Wednesday 20 August 2014

Visiting Mars Hill Church

Song of the day: Dustin Kensrue - O God (We sang this on Sunday)

Hello, it's Jimmy. I've been drafted in to write this blog as Josie is otherwise engaged in writing some book reviews for the 8 books she's read this summer.

This last Sunday we visited Mars Hill church in Seattle.

Their pastor Mark Driscoll has recently (and almost always since the church's inception) been embroiled in some controversy.

A little background...

Seattle is regularly at or near the top of lists like "the most influential" or "coolest cities" in the USA and, until recently, was also the "least churched city in America."

Mars Hill Church began in 1996 meeting in the Driscolls' living room. God has blessed them and they have grown to a church of around 15,000 meeting in 15 locations in 5 states with about 60 weekend services. Mark also co-founded a church planting network (called Acts 29) which has now planted almost 500(!) churches, and a training/ resourcing website called the resurgence with millions of users every year. He also helped found the gospel coalition and churches helping churches - a disaster relief organisation.

Mars Hill designed a church based social network called 'the city' which was bought by Zondervan and is widely used by the churches we've visited all over the states. He's written or contributed to 19 books, his sermon audio is regularly at the top of the iTunes charts for religion and is downloaded by over a million listeners a month. More recently his church began a record label called Mars Hill Music which has been responsible for some of the most God honouring and sonically appealing music that I've ever heard.

Whatever you think of Mark Driscoll, he has undeniably been prolifically used by God.

I've been listening to his sermons for years and have always found him to be a world class and exemplary communicator whose preaching has been (for the most part) biblical, relevant, engaging and challenging. He and a handful of other preachers, some of whom I know personally and some of whom I listen to every week online, have been a great inspiration to me and have made me actually want to do what I believe God has called me to; pastor a church.

However, something happened recently that changes things. Or rather, something came to light recently that changes things.

The catalyst was a video that Mark Driscoll posted talking about the current season of trial and opposition that his church is going through. He lamented that he has treated some people (particularly men) harshly in the past and that he and the church has started a reconciliation process through an independent Christian organisation (Crossway resolution group) with some past members of the church. He offered anyone who has a grievance against the church or Mark himself to come forward and work towards mutual healing and forgiveness.

By the way, if you bristle and harden your heart when a church leader admits fault and says they want to genuinely pursue the healing of broken relationships and find forgiveness from people they've wronged, you need to give yourself a good talking to (if you're a Christian). 

Ephesians 4:32 - Be kind to one another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another, as God in Christ forgave you.

Mark 11:25 - And whenever you stand praying, forgive, if you have anything against anyone, so that your Father also who is in heaven may forgive you your trespasses.

Matthew 6:15 - But if you do not forgive others their trespasses, neither will your Father forgive your trespasses.

Matthew 18:21-22 - Then Peter came up and said to him, “Lord, how often will my brother sin against me, and I forgive him? As many as seven times?” Jesus said to him, “I do not say to you seven times, but seventy times seven."

James 5:16 - Therefore, confess your sins to one another and pray for one another, that you may be healed.

In a throwaway comment, he said that part of the problem is that while many people who are upset by the church are known to them, there are also many who are anonymous (criticising from behind pseudonyms and screen names) and they have no way of reconciling with them.

In response several hundred people formed a Facebook group to declare that they are not (or at least are no longer) anonymous, and started posting stories of complaint and poor treatment at the hands of Driscoll.

In a church with 15,000 current attendees and several thousand who have passed through, it's not surprising that some people will have bad experiences and complaints that they'd like to share. The alarming thing is the sheer volume of ex-elders from the church who have banded together to share their stories and publicly state that Driscoll is at present unfit to be a pastor and is largely unchecked in terms of accountability. Despite Driscoll's considerable gifting, complaints about his behind the scenes character from other elders shouldn't (and can't) be ignored.

The result of these elders' testimony has been monumental, with each devastating consequence coming hot on the heals of the last. Almost every sin from Driscoll's 20 years in ministry has been aired publicly by local and national media outlets, raising quite a stink. Current (widely known and respected) members of the church's board of advisors and accountability have resigned. There have been protests outside the church from ex-members. The current leaders of Acts 29 have removed Driscoll and Mars Hill from their membership - as founder, his reputation has been intrinsically linked with the credibility of A29. Lifeway have removed his books from their 180 stores while they assess how the saga develops. Driscoll has been removed as the keynote speaker at several upcoming events and the church has had to cancel their annual resurgence conference due to some of the billed speakers pulling out.

What a mess.

As a side note: Josie and I have been greatly encouraged to have received a couple of emails and had a few conversations with people who have heard about some of these events and have urged us caution while visiting Mars Hill. We're really grateful to have friends who will humbly raise concerns with us and look out for us spiritually - thanks guys!

An essential part of this trip for us has been to learn from the positive examples set by a range of churches across the states. We've filled 10 hour drives and notepads with ideas and inspiration from great ministries led by Godly people. It has been 100 times more helpful to see first hand how these churches operate than it would have been to read their blogs posts on how churches ought to operate. I'm brimming with enthusiasm and love for the church and we're bursting with really practical methods, structures and ideas that will (God willing) help us in our ministry for years to come.

The other, and less emphasised, side of the coin is that we also want to learn from from the pitfalls and shortcomings of the churches we have visited. In some instances we have visited a church, worshipped Jesus, chatted with some members and left saying "Let's never do church like that!" In some ways those churches have taught us almost as much in terms of practical ministry pitfalls to avoid.

Mars Hill seems to be a mix of both. There are aspects of their ministry that every pastor should want to emulate (re-read those first couple of paragraphs! God has done tremendous good through this church in a remarkably hostile part of the country. It really is hard to overstate that). However the big take home for me is that character really is more important than reputation. Who you are is more important than who people think you are and, in the end, one of those two things will catch up to the other. If your character behind the scenes is controlling, power hungry, self-seeking or immature, it largely discredits all the good you have been working towards when it comes to light.

This whole year has been a mess for Driscoll with several bad (sinful) decisions that betray some pretty deep character flaws.

I am hugely grateful for Mark's preaching over the years but, for what it's worth, I do think that he ought to step down, at least for a year. It would give him time to feel the gravity of his responsibility and the hurt he has caused by being harsh in leadership. It would give him time to be with and focus on his family. It would be a time for the other church pastors of Mars Hill to grow and step up in leading and preaching. It would cause those who attend Mars Hill because he is a 'celebrity pastor' to leave and find other churches. It would cause those who attend Mars Hill because they believe God has called them to that place, for that mission and knit them into a family to rely more on God and to lean more on each other.

If you care about these things, or you've got a lot of time on your hands here are a couple of insightful blog posts on the issue that are reasonably well balanced.


Adrian Warnock - Thoughts on the Mark Driscoll and A29 controversy (This is a long one!)
Barnabas Piper - A Fall From Grace And A Need For Grace

To close, 3 thoughts:

1. All of this came about because he tried to publicly repent and reconcile. Interesting.
2. Mark is a Christian, Jesus has forgiven his sins. We shouldn't hold sins against someone if God himself doesn't.
3. No matter how gifted and successful you are publicly, who you really are privately matters a great deal.

All of that was a roundabout way of saying: We went to Mars Hill this Sunday and we learned loads from it. The welcome was genuine, the music was incredible, the message was encouraging and we were even invited to hang out with the students on Thursday at the park - should be fun.

2 comments:

  1. Hi Jimmy,

    I spoke negatively to you about Driscoll a year ago. I'm sure you remember. But I've felt a bit guilty for just telling you that you were wrong to take him seriously without giving a fuller explanation. You see, from some painful experiences a few years ago, if theres one thing I know a lot about its about abusive church leaders. The way he talks to people and especially the stories I read about how he has treated others resonate with the cult-like actions of my former 'church' leaders.

    The effect of it all disconnected me from organized religion somewhat, but gave me a greater need for good theology. I love learning about the nature of God. Andre Rabe is my favourite teacher on this at the moment for instance.

    Feel free to talk to me about any of this if you want to.
    And whatever sort of spiritual community you foster in the future, I pray they know the love of the Father better through you.

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  2. HI Jimmy thank for this, Mike and I have been concerned about Mark and the ongoings over there!!As you have said Mark is just a man and I kind of blame the church for setting up this pedestal from which he has fallen!!The Bible is full of stories of people who messed up but they loved God and He had a purpose for each of them which gives us all hope!!!I know God will use this for the furtherance of his kingdom as He can make All things good even after we kind of make a mess of things!!!So well done for your excellent blog, you and Josie will be awesome in His service and we will endeavour to pray for you both regularly. Stay safe and keep in touch, with love from 2 big (saved by grace) sinners!!Heidi & Mike!! xxx

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