrows, Dare to contend! A call to Anglican Evangelicals, Newcastle upon Tyne 1990, 45; Herriot, Warfare, 20.
147 Cited in R. Steer, Inside story: the life of John Stott, Nottingham 2009, 230.
148 M. Guest, Evangelical identity and contemporary culture: a congregational study in innovation, Milton Keynes 2007, 112.
149 Herriot, Warfare, 6, 20.
150 J. Stott, ‘That word “radical”’, Church of England Newspaper, 24 Feb. 1967, 7.
151 Idem, What is an Evangelical?, London 1977.
152 Stott to Eric Kemp, bishop of Chichester, 24 May 1977, Stott papers 3/8/7–12; Stott letter, 8 Apr. 1977, Stott papers, 3/8/7–1; Eric Kemp note to all members of faith house group, with a copy of Towards a renewed Church, 29 Mar. 1988, Stott papers 3/8/7, fo. 5.
153 E. W. Kemp, M. Harper and J. Stott (eds), Towards a renewed Church: a joint statement by Catholic, charismatic and Evangelical Anglicans, Nottingham 1988. See also comments from Eric Kemp on Towards a renewed Church, Stott papers 3/ 8/7– 6.
154 M. Harper, That we may be one, London 1983.
155 Randall, ‘Charismatic renewal Cambridge’, 143.
156 Bebbington, Evangelicalism, 247.
157 Stott, Baptism and fullness, 15.
158 Herriot, Warfare, 13–14.
159 Ibid. 6.
160 Village and Francis, Anglican clergy, 49–50, 159.
161 Stanley, Global diffusion, 42.