From a distance, the Mars Hill story looks an imponderable mess.
Who did what, when, why, how, and (what’s more) why on earth could it have been allowed to get to this level of angst? These are questions that people like you and me, who are outside the celebrity inner circle, ask but are unlikely ever to find answers.
No winners
Even addressing the question has become difficult. One person tries to say the equivalent of ‘he who is without sin let him cast the first stone’. Then those who are – it appears really and truly – hurt and wounded by the mess are miffed, and their defenders are outraged. Another person cheers on the process of ‘church discipline’ and the opposite group is equally annoyed. There are no winners in this situation – least of all those who have been spiritually shepherded and (let us not forget) brought to confess Christ through the ministry of Mars Hill.
I am often reminded of Jesus’s warning about how offences are bound to come but to beware that they do not come through us: it would be better for a millstone to be tied around our necks than to cause one of these little ones (a new Christian recently converted) to stumble because of this public airing of dirty laundry in this manner.
What can responsibly be said?
‘Tell it not in Gath.’ David’s famous lament at the fall of Saul (‘How the mighty have fallen!’) is worth reflecting on in these days. Obviously, we hope that all will be restored and that the story has not come to an end in the way that it had with Saul. Yet there is an echo of common sense, grace, and Spirit-directed wisdom in 2 Samuel 1.19-27.
First, David did not gloat over his defeated foe. It would have been easy for David to have celebrated the demise of Saul, who had after all persecuted him, but instead he was the leader of the mourning for Saul (not the leader of those who rejoiced that Saul was no more). It would be good for the Christian community in general if those who were least likely to agree with Mars Hill’s theological philosophy of ministry (perhaps the anti-charismatic group) would be most likely to mourn at the passing of this ministry.
Second, David understood the issue of witness. The phrase ‘tell it not in Gath’ means don’t announce this among the pagans, the non-believers, the enemies of God’s people. When news like this seeps across the invisible membrane between Christian media and secular media and out into the wider discussion, we should be those who attempt to not speak ill of it, and ideally to not speak of it at all – in that context, ‘Tell it not in Gath.’
Third, by these means Paul started a trajectory of unity among God’s people. It would have been very easy for the death of Saul to have led to a never-ending civil war between the followers of David and the followers of Saul. Even with David’s diplomacy, that spectre was only barely averted, and that after considerable time.
In short, ‘Tell it not in Gath’. Whether you like what Mars Hill stood for or you don’t, whether you were a fan of Mars Hill or an avid critic, no matter: now is the time for Christians of all stripes to come together for mutual healing and prayer that the work of God would continue to prosper in Seattle.
After all, souls are at stake.
