Welcome to the final round guys. You have done a great job so far.  As a quick reminder to everyone reading along, this is the final part of my interview with Frank and George.  In the next day or two, I will be making one final entry into the series with some summary thoughts on the book, the interview, and the church.

Joe: George, some of your older books like, “How to Increase Giving In Your Church” were written to help pastors. In this case the book was intended to help boost tithes and offerings based on the techniques of other financially lucrative churches. Readers will note a definitive change between this older book and Chapter 8 of Pagan Christianity where you describe the practice of tithing as a corruption of the church. Can you please share with my readers how these two very different books exemplify your own journey and understanding of the church?

George: I’m learning new things about Christianity all the time, just as I would hope other Christians and leaders would. I’ve written a few other books that I would not publish today, given the other insights I’ve gleaned in my journey. Everything we believe and model and teach in life is seen through a particular lens – our worldview – and mine is continuing to mature. What I write and research reflects that growth. Hopefully it is the result of following the guidance of the Holy Spirit on that journey. I think it is not dissimilar to the journey you see among many other Christian authors who do not keep rewriting the same but are honestly seeking to add value to the Church and are willing to say things that challenge people.

Joe: In terms of leadership you both assert that “[e]very Christian possessed different gifts and different functions, but only Jesus Christ had the exclusive right to exercise authority over His people. No man had that right.” You go on to say that, decision making in the New Testament church fell upon the shoulders of the whole assembly… It was the church’s responsibility to find the Lord’s mind together and act accordingly (248).” What would you say to the critic who asks: “So if every church has the right and authority to decide for themselves how they should worship, or if they should pay an Elder/Pastor, on what authority do you conclude that churches who decide to follow the traditions that you challenge in your book are doing something pagan?” (p. 246-240)

Frank: First, the issue for me is not if they’re doing something “pagan.” We mention many things in the book that are pagan in origin, yet they don’t violate New Testament teaching. The issue is: Is what we’re doing pleasing to God or does it violate His will?

Second, there is only one authority in the church. It is Jesus Christ. All authority in heaven and earth has been given to Him (Matt. 28:18). In the church, decision-making by consensus is a process where decisions are made corporately under the direct leadership of Jesus Christ. I do not believe nor have I ever believed that a group of Christians has any authority to make their own decisions independent of the Head of the church or in violation to the will of the Head. Thus if a group of believers decides on their own to do something that contradicts the will of Jesus Christ, I’d say that their decision is wrong. The authority for that conclusion would be the New Testament.

This brings us back to the central question of the book. Are our modern-day church practices a reflection of God’s will as envisioned in Scripture, or at they at odds with it? We hope that every reader will prayerfully and honestly ponder that question.

George: Please note that we are not saying there should not be the exercise of leadership. We are indicating that God has gifted some to be leaders, and that every group or community needs some form of leadership, but not necessarily the forms that past generations of the Church created. We don’t believe that chaos and dysfunction are marks of the authentic Church, but neither are many of the forms of leadership evident in conventional churches these days.

For me, it goes back to the research we have conducted about leadership and organization in churches. The sad reality is that the model of the “church” men created and have been defending for centuries is a broken model. Look at the research. The vast majority of pastors, by their own admission, are neither called nor gifted to lead. Most of them, by their own admission, are called and gifted to preach and teach. Sadly, the model prevents them from doing that because 1) they believe and have been taught that you have to draw a fulltime salary and benefits to do it and 2) you must ascend to the primary position in the body, which is a leadership position (e.g., Senior Pastor) in order to get regular access to the platform. So, in a nutshell, what we wind up with are good people, called by God to ministry, pretending to be leaders in order to have the chance to do what God actually called and created them to do. In the process, everyone suffers because they have to spend a lot of their time and energy operating outside their areas of giftedness in order to have a chance to spend some time doing the things they are gifted and called to do. The entire conventional church system is based on a number of bad assumptions that lead to the problems we have today.

Joe: George and Frank, what do you see as the best possible outcome for individuals who read your book? For those who are compelled to take actions, what should they do to ensure they are worshipping in a more biblical, or in your words, “organic,” way?

George: It is important for every follower of Christ to continue to grow. The alternative, of course, is not to grow, which is the equivalent of death. Frank and I have prayed long and hard that this book would only offend those who God needs to offend in order to get their attention and heart; that it would challenge the minds and hearts of those who are seeking to be part of the authentic Church of Christ; and that those who stand apart from the body of Christ because they cannot relate to the traditional practices will be encouraged that there are alternatives open to them.

As I mentioned in Revolution, there is a growing cadre of people in the U.S. who simply want more of God in their life and will do whatever it takes to get that. For some people, the conventional church is the way to achieve that, and I am perfectly fine with that. For others, though, the conventional church route does not work, so they need an alternative approach to connecting with God and His people, and becoming a fully committed lover, worshiper and servant of God. We pray that this book might add one more bit of help in their quest to be all that God made them to be.

Frank: As we state in the opening pages, the book is not for everyone. It’s primarily written for the millions of Christians who love the Lord, but who can’t abide “church” in its institutional form any longer. And/or who know that there has to be something more. We wrote the book to generate prayerful and open discussion with fellow Christians and with God. For this reason, George and I have created a discussion guide that helps navigate readers toward profitable discussion on the issues the book raises. It can be freely downloaded at www.paganchristainity.org.

To my mind, the best possible outcome is for readers to have a head-on collision with Jesus Christ. To begin a journey of knowing Him in reality with other believers in close-knit community, the way the New Testament envisions. To make Him not only Lord of their individual lives, but to make Him Head of a local body of believers in a very practical way. To give the New Testament a fresh look, and to seek to find God’s perfect will concerning what the body of Christ really is and how it’s to express itself in the earth. And to pay any price to be involved in that. Add to that: to touch the hearts of some young men who are called by God to His work, but who will be stirred and challenged to do things very differently from the way they’ve been done for the past 500 years. (If there’s a young man reading this whose heart has been stirred by the book, I hope he will contact me.)

Thanks for this opportunity, Joe. I hope that what we’ve said here will help God’s people to better understand our heart in writing this book. I think it’s important for readers to understand that Pagan Christianity is only one statement in a fuller argument. George, as well as myself, will be coming out with other books that will build on what we’ve written in Pagan. Consequently, readers can think of Pagan Christianity, and in some ways Revolution, as the stripping-away phase of the argument, while the books that follow them will be the constructive phase of the argument. Our hope is that God’s people will discuss these issues soberly and prayerfully, and that the Lord will gain something for Himself out of it all.

Joe: My questions were tough, but like we talked about on the phone Frank, you know I would not want to write about this book without giving you and George a fair chance to address directly some important concerns. I hope everyone will learn from this interview. Even if my readers disagree with your answers, or with parts of your book, I hope everyone will learn, not just from the Q&A, but also from the grace you have demonstrated in dealing with critical questions.

I hope we can all recognize that there is not one standard for the “pastor class” and a different one for the “lay class.” I am confident that my readers will appreciate your candor in not just discussing the pastors you write about, but in exposing your own lives to the same standards.

Frank and George, thank you for your time and willingness to explore your book and your lives.

God bless!

If you are just now coming to this interview, head back to part one so you don’t miss out.  In the meantime, I will take some time to think about everything and, in the coming days, share a few closing thoughts on the interview and on the book itself. I will also address questions from my readers.

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