At the end of July, Harvest Christian Fellowship held its second annual “Jesus Revolution” baptism event at Pirate’s Cove Beach in Corona Del Mar, California, according to The Christian Post.
About 2,000 people were baptized into Christianity in the waters of the Pacific Ocean, the article said.
The baptism event followed the 2024 Harvest Crusade. Led by the Rev. Greg Laurie, the Harvest Crusade was attended by 50,000 people in person, and around 200,000 more online.
Here’s what you should know about the Rev. Laurie, who was the inspiration behind the 2023 movie, “Jesus Revolution.”
What is the ‘Jesus Revolution’?
“Jesus Revolution” has multiple meanings: It refers to the baptism event, as well as the “Jesus people” movement in Southern California in the 1970s.
The movie of the same name chronicled the Rev. Laurie’s work with hippie believers in 1970s, as the Deseret News previously reported.
The Rev. Laurie was a prominent evangelical Christian pastor even before part of his life story inspired a major movie. He leads a megachurch in California, Harvest Christian Fellowship.
The Rev. Laurie has authored multiple books on religion, helped edit the New Believer’s Bible — which was distributed to each convert at this year’s baptism, per The Christian Post — and worked with several movies, including “Jesus Revolution,” which details his own spiritual odyssey.
Laurie’s work has led to thousands of baptisms in California and beyond. Last year’s Jesus Revolution baptist event baptized 4,500.
Pirate’s Cove Beach is the same place where the Rev. Laurie himself experienced a spiritual awakening, per The Christian Post. He shared that it was at that beach that the Holy Spirit asked him to “preach the Gospel.”
“And so, I found myself preaching to these people up on the rocks,” he told The Christian Post. “And the Lord was sort of giving me a glimpse into the future of what I was going to end up doing.”
An evangelical movement spanning California
This year’s Jesus Revolution baptism event follows another major baptism even in California called Baptize California.
That event led to 6,000 people being baptized in the waters off Huntington Beach, with another 6,000 baptized in churches throughout the state, according to CBN.
“It was a lot of people — so many cool stories,” said the Rev. Mark Francey, who orchestrated Baptize California.
Churches from a variety of Christian denominations participated in the event, CBN reported.
“It’s an inter-denominational effort. It’s really a Great Commission mandate that’s allowing everybody, enough room in our doctrine to go, ‘Look we might not see eye to eye on every single tenet of our faith, but we all do agree that Jesus told us to go into all the world, make disciples of all nations baptizing them,’” said the Rev. Francey.