Very wise, as usual, Mr J!

And as I posted earlier, the path may be set for him with the issues at the Naples church where he spoke earlier. Since the JMac supporters pulled the lease on the building effective March 2020, they (and any other JMac supporters in that church) can bring him and his buddies down to sunny Southwest Florida (by then he will be out of power for nearly a year, so he can claim “rehabilitation”), start the new congregation in the existing building (while the other congregation looks for a new place), lather, rinse, repeat.

And as I posted earlier, the path may be set for him with the issues at the Naples church where he spoke earlier. Since the JMac supporters pulled the lease on the building effective March 2020, they (and any other JMac supporters in that church) can bring him and his buddies down to sunny Southwest Florida (by then he will be out of power for nearly a year, so he can claim “rehabilitation”), start the new congregation in the existing building (while the other congregation looks for a new place), lather, rinse, repeat.

The fact that this is coming so late just means that the lawyers have finally convinced JMac that he must issue some kind of public statement. It takes a long time to get through an ego the size of the one he has. But lawyers do not apologize, they carefully word things so that there is no actual admittance of guilt that can be admitted into a later trial. I have no doubt that this man was looking for murder-for-hire hitmen at least twice. This will never be confessed and the whole thing was b.s. carefully worded by lawyers. Any people who are still following such an evil man will suffer the consequences of utter foolishness. I think God allows this just so the rest of us can see how bad this worship of celebrities has gotten to in Western Christianity. When attempted murder gets a pass, where how much worse can it get than that?

This is all about Mammon and the closely related saving of face. JMac’s old org is in the process of going literally bankrupt and the “new” elders are trying to plug holes in the failing dam with their fingers. JMac has always been a psychopath wanting to con people out of their money and making himself out to be bigger than life. Insiders have wanted the new elders to publicly call out his sins and so much pressure has been brought to bare. JMac wants to get more Mammon out of an organization that does not have any.

My Repentance
I was, am, and will remain very sorry for the careless and hurtful words that were illegally recorded and publicized.

Right off the bat, he airs a grievance that is completely irrelevant to his behavior. More so, if they had not been recorded and publicized when they were, he’d still very likely be senior pastor at Harvest and angrily denying all claims of his aberrant behavior. He’s upset he got caught.

These sin issues had been points of growth and victory as expressed through my preaching and writing, but I fell back beginning in late 2016 and have only myself to blame.

I believe the issues have been going on far longer than 2016.

I wrestled with the stress I felt, the injustice I endured, etc.

“Not really my fault — if only people hadn’t been unfairly attacking me all the time and causing me so much stress.”

As part of this, I have come to see my sin of handling pressure in a way that got things done

“Hey, guys, I may have been an a-hole, but I was a highly effective a-hole, don’t you forget that!”

Decisions by the current Elder/staff, along with inaccurate announcements and recent public condemnation, signaled clearly the timing to communicate our message directly. With sadness we accept that no face-to-face confession or truth-advancing interaction will be forthcoming.

There is absolutely nothing to stop MacDonald from making face-to-face confessions. The real problem is that he still feels Harvest owes him — whether it’s back pay, or retirement funds, or other ministry assets he developed while he was in their employ — so any such confession is clearly still contingent on them playing ball with him, which they are right not to do.

So yeah, everything he’s said and done so far is clearly just part of a carefully calculated plan to get himself back into the game — a highly profitable ministry of some kind. This is not the confession of a truly repentant man.

Ever heard of Mark Driscoll? Ted Haggard? Even Andy Savage is getting back in the ministerial saddle.

MacDonald will be back. Like a bad penny.