Hillsong

 Last night I caught up on watching a documentary on Hillsong church.  My colleague Marcus had mentioned watching it.  It followed the development of the brand, the mega church, the power and influence of the main pastor and his all white, mostly all male leaders through many nations.

It was very difficult to watch, in that I am middle aged, a follower of Jesus, and I was never, ever cool, one of the in crowd - I always felt an outsider at school.  When I was a teenager, I was part of a church that edged towards this level of control, power encounters with God, a family who led and still lead the church.  It didn't do much for my young faith except lead to one incredibly unwise decision that I wasn't equipped to make.

Occasional forays into a scaled down version of Hillsong would be the women's conferences held by my friend's church in Cheltenham racecourse.  With lights, big screens, smoke machine, powerful speakers, prayer ministry, and the gimmicky and expensive goodie bags and merchandising.  I felt uncomfortable, awkward, manipulated, yet I found it a memorable experience because my good friend loved it so much. It was time spent with her where she found God at work. That meant a lot to me.  

So I can see the appeal.

The young pastor, tattoed, with "fedora, leathers, skinnies and boots" the hillsong brand "starter kit" was incredibly passionate about living all out for Jesus.  It is so hard to question that, it is an attractive thing.  But the film did make me think - this is all about image, all about numbers, "insta" and selfies - particularly the selfies and filming at the holy sites in Jerusalem were awkward - other christians were lost in devotion, these cool young guys were like tourists with little understanding of their faith but so much enthusiasm. 

Despite all the abuse - a history of sexual abuse not reported, abuse of power, control, money irregularities, I felt conflicted.

Here is a church which gets young people committed to Christ, to reading the bible, to bringing their friends to church.  It provides a home and family for the lost and lonely, the city kids, the damaged.

It is smart, it is definitely somewhere you would not be ashamed of attending.  It has amazing music, quality drama, plaform speakers whose rhetoric is easy to digest.

And yet, and this is a criticism levelled at me, it seemed so far from the Jesus in the gospels. I know I hide my faith too often, I know it is isn't centre stage sometimes and these extrovert guys just want the world to know they love Jesus - what is not to like about that?

Like the young pastor, I pray I will have Jesus' integrity, his honour, his love and ability to sacrifice.  I just wonder if that is what my colleagues see, worked out day by day.