Then What's a Good Church?
- Spiritual Fodder
- Cultic, Aberrant, or Abusive?
- Role of Women in Ministry
- Then What's a Good Church?
- Why So Quiet?
- Becky's UBF Roots
- The Letter
- Dissecting Ed's Brain
- Shepherding/Discipleship Movement
- Exit Strategy
- Moving On
Foremost, a good church shouldn't do harm. More specifically, a good church shouldn't have a consistent history of damaging people emotionally, psychologically, and spiritually.
This should not be seen as a necessary or forgivable byproduct of doing God's work, as Berkland staff have evidently convinced themselves of.
A good church shouldn't have an agenda other than following the directives of Jesus Christ. Berklanders believe they are a good church in this regard, often pointing out that they do not compromise to accommodate greater numbers. It's one thing to not compromise on
what is Biblical, where one can feel comforted even as people turn away. What Berkland doesn't compromise with is the manner in which it achieves its ends, to
demonstrate the ideal church (as opposed to actually
being, which doesn't involve control tactics).
Berkland's ambition in demonstrating this uncompromised church (ostensibly for God's glory) has permitted its use of un-Godly means: after gathering a bunch of students together in the name of Christ, Berkland weeds out the kids who don't want to commit their lives to performing in Berkland's
monolithic front, which in order to carry out apparently requires emotional, psychological, and spiritual leveraging. The damage occurs here.
A good church serves college kids as they pass right on through, like a good teacher. A good teacher serves his students as they head off to greener pastures, while he remains faithful and constant at his post. As he pours out his energies for his students, most will not acknowledge or return to show gratitude for what he has done:
But even if I am being poured out like a drink offering on the sacrifice and service coming from your faith, I am glad and rejoice with all of you. (Phil. 2:17)
The teacher will grow old and retire, without receiving much glory at his retirement, a victim of his own generosity to others, rewarded only in Heaven.
When ambition enters into this picture, the good teacher is replaced by a CEO. All the CEO's efforts in serving God must manifest tangible gains of significance and influence in the present life. Students cannot simply receive spiritual instruction and pass on through to greener pastures; to Ed and Becky, service in God's name must manifest itself into a glorious,
more-Biblical-than-yours church, because that is their compensation for dedicating their lives for God (the life dedications of others are part of that compensation).
Therefore, you will be made to feel that your Christian life cannot flourish outside of Berkland, and this is the tell-tale sign that your faith is less about Jesus Christ than it being about Berkland. However, the pervasive belief that Berkland is uniquely superior to most churches leads one who is departing to think they are rejecting what most closely resembles what God desires from the church:
If they have escaped the corruption of the world by knowing our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ and are again entangled in it and overcome, they are worse off at the end than they were at the beginning. (2 Peter 2:20)
The pervasive ostracization practiced by Berklanders is clearly motivated by this point of view, but to other Christians of the Universal Church (not the ecumenical church) who should witness such behavior, such exclusivism is clearly unBiblical.
The very act of being at Berkland induces people to live, or at least demonstrate, Godly lives, because they must obey in order to stay there. Unfortunately, if a Berklander is merely motivated to satisfy the requirements of his community, he has "
received [his] reward in full" (Matthew 6). Only God knows whether their actions were for the right reasons. My main objection to my staying at Berkland was, I couldn't tell what motivated me more, the fear of God or the fear of Berkland.
Am I now trying to win the approval of men, or of God? Or am I trying to please men? If I were still trying to please men, I would not be a servant of Christ. (Gal 1:10)
A leader once said that the ambition he would have otherwise used for worldly success was used to acquire spiritual success. To have a successful community, you need strict governance and methods to control. Taking an extreme example, to be a resident of Pyongyang, you need to meet a certain height requirement, free of defects, and be unquestioningly loyal. If you cast out all the dregs, you create a semblance of a unified, successful community. Berkland does the same to achieve the semblance of a unified, successful church. However, without the control, one has a signficantly weaker church, where a few shoulder the cost for benefits experienced by all.
19 comments:
I've had a pretty awful experience with Berkland in the past.. but I think it was a blessing even though I was bitter and confused for a long time. I confronted a lot of issues with Christianity that are at most subtle at the other churches I've been to. More importantly, it made me really question what it means for me to personally hear God's voice or to follow God. The main thing was that the leaders at Berkland kept on telling me very specific things to do with my life that could have or could not have been right but I just didn't think they had any idea of knowing. These were the very questions that I was struggling with in terms of learning and following God's will. I just couldn't understand why they would know more about what God wanted for me when most of what they thought about me were based on groundless assumptions about my lifestyle. Also, they were pretty hypocritical about things they would say or do (in very subtle ways though) so I really didn't think that I could trust their guidance with the wholehearted obedience that they demanded (no church or person should be demanding "obedience" the way berkland does).
Anyway, the main reason that I stopped going to Berkland had nothing to do with Berkland's flaws but it was that their flaws that I mentioned above was what kept me up at night, praying to God for guidance. And really, no matter how messed up Berkland was structurally or the leaders or the people in it, if God wanted me to be there and if he wanted to teach me something or to use me eventually in some way, I would have stayed. So the most difficult thing for me was being able to know what God wanted me to do.. and that was really difficult because I didn't know what God wanted me to do in terms about just about anything and everything in my life back then. But to make a long story shorter.. when I chose to leave Berkland, I had become pretty convinced that God did not want me to stay there.
It has been about two years since I stopped going to berkland, and something that has been plaguing my mind that I really wanted to ask other ex-berklanders was: why do the leaders of berkland do what they do? I am sure that it depends on each individual who chose to become devoted to berkland but I guess mainly, I wonder about people like the Kangs.. is it that they truly believe that they are doing God's will? Or are they knowingly using God's name to promote their own interests? And if so, what are these interests that they are working towards?
I don't keep in touch with anybody from Berkland so I would really like to know what other people think.. my own thoughts on the question is that I think that as Christians, it is very easy to believe that you are doing God's will when you are really just listening to what you think is right. It mostly really made me question how much I really know God.. not for who I was taught he is or how I might interpret him to be from reading the Bible with my own little head.. but what God's nature really is aside from good, omnipotent, loving, etc. etc.
PS: sorry for writing such a long comment on your website but I really don't have any people to talk about Berkland. thanks.
In regards to your first paragraph concerning God's particular will for you, I'd like to reference a book called "Systematic Theology" by Louis Berkhof, pg. 77:
"Several distinctions have been applied to the will of God...They may be stated as follows: (1) The decretive and the preceptive will of God. The former is that will of God by which He purposes or decrees whatever shall come to pass, whether He wills to accomplish it effectively (causatively), or to permit it to occur through the unrestrained agency of His rational creatures. The latter is the rule of life which God has laid down for His moral creatures, indicating the duties which He enjoins upon them. The former is always accomplished, while the latter if often disobeyed. ... (4) The secret and the revealed will of God. This is the most common distinction. The former is the will of God's decree, which is largely hidden in God, while the latter is the will of the precept, which is revealed in the law and in the gospel. The distinction is based on Deut. 29:29. The secret will of God is mentioned in Ps. 115:3; Dan. 4:17,25,32,35; Rom. 9:18,19; 11:33,34; Eph. 1:5,9,11; and his revealed will, in Matt. 7:21; 12:50; John 4:34; 7:17; Rom. 12:21. The latter is accessible to all and is not far from us, Deut. 30:14; Rom. 10:8. The secret will of God pertains to all things which He wills either to effect or to permit, and which are therefore absolutely fixed. The revealed will prescribes the duties of of man, and represents the way in which he can enjoy the blessings of God.
If your Berkland leaders were guiding you to follow the preceptive will of God, you should have heeded them, or rather God. Specific things like which career to choose or who to marry relate to the decretive or secret will of God, to which no one can claim authority in knowing. It's not our business to figure this out because ultimately it is up to God to reveal it if He chooses to. Our business is to follow and not usurp (which we can) His revealed will.
I can only guess as to why Ed Kang does what he does. I remember when he introduced himself at a retreat that while he was a pastor, he was "not a loser" (he was deadpanning). He was explaining that he didn't become a pastor because he ran out of career options. He has a gift for oration and realized that people responded to his sermons. Once having made that initial step to become a pastor, he was not going to do it half-heartedly. Because he made this tradeoff with worldly greatness, he expects greatness in the church that he builds.
I just don't think this ambition for greatness is of God.
i appreciate this post very much. when you deleted my comment from your prev blog, i thought you were going to ignore this issue entirely.
i am actually more interested in the issue of the church and what it should be (not so much this berkland), so it was interesting and enlightening to hear what you have to say.
one question however, it seems that you are saying that a church should essentially kind of die away...
"The teacher will grow old and retire, without receiving much glory at the end, a victim of her own generosity to others, rewarded only in Heaven."
I understand the spirit of this comment, but I am wondering if just purely from a church discussion level if this is what God wants.
When I read Paul's epistles, I am often struck by how much he actually told (vehemently) the various churches what to avoid and what to do, so it seems to me from him that he is wanting to ensure that the church stays very much alive and just doesn't grow up and retire.
could you please provide your input on that?
Thank you for your viewpoints. This blog is quite interesting in that your issues seems well thought out with this specific church.
I removed posts 9/23/2006 10:55 PM, 9/23/2006 11:07 PM, and 9/24/2006 9:48 PM because I can't edit these posts. I've encountered a thought that I needed cleaning up, and here's my conclusion:
God makes His Will known through the Bible (revealed will), and this is sufficient for us to bother with. Among these include a permissive decree, which allows us to exercise our own wills. His hidden will, He exercises as He pleases and is absolutely fixed (we cannot alter it). When some says "God's plan for me," they use it to refer to both, that is, if we choose to follow God's revealed will, there is a direction He has in plan for us, and another path if we choose not to. Whatever distinctions people may place on God's Will, it's a unified whole.
9/23/2006 11:50 AM, I believe your main question was: "...my own thoughts on the question is that I think that as Christians, it is very easy to believe that you are doing God's will when you are really just listening to what you think is right." I believe my clarification above doesn't answer this question.
If God's will as revealed in the Bible is not clear enough for your path, then ultimately you do have to decide with your own mind and heart what God is trying to reveal to you, and there's no escaping it. There is no authority other than God, because all your peers are human just like you, regardless of how intelligent they are. The condition of your heart will decide whether you hear God's voice (you will either listen to yourself or to God). But remember, there are many absolute directives that you can follow without ambiguity. Research (in and out of the Bible) in proportion to your level of dissatisfaction of the answer you already have. If you run across an answer you find objectionable, try to find affirmations or negations and then finally make an honest assessment of whether it is God's will. I'm doing just that with this blog. Not everything is a potential delusion upon which your entire faith rests upon. Trust in God's grace.
9/25/2006 5:58 PM, the only posts I've deleted were my own. Perhaps you didn't successfully upload your comment.
You've carried my analogy to a direction I didn't intend, about a church dying away, but you seem to already know this.
When I said that the good teacher may merely grow old and die unrecognized for her efforts, I am saying that church members should serve realizing that there is no guarantee of reward on earth for their efforts, and it is only in death whether they will know their efforts have been in vain.
My father used to shop groceries for an 80 year old man, who was an atheist. I asked him why he thought my father bothered to help him, and he replied, "Because he wants to go to Heaven." Essentially, the old man was saying that anything a Christian did was essentially driven by selfishness. I thought about this and disagreed: a believer is always aware that his efforts may possibly be in vain, but chooses to follow God anyways. This is not selfishness; it's either foolishness or selflessness made possibly by faith.
hi,
just about God's will, which you spoke about:
"God makes His Will known through the Bible (revealed will), and this is sufficient for us to bother with."
Do you personally believe that there is more clout to personal revelation through the Bible, or through church leaders (whom I'm assuming are also reading the Word), or equal?
I am questioning this aspect, because although it seems like in the Bible, Paul does exhort for christians to obey their leaders (and parents). I mean, he himself exhorts them to listen to him as their leader, and etc.
and I do agree with you overall, that if leaders take their position to coerce on a non-biblical point of view, that is completely wrong and immoral.
I guess I am wondering ultimately who (in your opinion) you should trust more as knowing the will of God, people who are over you as leaders at any church (not necessarily this berkland) or yourself.
It's something I'm trying to really figure out myself.
I didn't intend to make this question sound so technical - sorry.
hi, this is long, but wanted to share my humble opinion.
I think one thing to keep in mind throughout all of this is that people are all sinners (romans 3:23). Even pastors and leaders and yes of course, all of us are sinners. that means we should ALL carry a sense of humility and brokenness.
I think power corrupts and absolute power corrupts absolutely (that famous quote) and therefore, leaders in any church (perhaps any org for that matter) should second guess themselves before really saying something that is important and could be flat out wrong. if anything, leaders should be in a place of more fear and trembling before God.
that having been said, I think everyone, if they are christian should get back to the Bible and check with that as the ultimate authority. if something is in line with the Bible, then fine, but if something is not, that should be used to question whatever church authority has brought up. If that church is unwilling to listen to the Bible as authority to correct whatever wrong actions, then that church has prioritized its power and its own existence beyond the gospel, and therefore is illegitimate.
but at the same time, I think it's perhaps not always correct to categorize every single person at a church as part of the 'collective' because in my opinion, a person that is a leader in a church does not mean he's perfect. I've heard of one staff member of a church rape a fellow church member girl. not that that's any excuse to be not a more spiritual person, but I think there is power in just acknowledging that it's true - that we're all sinners, and each person deals with their own struggles/sins. it also eliminates the sometimes false categorization that these flawed people are out to get you corporately out of one shared motivation.
perhaps it's more that whoever leader like in this berkland scenario is demanding that you do something perhaps driven out of his own insecurity to prove himself as a leader - and he should repent of his wrong motives, even if what this person has said seems 'right'. so again a leader should not be exempt from humility and repentance himself, again since we're all sinners.
but on the side of the regular 'lay' people christians, it seems that we need to have the correct perspective, again by setting everything against the Word of God as the standard, not just our feelings of being offended. Sometimes, my own experience is that I get offended even when I'm actually wrong. so we too need to be humble and engage in repentance.
Anyways, my ultimate opinion is that the Word of God has to be the defining, ultimate authority, and it will help Christians find the right church and be able to discern more objectively than we would by our own emotions.
sorry for the long comment - i know it's not completely organized, but i wanted to share my 2 cents.
thanks.
-just another christian.
9/26/2006 3:54 PM presents the right answer, but it seldom provides resolution to real conflicts between within the church. While both sides must humble themselves, one side must make a concession for there to be harmony (the root word in "Protestant" is "protest"). Ideally, it should involve debating the issue, each using Biblical support for their respective views. When neither can convince the other party, sides simply agree to disagree and the church may divide if no other resolution can be found.
I found this article in Wikipedia: Priesthood of All Believers, where it states, "[1 Pet 2:9] removes the possibility of a spiritual aristocracy or hierarchy within Christianity. God is equally accessible to all the faithful; no Christians have been set above others in matters of faith or worship...The vast majority of Protestants nonetheless draw some distinction between their own ordained ministers and lay people, but regard it as a matter of church order and discipline rather than spiritual hierarchy." The answer appears to be "equal."
In this part of the blog, the first comment has the question "why do the leaders of berkland do what they do?"
From my experience in another church (not affiliated to Berkland) where I was spiritually abused (and where I was the target of scare tactics, intimidation, guilt tripping, and other things), I have drawn the following conclusion.
I am very convinced that the traditional Confucian hierarchy of Korean culture, which most of us here who are Korean-Americans are familiar with, has to do with this. Now, all of us know that sin manifests itself manifold, and stubbornness and pride is crosscultural.
Yet, I can't help but point to the root culture of our own parents (and of the first generation of Berkland leaders, who are from my recollection not only flawlessly bilingual but also extremely conservative in their outlook - read KOREAN here) as part of this problem.
As I'm sure you guys have experienced, the norm when it comes to apologizing is that it never happens, or happens rarely, when the recipient of the apology is someone younger. I have yet to see a senior citizen apologize to someone in his 20s for having hurt his feelings; saying "sorry" in Korean for a very minor thing, such as keeping a younger person waiting, is not the same.
Back to my story, which I compare with Berkland: after my departure from my former church, I had one or two conversations with one of the leaders (ironically, this leader himself had treated me with the ugly things I listed above when I announced my decision to leave. He at least apologized, but he apologized for the rudeness and tone of his voice, not for the inappropriateness of his actions vis-a-vis his status as a Christian and as a church officer).
I asked this leader if he had ever spoken one-on-one with the pastor, and whether he had mentioned to the pastor that the pastor's modus operandi had been behind the departure of many people (this church experienced several exodi over its years after a period of peak growth).
The leader's answer was "yes," and he had even mentioned to the pastor that several of those who had left had been hurt/wounded by certain actions on the pastor's part.
The pastor's reply? The leader said he refused to acknowledge any wrongdoing and that he insisted what he was doing was right in God's eyes.
Mind you, I had known this pastor from my younger years and even then he had been quite stubborn and proud - but I had never thought he would have carried these traits to the headship of a church.
Don't get me wrong. We are all proud, and all of us have had moments when we did not want to apologize out of sheer pride, even though we knew we had done something harmful or hurtful.
But I stand by what I said earlier... the traditional culture of Korea and East Asia (China) didn't have penitence or restitution as part of its development. Western European history had Christendom and the concept of "civitas;" this never existed in Korea. Korean culture has most definitely influenced Korean Christianity and churches... and I strongly believe that both my ex-church, as well as Berkland, are no exceptions.
Hence my skepticism as to either my ex-pastor, or any leader of Berkland, issuing any statements of apology or regret, especially since they most definitely believe that what they do is right - even if others are hurt.
Orangehead
I've been going to Korean churches for the majority of my life, and none resembled Berkland.
The cult characteristics I described in my 2nd blog is not particular to a particular culture, but spans many cultures.
Orangehead, I am still waiting for your email. However, there isn't much I can add to what I've already mentioned here.
Hamcycle, I emailed you and now I realize I forgot to add this...
I realized with my experience at my ex-church that no human leader - Berkland, or any other church - is above corruption or error. No human leader, however committed to God, is immune from the temptation to aggrandize power, to become arrogant, to refuse correction. I once thought there were Christian leaders who could not possibly fall into this... but I learned that I was wrong. The only difference between the rest of those here including you and myself is that you guys learned this at Berkland; I learned this at my ex-church (not affiliated with Berkland).
- Orangehead
The buzz around Pastor Ed and Becky JDSN's parting of ways seems to be spreading through the comments on the blogs.
The topic of what makes a good church makes me wonder with the "new" churches that have claimed independence from Berkland and if they are submitting themselves to certain standards in the parting.
Hamcycle's links to the churches fomerly known as BBC Davis, BBC Silicon Valley and BBC Berkeley were helpful in seeing how the pastors of the respective ministries are addressing their former affiliation with Berkland.
Pastor Chris has done the right thing by stating that the church was founded by Berkland but is now independent. Pastor Joong says that the Davis church was started by Gracepoint. A little misleading. No mention of Berkland at all. The information about Gracepoint's history on the Gracepoint site makes no mention of Berkland. (Whu?!) As if it sprang from sea foam.
Whatever may have crossed between Pastor Ed and Becky JDSN, I wonder if the right thing to do was, first, to tell the truth of the source of the ministries and, second, showing a modicum of gratitude toward those that built the ministry from the empty pews up.
Should standards of truthfulness be lower for churches than what we expect of our human institutions?
Pastor Paul. He is a good and decent man of God. His name should not be rubbed out of these churches' "histories."
Errata: Gracepoint does acknowledge that it began as Berkland Baptist Church.
Sorry for the error.
Weird. No longer a part of these ministries, yet there's some desire in me to see the name change mean more than some broo-ha-ha between the pastors. A desire, too, for a parting that acknowledges the good that both Pastor Ed and Becky JDSN brought to each other's ministries. Perhaps even a nod to those who left over the years with legitimate grievances. And some sign of introspection.
Perhaps I was projecting my experience of departure on the recent parting by thinking Pastor Ed and Gracepoint had left, too. That Pastor Ed was an ex-Berklander like the rest of us. Then it occurred to me, the name change was just re-branding.
Sad, really. As when Jacob became Israel, the name change could have been something truly meaningful.
What would Pastor Ed or Kelly need to do to make things right? This is not intended in any way to be a sarcastic or rhetorical question. But honestly and sincerely, what would make things right for the hurt and offended people?
Would it take a personal apology to each person offended? Righting of ways at the church? What?
I'm sure that people have stated it here and there throughout all of these blogs, but if someone could state it simply, it would help me to make sense of how to reconcile all these issues.
It seems that so many people have been hurt and offended, and that is awful. So, how can people be healed and be able to move on?
Honestly, I think that this blog only has ONE good quality--it can be quite therapeutic/cathartic, BUT I think that it can also be very damaging and un-Christianity at times. So, since true healing or reconciliation cannot take place here on this blog, what are people looking for in terms of making this right?
This blog has more than 1 good quality.
Yes, it's a place to catalog hurts. But I hope leaders coast to coast are reading this and repenting.
Do you think leaders are reading this? Don't you think they dismissed all those who have left as selfish, ungrateful, immature sheep with nothing useful to say?
I've met very few leaders who have given a sheep the benefit of the doubt on any issue much less serious ones like this blog addresses.
A good link:
http://www.leaderu.com/orgs/probe/docs/abuse-ch.html
Post a Comment