Mars Hill Watch: Spiritual Warfare, pt 2
Mars Hill Church has been one of the largest and fastest growing Christian churches in the Seattle, Washington area. It is listed as one of the top 50 influential churches in the United States. Attendance purportedly exceeds 7,000, with more than 24 pastors on staff. The church meets in six locations (Ballard, Shoreline, West Seattle, Lake City, (formerly called the “Wedgwood” Campus), Bellevue (formerly the Eastside Campus, Downtown) and Olympia) with a total of seventeen services each Sunday.
With great power comes great responsibility, according to Spiderman. I imagine that he would greatly disapprove of Pastor Mark Driscoll, the big name behind Mars Hill. Driscoll has been known to be no stranger to controversy, and I’ve heard a great deal of hateful quotes attributed to him. Mars Hill is growing to the point that it can no longer be ignored, and has been gaining presence around campus with Driscoll’s Vintage Jesus lectures in Kane Hall. I figured that it was high time I hear the man speak for himself.
Mars Hill offers a podcast of Driscoll’s podcasts. I loaded up the most recent sermon, entitled “Special: Spiritual Warfare Pt. 2″ on my trusty Zune, and went out for a jog.
I had to cut my jog short, however. Bigoted, divisive, and hateful statements came pouring out of my headphones faster than I could make mental notes of them, and I knew that I would have to write them down to keep track. Here, then, is a play by play of the prejudiced pontification. Listen along, if you like.
0:00-0:55:
Driscoll makes mention of Satan and demons. Interesting note: he actually believes that there are demons. Driscoll also pronounces the word tome “tow-may,” which makes me giggle.
2:19-2:50:
Wow, that didn’t take long. Two minutes in, and Driscoll makes a sexist of himself. In his “Demonic Counseling,” he claims to counsel significantly more women than men. He claims to not know why, citing the biblical Paul, who states that “women are the weaker vessel.” “Feminists aren’t going to like that” - damn straight, we won’t. Driscoll finishes, joking that it’s evidence that they are deceived.
3:50:
Satan loves heresy, and those who teach “false doctrine” are demonically inspired. I imagine this extends to everyone who isn’t at Mars Hill Church.
4:30:
Continuing on “demonically inspired teaching,” Driscoll mentions a Christian from the Colbert Report that released a book calling for love and acceptance of homosexuals as an example. Satan wants you to love teh gheys.
That's right kids! Gay people are your friends!
6:15:
False doctrine “has verses.” Driscoll goes into a tirade about misquoting scripture. Points for condemning Prosperity Theology, though. It seems that he condemns cherry-picking verses, yet… we all know that no one lives completely biblically. Every Christian cherry-picks verses (how many leave their families and sell all their possessions?)
9:50:
The “ordinary demonic.” Driscoll makes a subtle dig at Catholics for their “bizarre exorcisms.” The first thing he talks about is that lack of frequent sex among married Christians is demonic (I wonder how many husbands used that on their wives that night)!
10:40:
Christians get divorced more often than non-Christians. Driscoll attributes this to Satanic interference, and implies that it’s from not enough sex. It would be really interesting to study this further, but my knee-jerk theory is that Christians get divorced more often because they don’t have sex before marriage.
11:45:
Marriages he counsels usually have problems stemming from one person wanting sex more often than the other. That’s called sexual compatibility, Mark. You’re bound to have compatibility problems when you commit to someone else for life while completely oblivious to the very real physical aspect of relationships…
13:45:
Marriage between a Christian and a non-Christian is demonic! Satan WANTS Christians to marry non-Christians, so that they won’t raise “godly children.”
15:31:
Christians dating non-Christians is demonic. Satan “baits the hook with non-Christians.” Hear that, members? We’re Christian bait!
16:08:
Oh, he’s on a roll now. The religious experiences in other religions are inspired by Satan and demons.
16:40:
“Did you know that the Mormon Jesus is demonic? And the Jehovah Witness’ Jesus is demonic, and the Islamic Jesus is demonic, and the new spirituality Jesus is demonic, and the Jesus of Oprah is demonic…” Other demonic Jesuses include any Jesus who don’t send people to hell and the Jesuses who say you can be lesbian, bisexual, or homosexual.
I couldn't say for certain, but I bet teh Jesunator is also a demonic jesus.
20:45:
It’s ok to be angry, but not bitter.
21:26:
If someone teaches false doctrine (ie, anything outside of Mars Hill), you should be angry! It’s not ok to be indifferent to other doctrines.
“The wrath of God appears more frequently than the love of God in the Bible.”
How true.
22:22:
Driscoll tells the story of a man who came to him and told him that he’s cheated on his wife, and might have venereal disease. Driscoll tells him that if the man doesn’t tell his wife, Mark will. The audience laughs. The man thought he was speaking in confidence, and Driscoll didn’t respect that. He mentions how he wants to assault the man. The audience laughs again.
25:00:
Over the course of the next few minutes, Driscoll repeatedly states that “if you don’t get angry, there’s something wrong with you.”
27:24:
Mark gives us permission to be angry, and to tell people that you are angry. At least he tells the flock to stay away from violence. He does, however, talk about how it’s good to have that anger motivate you to do things such as interfere in other peoples’ lives.
28:00:
Long tirade about the evil of bitterness. Not awful, I suppose, we could also do with less bitterness, more love, more acceptance, and more tolerance. Driscoll slams bitterness, but doesn’t mention anything about being more loving, accepting, or tolerant… the whole thing has an incredibly negative tone.
43:40:
Finally a mention of something positive. Kind of. Straight back into the negative tone, with the hypothetical question, “what if god was bitter?” My answer? Probably something like the Old Testament.
46:57:
Talks about how many churches are built on bitterness. At this point Driscoll sounds a little bitter about bitterness.
48:40:
Satan wants Christians to hang out with people who love to sin and get drunk. Sounds like Satan wants me to have lots of friends!
50:11:
Satan loves gossip and busybodying: “Ladies, this one is for you.” for the next fifteen minutes, Driscoll slams on “women who gossip, or busybody.” He doesn’t even mention men once. Apparently, men never gossip or busybody.
53:05:
Driscoll has to protect his wife from people who want to chat and have coffee, because that’s Satanic.
54:16:
“Female manipulation.” Women use emotion to manipulate you into gossip and busybodying. That’s Satanic. Women, stay busy with your home, your family, and Jesus. Apparently Mars Hill women can’t have friends either.
56:45:
“Sometimes women’s ministry is the cess pool that this kind of activity flourishes in. Some people ask, why don’t we have women’s ministry? We do, but you have to be very careful. It’s like juggling knives.” The message you get is that even when Mark gives in, and gives these needy women a little bit of power, they are emotionally unstable and cause all sorts of problems. Women meet secretly to all rip on their husbands. “It happens all the time.”
Some good, old fashioned misogyny.
57:40:
The wrong women tend to want the power. They’re the ones who are “gossip mamas and drama queens.”
1:04:00:
Driscoll mentions stories about women who believed that being raped was their own fault. Huge points to Mark, he condemns this as a horrible lie - no woman is ever responsible for being raped.
1:07:40:
Belief in a lie is a sin. Thoughtcrime, anyone? It’s no coincidence that the rest of us are called “freethinkers.”
1:09:11:
THE lie is that god and creation are the same. It’s a specific attack on pantheism, which he names. He also names most eastern religions and extreme environmentalism. Belief in this lie also leads to homosexuality.
1:10:58:
Condemns the worship of creation… including the “worship of our own bodies.” This reminds me or Morel Orel’s lost 11th commandment: “Though shalt be ashamed of thy natural anatomy.” Humanism has the opposite message - that this world, and our passions, and our loves are the things that deserve our attention. Apparently, Humanism is even more demonic than Atheism!
1:14:00:
Mark tells a story about waking up feeling paralyzed, with a heavy weight on his chest and throat, and believes that he has been attacked by Satan or a demon. He even claims to have bruises as a result. For more on night terrors, click here.
1:17:45:
Some people actually are clairvoyant because demons are watching you, and the demons tell them what you are thinking. Some people really do have supernatural powers through demons.
1:23:00:
Mark talks about how when we have self accusations (you can’t do that, you aren’t good enough), it’s Satan and demons dragging you down. Demons are chasing after you, telling you that you aren’t good enough.
Demon Cat is always on your tail.
That’s about the gist of it. Everything that isn’t from our particular interpretation of the Bible is demonic. Women are more prone to demons than men, especially when it comes to gossip and backbiting. You should be angry with people who believe differently than you, because they believe “false doctrine.”
Divisive, bigoted, sexist, fear and hate-mongering, I sure hope that this sermon is not indicative of what a normal Mars Hill sermon is like. The small glimmers of good that shone through the lecture didn’t nearly shine through the hateful muck of the rest of it.
