I watched a couple of hours of documentaries this week and that was about all I could take without a significant break.
One of documentaries that I watched is called, “Breaking Brethren”. It is a Canadian production focusing on the Exclusive Brethren Church. The Exclusive Brethren are a branch of the Plymouth Brethren Church that started in the UK in the mid 1800’s. The Plymouth Brethren were a breakaway group from the Anglican Church and, not long after their beginning, they split into various factions with the main two expressions being the Exclusive Brethren (Closed Brethren) and the Open Brethren.
In general, you can thank (or curse) the Plymouth Brethren for foisting upon the world concepts such as the Rapture. The church at which I worked for 25 years was a Plymouth Brethren church. It was part of the Open Brethren, and the governance structure of the church was largely responsible for the way in which myself, and many others, wound up leaving. Open Brethren churches have become largely indistinguishable from other standard evangelical churches. In fact, people who leave an Open Brethren church often wind up at a Baptist church or an Alliance church. Many people who attended an Open Brethren church may not even have known that it was Brethren. The Exclusive Brethren are much more controlling and, according to the documentary, do not seek to expand via outside additions and conversions. Having been part of a Plymouth Brethren church for many years, I often heard stories from people in the congregation of growing up among the Exclusives or of their family members who were still part of that branch. The bottom line, both from my observation at the time and from the documentary, the Exclusive Brethren are a cult.
What this means for Open Brethren is interesting, at least, potentially troubling. I did not, in my time as pastor in the church, see any shunning of people who left. I did not see overly controlling behaviour on the part of the Elders (though I do recall multiple occasions in which the Elders discussed the personal lives of congregants who might need to be called for discipline of some kind). However, the residue of fear and the posture of condemnation to the world in general was still present in some people and it was a palpable memory for many in the church.
The second documentary that I watched was the first episode of a three part series on Hillsong. The Exclusive Brethren are not well known at all, though they have had lasting impact on evangelicalism. Hillsong is very well known and aims to be as visible as possible.
Discovery Plus produced the documentary and the first episode outlines the history of Hillsong and the general strategy and business plan. It then moves to a focus on Carl Lentz who was pastor of Hillsong NYC during its peak days in terms of crowds and visibility. You can sign up for Discovery Plus free for a week if you’d like to watch the series.
There is a lot that could be said about both of these documentaries. Virtually every single evangelical church in the world has used Hillsong music in the past couple of decades. Even if you are not familiar with the Exclusive Brethren or with Hillsong, if you have been involved in the evangelical church, you may be a bit triggered by such documentaries, perhaps because they can remind you of how control was exercised. It can be troubling to peel the curtain back on some of these things that claim to be all about God and see that maybe, perhaps, they were also about power and money and control.
One issue that comes up when considering these entities revolves around the question of when they went bad. Maybe that’s why “Breaking Brethren” is such good word play.
Did Mars Hill (the Mark Driscoll church) become bad only after it grew to a certain point? Was it all bad? Did Hillsong start out with laudable goals only to become corrupted by celebrity and power? I think that the genesis of the trouble goes a lot further back than that. Hillsong started with an almost singular goal - become big. Hillsong NYC became an almost cartoonish version of this with a pastor who wore $15,000 hoodies and flaunted his relationship with celebrities such as Justin Bieber, Selena Gomez and Kevin Durant.
One of my points of consternation about Hillsong is what I call the “Worship Porn” aspect of it. Hillsong used music to attract people and the music was good. However, almost every song followed a pattern and used particular cord progressions to generate emotional response. The pornographic aspect is a pattern, some form or variation of the following:
Verse (Usually gently upbeat, sometimes very quiet, just starting out.)
Chorus (Introduction to the part of the song that you know will eventually bring payoff. You know, you gotta like the chorus.)
Verse again (A little more forcefully this time, hopefully generating the desired response, hopefully now the consumer (congregant) is getting into it, starting to lose themselves.)
Chorus again (Starts to seem like the payoff will be here, but turns out to be not quite yet.)
Verse again (The consumer (congregant) is now into it, so the repetition is received gladly, in fact it might seem like the payoff will come now.)
…But then … Bridge (The pace, emotion and possibly tempo have been building, but then a bridge delays the real gratification, only heightening the big payoff which comes with …)
Chorus again (And this time loudly and exuberantly and there is no holding back and you are caught up in it and it is amazing and you feel one with everyone there, but the emotional climax also seems to be all your own.) and then …
Verse again, maybe chorus again after that (This is what I call the “Yes, Lord” resolution phase. You are simply now basking in the experience. The music is quiet again, almost whispering. Now you don’t just feel thankful for the band and the church, you belong to them.)
And then they do another song, same or similar pattern.
Of course, I am aware that such progressions can be used as emotional manipulation. Hillsong music is good and it can really feel good to get immersed in it. I also do not dismiss the possibility that real spiritual encounters can happen at such times. My consternation comes largely from the fact that, as a pastor, I saw that many churches, including ones in which I worked and worshipped, were affected by the idea that this kind of worship was something to emulate. You may have seen it at your church. The worship band may have no hope of being as good as Hillsong. They simply cannot match the talent or, even more so, the production value. That does not mean that they don’t try. I can think of multiple churches, in my own neighbourhood, who would love to follow the arc of Hillsong. They seem to be attempting to do so.
Often they do this via the music, the tone and look of the pastor(s), and the overly friendly “you are SO welcome here” kind of approach. Hillsong perfected these things and used them to market a product. They may have also presented the Christian gospel, but this is not as clear.
Carl Lentz was a celebrity and he apparently enjoyed it very much. Despite what Carl says, Jesus was only briefly a celebrity. He never seemed to like it at all. Jesus directly rejected celebrity status, and his mission was defined in becoming less, not becoming more.
It’s nearing the end of the season of Lent right now. Jesus is becoming more and more alone. He has “set his face to Jerusalem”. In other words, he is headed to the cross, to sacrifice for the life of the world. In relation to the two documentaries I ask myself, how did Jesus express his love for people? Did he exercise control in a way similar to the Exclusive Brethren? (he did not). What kind of kingdom was Jesus building? Was it a multimedia, consumer empire like Hillsong? (it was not, in spite of how things sometimes look today).
I have been thinking about how churches operate and where trust lies. Trust, in the Exclusive Brethren, is the property of the small group of leaders. People in the congregation subjugate themselves to those leaders. In Hillsong, trust lies with people like Brian Houston (recently resigned due to indiscretions with the accompanying “I took too much medication and found myself in her hotel room” explanations) and Carl Lentz, who was removed from leadership in 2020 due to similar circumstances. The congregants, the parishioners, the people who attend are not to be trusted. Instead, it is “I have something you need, whether you know it or not”. Somehow, in the years ahead, as church changes, this is one of the areas in which change is needed. The church should not be the everything. The church should be the place where hope is presented so that people can live their lives, which mostly happen outside of the gathered church experience. The more that church demands allegiance or money or constant involvement, the more likely it will be given to the kinds of things that become exposed in documentaries like the two I watched this week.
In the meantime, if you are a young pastor reading this, I implore you to aim for something better than Hillsong. That is, have a goal in mind that is better than becoming the next big thing. Have a goal in mind that allows your insignificance. It might be liberating for you to stop trying to make what you are involved with the next great work of God. Trust me, the work of God is more and better and different than the limits of your particular ministry, and that is a good thing, for you and for those you lead. Don’t try to convince people who follow you that your work and God’s work are one and the same. It would be good if you simply started laughing when you began to express that something about “God’s work” and then went on to describe your own. It might seem to work for a season, but if you say those things, you wind up actually preventing people from seeing the work of God in their lives as they confuse it with the success of your endeavour. I have found that most pastors do have a real faith and do care about other people. Such truth means that they can minister in a world in which there is much longing for God. However, the ministry that takes place in hospital visits and in seeking to speak hope to even a small group of people does not often lead to empire. That’s a good thing.
Upon completion of this article I received notification that the New York Times just published a piece on Hillsong and its scandals.