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Tag Archives: tithe

Hillsong: The multi-million dollar “crazy cult”

21 Tuesday Apr 2015

Posted by Nailed Truth in Uncategorized

≈ 65 Comments

Tags

10%, 20%, a current affair, brainwashing, crowd control, cult, dangerous cult, money, prosperity cult, ten per cent, tithe, twenty per cent, word of faith cult

Tonight (the 21st of April, 2015), Australia’s ‘A Current Affair’ aired this report on Hillsong.

In spite of Hillsong’s continual lies, their facades of “relevancy” and their contemporary nonsensical gimmicks, the world still sees through it. The reality is this: the world is not being won over to Jesus Christ. In fact, Hillsong is giving the world an excuse to hate Christianity while Hillsong is militantly campaigning against biblical Christianity. Not only that, Hillsongis stealing Christians from other churches and taking over churches by force under the guise of “blessing” churches.

It is time the media, the Australian Government and more importantly church leaders, stop calling Hillsong a church. Cults have always declared war on Christianity. Hillsong for decades have proven again and again to be a word of faith and prosperity cult.

When will Christianity finally say enough is enough?

Houston Says Jesus Wants Our Righteousness “to exceed, or go beyond” The Pharisees?

25 Friday Jan 2013

Posted by Nailed Truth in Books, Uncategorized

≈ Comments Off on Houston Says Jesus Wants Our Righteousness “to exceed, or go beyond” The Pharisees?

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Brian Houston, exceeds, false prophets, Hillsong, money, Pharisees, tithe, tithes, wolf, wolf in sheeps clothing, wolves, wolves in sheeps clothing, You Need More Money

Pharisee Houston

This article is broken up into four segments. The last segment provides the snippet of Brian Houston which the earlier segments set out to correct.

WHO IS JUST JUSTIFIED AND MADE RIGHTEOUS?

Jesus told a “parable to some who trusted in themselves that they were righteous.”

“Two men went up into the temple to pray, one a Pharisee and the other a tax collector. The Pharisee, standing by himself, prayed thus: ‘God, I thank you that I am not like other men, extortioners, unjust, adulterers, or even like this tax collector. I fast twice a week; I give tithes of all that I get.’” Luke 18:10-12, Emphasis added.

Was the pharisee justified and made righteous by his own efforts? Do you believe they could be made righteous by their own efforts? Was it the tither that was justified? Was it the one that kept giving? Jesus continues,

“… But the tax collector, standing far off, would not even lift up his eyes to heaven, but beat his breast, saying, ‘God, be merciful to me, a sinner!’ I tell you, this man went down to his house justified, rather than the other. For everyone who exalts himself will be humbled, but the one who humbles himself will be exalted.” Luke 18:13-14, Emphasis added.

Who was made right before God in this parable? The Pharisee or the tax collector? Jesus was making the point in the parable that those “who trusted in themselves that they were righteous” were in fact not. Righteousness and justification was given to the man who realised his sin and asked for God’s mercy.

THEN WHO CAN BE SAVED?

In the sermon on the mount, what did Jesus condemn the pharisees of doing that Jesus also demonstrated they did in his above parable? Jesus exposed their sin in trusting themselves in thinking “they were righteous”.

So what do you think Jesus was saying to the multitude about the Pharisees at the beginning of his sermon on the mount?

“For I say to you that unless your righteousness surpasses that of the scribes and Pharisees, you will not enter the kingdom of heaven.” Matt 5:20

Was he telling the Jewish people to try harder than the Pharisees? Is Jesus challenging believers “not to live below the level of righteousness upheld by the Pharisees”? Was Jesus teaching the multitude to “exceed, or go beyond” the righteousness of the Pharisees?

No. Jesus’ message was against them and their false teachings. Instead, Jesus taught people to follow Him and his teachings. The scripture above was to dishearten his listeners to even bother trying to live up to the false teachers standards.

The Pharisees practiced the Law as best they could. The only issue was that the Law was designed to have people to depend on God to forgive and save man from their sins. No one in Israel could follow the Law perfectly, EXCEPT Jesus. The Pharisees and the Lawyers could not obey the law perfectly or be good all the time. Jesus kept EXPOSING the lies and hypocrisy of the false teachers who practiced the Law and believed they could follow it perfectly (Luke 18:9-14; Luke 18:18-26). When Jesus exposed the sin in the heart of the rich young ruler, one of Jesus’ apostles cried out, “Then who can be saved?” (Luke 18:26). This is where Christ wants his audience to be spiritually situated in his sermon on the mount.

JESUS VS PHARISEES

Jesus continually challenged the false teachers, leaders and prophets through His sermon on the mount. He exposed their false teachings, shows and hypocrisy (Matt 6:2; Matt 6:6; Matt 6:16). He warned people to not be like them and do the opposite to them (Matt 6:1; Matt 6:6; Mat 6:17). He is not encouraging people to exceed in the ways of the Pharisees. He is warning people not to follow them but instead follow him. Christ preached Himself. In this sermon, Jesus used the Law to point all his listeners to his teachings and to Himself.

In his sermon, the climax falls on the false teachers again. Jesus teaches about two ways, two trees, two gates and two foundations. Only one way leads to life. Only one tree offers life. Only one gate allows you to enter life and only one foundation offers true life.

Jesus associated the pharisees and their teachings (“false prophets, who come to you in sheep’s clothing but inwardly are ravenous wolves”) to the false road, the false gate, the bad trees and the bad foundations. 

Through out the gospel accounts, Jesus reveals he is The Way, The Truth and The Life (John 14:6) and The Gate (John 10:7). When Jesus told people to watch out for wolves in sheep’s clothing, he was actually describing a wolf disguised as a shepherd. Jesus says HE is The True Shepherd (John 10:11). He is pointing the people away from the Pharisees, their false practices and their false teachings. The only option that Jesus offered was always Himself.

The people in this sermon were left with these two options:

    1. Follow Jesus and His teachings to life. Reject the Pharisees. Or…
    2. Follow the Pharisees and their teachings to life. Reject Jesus.

This is why after hearing this controversial sermon the writer states

“the crowds were astonished at his teaching, for he was teaching them as one who had authority, and not as their scribes” (Matt 7:28-29)

The Pharisees were the image of righteousness before the people. But Jesus was calling the Pharisees the “least in the kingdom of heaven” for nullifying or twisting “one of the least of these commandments” and for teaching “others to do the same”. He was reforming the people. He was rightly using the Law to bring them to despair. Who can honestly say that your own righteousness can surpass the righteousness of dedicated religious leaders? Who can honestly say that Jesus wants our own righteousness to exceed the Pharisees?

Well… Brian Houston does.

======================================================

WHAT JESUS WOULD NEVER TEACH

Houston says that Jesus teaches that “your righteousness” can “exceed, or go beyond” the righteousness of the Pharisees through all means possible (especially in  giving). He teaches “what the Pharisees did is only a starting point” and we are meant to exceed their righteousness. Houston believes that WE are to take “everything one step further.”

If Brian Houston actually believes this, any Christians should actually question if Houston is a pastor or a Christian at all. Brian Houston has missed the entire point of the New Testament, the gospel and how one becomes a Christian if he believes this.

Not only does he misquote Jesus saying, (“Jesus said we shouldn’t get angry”), Houston twists Jesus’ sermon to teach people that they can be made righteous through their efforts, especially in their tithing.

Houston then further demonstrates biblical incompetence by teaching that “You tithe because you put the Kingdom first in your life, and it is with a spirit of faith that you sow into God’s Word”. As we already have seen, tithing is not a requirement for Godly righteousness. It was of the Mosaic Law and not taught by Jesus and His disciples. Because tithing is of the Law, Brian Houston is flat out wrong saying, “You tithe… with a spirit of faith”. God rebukes Houston with this:

“Is the law then contrary to the promises of God? Certainly not! For if a law had been given that could give life, then righteousness would indeed be by the law.” Galatians 3:21

“I do not nullify the grace of God, for if righteousness were through the law, then Christ died for no purpose.” Galatians 2:21

“The law is not based on faith.” Galatians 3:12

According to Brian Houston and his beliefs, he must be an even greater Pharisee than the Apostle Paul (Acts 26:10). Paul says,

“Look out for the dogs, look out for the evildoers, look out for those who mutilate the flesh. For we are the circumcision, who worship by the Spirit of God and glory in Christ Jesus and put no confidence in the flesh— though I myself have reason for confidence in the flesh also. If anyone else thinks he has reason for confidence in the flesh, I have more: circumcised on the eighth day, of the people of Israel, of the tribe of Benjamin, a Hebrew of Hebrews; as to the law, a Pharisee; as to zeal, a persecutor of the church; as to righteousness under the law, blameless. But whatever gain I had, I counted as loss for the sake of Christ. Indeed, I count everything as loss because of the surpassing worth of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord. For his sake I have suffered the loss of all things and count them as dung, in order that I may gain Christ and be found in him, not having a righteousness of my own that comes from the law, but that which comes through faith in Christ, the righteousness from God that depends on faith.” Philippians 3:2-10, Emphasis ours.

We will now leave you with the Pharisee of Pharisees to teach you how “to exceed” your own righteousness. This excerpt is found in the chapter, ‘The Power of Tithing’ from Houston’s book ‘You Need More Money’.

“Exceeds

For I say unto you, that unless your righteousness exceeds the righeousness of the scribes and Pharisees, you will by no means enter the kingdom of heaven. (Matthew 5:20)

Jesus said that he didn’t come to destroy the law but to fulfil [sic] it. This is why the Old Testament is so relevant today. However, the challenge to believers is not to live below the level of righteousness upheld by the Pharisees – His challenge to us is to exceed, or go beyond, it.

What the Pharisees did is only a starting point. Jesus took everything one step further. For instance, one of the Ten Commandments is not to kill or murder. Jesus said we shouldn’t get angry, because that would lead us to sin.

When Jesus said that the Pharisees ought to tithe, that sets a precedent for us to go further. New Testament tithing is different to the bondage and legalism of the Old Covenant. You shouldn’t feel depressed or miserable about it. You tithe because you put the Kingdom first in your life, and it is with a spirit of faith that you sow into God’s Word.” – Brian Houston, You Need More Money, Smithfield, NSW: Alken Press, 1999, pg. 72.

Brian Houston Is A Pastor How?

02 Wednesday Jan 2013

Posted by Nailed Truth in Books

≈ 83 Comments

Tags

Brian Houston, exploit, false, false gospel, false teacher, false teaching, first fruits, greed, Hillsong, Hillsong Church, money, pastor brian houston, tithe, tree, tree of knowledge of good and evil, You Need More Money

What you are about to read from Brian Houston is not theological, historical or logical. This is what it means when Peter said, “In their greed these teachers will exploit you with stories they have made up”, (2 Peter 2:3). Below is an excerpt from Houston’s book, ‘You Need More Money’.

“WHAT IS THE TITHE?

Tithing was a principle that was established in the book of Genesis. We’ll probably need to go into a bit of Bible history here, but literally a tithe means “one tenth”.

The principle of first fruits

Going back to the book of Genesis, you discover the principle of first fruits. It was established in the Garden when one of the first principles given to mankind was that God kept something for Himself. Initially it was a tree in the middle of the Garden. Everything else was free for Adam and Eve to enjoy.

While Adam and Eve disregarded God’s portion and subsequently reaped the consequences, their sons Cain and Abel, made offerings to the Lord from their work.

“And in the process of time it came to pass that Cain brought an offering of the fruit of the ground to the Lord. Abel also brought of the firstborn of his flock and of their fat. And the Lord respected Abel and his offering, but He did not respect Cain and his offering.” (Genesis 4:3-4)

One brother gave the first of his increase, while the other waited to the end of  his harvest and gave of his left-overs. God honoured the offering that put Him first place, not the after thought. The eternal principle of first-fruits was established here.” – Brian Houston, You Need More Money, Smithfield, NSW: Alken Press, 1999, pg. 68-69.

HOUSTON EXPOSED

It only took Satan to reinterpret what the tree meant to Eve so she could eat of it. It only took Brian Houston to reinterpret what the tree meant so people could eat his false Christianity.

God said, “You are free to eat from any tree in the garden; but you must not eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, for when you eat of it you will surely die” (Gen 2:16-17). It is at the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil that Satan made Eve doubt God’s Word, “Did God really say?” (Gen 3:1), and eat the fruit.

It is clear that Brian Houston is lying to the reader. No where does it say in the bible that the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil is the tithe or “God’s portion”. He simply made it up. The Apostle Paul correctly writes about the Genesis account and writes against people like Brian Houston (emphasis ours):

“I am jealous for you with a godly jealousy. I promised you to one husband, to Christ, so that I might present you as a pure virgin to him. But I am afraid that just as Eve was deceived by the serpent’s cunning, your minds may somehow be led astray from your sincere and pure devotion to Christ. For if someone comes to you and preaches a Jesus other than the Jesus we preached, or if you receive a different spirit from the one you received, or a different gospel from the one you accepted, you put up with it easily enough. But I do not think I am in the least inferior to those “super-apostles.” 2 Corinthians 11:2-5

Brian Houston than dared to quote Genesis 4:3-5, in an attempt to teach something that contradicts scripture. In fact, Brian Houston once again lied about what the text says. The text Genesis 4:3-5 does not teach us that, “The eternal principle of first-fruits was established here”. Instead Hebrews teaches us something that opposes Brian Houstons false teaching. (Emphasis ours.)

“By faith Abel offered God a better sacrifice than Cain did. By faith he was commended as a righteous man, when God spoke well of his offerings. And by faith he still speaks, even though he is dead.” Hebrews 11:4

It wasn’t by the “eternal principle of first fruits” that Abel offered a better sacrifice to God. That would make Abel a pantheist. Abel didn’t bow to the eternal principles of nature to see God respect his offering. This wouldn’t be faith. This would be sin. Houston is teaching believers a pagan belief.

God did not honour “the offering that put Him first place.” If it did, that would be righteousness by works (a false gospel). Instead the scriptures say against Houston, “By faith [Abel] was commended as a righteous man, when God spoke well of his offerings.” This is righteousness by faith and not by works, (Ephesians 2:8-9)

To further demonstrate the logical bankruptcy of Houston, one has to consider what he meant here:

“The eternal principle of first-fruits was established here.”

What does this mean? If an eternal principle was “established here” in an historical moment (recorded in Genesis 4:3-4), then this principle is DEFINITELY not eternal. It is temporal. We must remember that Brian Houston is linking the “eternal principle of first-fruits” with the tithe “in the book of Genesis”. Therefore Houston simply defeated his own argument that the tithe/firstfruit principle is eternal or played a significant role in the early Genesis narrative. Not only that, the tithe no longer meant his definition of “one tenth”. There weren’t only ten trees in the Garden of Eden. The bible does not inform us how many animals Abel has. Houston simply redefined his meaning along the way to support his argument for the tithe.

Following this logic through, one has to ask these questions: Who taught Abel this “eternal principle”? HOW could Abel learn this “eternal principle” if his latter actions established this “eternal principle”? Maybe Abel should have asked Brian Houston how to access these eternal principles so God could respond in favour to Abel. Maybe both Cain, Abel could have bought Brian Houston’s book ‘You Need More Money’ to access these supernatural principles… You get the point.

To justify his unbiblical stance in regards to his false doctrine, Brian Houston created fables. Since when is a pastor ever qualified to treat God’s Word like this?

In his statement of beliefs, Hillsong says the bible is, “accurate, authoritative and applicable to our everyday lives”.

After examining Houston’s handling of the bible, everyone should be asking the question to Brian Houston or the congregation of Hillsong: “How?”

The Issues With Hillsong

11 Thursday Oct 2012

Posted by Nailed Truth in News Headlines

≈ 5 Comments

Tags

Brian, Brian Houston, bullock, cash, cash buckets, concert, credit card, geoff bullock, Hillsong, Hillsong Church, houston, money, mulah, multi-media, rock concert, salary, salary tithe, tithe, tithing

The Australian reports:

The High Cost of Faith

Published by News Limited, 29 April 2006, by Jennifer Sexton.

As crowds – and their cash – flood into Hillsong Church, former members tell Jennifer Sexton about the heavy price they paid for leaving the flock.

Whoa! I wanna know you, I wanna know you today.” With that catchy lyric, the lead singer rips into a punky-pop riff on his electric guitar as the band and side-stage choir spring to life. Over a sea of raised arms, five cameras capture the action as the audience, in time with the lanky, tousle-haired lead singer, belts out a thundering chorus: “You’re the best thing that has happened to me.”

No, this isn’t MTV live. It’s Hillsong Church, part religious service, part rock concert, part multi-media conglomerate. Every weekend at Hillsong churches in Sydney 19,000 people sing, clap and jump through a two-hour tribute to a God who rocks. As traditional religious congregations shrink, Hillsong attendance expanded more than 13 per cent in 2004.

There are no images of Jesus being tortured on the cross at Hillsong headquarters in Sydney’s Baulkham Hills, no vaulted ceilings. The audience sits not on wooden pews but on 3500 cushioned theatre seats. Under each one is an envelope and credit card form for believers to donate their pre-tax 10 per cent salary tithe. Ushers flood the aisles and pass black buckets down each row. The buckets have holes in the bottom, presumably to discourage parish-ioners from giving coins. And the rivers of cash keep flowing: donations and salary tithes to Hillsong were $15.3 million in 2004; merchandise, CDs, books and DVDs, returned a further $6.93 million, while total church revenue has now passed the $50 million mark – all tax-free thanks to Hillsong’s charitable status. And then there are the donations – it’s anybody’s guess how much – from the owners of the $40 million Gloria Jean’s coffee empire, Nabi Saleh and Peter Irvine, who are both senior members of Hillsong, the former as treasurer. The message of Hillsong’s prosperity gospel is: the richer you are, the more you can help others.

But along with the expanding congregation and profit margins have come the ugly rumours that won’t go away – of underhanded treatment of disaffected church members, of attempts to silence critics, of profiteering from the faithful. Only last month, the Labor Mayor of Blacktown in Sydney’s west, Leo Kelly, accused Hillsong of attempting to pressure him, via an ALP state official, to dampen his criticism of their use of public funds.

Hillsong’s main benevolent arm, Hillsong Emerge Ltd, has been accused in federal and NSW parliament of misappropriating commonwealth grants worth millions of dollars. And a former member, Robert John Orehek, was charged with fraud after allegedly fleecing believers of up to $20 million, which he sank into failed and fraudulent property investments.

THE KING OF HILLSONG EVANGELISM, Brian Houston, bounds onto the stage, clad in a dapper suit. “The faithful are in church tonight,” he declares, surveying the auditorium. “Awesome!” The background music fades away and the house lights brighten. People reach into their bags for Bibles and notebooks. Houston savours a silent pause. He’s been thinking about the seven deadly sins. “What would be my deadly sins, destructive in the lives of people?” Avarice, gluttony and wrath are apparently old hat. Houston instead says the sins are negativity, regret, complacency. Just a few weeks later, Hillsong’s formidable marketing arm has swung into action, releasing a four-CD set of Houston’s teaching on the sins that undermine potential in people, retailing for $35 in the church shop.

Houston has become the most influential pastor in the Pentecostal movement, and is a household name to born-again Australians. He also has political pulling power: Prime Minister John Howard, Treasurer Peter Costello and former NSW premier Bob Carr have all addressed the Hillsong congregation in recent years. In the last federal election, Hillsong member Liberal Louise Markus narrowly snatched from Labor the seat of Greenway, next to Hillsong’s Baulkham Hills church.

After the service – there are 30 every week in the two main Sydney venues, Baulkham Hills and Waterloo – people pour into the Hillsong shop. Half of the back display is devoted to the CDs and books by Houston and his perky wife of 28 years, Bobbie. Their bright white teeth and perfect hair seem to shine down from dozens of book and CD covers. In Bobbie’s CD set She Loves and Values her Sexuality she proclaims, “You might be happy with your weight but is your husband happy with your weight? … How are you going to do anything that might surprise your man when you need a hydraulic crane just to turn over in bed?” Boob jobs and face lifts get the thumbs up, as do good sex and a husband who says sorry with an impromptu spending spree at the jewellers. It’s a feel-good message, and when it doesn’t feel good, money makes it better.

GEOFF BULLOCK KNOWS ALL about Hillsong’s brand power and merchandising. He helped build it, even coming up with the name Hillsong more than 17 years ago. He launched the church on the international Christian music scene when he wrote most of the original songs, such as Power of Your Love, Refresh My Heart and Have Faith in God. For the church’s first decade he was Brian Houston’s best friend. For eight years, until a messy split in 1995, he ran the music department, nerve centre of “the brand”. Although his songs are now rarely played at Hillsong, they are popular on the international Christian music scene and Bullock lives off composition royalties paid through APRA (the Australasian Performing Rights Association).

When I meet Bullock at a sunny, beachside terrace cafe he is edgy and constantly apologises – for knocking the table as he crosses his legs, for being unable to eat much of his salad. A short, tidy man with intense blue eyes, he is approaching his 50th birthday. He hasn’t slept much in anticipation of revealing the backstage story behind the “miles of smiles” at Hillsong. “It was very nice being at the top of the tree but it just … ” He pauses, swallows. “This is going to sound dramatic. They stole my soul.”

Bullock’s moment of religious revelation struck in 1978 at Sydney’s Koala Motor Inn, where Houston’s father, Frank, was preaching. Bullock was 23 and had been touring the east coast in a rock’n’roll band, smoking dope and reading Carlos Castaneda’s stories of magic and sorcery. “It was wild,” he recalls of that November night. They sang hymns to a funked-up polka tune played with live piano, drums and bass. In the latest fashion blue safari suit, at the centre of the throng was the bespectacled 56-year-old preacher, Frank Houston, who declared that he used to smoke cigarettes before Jesus saved him. “People were trying to put cigarettes in his mouth,” says Bullock. “He lay down and he spat them out. It was a show of great confidence and charisma.”

Bullock was a needy, naive Sydney North Shore lad, schooled at the Presbyterian Knox Grammar. He believed in a higher being and was willing to try anything to reach Him, including cannabis. “I was absolutely ready for brainwashing. I was absolutely ripe for ‘love bombing’.” So, just two hours after walking into his first evangelical experience, Bullock answered God’s call, and his 21-year-old Anglican girlfriend from Lithgow in country NSW, Janine, followed. Individually, in back rooms, they were counselled. They had been born again and were now committed to Jesus. Satan would fight to get them back, they were warned. “I went in with a confident world view and I came out quite rattled. My whole belief structure had been turned on its head.”

He said goodbye to his rock’n’roll band, Arnhem, and to smoking, drinking and playing the occasional gig in topless bars in Sydney. A church leader came to his house and threw out his extensive collection of music – Joni Mitchell, Pink Floyd, The Beatles. “I had this wonderful group of friends, a great lifestyle, going listening to bands. All of that was viewed as being ‘of the devil’ … I didn’t lose some friends, I lost all my friends.”

Five years later, when 29-year-old Brian Houston set up his own church, Hills Christian Life Centre, in the newly suburban northern hills of outer Sydney, Bullock was a founding member. Young Houston was inspired by Tony Packard, who established a high–profile Holden car dealership in the area at Baulkham Hills with the catchcry “Let me do it right for you”.

Bullock was among the 70 believers at Pastor Brian Houston’s first service on Sunday, August 14, 1983, at Baulkham Hills Public School. From here a Pentecostal phenomenon called Hillsong was born. Bullock sang, played piano and was music frontman on stage for at least three services every Sunday. He recorded the church’s first six albums, three of which went gold, one platinum. He also ran the Bible college curriculum. For this he earned no more than $45,000 a year from the church and gave back a pre-tax tithe of 10 per cent, even when he couldn’t pay his growing family’s bills. Now he is being treated for post-traumatic stress disorder after being expunged from the church he helped build.

Bullock and Janine married in 1980 and had five children within a decade. At the height of his Christian stardom in the late 1980s to mid-1990s, Bullock toured the United States, Britain, Asia and New Zealand with an expanding repertoire of songs. For Sydney Sunday services they rose at 6am to set up the band and audio equipment and then rehearse ahead of morning, afternoon and evening church services. He was too busy to notice he was failing as a husband and father. “We had to put our parenting on hold,” he says.

Bullock began to feel like a real estate agent selling a manufactured ideal of God rather than one he really believed in. “I think Hillsong’s still got it, this feeling that God smiles a bit more when we’re singing our songs, and we’ve got good hairdressers, dentists, cosmetic surgeons. I came to think that the patron saint of Hillsong was Gianni Versace.”

Christmas Eve 1994 was the end for Bullock. He had rehearsed the choir and band to play the standard church repertoire for three Christmas services. Just hours before the first service, Houston discovered Bullock had not rehearsed traditional Christmas carols. “He just tore me to shreds and then left me to do three services,” Bullock says. Houston got his Christmas carols that night, but it finished his partnership with Bullock.

Once Bullock departed, a campaign of whispering about his morality and sexuality filtered throughout the church. When he broke up with Janine a few months later, his subsequent relationship with a married woman (whom he later married) was, he says, twisted to become the reason he had been forced out. At the same time, Houston preached about dark forces intent on undermining the church. “They ran a huge campaign to discredit me,” fumes Bullock.

Janine says she changed her phone number to stop friends from the church calling to tell her Bullock’s departure and their marriage break-up was against God’s will. She once hid in the wardrobe when a woman visited her house a second time. “I couldn’t bear her preaching at me again, telling me that this wasn’t of God.”

Janine still goes to Hillsong once a month, but says she can’t help but be cynical about the facade of spirituality compared with the lack of compassion and understanding she experienced. But, she adds, “there’s some beautiful Christian people who attend there”.

GEOFF BULLOCK ISN’T THE ONLY FOUNDING member of Hillsong to question its methods and ethics. For a decade until 1991, Stephen Grant was paid $100 a week to preach at Hillsong and was dean of the church’s Bible college. He admits that, as an eccentric, he was a strange fit for a fundamentalist church.

Still, Grant came from a wealthy family – he now runs a successful art gallery in Sydney’s Redfern – and had pledged (but never paid) $150,000 to the church’s building fund. He had a beautiful wife and was entertaining at the pulpit. He wore loud, colourful suits and sometimes a red leotard. When he blew on the congregation, the entire room of people would fall over.

But he realised his views diverged from Houston’s when they travelled together to the US in 1988. “In the US, I saw the wholesale commercialisation of born-again Christianity. I went, ‘Nah, truth is becoming a commodity here. It’s not a question of internal search, it’s a question of external commodification.'” But Houston liked what he saw and soon Hillsong’s fundraising became increasingly glitzy.

“I started to question what the bloody hell I was doing,” Grant, 46, reflects. “I was preaching all over the world. But I was getting really depressed.” He had lost both his parents and his marriage was under pressure. Grant subsequently discovered that, in the inner sanctum of the church, his wife was being encouraged to recognise that he did not belong.

His clinical depression was seen by the church as a sign of faltering faith. “I knew there was nothing wrong with my faith, and yet I was told: ‘You are not believing in Jesus enough.'” The Hillsong website backs up Grant’s claim. “Depression,” it declares, “is a supernatural spirit straight from the devil.”

When Grant broke up with his wife and left the church, like Bullock, he had to start life all over again, outside the Hillsong fortress. “People find a lot of healing in the church. I don’t have a problem with that. But … if you are kicked out, you are f—ed.”

The Christian message of the shepherd seeking lambs lost from the flock doesn’t apply at Hillsong, says Grant. “It was forbidden for me to be visited by the members of the church. Damn the lost lambs.” His recovery took five years.

The sentiment is echoed by theology student Penny Davis, who took years to rebuild her self-esteem after a shattering experience at Hillsong, which began in 1995 when she was just 20. Women who don’t fit Bobbie Houston’s mould at Hillsong, or those brave enough to challenge the male hierarchy, are swiftly brought into line, she says. With ambitions to become a pastor, Davis quickly realised she needed to change her wardrobe. “To get anywhere, you had to become a clone,” she quips. “I grew my hair, started wearing make-up and doing all the nice girly things.”

Life became very full, and it was all about church. She moved into a share house with four other young women from Hillsong, volunteered two days a week at church and did paid work with the Hillsong community youth centre three days a week, earning a weekly income of $600, less the 10 per cent salary tithe. “The pressure at Hills to be glamorous and have everything as well – it’s quite difficult on a low income.”

Just months after joining, she slept with a woman from the church – one who later confided about the liaison to a youth leader. Davis was immediately counselled that homosexuality was a sin. “I was just so vulnerable,” Davis says simply. She was assigned a mentor, who claimed she had successfully corrected her own “dysfunctional” sexuality. They spoke at least once a week, when Davis had to confess any lesbian fantasies. The mentor also read Davis’s diaries. After the “problem” persisted, she was put into an 18-week “ex-gay” program called Living Waters, then conducted at Hillsong. Once a week she attended the Living Waters group sessions, where she was told to focus on problems in her past which may have triggered her sexual “dysfunction”. “I was committed to getting these things fixed,” Davis says.

Three years of counselling, sessions with a psychiatrist and group therapies failed, however. Davis resorted to grabbing joyful glances at a video of Sydney’s Gay and Lesbian Mardi Gras while her flatmates were out, she laughs. “I started to subconsciously realise that this was not going to change … the shame and guilt were eating me up inside.”

Davis decided her sexuality and spirituality could never be reconciled at Hillsong and made the momentous decision to leave. In response, her Hillsong friends sent a barrage of text messages quoting the Bible on the “sin” of homosexuality. She was kicked out of her house and then her friends froze her out, ignoring her emails and phone calls. “She’s gone, we have restructured, there’s no need to continue communicating with her” was the message sent to her Hillsong friends by church leaders, claims Davis.

Social worker Tanya Levin, who spent her teenage years at Hillsong, says that those who question church policy are first shouted down and later ostracised if they persist. Levin has been commissioned to write a book about growing up in an evangelical church. For research, Levin attended the annual Hillsong women’s conference Colour Your World last March and took offence when poor children in Africa were being marketed for sponsors in the audience on the basis of being cute. “They are actually for life, not just for Christmas,” Levin shouted before walking out of the auditorium.

When she wrote an email the next month to the Houstons asking to meet them on a regular basis in order to gather material for her book, she got this curt response from the general manager, George Aghajanian: “We are aware that during your attendance at our recent Colour Your World Women’s Conference you caused a significant disruption. It is for this reason that we ask you to refrain from attending any future Hillsong church services or events; including accessing Hillsong’s land and premises at any time.” Aghajanian closed by saying the church’s leadership and staff were unable to provide assistance for the book.

When Levin subsequently attended a Sunday evening service, a pastor asked to speak to her outside. When she attempted to get back in to retrieve her bag, two security guards blocked her path, picked her up by the elbows and escorted her off the premises.

Brian Houston refused numerous opportunities to comment for this story, except to say: “More than 19,000 people come to Hillsong Church every weekend and I know that the overwhelming majority of them would testify to a healthy experience for both themselves and their families. They would also speak of the constant positive impact they see on others who are being helped through Hillsong Church and its many community programs.”

There is no doubt that Hillsong – or, closer to the mark, its loyal parishioners – perform many good deeds. The church has a number of charitable arms, including Mercy Ministries, a residence for girls dealing with unplanned pregnancies and eating disorders established five years ago by Hillsong’s Darlene Zschech, the country’s most popular and successful Christian singer. Although recently mired in controversy, the church’s main benevolent arm, Hillsong Emerge, has helped people find jobs and recover from addictions. Hillsong attendees sponsor about 2600 children in Uganda, and generously gave $500,000 to victims of the 2004 Boxing Day tsunami.

But the criticism seems likely to persist as long as Hillsong makes $50 million in revenue, pays no tax and yet spends just $2.67 million on “welfare services”. It is not clear how much Mercy Ministries gets from Hillsong, but its total donations were just $304,840 in 2004. And Hillsong Emerge’s 2004 accounts show it got only $646,666 from the Hillsong Foundation Trust and about that again in government grants.

And Houston has been less than transparent about his own income. Until last year he had failed to declare that he and Bobbie had sold their own personal property holdings to a Hillsong-related entity of which he is a director, Leadership Ministries Incorporated. Bobbie sold a Bondi beachfront apartment on the same block as Jamie Packer’s pad to the not-for-profit LMI for $650,000 in February 2002. The couple also sold a waterfront property on the Hawkesbury River in October 2004 to LMI for $780,000, making $535,000 on their 1998 purchase price. They continue to use both these properties.

LMI is the tax-free entity Hillsong set up as a vehicle to pay the couple’s income. In breach of Office of Fair Trading reporting rules, no financial statements had been lodged since its inception in October 2001. Only after the property deals were uncovered by The Australian were the accounts filed in August last year. When the numbers came in they revealed the golden couple got a measly net income, after donations, of just $21,658 in the year to December 2002, $12,739 in 2003 and $69,041 in 2004.

If this is all there is, then how do the couple and two of their three children pull off a property buying spree worth $1.738 million over 12 months in exclusive beachside Bondi? On August 26, 2003, son Joel, who is a lead singer in the Hillsong band and earns song-writing royalties, bought a $676,000 apartment a few minutes’ walk from the LMI-owned apartment, paying $276,000 up front. That same day Brian and Bobbie paid $650,000 with a collateral mortgage for the apartment next door to Joel’s. Exactly a year later, son Ben borrowed just $90,000 to buy a $412,000 apartment a few streets from the other family holdings.

And questions persist about why it took 30 years for Brian Houston’s father, Frank, to be exposed over a complaint of sexual abuse of a boy in his homeland of New Zealand. Houston says his father was banned from preaching in 2000, when he confessed. But Frank continued to live on the Hillsong account, in church digs, until his death in November 2004.

Houston has hiring and firing rights over the board, and has appointed some influential and rich men to control the church’s empire (there are no women, he says, because one of the board members won’t allow it). The general manager of Hillsong – psychologist George Aghajanian – now oversees a $100 million property portfolio. And Hillsong has its sights on lucrative new markets in Europe – it opened a church in Paris last year and already has churches in London and Kiev.

Geoff Bullock says he can’t help but admire Houston. “He works hard and is gifted. He deserves to be a wealthy man.” But when told how little Houston is claiming as net income Bullock is incredulous – especially knowing the charismatic pastor’s fondness for Valentino suits and first-class plane tickets. And then there are the thousands of dollars in “love offerings” Houston regularly personally pockets for every talk he gives on the international Pentecostal speaking circuit. “Why not just be open about it?” Bullock asks.

As Bullock watches the church lurch from one controversy to the next, he has a sense of foreboding. He muses there is a valid expectation that the church should pour more money into helping others and less into promoting itself and amassing wealth. “In the end, it’s just sad,” he says, looking into his coffee cup. “It does look like it’s approaching a train wreck.”

Jennifer Sexton is a senior writer on The Australian.

Source: Jennifer Sexton, The High Cost of Faith, News Limited, Australia, Published April 29, 2006. [Archived]

 

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