Inside Mars Hill's massive meltdown
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EmailA recent outpouring of accounts by former church members of Mars Hill, Seattle's own homegrown megachurch, are painting a picture, both fascinating and horrifying, of outrageous and psychologically damaging behavior that's been happening inside the church for many years.
Women's Training Day at one of Mars Hill's Seattle meetinghouses. Photo: Mars Hill Church
There are emerging stories of sensational kangaroo courts and "sex demon" trials, like something out of the Salem witch hunts of the 1600s. Even more devastating to individual members are the ways in which they are shamed, taught to blame themselves and each other when they see problems, and to formally shun people who step out of favor with church leaders. Shunnings, both formal and informal, have caused the outcast to spend years in isolation, cut off from friends, sometimes suffering deep clinical depression, nightmares, disillusionment and shattered faith.
New heartbreaking stories are emerging almost every week, some told by people who were once prominent leaders, including a cofounder and former pastor of Mars Hill, who describes himself at Mars Hill as "driven by Narcissism and anti-social tendencies."
As insiders begin to open up, financial scandals are also rising to the surface. Former pastors say the church is being run more like a cutthroat business, where people who give up their secular jobs to serve the church are then abruptly fired on a whim. The threat of witholding severance pay is used to secure their silence in the form of non-disclosure agreements and non-complete clauses. But several former pastors have now refused to comply.
Recently, a former member started a petition at change.org requesting financial transparency. It asks Driscoll to reveal his salary, which is estimated by a few insiders I spoke to to be somewhere in the ballpark of $900,000, and it raises questions about how much of the $2 million donated to the church's Global Fund in the 2012-2013 fiscal year actually made it to Ethiopia and India.
A few days ago, the church sent an email to members. "Mars Hill has now admitted that money given to the Global Fund actually went in the church’s General Fund and mostly was spent on expanding Mars Hill video sites," writes Warren Throckmorton, whose blog at Patheos.com has become a major conduit of information about the church.
As of publication time, requests for comment on these and other issues went unanswered.
Collectively, the stories that are emerging help explain how a whole community came under the control of one man, and why, even years after leaving the fold, most have chosen to remain silent, until now.
The problems in the church haven't always been so obvious. In the beginning, Mars Hill church was a grassroots Seattle start-up with a 90s indie rock approach to organized religion.
Exuding charisma, the church's young leader, Mark Driscoll, managed to make stories from the Bible entertaining and accessible. Unlike many other Christian evangelicals, he did not think that beer, electric guitars, married sex and mixed martial arts were at odds with Jesus.
Driscoll preaches a theology that counts homosexuality as a sin. He casts females as destined to play a supporting role, always orbitting the male lead. Though many didn't like what Driscoll had to say, or how he said it, quite a few people did.
Married to his highschool sweetheart, Grace, Driscoll presents himself, then and now, as having a lockdown on what it means to be a card-carrying godly heterosexual man's man. Brash and bossy, a smooth operator with sharp edges, he has what one former member describes as "Chris Rock talent." He made people laugh, and it drew them to him. As it turns out, once they were close, he also made a lot of people cry.
But somehow, despite the rocky road including a mass exodus of an estimated 1000 people in 2007 — a period which many point to as a dark turning point — Mars Hill transformed from a scrappy enterprise with meetings in Driscoll's living room into an expansive multi-million dollar enterprise, with 15 campuses in five states and headquarters in downtown Bellevue. Driscoll's lively and at times alarming Sunday sermons are live-streamed to rapt audiences, amplified through high quality sound systems and projected onto drop-down movie screens.
In the late 1990s, when the church was just a few years old, Mars Hill got a massive boost in street cred when cofounder Lief Moi purchased an old movie theater in the University District, the Paradox, and turned it over to be used as an all-ages music venue, hosting shows for secular local bands almost every night.
It was a rock n' roll ministry, with rock n' roll preachers and a rock n' roll Jesus. Here and there, talented local musicians were recruited to play in the church's worship bands, so that instead of organ music or gospel choirs, church-goers were greeted by electric guitar riffs, bass lines and young Christians with full sleeve tattoos crooning into the mic. A lot of Seattle's 20-somethings started turning out for services.
A member is baptized during Easter service at Mars Hill's Samammish location. Photo: Mars Hill Church
Recently, this alt-music fueled strategy backfired after Mary Lambert, who once attended Mars Hill, wound up singing about the church in Macklemore's hit "Same Love." Lambert used to listen to Driscoll's sermons railing against homosexuality and feel miserable, but after leaving the church, her pain lifted. "And I can't change, even if I tried, even if I wanted to. My love, my love, my love, she keeps me warm," she sings in a gorgeous melodic refrain.
At right: Lambert performs "She Keeps Me Warm" at SXSW 2014. Photo: WFUV
The hit single now has 122 million views on YouTube. "Love is patient, love is kind, I'm not crying on Sundays, not crying on Sundays."
If they came for the music, or if they came for the message, what many people also found at church was overwhelming attention. Church-goers are quickly assigned to community groups that meet weekly. They also get pulled into informal counseling and mentoring sessions, trainings and classes, to the point that church can become like another job, taking up all of a person's spare time. But these structured activities also help foster deep friendships and emotional bonds.
The church is apparently able to provide an intensely emotional ambiance, such that many people interpret their experience there as how they "met Jesus."
At first, many people feel embraced, as if by family, perhaps the family they dreamed of but never had. But somewhere along the way, the hug turns into a stranglehold, a vice-grip that tightens every time a person asks a question, voices an opinion or stands up against mistreatment or abuse.
Patterns of abuse, particularly the psychologically damaging practice of shunning, first came to widespread attention for many outside Mars Hill with reporter Brendan Riley's 2012 expose, "Church or Cult?" published by the Stranger, which detailed the shunning of a young man for not repenting to the degree that church authorities thought he should.
"To them, repentence is groveling at their feet as if they are god," said former member Rob Thain Smith — who was pushed out of the church and has a blog, Musings from Underneath the Bus.
Merle and Rob Thain Smith, in their 40s when they joined in 2002, initially found the church's youthful energy to be exciting, engaging and dynamic. They were attracted to Driscoll's take on "freedom," and to the church's original structure which shared power and decision-making among two dozen male elders. From South Africa, the couple knew the dangers of repressive governments from apartheid. "I fled that environment," says Thain Smith, who builds boats and also runs a non-profit providing aid to African orphans.
At church, the Smiths were recruited to serve as informal marriage counselors, with Merle also mentoring women one-on-one. She worked closely with a pastor named Bent Meyer, whom she describes as a gentle man.
Like many others, the troubles for the Smiths began in 2007, when Driscoll decided to suspend the voting powers of the 24 elders, and consolidate power into the hands of a few hand-picked men. For disagreeing with this massive change, Meyer was fired and another pastor, Paul Petry, was put on trial. Smith recalls how, after he sent an email to the elders about the trial seeming unfair, Driscoll called him at 7 in the morning and told him he would destroy him. Then, on the same call, "he apologized," recounts Smith, "even sounding teary. Then he would start up say the same things again. It was like Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde."
Smith's reputation was destroyed, he said, when Driscoll labeled him "divisive." In the highly charged environment of Mars Hill, this became one of the most feared words in the English language, akin to being labeled a counter-revolutionary in Maoist China. Repentence trials seemed more like class struggle meetings. Still, many stayed quiet, out of fear or misplaced loyalty, sometimes even coming to believe the charges against them, and quietly leaving the church in shame. Though the only weapons were words, the words were like a spiritual death sentence.
People are genuinely afraid of Driscoll, especially the men, said Smith. Women have often been the first to stand up to Driscoll.
"He's calling on men to be men," Smith said, "and all the men are cowering."
At right: Mark Driscoll's moment of high school yearbook fame. Photo: Cheryl Hammond
It was during this period, around the mid-2000s that Driscoll started using more violent language to discredit people.
"I think these guys were trying to do due diligence and to rein Mark in in a healthy way, and at some point he got tired of being reined in," said Wendy Alsup, who led theology classes for women at Mars Hill. She recently helped start the website "We Love Mars Hill," one of many sites where former members are posting stories, and has her own blog Theology for Women.
Driscoll would talk about an ex-elder having been "put through the wood chipper." He also likened someone to "a fart in an elevator." At one point, on a church social networking site, he told a man to "shut up your wife or I'll do it for you."
"He was just brutal," she said. "When he said these things, we all just hung our heads."
Alsup quickly learned to fear the power of group disapproval.
"They're going to project onto me that I am a bitter, nagging, contentious, gossip, manipulator. I learned to rein in my own voice."
Church cofounder Lief Moi has recently published an account of his departure from the church, also during the 2007 period. He is the one who describes himself as acting out of narcissism, and describes a philosophy of growth at any cost. "It has been written, spoke of and declared, that in order for a church to be 'On Mission' that sometimes people need to be 'Run over by the bus' and a large pile of bodies is a good thing. I know where this kind of thinking came from because I believed it to be true and was in full agreement," Moi writes. "I tell you this because this is who I was when I helped plant MH and I believe some of the values and practices of MH have come from this perspective."
Driscoll demonstrates a passing familiarity with narcissism in his most recent book, Real Marriage.
"As a pastor, I recognize that in theological terms, narcissists want to be the center of attention, like a god," Driscoll writes, "and have people worship them by paying attention to them, buying the products they promote, and emulating their behavior."
The book gained notoriety when leaked documents showed that the only reason it skyrocketed to the top of the New York Times bestseller list was because church executives used church money to pay a marketing firm to game the system. For $210,000 in tithing funds, the company purchased thousands of copies of the book, lending it the false appearance of influential popularity.
Church executive pastor, Sutton Turner, later allegedly sent an email to a member, asking for a pardon. "Please forgive me for my poor stewardship," Turner wrote in the message, which was posted online. "I take that very seriously as a King."
The fear that church members felt when Driscoll's anger is centered on them is palpable.
"If Mark had had ecclesiastical power to burn Paul at the stake I believe he would have," writes Jonna Petry, at Joyful Exiles. It was standing up for Petry's husband that caused the Smiths to be put under church discipline and leave.
Petry describes how she and her family were eventually shunned by all but a few friends, but, before she knew the pain of being the receiving end, she also describes practicing it herself, when a friend of hers was fired by Driscoll.
"Regretfully, I treated my friend, Karen, horribly," Petry writes. "After she was fired I stopped seeing her altogether. I was afraid of what it might mean for me if I continued as her friend. It was never spoken but rather understood that to remain in contact with her would be unwise. So with fear and pride in tow I conformed to the toxic system in order to show respect and loyalty."
Merle Smith describes how, even six years after leaving the church, she's still recovering.
"After we left Mars Hill, I found myself in a very hard place. I really didn't want relationships," she said. "I didn't want to go [to church], and I didn't want to see anybody." Her isolation also drew her into a closer spiritual communion with Jesus, she said, but still, she's lonely.
"These years since we left Mars Hill have really been some of the hardest of my life."
SEX
It was also around the mid-2000s that members noticed Driscoll's growing preoccupation with sex.
Driscoll also started to preach more about male privilege and sexual entitlement. This had a damaging impact on many marriages, said Rob Thain Smith, who, with Merle, was acting as an informal marriage counselor to many young couples.
"He created enormous abuse of wives," Smith said. "He helped young men objectify women, by his over emphasis of sexualization of women and subservience."
"The way Driscoll talked, you thought that he was getting it every night. All these men are seeing his hot wife, and are thinking he's got it made."
Mark and Grace Driscoll and their kids are honored for Mark's 15 years of service to the church at a 2011 Mars Hill service. Photo: Mars Hill Church.
In Real Marriage, Driscoll bitterly describes a largely sexless marriage, and seems to imply that he's been acting out all these years because he was sexually frustrated at home.
Smith discouraged me from reading the book. "I don't recommend it," he said. "It's disturbing."
REAL MARRIAGE
Even the subtitle of Real Marriage — "The Truth About Sex, Friendship & Love" — implies that reality has, until now, been in short supply.
In the book, co-written by Grace Driscoll, she is frank and forthcoming about the abusive relationship she was in prior to meeting Mark in high school. This previous boyfriend was possessive, controlled her schedule, stalked her, and sexually assaulted her.
This abuse contributed to her emotional numbness and dissassociation during sex, she said, and she kept the story hidden for most of her life, out of a sense of shame. She seems to be in the middle of her healing process, and does not seem to have a clear idea that being sexually assaulted was not her fault.
While Mrs. Driscoll is bravely bringing to light extremely personal struggles in her life, Mr. Driscoll seems more interested in focusing on other people.
About his childhood, he mentions a series of disturbing influences.
"Ted Bundy and the Green River Killer picked up many of their victims in my neighborhood, even dumping at least two of their bodies at my Little League field," says Driscoll, who grew up in the Sea-Tac area.
"The men on my father's side include uneducated alcoholics, mental patients, and women beaters," Driscoll begins. "This includes an uncle who died of gangrene and his sons, roughly my age, who have been in prison for beating women ... One of the main reasons my parents moved from North Dakota to Seattle was to get away from some family members when I was a very young boy."
Driscoll fails to acknowledge that running away rarely stops the cycle of abuse. How did his family deal with it? Was Driscoll's father among the men who were abusive? As one member put it: "Crickets."
Parsing out the things that Driscoll says can quickly lead a person down the rabbit hole, where everything is upside-down, backwards or distorted. In a portion of the book about the dangers of consuming pornography, Driscoll again brings up Ted Bundy, providing an excerpt of Bundy's last interview as a cautionary tale against consuming pornography.
"I grew up in a wonderful home with two dedicated and loving parents," begins the quoted passage. Driscoll presents Bundy's account of blaming his serial murders solely on his addiction to porn as credible, and does not reveal important context about Bundy's true exposure to family abuse. According to Bundy's defense lawyer, his mother was living in a home for unmarried pregnant women when she gave birth to him, and that family members speculated that Bundy's grandfather, who was highly abusive to Bundy's grandmother, could also be his father.
It would be perverse understatement to say that Driscoll and other elders at Mars Hill seem ill-equipped to counsel people who have been sexually abused. The church seems to equate being abused with doling it out. "We are all made dirty and defiled through the sins we commit and the sins committed against us. Jesus makes us clean," reads a church Facebook post on the matter.
Blogger Matthew Paul Turner has posted another disturbing account by another exile of Mars Hill, a woman who under the psuedonym "Amy" describes what it was like to get marital advice from Driscoll.
"Once, when I shared with Mark that I felt neglected in my marriage, he told [me] that I was being a nagging wife and that I needed to suck it up. That was something Mark preached about a lot — the nagging wife.”
Later, Driscoll told her and her husband that she was beset by sex demons.
"Mark stared hard at Amy and began yelling questions at her 'sex demons'. His fierce glare seemed to look past her as he screamed his questions at her face. He asked the demons what their names were. He asked them about sex. He asked them about Amy’s past sexual sins. He asked them about Amy’s current lustful thoughts. He asked them if they were planning to destroy marriages in his church. And then he asked whose marriages were they planning to destroy and how. And then, according to Amy, Mark cast the demons out."
After Amy filed for divorce, she, too, was shunned.
With all of the bad things happening to people at church, it begs the question, why do people stay?
Warren Throckmorton, a professor at a Christian college outside Pittsburgh, Penn., who first started blogging about Mars Hill while looking into allegations of plagiarism in Driscoll's books said that what kept his interest were Driscoll's claims that he can see other people's sins.
"You can keep people in a movement by making them responsible," said Throckmorton, who has studied new religious movements, "by giving them a position and telling them 'You'd be letting people down if you quit. You'd be hurting people. You've already commiteed to this, you're going to look like you don't know what you believe.'"
"People think to themselves, 'How can I go against what I've said in public? I just stood up last month and said what a great church this is.' On the cognitive end of things, it's been a comfortable viewpoint. You think, 'This makes sense, it gives me a purpose.'"
"People go through a period of questioning before they ever leave anything."
Jonna Petry describes what it feels like to be caught in a delusion. "I have come to believe that when idolatry is at play, it often creates and allows for an unreality to take hold of those who participate, as if under a spell, unable to see or hear the truth because it is all filtered through a projected 'reality.' But it is a false reality — a delusion. I believe this dynamic is often true in cults where there is one dominant, charismatic, controlling leader," she writes.
After the mass exodus of 2007, the church continued to grow. In 2009, Driscoll's growing celebrity led to a profile in the New York Times Magazine, "Who Would Jesus Smackdown?", where he was portrayed as at the zeitgeist of an emerging "New Calvinist" movement. Mars Hill claims 14,000 members, and, in a missionary effort, hundreds of enthusiastic Mars Hill adopters have dispersed around the world, like dandelion seeds on a breeze, creating a network of over 400 loosely affiliated churches. Driscoll has stepped down from leading the Acts 29 Network, and no longer sits on the board of directors.
Currently, attendance is down by 1000 people at the church's Bellevue meetinghouse, a former member told me. Almost the entire staff has turned over, with an estimated 40 pastors and hundreds of staff who quit, fired or were laid off in the last two years.
Nevertheless, the church is advertising a new meetinghouse set to open in Spokane.
At the Bellevue meetinghouse, situated next door to Barnes and Noble and near Bellevue Square mall, with its clusters of Edison bulbs and contemporary minimalist furniture, the church feels kind of like an Ikea showroom. A week ago, when I attended a service, Driscoll wasn't there. Instead another pastor, Dave Bruskas was video-streamed in from someplace else.
Right: Greeters at Mars Hill's Bellevue location. Photo: Mars Hill Church.
He humble-bragged about not being cool enough to watch trendy TV shows, except "Breaking Bad," a reference I found interesting because several bloggers have called Driscoll the Walter White of organized religion. In what felt like blatant grasping to connect with the young audience, he talked about the recent tearful conversion of a man named "Buck," whom he portrayed as a super cool alternative Albuquerque D.J., but who in reality does the morning show for a Clear Channel station. Bruskas said the word "Jesus" so many times, I felt like I might be going into a hypnotic trance.
The sermon was prefaced and book-ended by a six-piece Christian indie-rock band. One young man in the audience kept putting his hand up in the air. At first, I thought he had a question, but later other people did it too, and I realized he must be feeling the music.
Paradoxically, many of the Christian values that attracted members to Mars Hill in the first place, have been found after leaving the church.
Former members are using the anarchy of the internet to take responsibility for their lives, telling their stories and seeking forgiveness directly from each other. They are by-passing clergymen and confessing to the world at large.
"People are apologizing to each other left and right," Alsup told me, "each one of us understanding that we were all afraid. ... We're a lot bolder and blunter than we've ever been with each other. It's been neat to find our voice again."
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Comments:
Posted Wed, Jul 16, 8:34 a.m. Inappropriate
Posted Wed, Jul 16, 11:18 a.m. Inappropriate
This is so shocking...so unprecedented in the history of religious movements...so unexpected an indication of vulnerabilities in the psyche of the Believer...such distressing evidence that a fool IS born every moment...
When will the Kool-Aid be served?
Posted Wed, Jul 16, 11:41 a.m. Inappropriate
Suspicions confirmed- once again. JG-
Posted Wed, Jul 16, 12:02 p.m. Inappropriate
There are a multitude of spelling and grammatical errors in the article's text. A simple use of spellcheck (at the very least) was in order here, ahead of publication.
Posted Thu, Jul 17, 4:20 p.m. Inappropriate
AcerSpade, you're assuming Crosscut has editors who give a crap about professionalism (and about making a writer look at least literate). That's an unjustified assumption.
Posted Wed, Jul 16, 1:12 p.m. Inappropriate
- Captain James T Kirk
Posted Thu, Jul 17, 1:07 p.m. Inappropriate
Can I just like this, i know it's not facebook... But the star trek fan in me appreciates the irony of your comment...giggle.
Posted Wed, Jul 16, 4:09 p.m. Inappropriate
Like lambs to the slaughter. How many more will religion claim?
Never trust a religious person, they will always find an excuse to screw you, or maybe kill you in the name
Of their vengeful god.
Posted Wed, Jul 16, 5 p.m. Inappropriate
And it is all tax-free!!! Yay for Religion!!!
Posted Wed, Jul 16, 9:22 p.m. Inappropriate
Mars Hill is not religion; it's a dictatorship.
Posted Thu, Jul 17, 8:41 a.m. Inappropriate
What people don't realize is how far reaching this pollution is. My story starts several years ago when my local church of which I was a member became entangled in Acts 29. This was still during the time Mark was at the helm. Our church was thriving when our new pastor took over with many outreach programs, such as a recovery group, and food pantry. We knew who we were, until the new pastor began talking about being "relevant" a buzz word used alot in Mars Hill communities everywhere. He introduced us to the doctrine of Driscoll and began extolling the man's virtues from the pulpit and hawking his books as well. We soon had a little bookstore out front full of reformed theology writers most out of the Acts 29 or Mars Hill publishing groups. Any book on Marks reading list was soon on ours, funny thing though, people started leaving. Just up and gone out of the blue, longtime church memebers. Deacons began stepping down as well. Soon they were replaced with young men who seemed to not be as grounded in the word as they were just kinda cool. While we saw all this change we also began hearing about how broke we were. We were struggling to pay our utilities after years of being fine. Our mortgage was late, and why? Well the only people that seemed relevant enough to the leadership were the young and grungy crowd, the youth and young adults were elevated and the older stable and tithing couples well they just aren't the face of Mars Hill or Acts 29 are they? We lost our heritage and our tithing base when they left, in the arrogance of our leadership they just weren't the face they wanted to project. But I know as well as others, that when our older bedrock couples left we were heading for disaster. Many friends had left, one Sunday after the Pastor had preached transparency I went into our church office and asked for a copy of the budget and financials. The secretary gave me all of it, even the stuff I should not see. I don't believe this was a accident on her part. When I went through the paperwork, I found all our savings gone, and a credit card bill that had over 6 months inflated to over 16.000.00!!! I found that we were paying as a church for the pastors cell phone bill of over 400 dollars a month, he had a housing allowance, insurance and a salary that for our small area was way ABOVE average. But folks, we weren't tithing enough. It was our problem not the problems of the pastor fleecing his flock. I was very upset. I was hurting as I loved this church and could not believe it had been hijacked. Women no longer had many roles available to us, we just weren't being allowed to serve unless it was in complimentary roles, or in the children's ministries. Our programs were wiped out by our lack of funds, meanwhile our pastors would charge our church mileage as they traveled to the church plant we had in a nearby town. The Acts 29 network was killing us and one day my husband and I stood up. I had been hearing lots of rumors about other financial dirty deals so my husband spoke to a pastor. It took them all of a day to call us into meetings. The first one I was told I was reading the paperwork wrong and then they had me hand it over. They said since I could not understand it they thought I should hand it back. I said no problem having made lots of copies beforehand. The next meeting I was called out for being a gossip based on the pastors hearing supposedly stories about me going around town from people. People I might add that never showed up to these meetings. It went from bad to worse, and eventually we were told they wanted us out. We told them we would pray about what our next steps should be and let them know. I had done none of the things they were accusing me of, except for a FB posts that were very mild. Yes, they even monitored my FB page and brought screen shots of comments I had made the week before. sigh. We prepared our kids for us leaving and took them one last time to their youth group so they could say goodbye to their friends and went to church our last Sunday morning to say goodbye and hug a few close friends. To our surprise we were pulled out of the worship service that morning and threatened by that group of men with a police officer if we did not leave immediately. Seriously. I had been a member there for over five years, my husband and I had served and tithed and loved our church and now that group of men were going to arrest us. Our children were with us so we left with them crying and asking our escorts why they were doing this. We later found out why they wanted us gone, the pastor from the pulpit informed the whole church about our "sin" Mark Driscoll style and handed a letter out to over 300 people naming us, calling our sin out and calling my husband out for not leading our home. In other words not shutting up his wife. It took less than two months after we left for them to put the church in bancruptcy and leave the church in ruins, they then moved to a smaller church building stripped out the old one of anything they could carry moved it into the new one and kept up the shop of preaching and teaching the gospel of Mark Driscoll. We lost a vibrant thirty year old church and million dollar campus, and many outreach programs. All for the sake of the Acts 29 heresy. This is happening in many other places even now, the doctrine has not changed, just the leadership. Many older churches are being taken over by Acts 29 and either being absorbed or end up like ours just a dead and empty building with the hurting and wounded surrounding it. I pray for everyone of the those church members right now and hope they will see the light and continue to leave...RUN>GETOUT>SAVE YOURSELVES
Posted Thu, Jul 17, 10:52 a.m. Inappropriate
Hi Rebecca Lynn,
Thank you for sharing your story here. That's devastating. And I agree, most people, including me, are unaware of how far these predatory practices have spread, how many people are being severed from their communities and places of worship and how much money is being hoovered up in the process. I'm curious where this happened? I'm at slsolie at gmail dot com if you want to talk more.
Posted Thu, Jul 17, 12:49 p.m. Inappropriate
I will email you this evening. thanks. rebecca
Posted Thu, Jul 17, 10:15 a.m. Inappropriate
In case you were unaware of your possible Mars Hill support: http://www.thestranger.com/seattle/coffee-and-mars-hill/Content?oid=17866798
Posted Thu, Jul 17, 10:50 a.m. Inappropriate
rebeccalynn1973...your story is very important and would be valuable in the course of the conversations by many who are concerned that change come to both Mars Hill and the Acts29 churches. Would you consider sharing it with others? There is a group on FB that is closed, so stays within the group and not broadcast outside. It is called REPEAL THE BYLAWS - EXONERATE PASTORS PETRY & MEYER. If you would prayerfully consider joining and sharing I think there is great value in your story.
Posted Thu, Jul 17, 12:47 p.m. Inappropriate
Thank you I will look into it. My story has been published by the wartburg watch already so some of the victims may have heard it. I have found a lot of comfort in sharing and speaking out. Of course that has painted a big target on my back as well. Trolls tend to try and smear me at every turn inferring that I am really the one at fault for all of this. No matter of the facts, they really don't care for those...instead they come at me when ever I speak out. Despite that our family is doing well, you see we did not walk away from our faith we are in a healthy church doing well. Our pastor has no complaints about my behavior or for that matter my husbands. I have found safety at last. One of my good friends happens to be his wife. I have come full circle and my message is that yes awful stuff happened to me, but God is still good. He can and will heal our pain if we let him. Why speak out if things are so good? Because there are many more of me stuck in the Acts 29 churches and Mars Hill type churches. Many more afraid to question or leave. My message to them is just go, leave, save yourself the pain and heartache. IT will get better, there are safe places, churches that you will be loved in. You don't have to put up with the garbage. What they think of you matters not, it is only what the God who made you thinks that matters......
Posted Thu, Jul 17, 11:02 a.m. Inappropriate
The next meeting I was called out for being a gossip based on the pastors hearing "supposedly stories about me going around town from people." -RebeccaLynn1973
When you go around nonstop posting things about MarsHill it's probably not a stretch to imagine that you were going around gossiping about your local congregation. The fact that they addressed it and you were unrepentant just has you coming across as immature.
These links are all posts where you post about the same thing. They're varied enough in time frame to demonstrate you should probably pursue a new hobby.
http://thewartburgwatch.com/2013/12/06/replanting-countryside-acts-29-style-a-personal-testimony/
http://mutteringheart.com/2014/06/03/mars-hill-stealing-and-destroying-congregations-right-from-under-our-noses/
https://www.facebook.com/stuffchristianculturelikes/posts/10151833871146534
http://www.kirotv.com/videos/news/video-kiro-7-investigates-mars-hill-church/vCP8LX/
Posted Thu, Jul 17, 12:27 p.m. Inappropriate
My story is out there no doubt. I begin speaking out after my stories were published in the wartburg watch. I don't hide it. Never did. Unlike the pastors and deacons at my church who repeatedly dragged my family through the mud with the allegations they made never once producing one person who actually heard me say or do something wrong. Why? If we had supposedly sinned were no people who observed my sin especially called in? You see that is how churches under Mark's direction work. I am flattered that dmarmott and other trolls find the time to track my many comments about this harmful church movement. I have found my voice and have used it. For awhile I hid with my pain, when I finally was willing to talk about my experiences it helped me heal. I am stronger today than I was, and I don't care if people believe me or not. My story stands and others like mine. So think what you want troll. You won't shut me up until women are free to be who they are in Christ. Until we aren't just a compliment to our husbands or boyfriends, until we are considered worthy on our own merits and I guess that is just too threatening for some of you,eh? To this date no one ever came forward in any way to accuse us of sin, except for those deacons, no one came forward as a witness, or with proof. The worst they could do to us they did. They lied to our congregation and then shunned us. What would you have me do, be silent while I see all this carnage? I think not. I attended there five years, worked alongside my husband in helming a small group, there was never a hint I had done anything wrong or sinned with gossip UNTIL we spoke out with the leadership over the financials....then all of a sudden wham...I was in sin and my husband was too. Imagine how surreal that was for us?!? So people like this troll or others can say what they will, because I know the truth so does my family and many in my community do as well. It is sad that this Pastor still has a small church and even more a shame that he is now a bigwig in the Acts 29 network as a pastor that shepherds others in this ministry. It is to the churches' great shame that these types of groups go largely unchallenged. Mark Driscoll has had a platform for too long. Wake up please you people out there and save yourselves from this heretical doctrine. And for all those trolls, I have been taking it easy lately, better get off my duff and step up my speaking out....
Posted Thu, Jul 17, 2:21 p.m. Inappropriate
Dear Rebeccah,
It is heartbreaking to read your 'from the heart' story. How many more there must be out there who came to these churches with open hearts and minds - who wholeheartedly served and contributed their time, talents, and treasure AND their trust, only to be betrayed and abused in the end. And then, to face further abuse from the sneering self-righteous mockers who see it as their place to demean you, to kick you while you are down, out of some misguided sense of loyalty to these so-called pastors and self-proclaimed kings. Be encouraged that you are helping open the eyes of the blind to what goes on behind the whitewashed walls of these little corporate empires masquerading as disciples of Jesus.
And please, oh please, remember - paragraphs are our friends!
Posted Thu, Jul 17, 5:19 p.m. Inappropriate
My entire inner monologue is run on sentences, sorry. I will work on the paragraph thingy. I have been called worse by trolls so no worries. He does not know me at all or the path I walked. So he can bite me. I began speaking out here and there and I am not gonna let some fanboy shut me up.
I will just have to step up my efforts if one little comment is gonna get his panties in a bunch. I have to say though yelling at me to get a life while stalking mine is kinda ironic, yes?
Posted Fri, Jul 18, 7:10 a.m. Inappropriate
Thank you for exemplifying exactly the mentality that keeps you attending at Our Lady of Perpetual Victimhood.
Trolling Mars Hill articles with some 'troother' story that didn't even happen at Mars Hill, really only demonstrates a perverse theology of affirmation on your part.
I'd say your conflict with your church probably came down to the fact that you were confronted with the righteousness of Christ and it got in the way of your self righteousness.
Posted Fri, Jul 18, 8:21 a.m. Inappropriate
She is speaking her truth and you are attacking her. Pretty clear who is self righteous and who is modeling Christ here dmarmott. Your posts here make you look like a self righteous bully.
Posted Fri, Jul 18, 8:21 a.m. Inappropriate
She is speaking her truth and you are attacking her. Pretty clear who is self righteous and who is modeling Christ here dmarmott. Your posts here make you look like a self righteous bully.
Posted Fri, Jul 18, 2:23 p.m. Inappropriate
So, according to your logic, she can attack people and its 'her truth'. If her claims are scrutinized its attacking and self righteous and therefore wrong, yet it's ok when you do it. If everything is so relativistic, then she gets 'her truth' then I get mine, and you can have yours.
What you're saying is that anything other than affirmation is not allowed. Which is exactly why I mentioned that she has a theology of affirmation. Self in the center, unable to bear scrutiny.
Posted Fri, Jul 18, 2:55 p.m. Inappropriate
I will be transparent, dmarmott. I do not like the "theology" of mars hill church that teaches that women and homosexuals are unequal and that questioning is irreligious. I grew up lutheran and a serious doubter and the pastor was ok with doubt and that is in part what led me back to faith. The Lutheran church I attend is completely transparent in its financing, and the church council is elected democratically. I have empathy for people seeking a spiritual attachment who are driven from their church because of the overt egotism of the leadership. I believe Christ would shrink in horror at what his loving kindness has become (to quote Harlan Ellison). What do you believe that leads you to doubt this woman's story?
Posted Fri, Jul 18, 5:04 p.m. Inappropriate
This so-called church is merely a group of male control freaks.
The leader must be awfully charismatic, but charisma is not the same as depth, wisdom or honesty.
Everything I have ever read or heard makes me think what a 'bunch of a-holes' not 'gee, what a great church'.
Posted Fri, Jul 18, 10:34 p.m. Inappropriate
Cheri,
I appreciate your transparency, thank you. With regards to your disagreements, you are very mistaken. Mars Hill is really just complementarian calvinism with focus on God's love over man's sin. Women are preached as equal dignity, value and worth with a different role. Exactly as the Trinitarian nature of God. As Jesus was fully God with a distinct role, a woman is fully equal with a distinct role. Men are to be servants of women, having authority and using it to serve sacrificially and reinforce her dignity as Jesus was fully divine yet gave his life for the church. It is the role of the man to love his wife to the point that God's grace is evidenced through his service to her.
With regards to homosexuality, the only thing that Mars Hill teaches is A) your identity is in God first (1st commandment). Sexuality, straight or otherwise as an identity is just idolatry. B) sex is a gift from God and its right expression is in the confines of heterosexual marriage, which leads us to the bigger issue.
Either you believe the Bible is all about Jesus and God's infallible word or you don't. The 'or you don't' aspect of belief about the Bible takes many forms including Jesus isn't God, I can pick my own truth out of what was said, it's good advice but not from God, it was written by men so fallible, etc, etc. However, once you compromise on one point you play God, and you make a poor god, we all do. It's possible to love God without hating sinners, no matter what size and shape they come in. After all God loves you like a father.
Posted Sat, Jul 19, 8:54 a.m. Inappropriate
I am not going down the rabbit hole of the many inconsistencies in the bible that make it impossible to be inerrant, I will say the overarching message of Jesus was above all things, love. We will never agree on theology and I am fine with that and am pretty sure God is ok with that too. What I wonder is why your beliefs are so fragile that you feel you have to attack that woman telling her story. I just don't find that helpful, or in any way leading with love. This article is about the growing list of people hurt and shunned by a once growing church. You don't have the same experience with it? Fine. Be positive. Share your truth. Attacking others spiritual journey as you did reeks of insecurity. Have a nice day.
Posted Tue, Jul 29, 7:25 p.m. Inappropriate
Interesting how passive-agressives always end their comments with phrases like "have a nice day".
Posted Tue, Jul 29, 10:23 p.m. Inappropriate
Ha! That is pretty funny, what you just did there.
Posted Tue, Jul 22, 8:30 a.m. Inappropriate
"Women are fully equal with a distinct role."
The religious version of Plessy v. Ferguson. Got any slaves picking cotton for the church? The Bible says that's a good thing, too.
The only portion of contributions to churches which are tax deductible should be that which is represented by charitable services given to non-attendees without proselytizing. Mars Hill is the poster boy for modern-day religious charlatanry.
Posted Sat, Jul 19, 11:50 p.m. Inappropriate
To the modern day Law-Lovers who have operated with the strong-arm of CONDEMNATION over trusting sheep, and who continue to defend such practices even though there is NOTHING hidden that will not be disclosed and exposed (Luke 8:17), and to those who defend even now the actions of this church under Mark Driscoll, I will remind you that the Bible says, "It is time for judgment to begin in the house of The Lord." 1 Peter 4:17
If there was no church-cleaning necessary, there wouldn't be a need for an exposé here. The plethora of supporting testimonies and financial statements and buy-offs are indisputable....
People have NEVER run away from the strong and indescribably wonderful loving arms of Abba Father, Daddy God. So when there's a mass exodus, something is terribly wrong. People flocked TO Jesus, not away from Him.
Posted Wed, Jul 23, 10:55 a.m. Inappropriate
What? Daddy God fathered ABBA, the great swedish musical act? I did not know that.
Posted Sun, Jul 20, 10:05 a.m. Inappropriate
Family Circle 40 years later:
Older brother in beard/mullet, bib overalls, bare chested, sternly warns middle sister, pudgy/nearsighted, and younger brother in goatee, all three sitting around a folding table smoking and drinking beer in cans,
"And Remember! No telling mommy I shot my probation officer."
Favorite response after telling this joke:
"I knew they were going to turn out like that."
Posted Sun, Jul 20, 10:10 a.m. Inappropriate
Poor Jesus. What did He do to deserve all this?
Posted Sun, Jul 20, 12:31 p.m. Inappropriate
Dear misguided followers of the Scapegoat money " church ". You need to find God and Jesus anywhere but Mars !
Posted Thu, Jul 24, 2:35 p.m. Inappropriate
These men are from Mars and women need to get the Hill away from them!
Posted Tue, Jul 22, 8:12 a.m. Inappropriate
Does anyone know what- if any- the relationship is between the Mars Hill Church and Storyville Coffee is?
Posted Wed, Jul 23, 12:15 p.m. Inappropriate
The Stranger wrote about it awhile back. Seems like the owners are or at least were at one time affiliated with the church and have donated "tens of thousands" to Mars Hill.
http://slog.thestranger.com/slog/archives/2013/10/03/god-has-used-storyville-coffee-to-bless-mars-hill-downtown
Posted Fri, Jul 25, 5:43 p.m. Inappropriate
A few thousand years ago, Middle East civilizations chose ethics and morals over dispute. Our generation sallutes them, Arab brothers, Asian communities, Nordic tribal nincompoops, Phillipine bamboo campsite communities, too many of whom bearded/face painted grasping knives, spears, arrows. Encrusted agricultural practices loaded with worst crap. These drove many others crazy, Nordicans/Others who thought themselves best, more worthier than others.
Let others live, others.
Posted Mon, Jul 28, 11:33 a.m. Inappropriate
I went to a service. The people seemed nice. Some of the titles of literature seemed well ignorant. That is the only word I can think of. They did seem to be very money focused and love was more distant. The major weakness to me was that the sermon was Driscoll via video. The local pastor was not trusted with the message. Driscoll himself seemed intelligent but not well educated in teaching. A lot of his examples were pretty poor. He also talked about praying for money in a way I thought was full of Mark Foolery. He prayed in a prayer circle for help from God and mysteriously $100 was given to him anonymously under his door at critical times. He used those events to leverage prayer with results from God. But it seems pretty obvious someone in his prayer group slipped him the $100 to give him a false sense of prayer? Maybe that is an old pastor's trick. If he prayed alone at home and $100 appeared I would be more impressed. As it here it is the noisy prayer who gets the money first, the quiet one never does.
Posted Tue, Jul 29, 9:39 a.m. Inappropriate
It is interesting how quickly everyone is turning on Mars Hill.
Seems like just yesterday Anthony Robinson was welcoming Mars Hill to downtown Seattle with open arms:
http://crosscut.com/2013/01/09/religion/112375/mars-hill-church-downtown-pastor-tim-gaydos/
I believe the real problem here are the so-called "moderate" christians. Moderates sugar coat and apologize for their more bible-based brethern.
Mars Hill is doing nothing but practicing what is stated in the bible:
http://haveyoureadthebible.com/moderate-christianity-why-tolerance-proves-ignorance/
Thoughts?
Posted Tue, Jul 29, 11:17 a.m. Inappropriate
Sure. Most people do not take the Bible literally, instead realizing that parables and stories are just that, parables and stories.
Rules and regs = holiness? Not so much when the top down approach uses shame, abusive power and fear to manipulate a flock, or even an individual.
Posted Thu, Jul 31, 10:09 a.m. Inappropriate
Fascinating to me that Christians need church at all. The constructs of being a christian seem simple: be kind and do good works. And the "manual is available everywhere.
The math of church based Christianity also confounds me. They ask for 10% tithe. So a congregation of 10 would easily support one clergy. A congregation of 1,000 is a business. And what do you get? The same free edicts: be kind and do good works.
The rest is fluff and hanging out with others who feel the same way. Donating to a church is not charity. It is not feeding the hungry or providing healthcare. Ponzi was a Catholic. And the Catholic church perfected the trickle-up economic theory.
Posted Thu, Jul 31, 7:52 p.m. Inappropriate
Amazing and bizarre comment thread. Hope those abused will heal. I suggest the best way to really heal is to completely separate and fill one's life with nothing to do with insanity.
I understand that telling the truth of one's experience and being supported is healthy in one phase, but there will be no satisfaction from those people. Eventually, getting engaged in debates with cult trolls will just make things worse, like picking at a scab.
Survivors of abuse need to heal together, learn the warning signs for future situations, and move on to a wonderful fulfilled life. That is my wish for all the people who have been sucked into this mess.
Posted Sat, Aug 2, 6:53 p.m. Inappropriate
wow. This doesn't surprise me. I worked at a very large church in southern california where the lead pastor was "mentored" by Mark (this was about 3 years ago). Mark had some very strong opinions about getting rid of some vital ministries in our church that unfortunately the lead pastor listened too..since he was obviously enamored with the "success" of Mark. Since that time, I am sad to say, the church has gone through horrible times because of the decisions and advice of Mark that were listened too. Although I won't hold him totally responsible (the lead pastor should have sought wise counsel), his decisions and position of "stardom" has hurt many pastors, families, and kids. I was "removed" and the flourishing ministry I was leading was removed as well...so the joke with my friends is that "Mark Driscoll got me fired and I never met the guy.". That church is now struggling to survive with most of the staff resigning (without having a job to go too) and the leadership core making an exodus to other churches in the area. The church has lost 1000's of people over the last few years. I pray that the leadership repents and changes it's course.
Posted Mon, Aug 4, 7:34 p.m. Inappropriate
Pastor Guy,
Have you ever considered that the problem with such churches -- and probably with one you will establish -- is the "glorious leader" structure? Power corrupts. Even Christians.
Perhaps especially Protestant Christians, because of the spiritual materialism inherent in Calvinism: if you are blessed it's because you're a "better Christian". What a mile wide gate through which to drive the truck of idolatry.
Posted Fri, Aug 8, 8:24 a.m. Inappropriate
Absolutely. I have seen this first hand watching a very humble loving leader get a "taste" of success and turn over time into a self seeking monster in the name of Jesus. Sad.
Posted Mon, Aug 4, 1:04 p.m. Inappropriate
Thank you, Crosscut, for having the courage to publish this exposé of Abrahamic religion in action.
Judaism, Christianity, Islam – each claims the same divine sadist as its founder, and each behaves accordingly. As their own scriptures tell us, "by their fruits shall ye know them."
Thus the long, blood-drenched litany of Abrahamic atrocities new and old: Gaza; 9/11; Yugoslavia; the modern-day depredations of Jihadists and Hassidim; pogroms; Mountain Meadows; the First Nations genocide; St. Bartholomew's; Ulster; the European wars of religion; the Burning Times; the Inquisition; the depredations of the Teutonic Knights; the Crusades; the Islamic invasions of Europe; Christian persecutions of Pagans in the latter Roman Empire; the innumerable massacres by the Israelites recounted in the Torah and Old Testament, etc. ad nauseam. (See for example http://rationalwiki.org/wiki/Massacres_in_the_name_of_a_peaceful_faith and http://infidels.org/library/modern/donald_morgan/atrocity.html )
At the core of Christianity's malevolence in the United States is the so-called “prosperity gospel” – precisely what is preached at Mars Hill. That it is the dominant religious ethos within the imperial homeland explains the nation's increasing savagery toward lower-income people, especially those who are elderly and/or disabled. Its inherent misogyny fuels the war against women. Its notion of “one nation under god” – literally, god as heavenly Führer – mandates foreign policy based on “American Exceptionalism,” the 21st Century variant of the Nazi doctrine of Aryan supremacy.
Moreover, this sort of fanatically militant Christianity whether Protestant or Catholic is methodically replacing the remnants of constitutional governance with theocracy based on biblical law, a relentless campaign in which the Hobby Lobby decision is but the most recent Christian victory.
Yet most of the Left, with its collective head plunged deep in the sands of denial, arrogantly mouths wishful platitudes about religion becoming irrelevant and thus refuses to recognize the threat – never mind it is thoroughly documented on-line and in many recent books.
The most useful of these sources include three books and three web sites. The books are: The Family: the Secret Fundamentalism at the Heart of American Power (Jeff Sharlet; Harper: 2008); American Fascists: the Christian Right and the War on America (Chris Hedges; Free Press div. of Simon & Schuster: 2006); and American Theocracy: the Peril and Politics of Radical Religion, Oil and Borrowed Money in the 21st Century (Kevin Phillips; Viking: 2006). The web sites are: Theocracy Watch (http://www.theocracywatch.org/ ); CatholicWatch (http://catholicwatch.org/); and Americans United for Separation of Church and State (https://www.au.org/).
Meanwhile Crosscut's reportorial bravery in showing us the internal realities at Mars Hill gives us a telling and presumably terrifying glimpse of what our everyday lives would be like if the Christian theocrats – who now control the U.S. Supreme Court (and are therefore able to dictate the terms of all governance within U.S. borders) – continue their victorious onslaught.
Posted Mon, Aug 4, 7:35 p.m. Inappropriate
The SAME divine sadist........
Fantastic post, Loren.
Posted Tue, Aug 5, 10:40 a.m. Inappropriate
Thank you. Of course I know Yahweh, Jesus and Allah are all names for the same divine sadist. And since I no longer remember why I phrased my second graf as I did -- though it seemed like a good reason at the time -- I have corrected it accordingly. Thanks again.
Posted Wed, Aug 13, 11:31 a.m. Inappropriate
Thank you for this comment. It exceeds the original article. Right to the point.
Posted Sat, Aug 9, 10:57 p.m. Inappropriate
I attended one of the Mars Hill campuses (before I moved). I was encouraged to know, trust, and love Jesus and to be a blessing to others. My family and I were very blessed by Mark and MH - I hope those that have been hurt can find healing and I pray that Mark doesn't grow weary but continues in faithfully preaching the Word.
Posted Fri, Aug 22, 8:44 a.m. Inappropriate
Thank you all, once again, for reminding me why I avoid organized religion. What a mess.
Posted Sat, Aug 23, 10:01 a.m. Inappropriate
The Mars Hill story hits the New York Times. And I agree with FigTree. Never turn your brain and emotions over to some manipulative egomaniac like Driscoll.
A Brash Style That Filled Pews, Until Followers Had Their Fill
Mark Driscoll Is Being Urged to Leave Mars Hill Church
http://www.nytimes.com/2014/08/23/us/mark-driscoll-is-being-urged-to-leave-mars-hill-church.html?module=Search&mabReward;=relbias%3Aw%2C%7B%221%22%3A%22RI%3A6%22%7D&_r=0
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