Biography
Terry Virgo was born in 1940, in England, in a family of the middle class. He grew up in the south of England and went to the local schools. He was brought up in the Church of England but had no deep faith. As a teenager, he was converted at a church meeting in Brighton. He was struck by the message of grace and gave his life to Christ. He was a quick and eager young man, who was drawn to preaching. He felt a call to the ministry, and as a student, he began to preach. He trained for the ministry in a Baptist college, though he did not stay in the denomination.
In the late 1960s, he became involved in the charismatic renewal. He was baptized in the Spirit and began to see the gifts of the Spirit at work in his own life. He was influenced by the teaching of Arthur Wallis and Bryn Jones and the early leaders of the house church movement. He was drawn to the idea of restoring the church to its New Testament pattern. He started a church in Hove, near Brighton, in 1970, which met in a hall. It grew rapidly and became a center of the new churches. It was called the Clarendon Church, and it drew hundreds of young people.
He became a leader of a network of churches that were planted in the south of England. They were called Coastlands, and later Newfrontiers. The network grew from a handful of churches to hundreds in many countries. It was marked by a stress on the Word, on the work of the Spirit, on church planting and on a plurality of elders. He taught a balanced Reformed charismatic theology. He was a man who stressed the grace of God and the gift of the Spirit. He called his teaching the new covenant. The network supported church planters in Africa, Asia, Europe and Latin America. It also ran a conference, Stoneleigh Bible Week, which drew thousands.
He wrote a number of books, among them The Tide Is Turning, God's Lavish Grace and No Well-Worn Paths, which was an account of his life. His writings were simple and warm. He was a speaker with a clear and winning style. He also was a man who took a stand for sound doctrine and spoke against the excesses of some of the charismatic movement.
He has had his trials. He has suffered from poor health, including Parkinson's disease, which began to affect him in the 2000s. He handed on the leadership of Newfrontiers in 2011 to a team led by Dave Devenish. He has also acknowledged the pain of the controversies over the authority of apostolic leaders in the network. He has been honest about his own faults. Some critics have charged that the network gave too much authority to its leaders, though others have praised it.
He is a living man, and the details of his later years should be checked against reliable sources. His life shows the effect of a young man who gave his life to the planting of churches. He has been among the leading architects of the new churches in Britain.