An Exclusive Interview with the Director of Frisbee: The Life and Death of a Hippie Preacher

The “Jesus Movement” of the 1960s and early 1970s is one of the more fascinating chapters of modern Christian history. Birthed in California, it attracted thousands of young people who shared some of the ideologies of the hippie movement of the time but were disillusioned by many of the messages and lifestyles of the counterculture at large.

Perhaps the most compelling and controversial leader of the “Jesus Freak” movement was Lonnie Frisbee, who director David Di Sabatino skillfully captured in his 2005 documentary Frisbee: The Life and Death of a Hippie Preacher (watch a trailer here). (Di Sabatino also directed the controversial 2009 documentary Fallen Angel: The Outlaw Larry Norman, about the pioneer of Christian rock who wrote such songs as “I Wish We’d All Been Ready” and “No More LSD for Me.”) I caught up with David Di Sabatino recently via email to learn more about Lonnie Frisbee, the “Jesus People,” and how the movement changed Christianity.

When did you first become interested in Lonnie Frisbee, and why did you decide to make a documentary about him?

Back when I was first gearing up to do some research on the “Jesus People" in 1993, I read a book written in 1971 that named many of the leaders during that time and where they were located. I fashioned a list of all those names and the cities they were from, and then called directory assistance to try and find them. One conversation led to another and I was off.

Funny enough, I had gotten hold of a secretary at Calvary Chapel in Costa Mesa and asked to speak to Lonnie Frisbee. She informed me that he had died three months previously. She then added, “He wasn’t a big part of Calvary Chapel’s ministry, though.” So, I crossed him off the list. (And, truthfully, from her vantage point, she was correct. Lonnie had not been there since 1977.)

I related that story to a fellow named Chuck Girard, one of the founding members of the early Christian rock group Love Song, and he corrected her oversight very pointedly, so much so that I never forgot his words. “David, Lonnie Frisbee IS the story of Calvary Chapel. Follow that story.” That made an impression on me. So, I did follow that story.

When I asked people about Lonnie, he sounded like a fascinating character, something of an Old Testament prophet descended upon the southern California religious scene after a rather interesting experimental countercultural existence. Because of my own religious upbringing, Lonnie galvanized so many of my interests in one rather eccentric personality. And it was a challenge to do justice to the story, which I hope I did.

Do you identify as a Christian and/or are you religious or spiritual?



Hmmmm… I tend to want to answer that question to make my religious compatriots wonder… like, yes, I accepted Jesus into my spleen when I was young. To which you can just hear so many of them mentally correcting me; “Aww… it’s the heart. You accept Jesus into your heart, you dummy.”

I do come from a very religious background. I was raised in an Italian Pentecostal church in Toronto, Canada, and whatever questions were spawned there—including what became my interest in the Jesus People and Lonnie—led me through Bible college, seminary and grad school.

Identification is a harder thing. I abstain from a lot of what passes today in Christian culture, even though I still have ties in that world. But if I am honest, those ties are getting more and more tenuous. I often like to wonder aloud about the guy in the Middle Ages who looked into the Bible and saw an ethic of love but was surrounded by a culture that was screaming, “Conquer in this name!” I’d like to feel I’m with that guy, standing around wondering what the hell is going on, and why the words of Jesus have been so misapplied and twisted.

What was the most surprising thing you learned while making the film?

Well, in my third and final interview with his ex-wife, she pipes up and says that Lonnie one day turned to her and said he “was gay.” That floored me. Before that, I think I was leaning toward the typical conservative evangelical sort of stance, that homosexuality was something he lapsed in to on occasion. To hear that he himself had defined himself as being a homosexual was a game changer for me.

All of a sudden I was now dealing with a situation where God had called Lonnie while he was gay. Up until that point, I had really felt that his homosexuality was not as pronounced, that it was just him experimenting with what was going on around him, and that when he made a profession of faith and stated he had left that lifestyle behind that his future dalliances were simply behavioral lapses. But when I found he defined himself as being gay, I had to rethink everything. What did it mean that God had chosen a homosexual to be his representative?

As you can imagine, I was a little freaked by this, because I was staunchly involved in that evangelical world, and this wasn’t news they were going to like. Homosexuality is at the top of their list of things they are against, and here I was ready to serve up one of their past leaders as having received his call of God while fully ensconced in that world. But that was the story.

But the more I thought about it all I began to see the greatness of the story, that God reaches out to anyone willing to be used, and that Lonnie’s true importance of being called while a homosexual way back in 1967 was to tell a generation of young believers that God was ahead of the curve inviting those that the contemporary church had excluded. And, just because Lonnie was chosen while he was a homosexual did not necessarily mean it answers the question about whether or not homosexuality is a sin. That is a politicized and emotionally charged issue, and I was adamant that what I was bringing across did not speak to that issue one way or the other.

Lonnie’s story reveals a God who consistently aligns himself with the lowly, the marginalized and the uncomely. To Lonnie’s credit, I think he understood he was the untidy choice, that him being granted such access made people extremely uncomfortable. But wasn’t that just like God to do something like that, to remind us that everybody is welcome, and that if he would choose Lonnie, then nobody is excluded.

One person interviewed in the film recounts being surprised that Lonnie would party on Saturday night and then preach on Sunday. Do you think there were any contradictions between the way Lonnie lived his personal life and the messages he was delivering in church?

I think that question is asked because the Christian church in the last 200 years fell into a big lie where “sinless perfection” and “holiness” became the noose around their own necks. And now, every time someone who tries to live up to an ideal falls, they are branded a hypocrite because expectations are not realistic.

I think the Church probably needs to be more honest in their polemic, maybe treat reality the way the Bible does, by showing their leaders as they are, clay feet and all. I think that is one of the reasons that I did these two documentaries that I did, to show that God doesn’t require perfection for a person to be his messenger. And in fact, it is more the opposite, that the greater the messenger, the greater the flaws.

So, no, I think Lonnie is like every other leader past and present, capable some days of doing some great things, and on other days being a complete bumbler. He was wonderfully human and fits in with every other biblical character and church history hero. People are going to mess up. And where the church throws them away for doing so, God never does.

Did making the film change how you initially felt about/perceived Lonnie Frisbee?

Not really. Early on I felt it was my job to honor him for what he did, and to chastise those in authority over him for excessively berating him for his particular brand of unbecoming behavior as opposed to theirs, and for being so uncomfortable with his memory that they marginalized his memory. Even if you believe homosexuality is a sin, I still cannot understand why they single that behavior out as opposed to pride or judgementalism or obesity.

I kept asking these leaders why a fat guy isn’t pulled out of his pulpit since it is obvious he lacks self-control, and the Bible speaks to obesity as a big problem. And none of them gave me a good answer. And what I found was their actions towards what they deem “sexual sin” is born of cultural stigma, not biblical exegesis. But that is a longer story about the church’s discomfort with sex in general. And unfortunately, Lonnie fell through the cracks of the Christian culture.

Why do you think the “Jesus Freak” movement became so popular? Why was it so attractive to so many young people at the time?

I think early on there was an authenticity to the movement that was compelling. These young kids were reading the Bible and seeing themselves in its pages, finding affinity with the stories and losing themselves in the lives of the characters. So many told me it was like they were walking through the very pages of the Bible. There is nothing more intoxicating than to believe you are directly involved in a cosmic war battling on the side of God himself for the souls of those around you.

Too, I think the movement conveyed God in a language that was understandable to both those in the counterculture and church kids who now found new outlets for their faith. They spoke about faith with music and theater, and in verbiage that was relevant and timely. Jesus became the first hippie who threatened the established way of life with his ethic of love, and in turn, young Jesus people saw him as challenging the staid orthodoxy of the previous generation.

What was the core message of the “Jesus movement” and why did it die out?

The message of the “Jesus movement” was that God was interested to meet the hippies half way. I think in times of real honesty like the 1960s, that stirs the Almighty, and as these young kids started questioning things around them it started a groundswell. I think for a season there was openness where participants really felt a sense of spiritual warmth for one another. There was also a sense of urgency to be part of this cosmic drama where they were locked in battle against the forces of evil for the souls of their fellow hippie compatriots.

I think the movement petered out for a lot of reasons. Kids started having families and having to plan for a future once they realized that the End was not going to come, as so many preachers (and also secular theorists) had suggested. I think a lot of its countercultural verve got co-opted by the established churches who were more interested in getting asses in seats and building large edifices than anything else. I also think that the counterculture ended, and life had to be met with a little more pragmatism than hippie ideology offered.

Overall, I think these renewal movements go off every few decades to bring spiritual revitalization to the Christian church. I think the Jesus movement changed how people worshipped, making things much more relaxed and culturally relevant. I also think that many people experienced God encounters that changed the course of their lives forevermore, whether they chose to continue being involved in organized religion or not. Where it failed, however, was bringing any relevant social change to the larger North American context. The Jesus movement was largely silent on civil rights and many of the hot issues of the time, preferring to concentrate on personal piety and the continuance of church growth programs.

How do you think Christian culture has changed since the days of Lonnie Frisbee? Has it changed for the better or worse?

In many ways, things have advanced. I think the left wing element of Christian culture has woken up and asserted itself. Even though the stereotype of fundamentalist Christianity still exists, I think if people bother to take a look they will see a much more diverse landscape of Christians out there, many with intelligent, high-profile visibility. (Bono of U2 comes to mind.)

I also think that the kinds of issues that Lonnie was dealing with in the 1970s and 1980s are no longer hidden. Larger social pressures to speak openly about abuse and sexual dysfunction have trickled down to the church, so, where someone like Lonnie had to suffer largely in silence, today there are outlets within the larger church body where you can seek assistance.

That being said, I think a lot of what started in the “Jesus movement” channeled itself into a pretty useless end. If all that is left as a legacy of that movement is Christian rock music, mega-churches and a handful of high-profile ministers who trace their lineage to that time, then something very wrong happened to an event that started with a lot of promise.

Are there any current trends or movements in evangelical Christianity that you think are similar to those of the Jesus People?

There is something called the “emergent” church movement that has brought a challenge to the old orthodoxy of the past. And I think that a lot of left-leaning, more thoughtful young leaders are dismissing a lot of the silliness of a previous Christian culture and forging some new ground.

Do you currently have any other films/projects in the works?

I do. I have one on Jim Jones that I would like to finish off, told from the perspective of some of the very first people that raised warning signs on a potential mad man, and suffered violence from the group who sought to silence them, and dismissal from new organizations who believed that Jones was leading a social movement. I am using their voices as a lens with which to question why we continue to neglect whistleblowers and their often important cautions.

Last but not least: Do you have any Christian nightmares?

Sure. With all the advantages I have had to be educated by and work alongside some of the great leaders of the Christian faith, that I would somehow miss the fundamental elements of what Jesus was getting on about. If my wife, kids and others that know me best said that I did not show love, that would be a nightmare.

(For more info about Frisbee: The Life and Death of a Hippie Preacher, click here.)