My Comments on the New Believers Article by Don Lattin

Jan 21, 2010 2:19 PM
My Comments on the New Believers Article by Don Lattin
by makestraight

I wanted to take the time to briefly address some of the things that Pastor Ed Kang stated in the “New Believers” article written by Don Lattin for Cal.
The Rev. Edward Kang ’86, J.D.’89, the senior pastor at Gracepoint Fellowship Church, said complaints about the expectations placed on church members will not stop him from asking tough questions about the way his flock live their lives. “How do you do a ministry that is absolutely safe from any kind of accusation? The way you do that is become this suburban country-club church, give a 20-minute homily, hope everyone lives it out, and then gather again next Sunday,” he said. “That kind of church will never get accused of anything.”
As I’ve stated in a comment elsewhere in this blog, this is a false dichotomy, a term that Pastor Ed himself likes to use. A false dichotomy is when two things are setup against each other and posted as opposites without any other alternative. For ex., “if you can’t be a doctor, then you’ll be homeless,” would be a false dichotomy, since obviously, there are many other professions a person could pursue.

Here, Ed is essentially stating that if you’re not as authoritarian, legalistic and demanding – he would put it as being fervent and serious about the gospel most likely – then you would end up being a lukewarm Sunday Christian.
This is a completely false “false dichotomy”.


I do concede that there are many lukewarm churches, but does that mean any other church not setup like Gracepoint is lukewarm? If you asked this directly into his face, Ed would most likely deny it, but he poses it as such in this article. It’s most likely his defense against this blog and others, stating that Gracepoint is only under scrutiny because they are so “fervent”.

Kang blamed some of the complaints about the college ministries run by Berkland and Gracepoint on the “very martial” nature of Korean culture. “I’m sure I’ve done my share of being short with people,” he confessed. “Up until the mid-’90s, that wounded a lot of people.”
Ed equates the complaints about Gracepoint as merely a cultural issue, and about him personally being “short with people,” or losing his temper essentially. That is not the same. The complaints against Gracepoint are about the overall overly authoritarian and legalistic, UNBIBLICAL setup that he and his wife Kelly has over that church.

However, he attempts to dismiss it as, “well, we’re Korean” and “well, I have had my share of having a short temper” which of course, seem like minor issues. But this issue with Gracepoint is NOT about being Korean, and not about people losing their temper.

Kang said it’s not that surprising that a student who leaves his church might feel isolated. “Suddenly, she is not meeting with her small church group. This might be her entire social network,” he said. He does acknowledge that some eventually find his church too authoritarian and too demanding, but shunning, he insists, is unacceptable. It was these practices—rebuking, shunning, and “shepherding,” the latter a radical form of Christian discipleship in which leaders exert an extraordinary influence on the personal lives of people in their flocks—that Kang said made him part ways with the Berkland network in 2006. In particular, he took umbrage with Rebekah Kim, who is now a leader of the Boston fellowship. (Rebekah Kim is not the same person as Rebecca Y. Kim, the Pepperdine sociologist.) Kang became, he said, “increasingly uncomfortable with her leadership and the culture at Berkland.” He severed the Cal ministries and changed the name of the Willard congregation to Gracepoint Fellowship Church.
I can only sigh about this above passage. First of all, it’s the bombarding of systematic kindness that draws in members in the first place. It starts in college where Gracepoint members seek students from helping move into their dorms to sitting with students at their very own dining commons. The staff members take them shopping, treat them to dinners, and meals, and will play sports with them. After all this systematic, targetted kindness, how can one NOT be drawn into Gracepoint church? It’s in a way, psychological manipulation in how systematic it is. One could probably be convinced to become a buddhist at this point, no?

But for Ed Kang to then present the situation almost as though it’s a person’s own fault for leaving and then feeling disconnected, is really wrong. It’s almost a bait and switch essentially, where you love-bomb people, and then urge them later in legalistic and authoritarian ways to do the same thing in this pyramid-scheme like structure for Gracepoint’s own growth and sustenance.

Note that when you’re “core” into Gracepoint, you are encouraged to really let go of other relationships, by “prioritizing” Gracepoint first.

They won’t actively tell you to dismiss your friends, but there are so many activities and obligations you could have tied to that church, especially as a staff member that you consequently and naturally lose touch with all your friends outside of Gracepoint. They at best, become prospects for “outreach” whom you call when Gracepoint decides to have an “outreach” event.

Also, the “shunning” does indeed happen. It’s not by a mandate that it happens. However, it’s really an odd mix of situations that causes shunning to occur. When someone leaves, the mid-level staff a lower have no idea what happened. Often, the older leaders and directors tell them an unfair angle of a story that’s self-serving to them. As I’ve stated before, they give a judgmental, one-sided reason, usually about how that person was essentially seeking the “world” or some “comfort”. Then the midlevel staff and others feel that since this person has “left God” that they should no longer associate with them, because after all, they no longer want to follow God. Any remote idea that perhaps what their leaders told them is not completely true, or even an outright lie does not enter their minds, because they have been taught and trained to quell any doubts of leaders, because believing leaders is like trusting God essentially.

At the same time, the GP leavers don’t want to have anything to do with Gracepoint anymore, because of hurts they have received [I"m talking valid ones, not spilled milk], or deceit they have experienced. They feel afraid to share anything because they know if they talk with any Gracepoint member, that member will obviously tell his/her own leader, and the word will travel up to the Kangs, who will most likely in turn twist that into, “see how bitter that person is?” They try to categorically dismiss any leavers accounts of what happened by leveraging their “trust relationship” with their members.

So on both parties, they don’t want to communicate, and the relationships automatically become awkward. The leavers realize the relationships really were not friendships, but working relationships under the umbrella of Gracepoint, and the members that stay pity the leavers, and they may even “pray for them” because they “left God for the world.”

Also, it’s astounding to me that Ed Kang could blame everything on Becky Kim. She had her significant issues, but he presents it as though she was the one leading the Berkland Berkeley back then, and doing all the rebuking, shunning and shepherding.

NO!

It was Ed himself and his wife Kelly Kang! THEY were the ones in the trenches doing the unbiblical rebuking and enforcing the unbiblical legalism through their hyper-authoritarian ways.

Ed frames it as though he were the hero and that he saved Berkland Berkeley from evil Becky Kim. Becky Kim was largely at fault for the whole of Berkland, but the specific sins in Berkland Berkeley were mostly due to Ed Kang and his wife Kelly. They actually promoted that same culture.

This is one of the worst cases of scapegoating I’ve seen in my life.