The Nineteen Sixties was a time of major upheaval. A generation stepped into the sexual revolution and drug culture to create a era of rebellion well documented in Romans Chapter One. The hippy movement took hold of the United States, as “free lov’in” and “love & peace,” became the catch phrases. In between the protests of the Vietnam War, the “love children” experimented with every kind of narcotic and sexual orgy that would make the ancient Greeks and opium eaters blush. The rebellion of the Hippies was against all institutions and traditions, with even books speaking blasphemies against the Bible and Our Lord Jesus Christ. In addition and more effective than their literature, the Hippies had their minstrels, The Beatles, Led Zeppelin, The Doors, The Who, Credence Clearwater Revival, and many more. These bands would give the voice to the Flower Children and leave a mark that can be felt today.
The “Peace” and “Love” movement caste doubt on all life, leading people into psychedelic mind trips with drugs and sexual escapades. Marriage and every convention of traditional life was considered the enemy, as the armies of the “Peace & Love” sought a higher enlightenment. In addition to importing hallucinogens, the hippy brought eastern religions to the US, in particular the teachings of Buddha, New Age, Egyptian witchcraft, and Occultism, in fact America had its first official Satanism via Anton LaVey who wrote the anti-Bible. The entire period was rebellion, rebellion to all authority even God, so the devil became a perfect mascot. In fact, the peace sign is an upside down cross that is broken, a traditional Satanist symbol. The 60’s was in many ways the 666’s, with rebellion via drugs (6), sex (6), and eastern religions (6).
During this turbulent time, one must ask what was our Lord God doing? How was Christ moving in this godless society that shirked all authority and rebelled against everything. The truth is the 1960’s serves as example of culture when it is in total rebellion, when people as the Apostle Paul said, gave themselves over to every indecency, “For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men, who by their unrighteousness suppress the truth. For what can be known about God is plain to them, because God has shown it to them. For his invisible attributes, namely, his eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly perceived, ever since the creation of the world, in the things that have been made. So they are without excuse. For although they knew God, they did not honor him as God or give thanks to him, but they became futile in their thinking, and their foolish hearts were darkened. Claiming to be wise, they became fools, and exchanged the glory of the immortal God for images resembling mortal man and birds and animals and creeping things.Therefore God gave them up in the lusts of their hearts to impurity, to the dishonoring of their bodies among themselves, because they exchanged the truth about God for a lie and worshiped and served the creature rather than the Creator, who is blessed forever! Amen. For this reason God gave them up to dishonorable passions. For their women exchanged natural relations for those that are contrary to nature; and the men likewise gave up natural relations with women and were consumed with passion for one another, men committing shameless acts with men and receiving in themselves the due penalty for their error. And since they did not see fit to acknowledge God, God gave them up to a debased mind to do what ought not to be done. They were filled with all manner of unrighteousness, evil, covetousness, malice. They are full of envy, murder, strife, deceit, maliciousness. They are gossips, slanderers, haters of God, insolent, haughty, boastful, inventors of evil, disobedient to parents, foolish, faithless, heartless, ruthless. Though they know God's righteous decree that those who practice such things deserve to die, they not only do them but give approval to those who practice them.” (Romans 1:18-32). So it is evident the attitudes and behavior of hippies was nothing new.
The end cap of the 60’s came with consequences, the people who had been hip and ‘high’ had lost their minds, and the free love’in contracted STDs (Sexually Transmitted Diseases), particularly AIDS. The Sixties folk were reaping what they had sown, “Do not be deceived, God is not mocked; for whatever a man sows, that he will also reap. For he who sows to his flesh will of the flesh reap corruption, but he who sows to the Spirit will of the Spirit reap everlasting life. And let us not grow weary while doing good, for in due season we shall reap if we do not lose heart,” (Galatians 6:7-9 NKJV), on their Prodigal path (Luke 15:11-32) when the Seventies hit and a new movement replaced “Peace & Love” with the Jesus Revolution, and the Hippy became “Jesus Freak.” While the 1960’s had been 666 the 1970’s was 777 as The Holy Spirit came down like Pentecost across the whole nation in the largest revival since Acts 2! While Satan got his temple with Aton LeVey in the 1960’s, Jesus got many temples by filing the hearts of the lost who became living temples of His Spirit! (Colossians 1:27, Romans 8:10-20, 1 Corinthians 3:16). The Jesus Movement was ironically filled with many of the Hippies who had made war against all institutions and authority, now these same people were holding Bibles in church buildings and seeking the Highest Authority, the Holy Trinity.
So what was Our Lord doing? The Sixties was anarchist and antichrist while the Seventies via the Jesus Movement took those rebels and made them righteous followers of Christ, “Jesus Freaks.” What was God trying to say? Was it a simple case of the Prodigal Son? Or was it something more? I believe a case can be made that the 60’s was a time of people to see what running wild outside God’s commands would lead to, at first there was pleasure but then Hepatitis C, AIDS, broken families, and brain damage from drugs which amplified the words of Scripture, “the wages of sin is death,” while the 70’s completed the same verse, “but the gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.” (Romans 6:23). The Nineteen Sixties was a dark hour when people left to their whims and hormones created a Hippy Culture that failed in all its attempts at “Peace & Love” via sexual depravity and drugs, but attained these true peace & love in the Nineteen Seventies through Christ who is love, “Beloved, let us love one another, for love is from God, and whoever loves has been born of God and knows God. Anyone who does not love does not know God, because God is love. In this the love of God was made manifest among us, that God sent his only Son into the world, so that we might live through him. In this is love, not that we have loved God but that he loved us and sent his Son to be the propitiation for our sins. Beloved, if God so loved us, we also ought to love one another.” (1 John 4:7-11), and who is peace, “And the peace of God, which transcends all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus.” (Philippians 4:7). At last the Hippies had found both love and peace but this time as Jesus Freaks.
The 1960’s serves as a reminder of when man is left to his devices and chooses the path of sin. At first it seemed pleasurable, but all the drugs and songs and sex could not fill the empty void in people’s souls, a need for Christ. The Sexual Revolution led nowhere, like the ecstasy trips so many hippies had taken, eventually after the buzz wore off there was still a horrible world of pain and suffering that no amount of narcotics or sex could snuff out. The truth that those hippies would find out, is that the only way to confront this painful world was through Jesus Christ who endured pain on the cross for our sins with eight inch nails, lead tipped whips and spear to the side. The True God, our Lord Jesus spoke to the hippy whose heart was broken and said “I am broken for you.” (1 Corinthians 11:24 KJV). Suddenly the 1960’s was “Father forgive them, they know not what they do,” (Luke 23:34), and the 1970’s was doubting Thomas (the hippy), seeing Jesus at His Resurrection, “Now Thomas (also known as Didymus), one of the Twelve, was not with the disciples when Jesus came. So the other disciples told him, “We have seen the Lord!” But he said to them, “Unless I see the nail marks in his hands and put my finger where the nails were, and put my hand into his side, I will not believe.”
A week later his disciples were in the house again, and Thomas was with them. Though the doors were locked, Jesus came and stood among them and said, “Peace be with you!” Then he said to Thomas, “Put your finger here; see my hands. Reach out your hand and put it into my side. Stop doubting and believe.” Thomas said to him, “My Lord and my God!” Then Jesus told him, “Because you have seen me, you have believed; blessed are those who have not seen and yet have believed.” (John 20:24-29 NIV). The doubters become devotees, Jesus Freaks on fire with the Holy Spirit!
It is evident that God was at work in the sixties and seventies. Through the 60’s people saw that free loving (sex), drugs, and eastern meditation could not solve the world’s problems nor heal souls. Then in the 70’s the Jesus Revolution brought true love (Christ), discipleship, and Holy Spirit power that filled the hearts and minds of broken people. In two decades our Lord Jesus Christ took the Hippy Movement and turned it into the Jesus Movement. Amen.
Source:
Jesus Revolution: How God Transformed an Unlikely Generation and How He Can Do It Again Today, By Ellen Santilli Vaughn and Greg Laurie
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