Neville Johnson

Neville Johnson was born in Sunderland, England to God-fearing parents who worked with Pastors George and Stephen Jeffreys in the early evangelistic healing movement in Britain. His grandfather was a preacher in the Welsh revival.

Neville Johnson was born again in the Pentecostal church Hebron Tabernacle in Sunderland when he was 12 years old and felt a call to ministry at the age of 14. His family moved to New Zealand while he was still a child, and in the 1960s, Neville and his wife Jo and two young children worked on the mission fields in the South Pacific.

Neville was greatly influenced by the personal mentoring of Walter Beuttler who became his spiritual father. Neville was also inspired greatly by the teaching of TL Osborn in missions work and became a personal friend.

For most of the 1970s his church was the largest Pentecostal church in Australasia [Source?]. He currently runs The Living Word Foundation from Australia.

Early years

From 1968 until December 1970 Neville and Josie Johnson served as missionaries in New Caledonia. It was then that they returned to New Zealand taking over the leadership of the Auckland Assembly following on from Bob and Noelle Midgley, a church which had entered a period of significant growth.[1][2]

Queen Street AoG

The church moved several times as numbers grew eventually settling in the Auckland Town Hall and became known as the Queen Street Assembly of God. During this time the media began to show some attention to what was happening in the AoG, and Pastor Johnson did the first radio interview on commercial radio by an AoG pastor on 1ZB. He spoke on divine healing.[3]

During this time Mission work with the Queen St Assembly as a base grew and a Bible College began, the Zion Bible Training Centre. This was a period of huge change in the Assemblies; Frank Houston resigned as Superintendent in 1977 and soon after Jim Williams was elected in his place.[4]

Contemporaneously New Zealand was experiencing what was described as the Charismatic Renewal in some Mainline denominations, and a revival in the Traditional Pentecostal denominations, of which the Assemblies of God was the main beneficiary. Christmas / New Year Conventions were held in Tauranga, organised by the Faith Bible College, which exposed New Zealanders to a week of world class Full Gospel preachers ( e.g. Brian Bailey, Leo Harris, Judson Cornwall ). Neville's teaching was not out of place in such company. A tape library was set up ( the " Living Word Foundation " later changed to " Life Living Ministries " ), based out of the Queen St Assembly, whereby all New Zealanders had access to Neville's and other international teachers sermons, for a modest borrowing cost. Hence Neville's teaching ministry was disseminated through the whole of New Zealand using what was then " modern technology " and the postal service.

Neville Johnson was believed by many to be a Prophet [Source?]. He would regularly visit Perth, mainly to a small Pentecostal group "City Chapel" who met in a Methodist church in Raglan Street, North Perth [1970-80s]. He was held in high regard there and gave direction and influence to a little-known pastor "Frank Hultgren". Later in his ministry, he and his wife moved to Perth where Frank invited him to minister in his church. Frank then provided Neville with funds and staff to start his own fellowship/church in a Perth hotel (The Kings Ambassador hotel on Hay Street). Frank's church, City Chapel, had already moved into a new church building called "Shiloh Faith Centre" located in Balga, Western Australia [at the request of the resident pastor Bernice Hall. Shiloh Faith Centre later moved from Balga to Hepburn Heights where a new name of 'North City Christian Center' was adopted. It later became part of the Christian City Church movement and is now known as C3 Hepburn Heights.

Frank had five children and two of them [Sandy and Ashley Hultgren] now run a church in Queensland.[5] Darren Hultgren runs a church in Perth.[6]

Frank retired from Shiloh Faith Centre and later to moved to Oral Roberts University and took up a position there.

Current Activities

Neville Johnson now runs The Academy of Light together with his wife Jo.

From the website:[7]

“ The Academy of Light is an End time Training facility using the Internet and Satellite transmission which can be received direct to television sets and computer screens worldwide. Its purpose is to train and prepare Christians and non Christians for the end-times ”

His message now has a special focus on walking with God, being a friend of God and understanding the times and seasons, end time revelation, understanding the ministry of angels [8] understanding the The Book of Enoch, referenced on his website.[9]

Notes

References