Calvary Chapel Survey
Warren Throckmorton has a survey for Calvary Chapel clergy, staff, and members, on Gospel For Asia.
The link to that survey can be found here.
If you fly the dove or you worship with one, let your voice be heard.
Warren Throckmorton has a survey for Calvary Chapel clergy, staff, and members, on Gospel For Asia.
The link to that survey can be found here.
If you fly the dove or you worship with one, let your voice be heard.
Good luck with that… too self-incriminating for cc whitewashers imho.
Survey done should be no reason why anyone would not fill free to answer the survey.
Should read: survey done well
If one attends a CC or a CC mid week study they should let the congregants know about this situation.
Post if on Facebook, Twitter wherever you socialize let everyone know
Does anyone answer random surveys (other than the silly ones on Facebook)? Does anyone answer honestly?
Does anyone here answer the phone when the caller ID says research or survey?
Survey taken and completed.
Survey completed as a former CC attender.
Survey completed
Done. I really want to know if any of the money goes for what it is designated? Are there any BOH children? Is mine being cared for, even a little? I will gladly suffer the wrong, but I don’t want to betray the child, unless it is better he was free from there as well…
Thankful,
Those are great questions…
Just a side bar:
When we first built CCCM there was an interesting thing that we who constructed it observed.
We would all meet in the mornings up in what is now the offering counting room above the lobby.
From up there we could view the block wall that had been constructed behind where the podium is located.
After the Mason’s completed the wall they acid washed it which left a residue of white on the brown blocks that wouldn’t come clean.
Now here is the really interesting part. The residue very clearly looked like Jesus standing there with out stretched arms as if to say,”Come unto Me.”
All of us saw it with no problem.
At the point that CCCM made the transition from evangelism as their primary emphasis to Bible teaching school, some one installed three steel doves on the sanctuary building.
One at the wall of the main entry, one covering the residue picture of Jesus and one on the wall outside facing Fairview street.
To some of us it was an indication that CCCM had officially become a brand name denomination.
The dove was the Logo and Jesus was covered by it.
Interesting that it actually panned out that way over the many years.
The brand name loyalty that was expected of everyone was almost cultish in subtle ways.
We used to lift up Jesus at the beginning in that tiny chapel.
Then we lifted up CCCM and road for the brand…
Today the course corrections being made are wonderful!
Brian and wife are a true blessing and honor Jesus Christ over and above the “brand.”
Never did like that dove image, I bet a major donor had something to do with it’s installation.
#11 Followed you all the way until here…
“Today the course corrections being made are wonderful!
Brian and wife are a true blessing and honor Jesus Christ over and above the “brand.”
NOT!!!
You better go back and find more acid signs on brick walls that morph into Jesus…
@11-12
times change, surfer.
Course corrections.
The jury is still out, but for the most part, I don’t really care. I live far from Southern Cal, what takes place there at Costa Mesa or any of the other mega-boxes has very little effect on our lives. We have our own tribe here and that is what is important to us.
and, I took the survey.
Gee pstrmike,
Tribal elitism?
There is one body and one Spirit–just as you were called to one hope at your calling–
Ephesians 4:4
Than your logic would indicate that most of what Michael shares on this site of the mega churches is/has little effect on your life…but you took the survey anyway?
Interesting.
***
Hey Once a CC guru,
I can’t help but notice some of your residual bitterness, reading some of your past postings when it comes to CC.
I would agree that CC has caused a lot of people to leave in bitterness.
But the fact of the matter is:
See to it that no one falls short of the grace of God and that no bitter root grows up to cause trouble and defile many.
Hebrews 12:15
http://shekinahfellowship.blogspot.com/2015/04/dont-take-bait.html
I was once very bitter when I got the invitation to “leave and start my own church” by CC through Jeff Smith and wounded by the “holy huddle” there.
(Today I still love and respect Jeff as a friend)
For years I festered and came across to others about CC like you do.
Then over time God dealt with me and is still dealing with me, as He will with you I am sure.
Michael N is a prime example of someone who was wounded but came through it all with a good clean heart.
I pray that you and I will heal up and come through it as has Michael.
Calvary Chapel is in God’s hands as are you and I…
GRACE!
SURFER 51
Up until your last post, I have been cconsistently encouragedand given to meditating upon what you have shared on this blog as well as your own. howeverit boggles my mind when anyone muses the bitterness card to explain away, to negate, or to dismiss another personsopinion when they Express an issuebuy those who have done my harm.I think the word bitterness is overused and too easily use to replace that which is true grief sorrow, trauma and/or victimization.
Ialso think its wrong to compare this attitude of bitterness by bringing Michaels name in the mix to build your argument.
SURFER 51
Up until your last post, I have been consistently encouraged and given to meditating upon what you have shared on this blog as well as your own. However it boggles my mind when anyone uses the bitterness card to explain away, to negate, or to dismiss another persons opinion when they express an issue by those who have done them harm.I think the word bitterness is overused and too easily use to replace that which is true grief sorrow, trauma and/or victimization.
I also think its wrong to compare this attitude of bitterness by bringing Michaels name into the mix to build your argument.I
When someone is bitter I don’t think its so helpful to quote Hebrews 12:15 at them lest you cause them to be more bitter. I view bitterness not so much of a sin as it is an emotional response to whats going on around us. To me its pretty normal. On the other hand, I believe pride and arrogance are always sinful. Yes, bitterness can be sinful but I don’t think it is always. What Hebrews is telling us is to not let a bitter root grow and one of the ways you do that is to not put all the blame on the bitter person. That is just my two cents.
Sheesh, some folks can turn anything into a spiritual pissing contest. ” I thank god I’m not like_______” Though out of the game, so to speak, I remain grateful and proud of the work and voice of Michael, Warren, Kevin H, Julie Anne and many others in fighting against corruption and for transparency in the church they love.
I’m not bitter, just cynical. 🙂
surfer,
You either mis understood or want to be contentious, I’ll give you the benefit of the doubt and go with the former.
There is a dichotomy that I live in with regard to these matters. Wisdom picks her battles. I use my voice in arenas where I think it will be heard. Don’t be overly analytical, we all live with tensions that if we allow it, will seek to polarize.
Most of my folks don’t have the exposure to CC that the average church attender in Southern Cal does. They have other things to concern themselves with.
My involvement here is centered on my sense of responsibility and concern for a movement that I am a part of, it doesn’t necessarily trickle into my daily ministry. It is a shame that I learn more about my own movement externally than internally.
I’m not trying to be curt, but I can post scripture too, the idea of “being one” takes many definitions, particular when we are talking generalities as opposed to specific instances.
Peace.
Thanks Uriah… I have heard the “bitterness” card played so many times at cc crap games, that I wasn’t even going to respond to surfer. But that’s how they ALWAYS deal with anyone who doesn’t play by their rules, first they shun you and then they label you as a disgruntled or bitter soul who needs healing…
Actually, my healing began when I finally left the dove because the cc Kool-Aid of elitism was the bitter poison I was drinking…
Wow, this is really helpful and informative. Thanks for posting Once a CC guru.
Back in the day the night crew would have been out in force when the word BITTER was used. Man I’ve been here a long time! 🙂
once a cc guru, I listened to the clip you posted and found it very interesting. I have read of some of what was spoken of before but I become uneasy that Jim Jones and CC could somehow be connected.
I understand gaining power through political association as Alex has explained about his step-father Bob Grenier. I suspect it happens much more than I’m aware of as I’m very naive about these things.
I don’t believe you were implying that any CC would go the route of Jim Jones and I guess that’s the point I am making.
I watched earlier today a story Anderson Cooper presented about the parents who were allegedly complicit in the brutal beating of their son resulting in his death and the beating of their other son all because they wanted to leave the “church” which seemingly is comprised of five families.
I see the power that people can hold over others a lot just by reading here but something like this and Jonestown still sends chills down my spine.
http://www.wmcactionnews5.com/story/30278203/the-latest-prosecutor-more-charges-possible-in-church-case
Dang…throw a rock into a pack of dogs and the one who yelps the loudest is the one that got hit…LOL
Must have thrown a handful…
Andrew @18 I like what you share, good stuff, I will definitely think about it.
Uriah, you wouldn’t happen to be Jims sister would you?
She always post twice on my blog when ever she comments…must be a computer glitch…better get that fixed.
“I’m not bitter, just cynical. :-)”
Alas, I find myself in that boat all too often.
I honestly am trying to find my way out of that boat.
Which Jim are referencing?
Always? Or just when initial needs an edit to make it easier to read.
Pack of dogs??? Wow, reminds of CS when Alex was descrbed as “yappie dog.”
There are many ways a person’s life can be destroyed other than causing their physical death. I think the tactics used to control others whether it be in CC Morris Hills or Jim Jones are very similar.
@26 just removed all doubt.
never liked surfers anyway.
I think comparing Calvary Chapel to Jim Jones and Jonestown is over the top. But to be comparing those who go to Calvary Chapel with the kool aid drinkers at Jonestown is inexcusable.
I know once a cc guru will come back and say that is not what he meant, but that is exactly what he meant by posting the clip. He may have once been a guru,but at #22 he is a fool.
Maybe saying cc is like Jim jones is over the top but I’m not so sure about k.p. I’m hearing some pretty cult like stuff with GFA. Go figure that cc is their biggest supporter.
Gene, Gene, Gene, the self-hating Jew… I am about as convinced of your spiritual discernment as this phony guy also named Gene…
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZFyexz_IuHE
PS. “And anyone who says, ‘You fool!’ will be in danger of the fire of hell” But I forgive you 😉
once a cc guru, I looked at the video you posted in #32 and as so much time has passed I don’t recall Gene Rosen. So I googled him and what I did find is that the first six articles from the Huff Post, UPI, Daily Mail, Salon, NBC News, and Time all defend Rosen and speak of a truther movement which from what I could gather is a conspiracy movement.
Were all of these outlets later discredited? Doesn’t seem as cut and dried as you make it.
https://www.google.com/#q=gene+rosen+sandy+hook&tbm=nws
Erunner… of corse they defend him! But think for a moment, why should they have to defend him?
once a cc guru, well it would have to mean the video you posted is a great acting job and whatever else these folks believe about Gene Rosen is also true.
Then I also read some believe Sandy Hook was a hoax. I read children listed as dead weren’t.
So I’m still on the fence.
once a cc guru,
It’s not about me or the other Gene. It is all about you and the association and claims you make towards CC and its attenders and Jonestown.
As for my spiritual discernment, I don’t use any with your posts as you never say anything spiritual. You just whine about being duped by CC (or in your high position, were you the duper of others?) … a proof you have no spiritual discernment.
Gene, Martin Luther hated Jews and believed they should be burned alive in their synagogues… These writing are what inspired Hitler and the Holocaust and you, who is a Jew are his disciple??? Great discernment!
Martin Luther: The Jews and their Lies…
“What shall we Christians do with this rejected and condemned people, the Jews? I shall give you my sincere advice:
First to set fire to their synagogues or schools and to bury and cover with dirt whatever will not burn, so that no man will ever again see a stone or cinder of them. I advise that their rabbis be forbidden to teach henceforth on pain of loss of life and limb. This is to be done in honor of our Lord and of Christendom, so that God might see that we are Christians, and do not condone or knowingly tolerate such public lying, cursing, and blaspheming of his Son and of his Christians.
Here you can read the whole rabid list from your guru Martin Luther…
https://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/jsource/anti-semitism/Luther_on_Jews.html
Martin Luther is also one of my “gurus” as God birthed the Protestant Reformation through him.
Sadly, you have discovered that he was a sinner like the rest of us.
Now, you may want to move from the simplistic to the complex and the context.
His words were horrific.
What fostered them?
Why did he write such things?
Do just a tad of research beyond the obvious and hysterical…
Done!
Done what?
I think most Christians are aware that Luther went off the rails there.
I don’t think most understand why he went off the rails.
My guess is that you know all about this part of the Lutheran corpus, but have never read “Bondage of the Will”…
But the guru does not address the accusations he has made against the good folks at CC.
So he reaches back almost 500 yrs to say, “hey, look over there.”
Perhaps you should remove the once from your name.
The amusing part of this is that every time someone brings up Luther and the Jews or Calvin and Servetus, they act like it’s the first time we’ve ever heard this news.
If MLD and I had a buck for every time someone lobbed those shots we could go in together and buy the Dodgers..
well, Luther was raised in church dogma of that time… it is a bit of a miracle of a work of God the Holy Spirit that he was able to dig out of the mire as much as he did – God’s man for the hour? perhaps … IMHO
i once took one of those bus tours around Washington D.C. hosted by a grad student, from there at Georgetown, if memory serves me… he made the observation that it was important to remember that the founding fathers’ memorialized there were not supermen – they had their shortcomings and foibles like “the rest of us,” but they were men who rose to the challenge of the hour … Luther wasn’t a superman or an Apostle, but what he did for the faith took a heroic man of the hour and … what MLD and Michael said … amen
or so it seems to me tonight
a strange day when mld is acting as a advocate on the behalf of CC… LOL!!!
guru is probably still steamed from the kool-aid he drank. I get it, I drank some as well, and it is hard to walk the razor’s edge between jaded and having a sense of divine insight on these things. But the Jonestown comparison is over the top, way over.
I think Michael should pull that post.
From what I am understanding from Once A Guru is saying is that tactics used by Jim Jones are the same tactics we find by those who are misusing God’s word to gain inappropriate power and control over those who followed them.
He was not focusing so much on the loss of lives which was the ultimate tragedy to so many. But rather, sharing about the idea of “drinking Kool-Aid” and what can happen, when one does when they have or are being mis-led, used, and abused, under the guise of being a called one to lead others in His name.
I found the video very informative and thought provoking. And yes, I can easily see similarities between some of what we know has taken place within CC as well as other institutions of Christianity. Heck, MLD ended up his legacy by provoking and encouraging the murder and so many other behaviors towards the Jews. As for him nailing his complaint on the Wittenberg door, so what—-do you really believe there were not others that also felt similarly to him and do you really think he would have done this if he did believe he had others who were like-minded. Too bad, the love of Christ was not his top priority, for if it had been, he could have so much better in loving whom he was misled to believe were the enemy of the cross, thus advocating such atrocities as well.
Sorry, met to say Martin Luther, not MLD.
Once again Uriah has shown that her ignorance of the Bible is exceeded only by her ignorance of history.
Uriah, may I ask, have you ever read what Luther posted? Do you know what the very first of the 95 was? And you say he didn’t do what he did out of a love for Jesus?
Check it out – you have google
The man called for the burning and killing of Jews as a Christians duty…. Where is the love of Jesus? What Jesus would require that? The King of the Jews?
There Are None So Blind As Those Who Will Not See…
Luther lived the last 25 years with a price on his head.
How I wish that people would read one real history book…
Just for the lurkers…
Luther comments were reprehensible, but to do anything but but state the obvious they have to be understood in their historical context.
Luthers anger didn’t come from racism.
Earlier in his life he was actually an advocate for better treatment of the Jews.
Luther issue was eschatological…he believed that the end of all things was upon the church and the church must act accordingly.
When the Jews refused to convert in the light of the rediscovery of the Gospel and the impending coming of Christ, his wrath against them was kindled.
There are a lot of lessons that can be learned from this tragedy if people are willing to think beyond their own historical context and read beyond the internet.
Yet everyone for the next 400 years understood Luther’s comments to be a polemic conversation and not a call to action evidence by the fact no one ran out and killed Jews.
Yes Luther was rude and crude, but he did live 300yrs before the Victorian era that aid you could not fart in public.
“they have to be understood in their historical context” ???
No, they don’t! When in post-resurrection history are those ideas EVER to be understood except as a warning as an antichrist?
Michael, I don’t want to argue with you and I know that this is your blog and you are very passionate about reform Theology, but do you really believe that ML was somehow justified for that level of evil because his eschatology was off or he had a bad season as a believer?
Michael, you said there are a lot of lessons that can be learned from this tragedy… I really would like to know what it is I need to learn?
Every historical figure and every historical event has to be understood in the cultural context they happened in or you truly have no understanding of the person or the event.
No one defends Luthers late life writings.
If you want to understand them and learn from them you have to do the work to understand them in the context they occurred.
To call the man who started the Reformation an anti-Christ is ludicrous.
A sinner, yes, an anti-Christ, no.
The first thing we can learn from Luther is that end times speculation can ruin even the best among us…
Guru – on day 400 years from now your comments about CC being Jonesville will be regarded as hate driven and not christian
“a polemic conversation…” what the hell is that?
Is it a program, crusade or an inquisition, a blood libel or an expulsion? Maybe it’s a forced conversion, or a massacre?
An underlying source of prejudice and hatred against Jews in Europe and abroad was the direct fruit of Luther’s teaching…
“An underlying source of prejudice and hatred against Jews in Europe and abroad was the direct fruit of Luther’s teaching…”
Read some real history…that simply is false.
Never, ever said CC was Jonesville, you did MLD… Just to set the record straight for those who will be reading in 400 years from now…
Did Luther ever repent for publishing the Jews and their Lies?
Using names other than the one people choose to use here will lead to being banned.
Period.
Luther died before repenting of a lot of stuff he did in the blast years of his life.
Luther was physically ill and mentally exhausted from carrying the Reformation and having a price on his head.
These are not excuses and one would have wished that he could finish better.
Most of us would have been finished off long before this bull of a man.
Still, a great man of God who was indeed both saint and sinner like us all.
“An underlying source of prejudice and hatred against Jews in Europe and abroad was the direct fruit of Luther’s teaching…”
Read some real history…that simply is false.
We will have to wait until the end of days when the Lord and Judge of all the earth opens the books and reveals the true intentions of the heart of every man, then we will all know who’s who in the zoo! Until then, it’s your historical sources vs mine I guess…
The Jews endured persecution long before and long after Luther.
To ignore Luther’s seminal and massive contributions to the church because of his late life sins is beyond my comprehension.
I am going to go out on a limb and guess that Guru does not like Luther. 🙂
I am also going to guess that Gurus’ transformation from CC to Roman Catholicism is complete, just by his suggestion that if Luther has not repented of something, he has lost standing with God.
You RCC guys are big on making salvation about us (what Luther did or said later in life) instead of it being totally about what Jesus did on the cross.
Guru – have you repented of all your sins by name?
I am sincerely sorry for calling you by your first name on this blog and I apologise. It will not happen again!
It does not bother me to be called by my name. Mos know me on Facebook and I email with many. I think my name may also be embedded behind my picture.
So who are you?
It does not bother me to be called by my name. Mos know me on Facebook and I email with many. I think my name may also be embedded behind my picture.
So who are you Friend?
Well, I’m really not Martin Luther’s Disciple 😉
Sorry about the double post. I was going through the Costco carwash and I didn’t think it went through.
This is probably not relevant anymore, but I had shared somewhere on PP that I was reviewing our church support of GFA and a few weeks ago our elders voted to stop support. It was ultimately reported to our church last Sunday (after I had a chance to tell GFA) with three main reasons given. Here is the text that was on our screen as I shared the info:
1. Accused by more than 100 former missionaries of spiritual abuse and cult like practices.
2. Lack of financial transparency and oversight leading to loss of accreditation from the Evangelical Counsel of Financial Accountability (ECFA).
3. Episcopalian style of church polity in India showing unbiblical honor to K.P. Yohannan and some doctrinal concerns.
4. Lack of updates from our missionary.