Saturday, April 17, 2010

Hope Legacy

Its been a while since i wrote on any updates, been thinking about the Hope Movement lately. I suppose over the course of over 25 years, the movement have scarred quite a number of people along the way, reading from the comments, I get a sense that our movement have swept many things under the carpet in the past.

Over the years, in the aim of pushing the 1 million churches by 2015, we have sacrificed many good people pushing them into mission field to reach the ultimate goal. I have lost many good friends burnt out and tired, trying to reach the goal of church planting.

Over more then a decade, I kept the "body count" of burnt out people, because of Dr Joseph and Ps PN pushing their agenda and dreams. Its truly a very fine line between God's call and personal agenda. Jehovah Witness and Mormons are also "Supposedly" spreading the Gospel, sometimes people maybe sincere but sincerely wrong.

For all I know Ps PN and Dr Joseph started out well but got side tracked along the way - one by the love of power ( Dr Joseph ) and one by the love woman ( Ps PN) - the saddest thing is the people in the Hope Bangkok church still don't know or don't believe Ps PN committed adultery.
Even big pastors around the world have absolutely no clue, i don't know if HIM should take a more bold stand - we preach holiness and integrity. What are leader's responsibility when you see our own brother's and sister's still living in a lie, not knowing the severity of the sin the leaders have committed.

I recently read a blog from a non-hope person, stating the Hope Church split because of financial and political issue. It does tell me many people are still unwilling to speak up, but why ? Should the leaders from the ex-hope take a bolder stand and not be too diplomatic and forgo those niceties ?

There are still good leaders in HIM and those that truly walk by faith, over the course of this split and the trials and tribulations of Hope, strong leaders have emerged. I really hope we can get rid of the stigma of the Hope legacy, there are some good principles we can keep but we should set a new direction, a new name hopefully. Its getting confusing sometimes, when you see Hope Church in certain places but they belong to different factions. Can u imagine 2-3 hope churches in one same place calling by the same name, same mission statement but run by different head ?

I do wish besides discovering our core this new chapter, we can set out doing something different. We should keep the Shepherding system, the follow-up and Cell system, but do away with the elitist attitude of " Leaders knows best attitude", because sometimes leaders don't know best. When Peter made mistake regarding partaking of food with Gentiles, Paul still could rebuke him and show him what he did was wrong.

In all honest truth, there were some bad choices and decisions made, leaders were promoted because of loyalty rather then spirituality. By loyalty i mean blind loyalty, Leader is always right and never wrong. When leader is wrong its because God's will changed.

I know in the blog, there have been some heated arguments about churches and pastors, but who am i to judge. God must have His reasons for everything. As leaders of God's flock, we will ultimately be accountable to God himself, no one can blame others and try to shift the responsibility away.


What i am trying to say is this, we should always cover the very area which destroyed Hope, the legacy left by the leaders of the movement. Have anyone every wondered, if blessing flow from Top down, what about curses ? Meaning every Pastor and leader who have been in Hope will ultimately face these test - Money, Power and Lust, Keep watch and pray so that we will pass this test.

I know there have been comments on these issues in the blog, I do pray its not all true, if it is it will be so saddening. I really Hope these is not the legacy we are going to leave behind as a movement.


I am praying this is a start of a new chapter, hopefully for those friends who have left Hope, may God give you strength.

20 comments:

Anonymous said...

Are you guys still aim for 1M churches by 2015?

Anonymous said...

Join an established denomination. Hope will tell you that denominations control every thing you do. That is simply not true. There is great flexibility in a denomination while holding on to core common beliefs.

What we know now is that Hope is the one who tried to control everyone's lives while top leaders blatantly sinned and not repented.

Sure, there are issues that arise in denominations too. But you can be assured that if and when such things occur, there will be desciplinary action.

Non-denomination can work as long as accountability exists AND can be verified through independent external organizations.

Anonymous said...

The 1M church idea was rediculous to start with. Count how many churches you have to plant per day.

Anonymous said...

Wow, I didn't know this blog existed until a friend told me about it.

What "big pastors" are you referring to? Pastors in Hope/HIM? or Pastors in general?

Very few really know about Hope in the first place. We used to tell people about the hundreds of churches planted and shown them the "Apostle of Hope" book as credibility. When asked, we could not prove much of anything. So we seeked to find the list of churches, a headquarters, a phone number, an email address, a real head leader person somewhere but could not find.

We asked what was being done with the finances. When there was no valid response, the separation of our church began. It was good that we separated. But we find that so many die-hard Hope still remain and continue to behave the same as before.

I am heart broken at the situation but have no other choice but to leave. Farewell Hope of God. May you all find peace wherever you go.

Anonymous said...

To Eagle Eye,

Hi Eagle Eye,

Thanks for your continued efforts in keeping this blog going. It has now been more than 1 year since all these problems began and HIM started (first unofficially and now officially).

As an individual who seems to know a lot about the internal goings on of Hope and now HIM, can you see if there has been any changes made that has changed Hope from the past and made it better ie. accountability of the top leader/s, the control issue of members, the lack of transparency of the movement, the shepherding issue, etc, etc. Can you see if anyhting has changed at all?

Also from a movement point of view, has there been any changes that has been announced to deal with any of these issues? Or is HIM just a clone of Hope?

Please do give us some feedback on this.

Thanks very much.

CT said...

The latest thing I've heard recently is that top leaders are hacking into leadership team's email accounts to test loyalty. I don't know how true, but I have heard about 6 cases already. May all just be coincidences, but what they are saying is that the weirdness about it is the timing of it all.

Common similarity would be either leaders in their area of finance (at least 4 out of the 6 cases I know of are like that) or if they have been previously on leadership team but step down for various reasons.

I didn't personally experience so I can't say for certain... Anyone else heard about this?

Fee Fee said...

Did you see my earlier post?

" FeeFee said...
The latest going around even scarier.

It's been said that there has been break in into leaders' email accounts to check up on them. To make sure that they are still loyalty to top leader.

That is one way to mind control people. Of course they deny accusations. I don't know how true, but just a thing to watch out for people! It's still a rumour but then who knows?"

So yes, I have heard of it also, but also don't know how true.

Anonymous said...

Hi,

Can i confirm in regards to the leadership checking the email. Is that church specific or you mean in general ?

Curious

CT said...

Curious...

What do you mean by church specific or general? Could you explain your question a bit more?

Anonymous said...

Is the emailing checking thing a general thing in all Hope Churches or is it just isolated to specific Hope church ?

I have not heard of this before. First time i heard about this, this is all new to me.

Would this be the Thailand church ?

Curious

Anonymous said...

Hi, I just found your blog. Being an ex-Hope of God church member, I thank God that you've answered a lot of my Qs regarding the founder & the mother church which I've wondered for the past 10 years. Please continue to expose the truth.

CT said...

From what I know, I've only heard about it spread out in 2 locations, Thailand & Oceania. So like I said it could be a coincidence... I'm not sure... But there has been a leak of information that they have engaged the help of others to hack into email accounts. It seem interesting as I don't really know what's the connection between Thailand & Oceania.

So I can only say, if it's true it's sad, if it's not then that's great.

Anonymous said...

Interesting, i did not know you could so easily hack into people's email account. If there are such cases, then something is really wrong.

For one hacking is illegal, so if leaders are doing that then maybe they are not so spiritual after all.

I think as well people with that kind of skill are often hard to find so my assumption would be in Thailand.

Oceania i do not think there are people with such skill.. but who knows.

I dont know if its a rumor can anyone substantiate this ?

Anonymous said...

Do you know that there were ex-people people commit suicide from the depression hope ministry have cause? The Lord will lead and reveal all truth in his timing. No one can hide from him, even those who are ex-top leaders. Those that have abuses the sheep, weak, and young impressionable for their selfish ambition...woe to them.

Anonymous said...

the person (church planter) was asking for help and closure from the leadership (hope) but no one willing or dare to help. All too busy and afraid.

John 10:11-13
11"I am the good shepherd. The good shepherd lays down his life for the sheep. 12The hired hand is not the shepherd who owns the sheep. So when he sees the wolf coming, he abandons the sheep and runs away. Then the wolf attacks the flock and scatters it. 13The man runs away because he is a hired hand and cares nothing for the sheep.

She was "abused" and exploited by a celebrated leader. But no one want to discipline this blue-eyed leader. She took her life 3 years later.

Anonymous said...

Is this the legacy we want? What about reconciliation? What about making right for the abuses leaders make? What about restitution from the current leader? Aren't we different from the scandal of priest that abuse young children (boys).

Anonymous said...

James 3:16
For where you have envy and selfish ambition, there you find disorder and every evil practice.

note: every evil practice can be found if there is selfish ambition.

Anonymous said...

hi anonymous,

When you say "abused" and exploited did you mean in Hope Thailand ? Was what you mention true ? Maybe you can elaborate more ?

Regards

Anonymous said...

Do not be surprise...follow the money trail.....where is the greatest source(money) and influence(power)? It is not in thailand...but HS. Young Church planters giving up careers and prime of life. They were celebrated as heroes and examples, but when they are in trouble and difficulty, they were gagged and kept out of sight. For this case, it is one the the first cross culture church planting (europe), who through "relationship" was pressured to give up career to serve. When complications arise, no one wants to help to heal, discipline, but choose to protect cover up the leadership involve. In my opinion exploitative of people.

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