Starting with 11 AM worship on Sunday, October 10, celebrate God’s historic work at FPCH in what became the Jesus People Movement and the beginnings of a new genre, contemporary Christian music, as The Salt Company reunites and joins our current worship band. Guest Pastor Tim McCalmont, who directed The Salt Company’s coffeehouse and music ministry for a time, will preach. (His wife Ruth is the daughter of former FPCH Senior Pastor Ray Lindquist!) Our new interim pastor, Dr. Dave Watson, attended The Salt Company as a teen, and will host. After the service, stay for a ribbon-cutting and musical “passing of the torch” to re-dedicate The Library as FPCH’s new coffeehouse, performance space and reading room, off the Rose Garden patio, in a continuation of our church’s call to be salt and light in Hollywood. No reservations needed. Free to all.
The Jesus Movement began at FPCH, according to scholarly research being presented at Biola University and Talbot School of Theology, when in October 1967, our College Department Pastor Don Williams and singer-songwriter Bob Marlowe staged “The Gospel According to Bob Dylan” in the sanctuary, and more than 3,000 people came. Marlowe sang popular Dylan songs, and Williams preached about their spiritual meaning.
In 1968, FPCH opened the first Christian coffeehouse, called The Salt Company, on the corner of Gower St. and Yucca (where the grassy area is now). The Salt Company band, along with performers including Larry Norman, Dennis Agajanian and Randy Stonehill, started performing folk and rock “Jesus music” at the coffeehouse, and pioneering “beach evangelism” in the summers of 1968 and ’69. Rare footage and interviews can be seen in the award-winning documentary “Salt & Light” by FPCH Elder Rob Loos (available via Amazon Prime, and screening at the Biola conference). Loos led efforts for this current reunion and Hollywood Pres homecoming.
By 1972, The Salt Company sponsored a Christmas and Easter “March for Jesus” where thousands of believers marched through the streets of Los Angeles carrying signs and messages of love, hope and forgiveness. National news and magazines picked up the stories, and similar gospel events sprang up nationwide. Their symbol also originated at FPCH, a “One Way” graphic of a hand pointing upward designed by then-Salt Company Director Lance Bowen (with some suggestions from his Mom, an FPCH church secretary).
Countless One Way posters, T-shirts and buttons found distribution throughout the world. All these pieces of FPCH history are now being featured at Biola and Talbot School of Theology’s first academic study of the Jesus Movement, called ABLAZE, October 7-9. The Salt Company and other influential Christian artists Dennis Agajanian, Honeytree, Second Chapter of Acts and Love Song will perform at the biggest “Jesus People” concert in years, on Friday, October 8, at 7:30 PM. Tickets available at https://www.biola.edu/jesus-people-concert
