A Christian author says the catalyst behind the recent split of a Dallas mega-church was implementation of Rick Warren’s “40 Days of Purpose.†Cornerstone Christian Church of Dallas was started last year by a couple of hundred former members of Valley View Christian Church. James Sundquist, author of Who’s Driving the Purpose-Driven Church?, reports that the church is one of many that has experienced discord as a result of becoming “purpose-driven.â€
Cornerstone’s pastor, Ron Key, who was formerly the senior minister of Valley View, had his 15 minutes of fame in October when President Bush nominated Harriet Miers to the Supreme Court. Miers is Key’s long-time friend and attends his church, so many journalists contacted Key in an effort to ferret out Miers’ views on abortion and other issues. Many of those reports (like this one in the Fort Worth Star-Telegram) mentioned the church split.
I found those reports interesting not so much because of Miers as because of Key and Valley View. I am acquainted with Ron Key and have relatives and friends who have attended the Valley View church. Valley View is an “independent Christian church,†part of a loose-knit fellowship of several thousand non-denominational theologically conservative churches. Rod Heggy and I have both participated in the independent Christian churches all our lives. Valley View is well-known as one of the largest such churches in this part of the country, so its progress has been of interest to us. (More info about the Christian churches is available here and here).
Ron Key joined the Valley View staff in the early 1970s and served in several capacities before becoming the senior minister in 2001. However, in 2004, the church hired Dr. Barry McCarty as their “preaching minister,†while keeping Key on as “senior minister.†That unusual arrangement wasn’t likely to last long. Last year Key’s tenure at Valley View terminated, and Valley View experienced a split, resulting in the formation of Cornerstone Christian Church.
What the new church didn’t expect was that just as it was getting started, one of its members would be nominated to the Supreme Court, bringing the church – and the church split – more publicity than it may have wanted. Many of the news reports about Miers offered some details about the Valley View split, mostly echoing this account in the Dallas Morning News:
The Cornerstone group broke not because of politics or theology, but because of concern about how Valley View Christian was being run, including staff changes and changes in worship style aimed at attracting more young people.
THE PASTOR’S WIFE’S PUBLIC LETTER
The other day I thought about Ron Key and his new church and decided to search for any new reports about how Cornerstone is progressing. I can’t find a Cornerstone website, but I did come across this letter, reportedly written by the pastor’s wife, Kaycia Key, to Sundquist. In her letter Key lays much of the blame for the church split on implementation of the Purpose Driven model. Sundquist said he has Key’s permission to publish her letter online. Here are excerpts:
December 14, 2005 and January 9, 2006
Hi James,
Our newly founded church, Cornerstone, is doing very well, has such a sweet spirit. We have over 250 members and we are meeting in facilities provided by Dallas Christian College. …I am so grateful to you for identifying [in Sundquist’s book] some of the causes of my fear and concern for the Lord’s church. … His [Warren’s] theology is definitely skewed. … Many who left Valley View Christian Church did so in great part because the leadership had developed an irrational and irrecoverable rupture in our common faith, belief and vision of Christ’s church after we studied and implemented the Purpose Drive Life by Rick Warren.
The church had been experiencing problems between the elders and the congregation and people were quietly (and some not so quietly) beginning to leave. When the elders brought in a new preaching minister people grew more unhappy and then after we did the Purpose Driven programs the rift developed into the rupture of faith and our vision for Christ’s church to the point of “re-visioning†even the foundational charter.
… The elders … asked Ron to resign … or be fired. Ron … [said] they would have to fire him. … Ron Key did not, as some may have thought (or been erroneously told) start a new church, but was asked to become the minister of the new church, once it was founded. Since then the church has grown to about 275-300, several of whom were refugees from other churches in the area who were also leaving because of many of the same issues with leadership that had developed in their respective congregations after Purpose Driven Programs. We are also now being able to share in love with more people about the perils of Warren’s programs. …
Kaycia Key
(More of the letter can be found here).
SPEAK UP OR KEEP QUIET?
Many believers feel uncomfortable when a Christian challenges a well-known Christian leader publicly. Perhaps one imagines that we should pull Rick Warren aside, maybe meet him for a coffee at Starbucks, to discuss our concerns. Unable to do that, some think perhaps we should just say nothing at all. Meanwhile, using mass media, Christian leaders are able to influence millions of believers and tens of thousands of churches all over the world. Modern Christians and churches especially seem eager to be carried along by every new wind that blows through the church. The anthem of the 21st-century Church could be “Blowing in the Wind.â€
When we become convicted that the “the latest new thing†seriously misses the mark of God’s Word, we are right to speak up. And when the Church Gurus disseminate their ideas through the mass media, the only effective way to discuss or disagree with them is also through the mass media. We should do so in love and with respect, but there is usually more cowardice than honor in remaining silent.
I am not a fan of The Purpose-Driven Church, which has played a pivotal role in turning church worship services into marketing events (see my previous post, “Is the American Church in Decline?”). I was disturbed by The Purpose-Driven Life, which, as many critics have pointed out, handled the Scriptures recklessly, with numerous out-of-context Scriptural quotations, often relying on loose paraphrases that distort the true meaning. I have never voiced those concerns before in any public way, but am prompted to do so now by the Dallas story.
In researching this article, I discovered that one of my favorite Bible teachers, John MacArthur, published a book last year that includes at least one chapter on the Purpose Driven movement. The book is Fool’s Gold, and I look forward to reading it. MacArthur’s modern classic on the seeker-sensitive movement is Ashamed of the Gospel, written in 1993, two years before Warren’s Purpose Driven Church was published. I heartily recommend Ashamed of the Gospel to all church leaders and anyone else concerned about the health of his or her local congregation.
* * * * * *
UPDATE (Jan. 31, 2006): Readers from the Dallas area, please see this special message just for you: “Every Secret Will Be Made Known.”
* * * * * *
UPDATE (Feb. 2, 2006): Rod Heggy has written a strongly worded opinion piece on church splits in general, and the Valley View Christian Church split in particular. Church splits are as old and nearly as common as church picnics, but rarely are they discussed as openly and as analytically as Rod has done here. See: “Growth by Fission: Anatomy of A Church Split.â€
* * * * * *
UPDATE (Feb. 15, 2006): Dennis Slaughter, minister emeritus of Valley Vew Christian Church, has written a response to this article. See: “Dallas Minister Responds to Articles About Church Split.”
