Tag: bill hybels

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Megachurch Willow Creek Closing Campus Amid ‘Unsustainable Financial Scenario,’ Losing 10,000 Members

Willow Creek Community Church has announced they’re permanently shuttering their Chicago campus location, with senior Pastor David Dummitt citing an “unsustainable financial scenario.”

It’s a blow for Willow Creek, the multi-campus 10,000-member church founded by Bill Hybels that pioneered the church growth and seeker-sensitive movement but has seen its fortunes over the years as it hemorrhaged money, people, and reputation. 

Their losses,began in 2018, the same year they purchased and moved into their Chicago location, after allegations of decades of sexual misconduct came forth against Hybels. These allegations included inviting women to his hotel room, making suggestive comments to female employees, extended hugs, kissing a woman against her will, and engaging in oral sex with an employee, leading Hybels to resign, along with the co-pastors who succeeded him, and then eventually the entire elder board.

They held massive staff layoffs in 2019 and 2020. When Covid-19 hit, Willow Creek completely shut down in-person gatherings for almost a year. When they did reopen, they did so at 25% capacity and mandatory masks for 2-year-olds and above.

In 2021, they made our radar after one of their woke pastors said that he Refuses to Teach to Mostly White Churches, describing it as ‘Casting Pearls Before Swine.’

In 2022, The church announced that they were cutting their staff budget by 6.5 million dollars and axing 30% of the employees, the result of losing over 10,000 congregants in the last three years. Things have not improved.

Doummit announced in a video on Monday that they could no longer pay the mortgage on the property they acquired just a few years ago, saying:

For years they (the campus) met in a rented theater. After a successful capital campaign they opened their doors in a new, current facility on State Street back in April of 2018. And at that time we had pledges to fund almost the entirety of its purchase with a plan to carry a responsible level of debt in line with the size and budget level of the campus at that time. 

But … since 2018, Willow at large and Chicago went through some pretty significant changes. And while Chicago was a growing congregation, we’re faced with an unsustainable financial scenario.”

Doumitt insisted they have no other plans to close other locations.

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Famous Seeker-Sensitive Megachurch Cuts Staff Budget by $6.5 Million, Laying off 30% of Staff

Willow Creek Community Church, once a multi-campus 25,000 member church founded by Bill Hybels that pioneered the church growth and seeker-sensitive movement – the demonic practice of gearing everything about a church service to be as comfortable and friendly to non-believing “seekers” as possible, is crashing and burning.

The church announced that they were cutting their staff budget by $6.5 million dollars and axing 30% of the employees, the result of losing over 10,000 congregants in the last 3 years:

“(In Post-Covid) In our informal network with other large churches, we know of only two churches experiencing attendance and engagement beyond 60% of their pre-Covid numbers, with many around 50%….

Willow has not escaped this reality. We reopened all our doors for weekend gatherings in April 2021. At the end of 2021, we were averaging 43% of our 2019 weekly average attendance. (A drop of 57%)

….The best rule of thumb for multi-site churches like Willow is to keep staff costs at or below 50% of the overall budget. Our staffing costs are 72% of our overall budget, which is too high to be sustainable. 

It’s not the first time they cut staff- they did so in 2019 and 2020, in order to cope with the sheep bleeding away from their crummy church. We’re all for this massive cut, and would like nothing better for the whole church shut down. You’ll recall in in 2007, a major study was released that was commissioned by the church itself, finding the church was failing catastrophically at producing deep, mature followers of Christ.

The real start of their losses however began in 2018, after allegations of decades of sexual misconduct came forth against Hybels, including inviting women to his hotel room, making suggestive comments to female employees, extended hugs, kissing a woman against her will, and engaging in oral sex with an employee, leading Hybels to resign. Then his co-pastors who succeeded him. Then the entire elder board.

Willow Creek completely shut down in-person gatherings for almost a year, and then when they did reopen, did so at 25% capacity and mandatory masks for 2-year-olds and above.

Last year they made our radar after one of their woke pastors said that he Refuses to Teach to Mostly White Churches: describing it as ‘Casting Pearls Before Swine.’

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Willow Creek Pastor Refuses to Teach to Mostly White Churches: ‘It’s Casting Pearls Before Swine’

A megachurch pastor has pledged he will no longer preach or teach at churches that aren’t sufficiently multiethnic, likening his refusal to Jesus’ teachings in Matthew 7:6 which talks about not casting pearls before swine.

Ed Ollie Jr. made the divisive comments during a dialogue on Black History Month with fellow staffer Shawn Williams. Both men are pastors at Willow Creek Community Church, a multi-campus 20,000 member church founded by Bill Hybels.

Willow Creek pioneered the church growth and seeker-sensitive movement – the demonic practice of gearing everything about a church service to be as comfortable and friendly to non-believing “seekers” as possible. Notably, in 2007 a major study was released that was commissioned by the church itself, finding the church was failing catastrophically at producing deep, mature followers of Christ.

Now, it seems they are repeating that pattern. Ollie Tells Williams:

I think Willow Creek is this really unique and weird place in that we are aspiring to something that is extremely difficult, and it’s fraught with all kinds of misunderstanding and pain. Because even in this room as we sit, we have Asian, African-American, white. When you start to look at that and you start to look at the reality of what the kingdom really looks like, and we’re trying to bring it on earth as it is in heaven, you will come against all kinds of challenges in doing so.

So I think it’s important to know the environment that you’re in and then be true to who you are and bring all of who you are into the circles that you come into. So there’s some places I don’t go and preach and communicate. Why? Because they don’t have values that are important to me and my family. I will talk to you privately. I’ll help build relationship with you. But until you as a pastor or church take steps to be more honorable to the scriptures, I don’t have to come into your environment and give my pearls in the midst of the reality of swine. I don’t need to do that, and I won’t do that.

And I think what happened in George Floyd was there was an eye-opening moment that happened for all of our culture, Shawn. What happened is people stopped apologizing. And I don’t know fully where this is all gonna go, but people of color, particularly who are evangelical, said, “We’re not coming to your events anymore. We don’t need your validation of our voice. We’re not gonna take that anymore.” There is a new level of awareness that has hit, and I don’t think that we’ve fully gotten to the bottom of where that’s gonna go.

But I think that it will take many moments like this and learnings like we are doing as a church and even our church staff. I have a very diverse staff, and I have a community that is 34% Asian that I’m pastoring. So it’s a part of our life. It’s something we value. But I don’t know if that’s the case for everyone else.

h/t to @wokepreachertv for the clip and transcript

Bonus awful thing said by Williams

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Bill Hybels’s Daughter Apologizes for Her ‘Silence’ After Misconduct Allegations

Popular writer and ministry leader Shauna Niequist has publicly apologized for her silence in light of the sexual misconduct allegations against her father, Bill Hybels, some three years ago.

Bill Hybels is the founding pastor of Willow Creek Community Church, a multi-campus 20,000 member megachurch that pioneered the seeker-sensitive movement – the practice of gearing everything about a church service to be as comfortable and friendly to non-believing “seekers” as possible.

According to GQ, “The messages address relevant topics such as marriage, parenting, and finances from a biblical perspective without sounding ‘preachy.’ Religious language and traditional religious symbols are avoided. The Bible is referred to but not preached from in an expository manner. The music, drama, child care, youth programs, special events, technology, and facilities are all of excellent quality.”

Notably, in 2007 a major study was released that was commissioned by the church itself, finding the church was failing catastrophically at producing deep, mature followers of Christ.

In 2018, allegations of decades of sexual misconduct came forth against Hybels, including inviting women to his hotel room, making suggestive comments to female employees, extended hugs, kissing a woman against her will, and engaging in oral sex with an employee.

These allegations resulted in him resigning, as well as several of the lead pastors and the entire elder board. Several investigations have been completed which conclude that the allegations are credible, but Hybels has continued to insist he is innocent.

Three years later, Niequist explained on Instagram that “I apologize for my silence & for all that it communicated. I’m so sorry. I continue to grieve alongside every person who’s grieving…”

Shauana and her husband (who was a worship leader at Willow Creek) have been criticized and harried on social media for not commenting further after the incident.

She explains that the “season” after the allegations shook her to the core and caused her to “shut down.” She says she was initially encouraged to take time to listen and grieve, but that “silence was necessary for me initially, but I extended that silence too long.”

I now understand that my silence communicated to many that I defend my father’s actions and his ongoing silence. I don’t. I grieve both of those things. I now understand that my silence allowed many people to assume that I don’t care about the people he hurt. That’s not true, & that’s something I regret so deeply. I’m so sorry.

In this area of my life, I’ve been living according to my fear, not my values. I carry so much regret, & I apologize. I know it might not make sense that someone who writes for a living, literally, could find herself so unable to say what needed to be said. But that’s the truth. I was wounded, & I waited too long.

Rather than apologizing for her silence since the allegations, we wish she’d apologize for their role advancing and promoting the devastating, gangrenous doctrine of “seeker sensitivity” that the church gargled and spit out on evangelicalism for decades.