Maybe, if the AP story has it right:
The church is in financial turmoil: It plans to sell more than $65 million worth of its Orange County property to pay off debt. Revenue dropped by nearly $5 million last year, according to a recent letter from the elder Schuller to elite donors. In the letter, he implored the Eagle’s Club members—who supply 30 percent of the church’s revenue—for donations and hinted that the show might go off the air without their support.
Robert H. Schuller, who is of course the church’s founder, handed over the senior position at the Crystal Cathedral to his son Robert A. Schuller a few years ago; after a while, though, it appears he decided he didn’t like what his son was doing, because last fall he removed his son from the television broadcast. After that, the younger Schuller’s resignation as senior pastor (which was announced last November 29) was inevitable, merely a matter of time. The resulting upheaval, of course, has badly damaged the organization. I was particularly struck by this comment:
Melody Mook, a 58-year-old medical transcriptionist from El Paso, Texas, said she stopped her $25 monthly donation and is looking elsewhere for her spiritual needs. She said she dislikes the guest pastors. “I feel hurt and confused, and I’m not sure that I want to sit and watch when I know there’s problems beneath the surface,” she said. “You feel like you’re in somebody else’s church every Sunday.”
I read that and I have to wonder, didn’t she realize it’s been “somebody else’s church” the whole time? She lives in El Paso, for crying out loud—she’s not a part of that congregation, and never has been.I have mixed feelings about this situation. On the one hand, this could have and should have been avoided; after all, it’s not as if no one saw it coming. The transfer of power from elder to younger Schuller has been planned since 1997 or so, and for that whole time, people familiar with the situation have been saying it wasn’t going to work. I remember being a part of a conversation in the summer of 1998 among folks from various parts of the Reformed Church in America in which people expressed two main concerns: one, that Robert A. Schuller didn’t have the gifts for the position to which his father wanted him to succeed; and two, that Robert H. Schuller would never really be willing to let anyone else run the show independently, not even his son. As a consequence, I doubt many close observers of the situation are surprised at how the transfer of authority has played out. I realize there was no way that the RCA’s Classis of California was going to tell the elder Schuller “no,” but they should have.On the other hand, maybe it would be for the best if the Crystal Cathedral did shut down. It’s generated a lot of money and a lot of publicity over the years, but to what real benefit to the kingdom of God? Maybe it would be better to shut the doors, let the property revert to the Classis of California, and let the classis and the Synod of the Far West figure out how best to use it. I know there’s been some discussion in the past about starting a new denominational seminary in the West; the campus could be used for that purpose, and you could probably cover a lot of the expenses of starting and running a new school by renting out the great glass sanctuary itself to some other church for Sunday services. Or maybe it would be better just to sell the whole thing and use the money to fund church plants all over southern California. I don’t know, but there would be lots of options.The bottom line here, I think, is that this is what happens when you build a church on a personality and a media strategy rather than on the gospel of Jesus Christ. If the driving force in a church is anything other than the gospel, and if the congregation’s chief loyalty is to anyone but Jesus, that church is built on the sand, and it cannot and will not endure.Everyone then who hears these words of mine and does them will be like a wise man who built his house on the rock. And the rain fell, and the floods came, and the winds blew and beat on that house, but it did not fall, because it had been founded on the rock. And everyone who hears these words of mine and does not do them will be like a foolish man who built his house on the sand. And the rain fell, and the floods came, and the winds blew and beat against that house, and it fell, and great was the fall of it.—Matthew 7:24-27 (ESV)
Interesting you mention this. I was Fuller with Schuller the younger [sorry couldn’t help myself] and when he took over the preaching I really felt much better about the whole thing.
It may be my sinful jaundice self but I’ve got a sense the kid didn’t pull the bucks in the old man did so out he went. I hope it was more spiritual than that. I agree though that if he was going to take it over Robert Sr. had to step entirely out of the picture. but that wasn’t going to happen.
Thanks for you view from inside the church.
Alan
You’re welcome. I don’t know about the money situation one way or the other, but one thing I’ve heard–second- or third-hand, but the article seems to support it–is that the core dispute between father and son was theological, and that’s the main reason Robert A. was pushed out.
Robert A, as I recall, was pretty straight forward Evangelical and cared about the church being the church. I remember listening to a sermon he preached on TV, a little envious I might add, and thinking, “Gee, it’s nice to really hear the Gospel from that pulpit.
Alan
That was what I had heard of him as well–and it’s what some folks (the less optimistic, perhaps) thought would lead to trouble. From the public record, it appears they were right.
It’s odd in some ways, because we’ve seen some strong gospel preachers on the staff there, and some good gospel ministry going on; but that work, from what I can tell, isn’t done in the big sanctuary, and it certainly isn’t done in front of the cameras.
The one thing I wonder is what it portends that Juan Carlos Ortiz is the interim senior pastor. From what I know of him, I have a lot of respect for him.