Francis Frangipane is a Christian evangelical minister and author. He is the founding pastor of River of Life Ministries in Cedar Rapids, Iowa, United States. In 2002, he also launched an international, online school called In Christ's Image Training (ICIT). This training lays a foundation of truth based on four principal themes: Christlikeness, humility, prayer and unity. ICIT has students in over seventy nations. Additionally, over the past decades, Frangipane has served on a number of other ministry boards. However, in recent years he has gradually resigned from these various boards. As of June 2009, he has also retired from his position as senior pastor of River of Life Ministries. In this more simplified life, Frangipane is devoting himself to prayer and the ministry of God's word.
Francis Frangipane has an active partnership with the Mission America Coalition, consisting of leaders from 81 denominations and over 400 ministries and networks. He is also a welcomed teacher in various Charismatic and Evangelical church settings, in both the black and white communities.
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Francis Frangipane was born in 1946 and grew up in Lodi, New Jersey. After graduating from high school in 1964, Frangipane entered the U.S. Air Force, where he was discharged honorably as a sergeant on February 2, 1969. He relocated briefly to Berkeley, California and then Honolulu, Hawaii before returning to the mainland U.S. These were the days when the hippie movement was emerging, and Frangipane, like countless other young people, was searching for meaning. He traveled extensively throughout the United States and Canada. Eventually his travels brought him to the Blue Ridge Mountains of Virginia where he became a Christian on November 26, 1970. Five months later he met his wife-to-be, Denise Piscitelli, and led her to the Lord. In October 1971 they were married.
In 1972 Francis and Denise received ministerial training at Grace Chapel in Southern California; by early fall they had moved to Hilo, Hawaii to start a church. Their little work grew to about twenty-five people, most of whom they had personally led to Christ. They also had their first child during this time.
After fourteen months, however, they felt their time in Hawaii was complete. A church in the Detroit, Michigan area offered them a pastoral position. For the remainder of the seventies, they led a small church of approximately 100 people; they also planted eight churches and home groups in southeastern Michigan and Ontario, Canada.
They relocated to Iowa in 1980 where, with the addition of four more children and a Vietnamese foster child, their family grew to eight. These were hard times. Francis was self-employed and the family was very poor. It was during this time that Francis began to develop his writing skills. It was also a three year season of being shut in with God; the only spiritual food that nourished him came from the words of Christ in the Gospels.
In 1982 the opportunity to pastor a church in the Cedar Rapids area was offered to the Frangipanes. After a season of prayer, they accepted this new assignment. Pastor Francis soon found himself united with several other pastors from various evangelical denominations who met in one another's sanctuaries for monthly prayer. After three years, the founding minister of this prayer group left the city, and in 1985 Francis and another local pastor (from the local Assemblies of God) picked up the prayer initiative. They opened it up for intercessors as well and increased their times together from monthly to weekly. The group soon multiplied, which led to many other interdenominational citywide events.
During this time, Frangipane began to write in earnest. His first book, Holiness, Truth and the Presence of God (1985), was a compilation of his essays and sermons. He wrote his second book, The Three Battlegrounds, in 1989 when asked to speak on spiritual warfare at a conference in Kansas City. Both these books became best-sellers. Since 1985, he has written fourteen books including four In Christ's Image Training manuals, developed for his online school, plus a number of study booklets.
He has traveled throughout the world, ministering to thousands of pastors and intercessors from many backgrounds.
Francis' wish is to see established in every city "Christlike pastors and intercessors, united before God, revealing the love of Christ to their communities".
Frangipane is the author of several books that have been translated into more than 30 languages. [1]
I know of few prophetic voices to the body of Christ that match the consistency of wisdom and balance of truth that Francis Frangipane represents. His pastor’s heart and biblical solidity flavor his writing and nourish souls unto health while calling us all to God’s purposes in this present hour.
—Jack W. Hayford
President, International Foursquare Church
Chancellor, The King’s College and Seminary
Francis Frangipane is a pastor who is a pioneer for our times. He loves the local congregations and the people he serves, but he is unafraid and undeterred to speak the truth in love (tough love, for sure) about Christ and the state of the Church. A pioneer too, he has mentored me in the work of the Holy Spirit in calling pastors and anointed leaders together for the welfare of their community and city. The topics and truths God gave Francis to write rescued me in the midst of a ministry crisis; reinvigorated my mind, heart, and soul; and reset my feet on a Spirit-directed path of service to Christ and His Church—and I have never looked back. Pastors and prayer-passionate leaders will be especially grateful and guided as they encounter the Lord and His scriptural vision for the Father’s house. Buckle up!
—Phil Miglioratti
National Pastors’ Prayer Network
I believe that Francis Frangipane is one of the most gifted of current Christian writers. The books that he has authored have appealed to a broad spectrum of Christians who have been encouraged and edified by many of his rich spiritual insights. I am deeply grateful for his contributions to my life and ministry. This volume has special interest to me since it focuses upon the need and benefits of authentic spiritual unity. I pray that God will use it powerfully to encourage His people who comprise the body of Christ to become committed advocates of the unity that only the Holy Spirit can provide. It is the great need of this generation of Christians.
—Dr. Paul Cedar Chairman,
Mission America Coalition
First, in the interest of full disclosure, Francis is a friend of mine. It is more than that. There are very few on Planet Earth of whom I could freely say our hearts beat as one in our passion for knowing and exalting the Son of God. Having traveled the globe for more than thirty years, I only know a handful of leaders who share with me an unshakable hope that the Church is at the threshold of a major Christ-awakening that will transform congregations, communities, and nations. Francis is at the top of my list.
—David Byrant
Founder of Concerts of Prayer international,
and president of Proclaim Hope