Larry Tomczak

Larry Tomczak is an apostolic leader and evangelist with over 42 years of ministry experience. He led People of Destiny International, a pioneering church planting movement which has established almost 60 churches in the US and abroad (though now under a different ministry name and leadership).

He was editor of People of Destiny magazine and is author of 8 books including the quarter-million best seller Clap Your Hands, Church Planters Handbook (co-author), Divine Appointments, Reckless Abandon, and The Bullseye Challenge. Larry is an almost 40 year board member of “Intercessors for America” ministry and was an instructor at the Brownsville Revival School of Ministry. Married over 40 years with four grown children, he serves as Executive Director of The Awareness Group (T. A. G.) and resides in the Nashville area

Tomczak was born into a Roman Catholic family in Ohio, and in his youth was part of a local rock band.

He became an Evangelical during the charismatic renewal of the 1970s, as described in his book, Clap Your Hands. Working with C.J. Mahaney, Tomczak co-founded the Covenant Life Church which would eventually become known as the Sovereign Grace Churches. Tomczak eventually left the ministry in 1998, citing theological difference in his leaving. Some of this period's tensions also arose because Tomczak's fitness as a father was called into question by church leadership over what Tomczak described as the "teenage rebellion" of his son in which Tomczak claimed to be blackmailed by the ministry. Tomczak claims never to have received an apology for the events of this period up until 2010. Subsequent to this statement by Larry Tomczak, in an email released by Sovereign Grace Ministries, dated July 4, 2011, it is clear that Larry and C.J. have been reconciled and C.J. has made a full apology to Larry and his family. Larry was invited to the Leaders Conference in November 2011, but the invitation was eventually withdrawn.

In 1983, Tomczak paid $150,000 to settle a lawsuit for repeatedly slandering psychiatrist Thomas Harris and his wife, Amy, authors of the best-seller I'm O.K. - You're O.K.,.

The New York Times reported that Tomczak repeatedly and publicly claimed "'Most people today don't know that the author of that book committed suicide about two years ago, and yet people are still practicing some of his philosophies."

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