Category: Religion

Joshua Harris and C.J. Mahaney No Longer Listed As Gospel Coalition Council Members

Checking out a lead that Joshua Harris and C.J. Mahaney had resigned from the Gospel Coalition Council, I asked the editor of the GC, Joe Carter, for comment. He wrote back to say that the GC isn’t commenting on the resignations and referred me to Harris and Mahaney for additional information.
The current Council page does not list either minister whereas the Google cache on May 16 shows both men.
Both men are leaders in the Sovereign Grace Ministries which has been rocked this week by the conviction of Nathan Morales, former member of former SGM flagship church Covenant Life Church on charges of child abuse. The church has been on the defensive due to allegations that senior leadership of the church knew of the allegations but did not report them to authorities.
This morning Joshua Harris tweeted his reason for resignation:


 

Megachurch Methods: And By Mars Hill Global We Mean Mars Hill Local

Yesterday, I posted a Mars Hill Church document about the rebranding of Mars Hill Global as a revenue source. The document was sent out by MH Pastor Sutton Turner in 2011 to the Media and Communications Teams and began:

When it comes to giving potential, Mars Hill Church’s global audience is a sleeping giant.

Since 2011, the giant has indeed ceased from slumber. At a recent Mars Hill vision breakfast meeting, this slide was presented to the congregation:

These numbers are increasing rapidly while overall giving has been flat, and according to sources in Mars Hill, declining in recent months.  In fact, the situation is troubling enough that sources tell me that the church will be approaching an entity known internally as “The Lucas Group” to help raise money. In addition, I have heard from several former staff members that the amount of Mars Hill Global money disbursed on behalf of missions outside of the United States is very low, less than 5%.
According to these sources, the rest of the funds are pooled in the general fund which is used to support administration of the  Mars Hill franchises. Consistent with that claim is the fact that MHG website lists the United States as a target of Mars Hill Global. All the franchises are listed, including the churches surrounding Seattle. Reviewing the April Mars Hill Global newsletter, it looks like global is local with most of the material being about the U.S. churches.
In 2011, Sutton Turner asked if there was a better name than Mars Hill Global for the cultivation of the international giving base. I think the better name would be Mars Hill Church.
 
 

Megachurch Methods: Mars Hill Global Wakes the Sleeping Giant

Subtitle: “Mars Hill Global Cultivates the Giving Base.”
Like businesses and other organizations, megachurches like to brand things. They brand pastors (Mark Driscoll: “I am the brand!”), and brand ministries. Probably nothing really wrong with that if the brand accurately represents what is being done and offered. For Mars Hill Church, Mars Hill Global is a phrase that describes the Christian market outside of Seattle. According to the MHG web presence, Mars Hill has things going on in Ethiopia, India, and online which is everywhere else.
In addition to whatever else it is, MHG appears to be a source of funding for Mars Hill Church. In November 2011, Mars Hill Executive Pastor Sutton Turner sent a document to the Media and Communications Team touting Mars Hill Global as a way to cultivate the international “giving base.” The document is here:

Note the prime purpose for MHG is to cultivate donations to Mars Hill. The strategy involves what appears to be a lot of good things, but it is hard to escape the impression that the end game is an increase in revenue.
Mars Hill Global existed prior to this memo. However, this memo promoted a new strategy. As a part of that strategy, the Media and Communications team is urged to “Craft the Origin Story.” Everybody likes a good origin story. Perhaps Mark Driscoll really did receive letters requesting resources. But maybe he didn’t. It is hard to tell. I can’t tell from the current website what story was originally crafted.
Currently, MHG takes in about $300,000 monthly. This is a dramatic increase from when this memo was sent. Apparently, the sleeping giant is awake.
 

Things I Learned Reading the Christianity Today Article on the Acts 29 (We're Not Mark Driscoll Anymore) Network

Christianity Today’s Joe Maxwell posted an extended interview today with Matt Chandler, leader of Acts 29 Network.  I learned a few things while reading it, and recommend you read it too.
1. Acts 29 apparently does not want to be viewed as an extension of Mars Hill and Mark Driscoll – Former Mars Hill elder Tyler Powell told CT:

“Here, we’re our own entity,” says Powell, North American assessment director. “We’re not planting mini–Mars Hills or mini–Mark Driscolls. We’re centrally located but decentralized.”

I guess the Acts 29 folks felt that was important to get across.
2. Mark Driscoll is an introvert.
3. Acts 29 isn’t a denomination. – Perhaps implying that Mars Hill’s franchise approach comes across as a denomination, the operations guys at Acts 29 addressed the perception that Acts 29 is in pre-denomination mode.

Some of Adair’s PCA peers call Acts 29 “a quasi-denomination or something like that,” he says.
“I understand the perception. I just disagree with it.”

4. It is apparently fine to be a charismatic and an actively involved Southern Baptist. Chandler said he is involved in the Southern Baptist Convention (his church is the 9th largest in the SBC), and he believes the “sign gifts” (e.g., healing, tongues) continue today. Perhaps that is common now, but it surprises me.
5. The network that doesn’t want to be a denomination seeks uniformity in pastoral leadership assessed via personality testing. In particular, the DiSC has been borrowed from industrial psychology to help categorize people, much in the way some organizations use the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator.
6. The network that doesn’t want to be a denomination asks for 1% of a member churches’ budgets. This is what my denomination does, even though they don’t enforce it.
Just prior to the announcement that Mark Driscoll would leave the Acts 29 board, Mars Hill launched a plan to expand their church planting brand: Mars Hill Global. The church continued (and may still) to support Acts 29 but Mars Hill Global has become a big part of the MH brand. Stay tuned for more to come on that topic…

Alabama Chief Justice Roy Moore Says First Amendment Only Protects Christians

This is a few days old but still worth talking about.
Alabama Chief Justice Roy Moore preached a sermon recently in which he said the First Amendment only applies to people who believe in the God of the Bible.
Here is the video:
[youtube]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZY8xf1uJOqI[/youtube]
At 1:15, Moore said:

Everybody, to include the Supreme Court, in the United States has been deceived as to one little word in the First Amendment called religion. They can’t define it. That’s what the 10 Commandments’ case was about, I wanted to define it but they backed off just decided not to take the case because they can’t, can’t define it the way Mason, Madison and even the United States supreme court defined it, “The duties we owe to the Creator and the manner of discharging it.” They don’t wanna do that, that acknowledges the Creator God. Buddha didn’t create us. Muhammad didn’t create us. It’s the God of the Holy Scriptures. They didn’t bring the Koran over on the pilgrim ship. Let’s get real, let’s go back and learn our history. Let’s stop playing games.

I’ve been over this before. The Founders used the word religion to signify a person’s conscience and beliefs about God, however conceived. Some, such as early Supreme Court Justice Joseph Story, claimed that the framers meant “sects of Christianity” but those who debated the Constitution in the states and some of the Founders took a different point of view. There is no religious test for public service in the Constitution. See the links below for more on why the First Amendment does apply to all religions.
Moore has been supported by the Institute on the Constitution and aligns with the Christian reconstructionist movement. I feel sorry for the citizens of Alabama.
For further reading on this topic, see:
Did the First Amendment Create a Christian Nation?
Politifact Debunks Bryan Fischer’s Christianity Only View of the First Amendment
Does Ted Cruz Believe the First Amendment is Only for Christians?
Answering Matt Barber on Jefferson and the First Amendment
Dean of Liberty Law School Says Islam Not Protected by the First Amendment
AFA takes a stand on religious freedom
David Barton: Pluralism not the goal of the First Amendment