Eight Years Later, I’m Finally Angry about MH Church, Seattle (II)

Eight Years Later, I’m Finally Angry about Mars Hill Church, Seattle (II)

Part 2: Current Perspective

I remember when Sutton Turner was hired and introduced. It was late in my ten years at MH. One by one we had started to do things that we had vowed we would not do as a church (publicly in sermons or in our community groups).

I remember being confused by his hire because with him came missions to Ethiopia. We had said as a church (particularly at MH Downtown Seattle) that we were devoted to Seattle, to local missions ONLY. I didn’t know the term white saviorism yet, but I was already suspicious of international missions. But here suddenly we were expected to donate to someone supposedly doing something good in Ethiopia.

Also, Sutton’s background was big business. I remember thinking, are we a big business? Not realizing exactly how much a mere business we already were.

There was this push for growth, more and more campuses, more and more members, more and more attendees, more money, that ran counter to what many of us believed about our purpose and community — especially some of us working in a care capacity. We knew we were already not caring well for the people we had by then, and couldn’t possibly handle more. But more we must.

Recently Sutton Turner has shared more of his experience at MH on his personal website and in podcast interviews on The Roys Report.

In the first of two podcasts he explains how he was shocked by many things that were happening when he was first hired, and how he witnessed violent and bizarre incidents regularly. One that stands out in his memory, he says, is *when Mark raged at a pastor backstage because there were not enough towels for a spontaneous baptism ceremony. *Mark grabbed the man by the neck and hoisted him against a wall, swearing and threatening to kill him.

This is a shocking story that I had not heard before. Also shocking for me is Sutton’s response, both at the time and now. At the time, he did not intervene or do anything. Now, he is speaking up about it, but he still tells the story in an interesting way. He says that seeing things like that is why he and others in leadership were so afraid of Mark.

I think it is important that Sutton explains how they really felt about Mark. Saying that they were literally terrified of him is refreshing honesty. My shock at this is not because they felt fear upon seeing such things. Rather, my shock is that they did nothing and Sutton still seems to barely see how wrong that act was, in that he continually describes it as an example of Mark’s anger issues and bullying.

That was an act of physical and verbal assault.

The action, combined with the explicit death threat, is something that can be prosecuted as a crime. (Side note: the criminal justice system is not a reliable way to understand what is right and wrong; but in this case, it identifies such actions better than the MH pastors seem to).

Interestingly, Mark regularly talked from stage about how he was afraid of being attacked on stage, how he got death threats. The church hired body guards (and his current church has upped this practice) and later even had a police presence at the Ballard campus Sunday services. I can now see that this was the pot calling the kettle black.

Also interesting is how that assault did not seem to make it onto the list of *formal charges* the group of pastors wrote up while trying to “hold mark accountable.” It galls me that someone committing criminal acts of violence was said to merely be “quick tempered, arrogant, and domineering in leadership,” was said to simply fall short of a Biblical pastor, and who needed to follow a church led plan of repentance leading to restoration (code for returning to full pastorship).

I am not saying the men there should not have felt fear. I am saying they should have stood up for the assaulted man, and said no more. Kicked Mark out (technically Sutton had the power to do that) on that very day, told the entire church publicly, potentially pressed criminal charges, and never never never never never let Mark enter a MH door again.

Why didn’t they do that?

Not only was it fear for their own safety, it was a delusional idea that God was working salvation miracles through Mark. That God needed Mark. That people needed Mark.

Whew.

I even hear lingering bits of that idea in the Roys Report podcast. Julie Roys and Sutton Turner still both identify as Christians. Both note that it would have been so amazing if Mark had submitted to that plan and actually repented and changed. How that would have brought so much glory to God.

That angers me. A wildly controlling, deceptive, abusive, violent man admitting to his wrongs and stopping doing them is an example of doing what is right, but is no more glorifying to God (whatever that means) than people who never do those things in the first place!!!! And is still not a good choice as a leader.

As refreshing as Sutton’s honesty is, I feel a bit of sad confusion hearing it now. The community I was in at MH, within community groups and the Redemption Group counseling community, honesty was really important. I’ve already noted that we pushed boundaries, were strangely focused on sex and sex negative at the same time, and tended toward scrupulosity, but I can say that we were also challenging white cultural norms by how honestly we were sharing ourselves. Clumsily, we were in fact trying to do something that a lot of white people (speaking to what I know) never grew up doing: learning to confront, share, and speak honestly and lovingly on difficult topics.

The whole be a man, man up kind of language was so important at MH, but from my place within the counseling community, I truly thought that meant be honest, brave in vulnerability, lead from brokenness. I didn’t know that the very men leading the groups I was a part of were being beaten up (or threatened with it). They did not tell us.

Our pastors were not being honest with us, were not telling us very important information about what was happening and how they were experiencing it, yet they were telling us to be honest. Shit. Even that list of charges mentioned before was confidential. When I read it now, I can only think, why didn’t they share that with us immediately? Mark was the most public figure at MH. What the pastors saw needed to be public knowledge.

I don’t like hearing these were some of the best men I’ve ever met as Sutton and others say in podcasts and interviews about the pastors around Mark. How can these men who were bullied into silence for so long, who also bullied us and deceived us be the best men? Normal people, yes, mistaken people, but the best? If I saw my pastor grab another person by the throat and slam them up against a wall while threatening to kill them, I wouldn’t be seeking a way for that man to stay a pastor. I would be seeking a way to protect and help the victim, and to keep the attacker from doing that again. Not even one more time. I would not be worried about what God could (or couldn’t) do without that one man.

For me, getting very very far away has been immeasurably helpful. Getting out of the US, out of church altogether, has brought fresh eyes.

Even the Roys Report assumes that people should worry about each others’ souls before God. Why do we spend any time at all worrying about each other’s souls and eternities when we’re still not doing a good job of tending to their bodies and minds right now?!

I think we need to back up even a bit more. These men follow a pattern set in the larger violent culture.

I recently read something that Jordan Peterson said. He is a conservative non-Christian who has worked in so-called liberal subjects and environments (psychology and universities) but has found a following even among Christians and especially among young men. He admitted at some point that he wished to just buy a church so he could preach each week. He, like Mark Driscoll, wants to be rich, famous, and powerful, for crowds to hang on his words. These people are in all parts of society, using others to build their names. Running from accountability. To quote Medium’s own Laura Halls they are all lying liars who lie. Mark Driscoll. Jordan Peterson. J.K. Rowling. Sean King. Matt Walsh. Kanye. Trump. It’s way too similar, all part of this cult of celebrity within the West (for much more on this I recommend Jessica Johnson). It’s time to tune them out.

I see Mark and MH as part of a large historical problem that continues in each new expression. At this point I don’t want to reform it. I want that church to die. Whatever Christ or Holy Spirit lives among the oppressed (thinking of “God is a Black Woman” by Christena Cleveland) might be worth learning about, humbly, quietly, not leading anything, but this white jesus, and his bully bodyguards, must go. And never pastor a church again.