The Bill Hybels Way

The Bill Hybels Way

Bill Hybels is the senior pastor (out of a total of approximately 48 staff pastors) of the 12,000-plus member, Willow Creek Community Church located in Northwest-suburban Chicago. When Hybels decided to plant a church, rather than "set-up-shop" and faithfully preach the Word of God, he instead took survey teams through the community, asking those people who admitted to being unsaved, why they didn't regularly attend a church. According to Hybels, the survey revealed that people: "(1) didn't like being bugged for money; (2) found church boring, predictable, and routine; (3) didn't think that the church was relevant to their lives; and (4) always left church feeling guilty (the Christian message was too negative with sin, etc.)."

Hybels' solution was to "program our Sunday morning service to non-believers, and program our service to believers on another day or evening." By this means, Hybels hoped the newcomers would "feel welcome, unthreatened, and entertained." Hybels states that it is absolutely essential that the "unchurched Harry's and Mary's be introduced to a "creative, introductory level, positive, Bible-centered church experience on a Sunday morning...a place designed for [the unbeliever]." Hybels states that his people "have put a lot of time and thought into what non-churched people want from a Sunday morning service. And we have concluded that they basically want four things: (1) anonymity; (2) truth presented at an introductory level; (3) time to make a decision; and (4) excellence in programming, creativity, humor, contemporary [worship], relevancy, etc."

Hybels sees Willow Creek's evangelism and outreach ministries through this same pragmatic, professionalistic model:

The personal [evangelism] goes on out in the marketplace, and on Sundays we continue and supplement the personal efforts by helping people as we give them a creative service to bring people who are in the process of deciding about a relationship with Jesus Christ.

We have Alcoholics Anonymous, Al-Anon, Narcotics Anonymous, Emotions Anonymous, you- name-it anonymous, I think we have it here. And we have a counseling center, and a food pantry, and a benevolent board that counsels people who are hurting financially; an employment counseling ministry; we are committed to helping a church in the inner-city; a hospital in Haiti; projects through World Vision, and other ministries. I believe we are called to arrest the social decay we see happening around us.

In Hybels' book, Honest To God, he relates the success formula used at Willow Creek Church. He claims that he was "honest to God;" i.e., he grew "God's church, God's way." As detailed above, Hybels in reality grew Willow Creek man's way -- he gave the people what they wanted -- a contemporary "church" in an atmosphere of glitz and entertainment, while preaching a feelings- oriented gospel of codependency/recovery, self-love, and unconditional acceptance, where unbelievers could, thereby, "be comfortable in God's presence." Hybels justifies his church growth philosophy with the following incredible statement:

At Willow Creek, we feel that God has given us a plan, but it doesn't necessarily have to apply to every church. In fact, we believe that this may be one of the few churches that God, manifesting a sense of humor if you will, has decided to say, "Look, I'm saying to give them a little different kind of plan over here."

As one would expect to find in a church founded and nurtured on Fuller Seminary/John Wimber principles of church growth, Hybels has a distorted view of the Gospel message. In Honest To God, he appears to be saying there are two different gospels, one for men and one for women. According to Hybels, the gospel message for a man is that a relationship with Jesus Christ is essential to avoid "mindless misinterpretations of masculine identity." For a woman, the gospel is that Jesus Christ offers freedom from being a "people-pleaser," thereby allowing her to satisfy her "need for inner security." These are obviously both self-focused gospels that are entirely devoid of a recognition of man's sin problem as well as God's solution to that problem. But then, what should we expect from a man whose ministry vision is to have unrepentant sinners be comfortable in the presence of a holy God?

Despite (or perhaps because of) Hybels' humanistic gospel, other churches hungry for Hybels'- style growth have been flocking to the Willow Creek staff to learn the techniques of "church growth." (About 15,000 people currently attend Saturday evening and Sunday morning "seeker services" with contemporary music, multimedia displays, dramatic sketches, and messages geared to those "investigating Christianity.") Hybels says his staff cannot keep up with the increasing number of requests for help from other churches. Therefore, he has recently formed Willow Creek Association (WCA), an international network of 96 like-minded churches. This organization will provide special conferences, resources, and consultation to its constituents. He has also formed Willow Creek Resources (WCR), a joint-publishing venture between the new association and Zondervan Publishing House. WCR will publish books, audios, and videos produced by staffers from within Willow Creek Community Church and the rest of the WCA.

--The BDM Letter

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