After the resignation of Lead Pastor Heather Larson and all Willow Creek church elders last night, President and CEO of the Willow Creek Association Tom De Vries addressed the Bill Hybels controversy at the Global Leadership Summit this morning. Watch:
He seemed sorry for something and then said the Global Leadership Summit would continue doing good work as in the past. Many would disagree with De Vries self-justification. He said there will be three commitments. One is to promote an independent investigation of allegations against Hybels. A second commitment is to explore power dynamics between men and women in the workplace at the summit and then a commitment to extend the topic after the summit.
He also addressed why the WCA didn’t cancel the GLS this year. Essentially, he said leaders have to step out and do something (as if pausing isn’t doing something). Then he said they are doing it for the women attending and used numbers of host sites that don’t match his own website’s numbers. In other words, the world can’t go on without the GLS.
Imagine a World Without
It is this attitude (the world needs us) that turns me off and strikes me as presumptuous. I am open to reasons why the show must go on. Maybe somebody’s livelihood is dependent on it. I get that. But don’t tell me that the sun won’t come up or that women around the world would be lost without you.
I think this is what gets evangelical pastors — like Bill Hybels maybe?– into trouble. I think Mr. De Vries expressed some of that too. The GLS must go on because we need it to. No, actually we don’t. Find some other reason.
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Image fair use from GLS conference website.