The Line at Mars Hill's Communion Table

This week brought to light more disturbing facts concerning Mars Hill's leadership. By paying to put Mark Driscoll's book on the New York Times Bestseller list, Mars Hill Executive Elders may have put the church's 501(c)3 tax exempt status in jeopardy. That would be a multi-million dollar hole from which the church may not recover. There is growing pressure for Mark to step down from leadership as more elders accuse him of what I have personally witnessed firsthand - a bullying, angry leadership style that leaves members and staff bleeding on the sidelines. He laughed about the dead bodies under the bus of Mars Hill in 2007/2008. People have been pointing out the dead bodies for years, but apparently the pile has to be big enough to see from space before enough pressure will be raised to cause change or repentance. But I admit from personal experience that, until you are personally splattered with your own blood or the blood of someone standing beside you in ministry, it is hard to believe the problem is as big as it is.

The larger Body of Christ needs to take seriously the criteria set in Scripture for acting on such accusations – two or three witnesses.

I Tim. 5:19-20 Do not admit a charge against an elder except on the evidence of two or three witnesses. As for those who persist in sin, rebuke them in the presence of all, so that the rest may stand in fear.    Continue at Theology for Women

Open Letter to Mark Driscoll (2013)

Dear Pastor Mark --

I know you don't read any of the little blogs, or people who are trying to make their own tribe, but others do, and I think it's worth writing a brief open letter to you this week based on your epic video from this weekend.  

I think it's fantastic that you can walk away from the Gospel Coalition, and hand over the reigns to Acts29, and with no muss and no fuss start your own tribe.  It's proof that you have something which most of us don't have.  I'm sure there's a Greek word for it, but unfortunately I don't speak Greek.

Someone with more time on their hands might want to go through this 21-minute monologue and find all the ingrown hairs and blemishes, but sadly: I'm on a tight schedule this week.  I'm writing today about the funniest parts of this video.  In your attempts here to get tribes to talk to each other, you have somehow done two things so well that they deserve a mention.

The first is this: you are fantastic at making much of yourself.  You are the master of the humblebrag now that the meme is dead and the ship has sailed.  Like a self-aware version of Ari Gold from Entourage, you drop all the names you know to demonstrate your position -- but dutifully, you're not like any of them.  T.D. Jakes didn't hardly even know you when he met you, for pete's sake.  And thankfully: you're nothing like the homeschooled fundies who can't make a tribe for themselves, who act drunk even though they would never touch the stuff.  You're a tribal leader.

If anyone knows how to salvage his own reputation from the doctrinal and moral pratfalls and frankly-insulting egoisms for which you are actually well-known, it's you -- and it's funny to watch you do it as you get older and your audience stays the same age.    Continue at Frank Turk

Let’s Talk about “Celebrity” and “Rock Star” Pastors

Increasingly we’re seeing the terms “rock star pastor” and “celebrity pastor” tossed about. Even though most people acceptably follow and patronize their favorite celebrity actors and performers, and a good number of us grew up idolizing “rock stars” (although, for me, it would have been rap–not rock), the terms in an Evangelical context are pejoratives, derogatory terms of abuse, expressions of contempt. In fact, there’s a good case to be made that most uses of the terms “celebrity pastors” or “rock star pastor” amount to uncharitable slurs.

I hate the terms.  I really do.  They tar and feather good men.

The increasing use of the terms does suggest a need to address an increasing problem.  Now, please don’t rush in judgment to conclude that the problem is the “celebrification” of pastors.  That’s only one potential problem.  The other potential problems have to do with the hearts of those who would use expressions of contempt and uncharitable slurs in the first place–particularly without knowledge of the person they’re so labeling.

 

So, it seems a good review of these terms is in order.  I’m feeling particularly interested in taking up this issue because in the last week the terms have come home to roost.  Following my post on multi-site churches, a couple dear brothers wrote to me privately to push back on the rhetoric, tone, and substance of the post.  Those were wounds of friends.  Both brothers in some way intimated that I might be a “celebrity pastor,” or at least face some of the same challenges as those I criticized in the post.  That was alarming, and the suggestion has by God’s grace been working good fruit of reflection in my own soul.  It immediately revealed that my own sinful pride came to the foreground in that post.  At the very least, I should have confessed more fully that everything in the post regarding pride and the temptation to idolizing self or others is true of my own heart.  I don’t need to leave the bed in the morning before I’m confronted with the corruptions of my own heart.  While I do think there’s a difference of degree created by some forms of the multi-site strategy, I should have made it more clearly known in the post itself (not just in the comments) that there is no difference in kind–all of our hearts are idol factories–beginning with my own heart.   Keep Reading...

IMAGE

How Churches Lose the Plot

How Churches Lose the Plot (part 1)
How Churches Lose the Plot (part 2)

Why so Many Churches Decline into Theological Liberalism