A Generation Led to Jesus: Remembering Pastor Chuck, Part 5
Many early Calvary Chapel pastors, now well-known, were radically saved early in the Jesus Revolution and beginning of the CC movement. Read about some of them in this installment of our continuing series recalling the passing of Pastor Chuck Smith, reprinted from Issue 96 (Summer 2023) of the print magazine.
Mike MacIntosh—Restored unto the Gospel
Pastor Mike MacIntosh
Mike MacIntosh’s spiritual quest led him to drugs, transcendental meditation, UFOs, and finally a mental hospital in the 1960s. One night in 1969, Mike recalled, “I was in Yucca Valley at 4 a.m. chanting my transcendental meditation mantra, waiting for an expected UFO to arrive.” Mike tried to push away the thought that his wife Sandy, expecting their second child, had taken their little daughter Mindi, and fled.
That night Mike, 24, went to a party. After badly overdosing, a .45 pistol was fired near his head, but the bullet never touched him. Mike recalled, “I thought part of my head was missing. … I felt neither dead nor alive.” Hitting rock bottom, Mike wound up at Calvary Chapel Costa Mesa, CA. When he heard the Gospel that night in April of 1970, he came forward to give his life to Jesus.
At a Jesus People Reunion, Pastor Chuck Smith recalled, “We wondered, Can Mike ever be normal?” One Saturday night at an elder’s prayer meeting, the men laid hands on Mike and prayed for healing. “Oh, what a joy it was to see the power of the Holy Spirit changing his life! To see someone who had been written off as hopeless—but with Jesus Christ, no one is hopeless. No one is out of reach.” Mike remembered feeling the divine love of God surround him as the men prayed.
Within months of his conversion, 26-year-old Mike moved into one of Calvary Chapel’s Christian homes, devouring the Bible teaching. “He was becoming a gifted leader and teacher, as he assumed more and more responsibilities over the house ministry,” Chuck said in the book Harvest.
Later, Chuck remarried Mike and Sandy with their little daughter Mindi serving as flower girl. Chuck said, “The tears of joy flowed freely, for we knew that God’s restoration was complete.” Mike became director of Maranatha! Music, often traveling with the bands. Mike would share the Gospel with thousands, sensing that was his calling. In 1975, a group of college students in San Diego asked Chuck to send someone to start a church; he sent Mike. Over the years, Horizon Christian Fellowship grew to over 5,000, complete with a school for children and a School of Evangelism for adults. Mike has traveled the world speaking at crusades and with national leaders about Jesus Christ.
Jeff Johnson—A Mind for Missions
Pastor Jeff Johnson
In 1968, Jeff Johnson set off for Hawaii to pursue psychic powers, and he seemingly found them—but it almost cost him his life and his sanity. After a near-death experience with LSD in a jungle in Oahu, the darkness that accompanied it terrified him. “Little did I know that God had His hand on me, protecting me through this deadly episode.” Disillusioned and burned out from drugs, he came back to California to clean up his life and pursue the “American Dream.”
He got a job, a house, and a wife. But the drugs resurfaced like a bad dream. One night, Jeff’s drug dealer stopped by with an invitation—to Calvary Chapel, where he had given his life to Jesus three days earlier. He told Jeff that Jesus set him free. “So, I grabbed my wife and little baby—I was loaded out of my mind—and he brought me around the corner to a little church,” Jeff recalled. “I got saved that night, and I went home and flushed all my drugs.”
Jeff devoured God’s Word and wanted to share it. He started a Bible study under a gazebo at a park in Downey, CA, that grew into CC Downey. That sprawling church now has three schools for K-12. Pastor Chuck was a tremendous source of counsel and encouragement in Jeff’s new role as a pastor. During a pastors’ conference in the 1980s, Jeff and his wife were quarrelling in their room. “Chuck brought Kay into our room, and they talked with us and calmed it all down,” Jeff shared. “They loved us so much and were very concerned for us.” Jeff said he has learned, from Chuck’s words and example, that “grace changes everything.” After 50 years of ministry, Pastor Jeff recently transitioned the church leadership to Pastor Art Reyes.
Don McClure—Shaping the Next Generation
Pastor Don McClure
Don McClure recalled the first time he met Chuck Smith after his sister, who attended CC Costa Mesa, insisted he come with her one Sunday. That brief encounter with Chuck impacted Don tremendously.
“Chuck says to me in a friendly tone of voice—like he knew me or something: ‘Hi, Don. How are you?’ I looked at him and said, ‘I don’t think we have met before.’ He replied, ‘No, … but there are some kids I met that come down from San Fernando Valley to our concerts. I talked to them, and they said they go to a Bible study taught by a fella named Don McClure.’”
Returning to hear Chuck preach the following Thursday night, Don was invited on stage to share what was on his mind. Stunned, he thought Chuck meant another Don McClure. “I don’t recollect what I even said!” he marveled. “Chuck was the biggest risk-taker with human beings I ever observed. He recognized the sovereignty of God and His hand on a man, so he invested in them.”
Don had come to faith in Christ in his late teens, becoming quite zealous for the Lord in his junior year at Cal Poly in Pomona, CA. British evangelist and pastor Alan Redpath invited Don and his wife Jean to England to study the Bible. His desire to learn the Bible in a structured setting was imperative to where he felt God was leading him. Returning to the U.S., he enrolled in Talbot Seminary in preparation to enter the ministry.
At Talbot, Don taught a Bible study for youth in a house ministry in San Fernando Valley. He described them as “hippie, youthy types, hungry for the Bible.” Unknown to Don, some of these youth had attended concerts going on at Calvary Chapel in Costa Mesa and heard Pastor Chuck Smith teach.
Don began teaching Bible studies at Calvary Chapel; the more he was there, the less interest he had in pursuing that degree. It wasn’t long before he joined the church staff. When Chuck asked him to pray about what God wanted him to do there, the Lord impressed on his heart to start a Bible college. “We have all these people coming to Christ; we have to equip them. I love schools, training, and equipping. Chuck told me, ‘Well, we need one, so go do it.’ He turned me loose with it. He did that with people. He knew the Lord gives the vision and would let us go figure it out.”
Don established Calvary Chapel Bible College at CC Costa Mesa—it now has 16 affiliates around the world. Don praises God for the growth He has given to CC since that outpouring of the Holy Spirit and Chuck’s obedience to the expository teaching of the Word of God.
Don and his wife Jean now run the teaching ministry, Calvary Way, which proclaims the fullness of God’s Word across the world. He is also the administrator of the Calvary Chapel Association.
Look for our next installment, where we share more stories of well-known Calvary Chapel pastors coming to faith in Jesus and beginning their individual ministries. Read Parts 1, 2, 3, 4, here.
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