So was it all a lie?
This is my question after forty-three years.
Today is my spiritual birthday.
Forty-three years ago today, November 11, 1981, I was baptized into Christ at the University Church of Christ in Tallahassee, Florida.
Since then, almost every major decision in my life - and maybe a few minor ones - has been influenced by two Church of Christ ministers, Chuck Lucas and Kip McKean.
Recent revelations about Chuck, Kip, and the churches they served, along with others involved with them, have left me questioning: Was everything they taught me a lie?
First Contact With the Church
I was 17 going on 18 when I began school at Florida State University in 1981. Unlike many students, I was looking for a church. Although my family had stopped attending our Baptist church, I kept reading the Bible and praying.
A few weeks into the semester, I noticed a sign for a Bible study in my dorm. No one invited me; I simply went. That study led to other Bible readings with church members and, after studying with them and reading on my own, I decided to be baptized.
This marked the beginning of my association with the Church of Christ, specifically, a sect known as the Crossroads Movement.
Crossroads’ History and Influence
In the late 1960’s, Chuck Lucas, the head minister of the 14th Street Church of Christ in Gainesville, Florida, created a model of discipleship/evangelism based on teachings found in different writings and teachings of the time. He was partly inspired by the charismatic Shepherding Movement and by Robert Coleman’s book The Master Plan of Evangelism.
Crossroads’ membership grew rapidly, but their success wasn’t without controversy. Soon, accusations of “controlling” and “cultish” emerged; many from potential recruits who didn’t join or from former members.
In 1972, Thomas “Kip” McKean, a University of Florida student, was baptized at Crossroads. He quickly became one of Chuck’s mentees. By the early ‘80’s he was leading the Boston Church of Christ, which also grew rapidly using practices he’d learned at Crossroads.
Two men trained at the Crossroads School of Ministry brought Chuck’s methods into the University Church of Christ. They are good methods and effective in reaching a community and helping mature young disciples. Where Crossroads went wrong was in using these methods to control their members. Here are some examples:
Community Bible Studies: Groups that met throughout the community once a week specifically designed to reach non-believers. We were encouraged to bring visitors; in fact, we were even asked who we expected to come, and if visitors didn’t show up, we were often criticized harshly.
Daily “Quiet Times”: A private time, preferably first thing in the morning, spent in personal prayer and Bible study. In weekly prayer partner sessions (explained below), we were asked what we were studying in our quiet times and how long we were praying/studying the Bible in each session.
“Prayer Partners”: Two people “partnered” together, usually an older or “more mature” Christian to guide a “younger” Christian. The good parts of a prayer partner relationship were the encouragement, the knowing that you weren’t on the Christian journey alone. The bad parts were getting rebuked for not “doing well” spiritually (too much “complaining”, a negative attitude, a lack of joy, a lack of enthusiasm for inviting people to church.)
Group meetings: As a college student, my church schedule included Sunday morning and evening services, Wednesday night services, group Bible study during the week, a weekly discipleship group, a group devotional meeting on Fridays, baby and bridal showers, and (if I was lucky) a date on Saturday.
Evangelism: We were expected to always “share our faith”, inviting everyone we knew, and even strangers, to Bible studies and church services. In the discipleship groups I mentioned above, we talked about “how many people did you invite this week?” Prayer partners also asked that question. For a shy person like me, inviting strangers felt uncomfortable, yet I felt pressured to do it because the number of people you invited and ultimately converted was held up as a measure of your spirituality.
The overriding theme was: we are the only church that is saved; we are the only church that is doing it right; we are the only church that is reaching the lost; and if you don’t join us, you are headed straight for hell.
When I was baptized forty-three years ago, I wanted certainty in my faith. I wanted to be right with God. I didn’t want to go to hell.
After five years, I left Tallahassee defeated and discouraged because I couldn’t measure up to the church’s expectations. Why didn’t I leave sooner? Well, if you want God, and if a certain group says they have God and can show you using the Bible that only they have God, and you have the threat of hell hanging over your head if you leave, then you’ll stay. Think of the reasons why a spouse in an abusive relationship stays, and you will get an idea of why someone stays in a bad church.
In 1987, I moved to Miami and attended a Church of Christ that was beginning to distance itself from Crossroads’ practices. After two years, that church eventually split, and I joined an independent house church. While it was freeing at first, eventually it did not give me the depth of teaching I felt I needed. My husband and I married in 1993 and moved to Atlanta a year later, where we now attend a Church of Christ.
Crossroads, the ICOC, the ICC, and now the RCW
I was still part of the University church when, in 1985, Chuck Lucas was fired by Crossroads for “recurring sins” in his life. The sins were not named. Chuck and his family moved to Thomasville, Georgia, where he lived until his death in 2018.
When Chuck was fired, Kip McKean moved in as the defacto “leader” of the movement, and in 1986, he started encouraging the leadership of churches planted by Crossroads to move to Boston for additional training. Eventually, he established Boston as the “mother church” and designed a system of “pillar churches” much like the network of the Catholic Church. If a church’s leader decided to go to Boston, Boston would send in a new minister . . . trained in the ways of Boston. The methods I mentioned in my list above became more intense with more pressure put on the members to meet expectations, particularly numbers of visitors and numbers of baptisms.
If a church’s leaders didn’t want to go to Boston? Well . . . Boston would plant a church in their backyard. They would then tout themselves as the “more spiritual” option, and unfortunately, too many churches lost too many members.
And, as Crossroads did before it, the Boston Church couched themselves as the only ones going to heaven, the only ones doing it right, and if you leave us, you go to hell.
I was living in Miami when the whole pillar church movement started and many members went to the new church started by Boston. Eventually, Kip’s organization took the name “International Churches of Christ” (ICOC) and, like Crossroads before it, it grew.
In 2002, the ICOC announced Kip’s resignation from leadership. At the time, the reason given was that his daughter was no longer a faithful Christian. The policy at the time was that if a leader’s children were not themselves faithful Christians, the leader had to resign because they had not managed their household well.
Several years later, Kip became the preacher of a church in Portland, Oregon . . . and within a short time, had established another movement, the International Christian Churches (ICC).
Early this year, Raul Moreno of the Los Angeles branch of the ICC sent out a letter announcing Kip’s retirement. But the letter wasn’t written by Kip; it was written by Raul and contained the phrase “faltered spiritually”.
The bomb dropped a couple of months ago: The ICC had disfellowshipped Kip. Why? Because of alleged recurrent sexual sin including porn use.
Recurrent alleged sin that leaders allegedly knew of for YEARS and did nothing about.
Overlaying all of this: In 2022, former members filed lawsuits against the ICOC, the ICC, and several current and former leaders, including Kip, and also including Chuck Lucas’ estate. The lawsuits allege that members - some of them church leaders - had sexually abused members, and that leadership knew and did nothing except to send the alleged abuser to another church. (Similar actions went on with the Catholic Church, and in 2019, the Houston Chronicle reported on widespread abuses in Southern Baptist churches. (The Chronicle coverage may be behind a paywall.)
And last month, yet another split occurred, this time, within the ICC. Members who believed that Kip’s disfellowshipping was poorly handled formed a new group of churches, the Restored Churches Worldwide (RCW). I’ve read letters flying back and forth between the leadership of the ICC and the leadership of the RCW and they remind me of kids saying, “You did this!” “Did not!” “Did so!”
To sum up: Years and years and years of abuse, spiritual and possibly sexual, went on under the umbrella of a church movement that claimed to be the only way to heaven.
I’m not talking about people who sinned and then repented of their sin. I’m talking about people who allegedly committed sin, did not repent, and had that sin allegedly covered up by people who knew.
If the leaders of the movement who said that they were the only way to God were, themselves, unrepentant sinners . . . was everything they taught me a lie?
Chuck and Kip’s influence
I said that Chuck Lucas and Kip McKean influenced every major and some minor decisions I made after November 11, 1981. Some examples:
I stayed in college during summers, instead of going home to my family, because it was another chance to maybe convert someone.
I chose library science for my masters’ program because a church member was also in the program.
I roomed with members from the church because we were told to under the guise of “encouraging others”.
I moved to Miami, to a church that had preachers from Crossroads on staff, because I was taught that they were the only ones who were “good churches”
The man I married, I met at a church conference run by Crossroads. (Ironically, we met at the University of Florida, the arch rival of my alma mater, Florida State!) And without my husband, I would not have my son.
I joined a house church made up of former members of the Crossroads-influenced Miami church.
When I visited home, I attended Churches of Christ specifically affiliated with Crossroads.
I believe I upset my parents greatly with my devotion to the church; and it didn’t help that I considered them “unsaved”.
Since learning of the alleged deeds of Crossroads leadership, I have a very hard time trusting anyone in church leadership. I wonder if there is backbiting or other scheming going on behind the scenes.
I wonder if I attend services out of guilt, or whether it’s because I really want to be there.
Because of the “we’re the only ones right” mentality, I constantly question, “am I right?” and worry that if I’m wrong, I’ll go to hell.
In answering the question: “Was it all a lie?” I have to say no, not all of it was a lie. The news that Jesus died for our sins and was resurrected isn’t a lie.
Not all of it was bad; I have some very fond memories of events during those years and I am in touch with several former members through Facebook.
And had I not gone looking for God, I would not have come out on the other end still believing that there is a God.
But teasing out the lies from the truth is a very hard struggle.
Forty-three years later, though, I am still here.
Just my .04, adjusted for inflation.
At first, in the early 80s, I thought I had found my nirvana. Those were good times. Then it became increasingly cultish, culminating in Kip's takeover. I had questioned their explanation of Peter/Rock before but suppressed my doubts, and actually believed miracles ended with the death of the last Apostle, but I now know that miracles continued throughout history. The straw that broke the camel's back was when we were told to imitate our disciplers in non-spiritual ways, such as their habits and preferences. That has nothing to do with scripture. I've completely severed ties with the CoC but acknowledge their role in converting me and teaching me the Bible.