Greg Laurie: ‘Criticising megachurches is like saying you’re against restaurants with a long line’

American evangelist, author and pastor Greg Laurie has first-hand experience of Christian awakenings.

Coming to Christ as a 17-year-old potsmoking hippie, Laurie was immersed in the Jesus Movement under the mentorship of Calvary Chapel’s Chuck Smith. It’s a revival that has many parallels with the quiet one sweeping Gen Z today, he says.  

“I told my friends: ‘The last thing you’ll ever see is Greg Laurie becoming a Jesus Freak’,” he says, recalling his teenage views on the swathes of young people joining the countercultural American revival of the 1970s. But hearing the gospel in the school canteen drew him in.  

“It was lunchtime in high school in America. The last thing I was going to do was walk forward like I was at some Billy Graham crusade,” he said. “But I did. And my life changed dramatically.”  

Not only did Laurie become a close friend of Graham’s, but he also became a megachurch pastor almost overnight. Ditching alcohol and drugs, he joined Calvary Chapel in the middle of a histrionic spiritual awakening – a story dramatic enough to become a $15million film now streaming on Netflix. Jesus Revolution – based upon the book written by Laurie himself – stars Jonathan Roumie and Kelsey Grammer. It was commended by review website Rotton Tomatoes for “avoiding the preachiness of common faith-based films” and has so far grossed $54million worldwide.  

Rising to lead

As depicted on screen (by Kissing Booth star Joel Courtney) Laurie was entrusted to lead a small Bible study by his pastor, Chuck Smith. The intimate group of 30 rapidly looked to him for leadership.  

“I never set out to start a church, they just began to call me pastor,” Laurie said. “I didn’t really know what I was doing, but I don’t believe it came from myself – it came from the Lord. From that day until the present, it’s been on-the-job training.”  

From a handful of enthusiastic, newly converted students, Laurie’s California-based Harvest Christian Fellowship grew to become one of the largest megachurches in the US. Today, up to 15,000 people attend in person across four campuses, and online participation is into six figures.

There are thousands of stories of faithful Christians serving the Lord, but you won’t read about them in the Daily Mail 

Laurie also serves on the board of directors for the Billy Graham Evangelistic Association and was invited by Donald Trump to participate in National Prayer services at Washington National Cathedral following his 2017 inauguration.  

When Trump returned to office in 2025, Laurie took to social media after briefly being refused entry to the new White House Faith Office - likening it to being denied entry into heaven. 

“I went to the White House to lead prayer at their very first worship service, and guess what? My name wasn’t on the list!” Laurie wrote on X in April. “It reminded me of something far more serious – some people will one day expect to be welcomed into Heaven, but their name won’t be in the Book of Life.” 

But despite his fame, wealth and influence, Laurie is clear that he is not motivated by numbers – although sometimes they are indicative of success. “I think there’s a place for everything – a place for a mega church, and a place for a small church,” he said. “Sometimes people will say, ‘I’m not into mass evangelism’ and ‘I’m against megachurches’, but most churches started out small. Criticising megachurches is like saying you’re against restaurants with a long line. If you go to a small restaurant where nobody eats, it means their food probably sucks.” 

“I’m for every effort to reach people with the gospel – big or small. Let’s just do what we can,” he added.  

The next generation 

Yet whatever your view on the right size for a healthy church, we appear to be witnessing a growing openness to faith both in the UK and the US - with Gen Z leading the way. The Bible Society Quiet Revival report suggests the Church is in a period of rapid growth, driven by young adults - and in particular males aged 18-24. Parallels can easily be drawn between Gen Z and the young hippies of the 1970s, Laurie claims.  

“I’m very encouraged by what I am hearing,” said the megachurch pastor. “My generation were going to all the wrong places for answers – we rebelled against our parents who came through World War II. But if I could look at any generation that paralleled mine, I would say Gen Z. This is a generation born with social media all around them. I think that’s a really good opportunity for the gospel. Social media has made a global audience – imagine if there was a spiritual awakening today - it would be on TikTok, Instagram and X. You could spread the message like wildfire.” 

His views about a fresh outpouring of the Spirit are underpinned by real-life events. Hot on the heels of the release of Jesus Revolution in 2023,  20,000 people crowded onto Pirates Cove, a rocky amphitheatre in Orange County, California that was at the epicentre of the original 1970s revival movement. In one day, 4,500 people were baptised in the sea by Harvest Ministries.

I never set out to start a church, they just began to call me pastor

“We were waiting for people to come down onto the beach,” Laurie explained, “and there was an elderly gentleman holding everyone up. I was getting a little frustrated, but when he finally made it down, I heard his story. He was 85 years old. He watched the Jesus Revolution film and said to his family he wanted to accept Christ. There was something very special about that.  

The following year, a further 2,000 people were baptised at the same event. In 2025, the third annual Jesus Revolution baptism saw 2,100 baptisms, according to Laurie’s Harvest Ministries. 

“To see a beach full of people, trying to get into the water to make a commitment, it’s a very cool thing,” Laurie said. 

Current numbers can’t be denied – nor can history. God, it appears, is still on the move – and much of it began on British soil. Laurie cites Charles Spurgeon, Martin Lloyd Jones and Rev G Campbell Morgan as the great early revivalists he studied as Harvest Christian Fellowship expanded during the 1980s. “The first megachurch came with Spurgeon and the Metropolitan Tabernacle – you Brits created it!” he said.  

Public scandals 

Yet, there are particular challenges that come with high-profile success stories and the public scrutiny they bring.

In September 2025, Harvest Christian Fellowship hit the headlines when former pastor, Paul Havsgaard, was accused of raping and sexually assaulting young boys at an orphanage in Romania which received financial support from HCF. The Romanian survivors – now aged 33 and 40 – filed a lawsuit accusing Laurie and other senior leaders for failing to prevent repeated abuse over eight years.  

In a statement, HCF said that the allegations were shocking, but that Laurie had been “wrongly targeted as a form of financial extortion.” 

When questioned on the topic of public scandals, just months before the above accusations were made public, Laurie said simply: “There have always been hypocrites in the Church and I’m not excusing it. It’s very disappointing when a leader fails, but it’s going to happen. We need to keep our eyes fixed on the Lord, and if a brother or sister is overtaken in fault, you should seek to restore them.  

“There are thousands of stories of faithful Christians that have served the Lord behind the scenes, but you won’t read about them in the Daily Mail,” he added.  

If I could look at any generation that paralleled mine, I would say Gen Z

Despite the highs and lows of his public ministry and career, Laurie remains convinced that God chooses foolish, earthly things to shame the wise (1 Corinthians 1:27). And that includes him.  

“The biggest lesson I’ve learned in all these years of ministry is that, if we can explain it, God didn’t do it,” he said. “God chooses the foolish things of the world to confound the wise – and there is no logical reason to it.  

“If we try to develop a formula, the Lord will move in different ways – it is not about method, it is about the mysterious work of God. There’s no way I’m qualified to do this. God does not look for the qualified. He qualifies the called.”  

Greg Laurie was speaking to Emma Fowle at the BGEA European Confrence on Evangelism in Berlin, which was held earlier this year. This article was produced with editorial support from Jo Lamb

To hear the full interview listen to The Profile podcast