Why Did Vineyard Pastor Alan Scott Step Down Unexpectedly?

this is Alan Scott and he was the pastor of the dwelling place in Anaheim California which you probably know better as the vineyard in Anaheim California the mothership of the whole Vineyard movement he and his wife unexpectedly left the church amid allegations of misconduct surprise surprise narcissism surprise surprise and spiritual abuse surprise surprise let's talk about how this breaks the church and how to fix it this is Church's lame I for one Scott am shocked and appalled and above all surprised right like who would have ever seen this coming from people who get put in positions of Power with no oversight the pastor of a mega church it just seems like one of those things that should be a completely stable position with no narcissists whatsoever ever right all right so let me just quickly take you through the details so that we can get our rage machine going okay all right Alan Scott is wife took over uh Vineyard Anaheim once again the mothership of the vineyard movement so way long ago in in the decade of Our Lord 2018 and within four years in 2022 he led the charge to disaffiliate from The Vineyard um with little to no explanation other than you got to trust in God now now that all of this uh hblue is started um church members have speculated that really this was just kind of a thinly veiled attempt to take control of 62 million dollar in church assets right and so the vineyard wouldn't have control of it uh the denomination would control those millions of dollars of assets others have asserted that Scott was responding to moves by The Vineyard denomination uh for more oversight and accountability do we ever talk about oversight and accountability not not once that I can recall after after that conversation happened uh pretty quickly there was an announcement that Scott and his wife were out of there W whenever denominations or churches split there's always turo turmoil right there's somebody who wants to split and then there's a very devoted crowd devoted to the denomination devoted to the family who says Over My Dead Body and so it was the turmoil of the splitting process um that really caused not only the current members of The Vineyard Church to speak out but former members and for former staff members of places where the Scots worked where they where they spoke out and said yeah this is the guy we know and we're not all at all surprised yeah and like that's not encouraging that you know that they're saying like we weren't surprised by this like you should be surprised the phone call like hey we're just going to check the references of uh Pastor Scott like where were the people then like oh no like you should run away from him as fast as humanly possible cuz he's a disaster waiting to happen the first red light is that he has two first names but then the second one yeah like John Wayne gayy come on like we we all know like You're a murderer we know that um that's exactly you separate from the you know the mega church Mothership denomination whatever we're calling it like the phrase with little explanation is deeply off-putting to me right like you should have a very clear idea why you're separating from that that parent organization let's take a break and after we come back from the break we will talk about in all of our rage induced Beauty how this breaks the church so I think we like we we we actually put the car before the horse and we started like going down the road of how this breaks things before we took the break so well you know we're excited we are cuz there's no shortage of details to get enraged about in this particular story there's like now a trend among uh the pajama Haden the social media Elites the trend makers they talk about red flags red flags and dating what's your red flag what is something that somebody exhibits that lets you know immediately there should not be a date number two right obvious psychopathy is I think a red flag yeah exactly right and I think this story in particular is full of red flag kind of details and I'm just going to quickly go down the red flag details and then we can kind of go into whatever we're going to go into okay okay okay flag me Scott would claim that those who disagreed with his decisions lacked Faith Scott would claim to know people sins before meeting them that's a little weird yeah Scott would claim that he would appear in people's dreams and that his appearance represented the voice and the will of God that's not weird no right um so all these allegations come across and an independent investigation reveals quote there's convincing evidence of manipulation narcissistic behavior and spiritual abuse I don't know about you but I've heard that phrase a couple too many times in the last decade now it's become all too familiar in my sermon on Sunday um you know I was talking about idolatry um you know kind of coming at through the the last chapter of the Book of Joshua and saying like modern ID idry is not the same as ancient idolatry and like the example I gave of a modern Idol is a narcissistic Pastor um and the pastor like creates the idol that they themselves worship and demand other people worship and one of the examples I gave of a thing that like you know people will use to justify like what the pastor does or as the pastor's excuses you lack Faith boom right there like that kind of punched me in the face It's like because these people are good people like you know they want to have a church body to be part of it's important to our faith life and like this is the kind of person that weaponizes that good thing against these people and it just it makes me it makes me sick but the Bible tells us in in a couple different places that um everybody has their Moses moment at the burning bush where where their purpose is revealed to them right and that's a very specific beautiful occurrence in everybody's life but just because you've been given a vision of your purpose we interact in a church body and the Bible gives us some pretty clear pictures that we act in unity and we act in harmony we act in agreement and we know that God is moving when it's not just one person working against the flow but it's everybody in agreement together saying yes this is the direction that we are going to corporately gr together and I would say like like the Bible project which is another YouTube channel like they have a recent video talking about like kind of like the the corporate work um that we have as a church and just kind of how we have that that corporate identity um as Believers and like if somebody wants to take that that corporate leadership away you know Ian it's one thing to say like you're a pastor you're in charge of you know keeping track of you know what's being taught and people's spiritual lives it's thing for that for that Pastor to exert undo leadership and control and command I always talk about functional versus dysfunctional I've seen this at its most functional when a pastor will get before leadership or get before the congregation and say I have a vision in in particular like I think of things like Willow Creek the mega church Willow Creek where Bill hbls you know gets gets up and says you know Seeker sensitive we are not going to go into the many many many interpretations of Revelation right that's not where we're going to go deep deep into the weeds we are going to stay at a place where anybody who walks in the door will feel comfortable sitting down and celebrating with us for an hour and then the congregation either decides yeah we're we're in here let's build a cafeteria let's build a big game room let's build a workout gym and and they all agree together to row in the same direction but yeah just the idea of of somebody who has the ability not only the vision but the ability to go against the wishes of all leadership in the congregation with little accountability in the words of I think it's Damon wayin Homie don't play that so 10 points to the listener the first viewer or listener who comments with uh what TV show that's from uh man you got knocked the I'll just let you figure out the rest of that one yeah just in case you weren't convinced yet of this pastor's narcissism one of the reports from the investigation somebody claims that they were made to physically bow before the pastor you know like like like all of a sudden we're in Game of Thrones and we have to bend the knee you know like that's that's worthy of like a loud fbm just right there if you're crazier than Greg lock you are completely bat guano crazy like right y I mean like we have jumped the shark if you are crazier than Greg lock yeah yeah I mean like yeah bow bow before me you know kneel before Zod I mean like right what it points to anybody who can identify that movie claiming that you appeared in people's dreams well I mean yeah maybe as like the monster that's chasing that uh you know your congregation around eating them you know but it's not just the pasture that's broken um in this case I think you can also make a good case that the congregation's Fairly dysfunctional as well in this one detail you have a pastor who's off the rail and he leaves so then you have to go through a pastoral search process and and either bring in a temporary or permanent replacement right yeah so Janet and Neil Young are the pastors who came in to replace the Scots they initially offered an apology but then said they don't agree with the report and they stepped down you can't make this stuff up like nope we like accountability we're not having it you know not no control of the church purse strings we're not having it we're out of here people I for anybody who's a fan of the office like I have Oscar in my head he's like if like if you don't say anything but this I will become apoplectic I feel like that it's like how insane when your your you know your you know replacement pastors are like yeah we're we're gone like usually like there's a honeymoon period where everything is like unicorns and rainbows apparently not in this case let's take a break and when we come back we will talk about how to fix it I think you and I have kind of both beaten on the main thing and so let me just put words to it a church that is a cult of personality is by definition a broken Church um The Cult of Personality should never ever ever ever ever revolve around a pastor or a worship leader or a visitor the only personality that ever matters in any church that claims to be a Christian Church is Jesus it's just like when you go back to Bible quiz and you're not sure of the answer the answer is always Jesus narcissism is a system when you have a narcissist in charge they create an entire system around themselves to me when you say systems I think of like a construction site and how they put up scaffolding mhm and you can kind of you can kind of see it as pastors they kind of test the limits in one thing and they get away with it so that you know that's one piece of scaffolding and then they'll test it in a financial way then in a theological way then in a relational way and all of a sudden there is all this scaffolding of the pastor getting his way all the time with with impunity there's such a track record of it now that nobody feels the authority to actually say no this ain't working this ain't it the machine is there and it's operating the way it was designed to operate that Pastor leaves you put a new pastor in there the machine's not going to be substantially different it's like saying well my my knife spinning machine hurts my hand well what if you didn't fix it well I'm now running it through 120 instead of 240 it's it's still a knife spinning machine you know so it's like you have to you have to take the whole thing apart broken people that are broken to this extent should not be leading the church right but like I said there's another side to this coin and that is a dysfunctional congregation so we have a congregation and a leadership team team I don't know what they call them Elders deacons officers I don't know what they call them right but you have this leadership team that's whose job it is to search for leadership to vet the leadership to put them before the congregation and sell them to the congregation and so now we have this leadership in this congregation who are broken because they don't they don't know a dysfunctional leader when they see it right and that's oh that's that's just tragic tragic and deeply disturbing I keep coming back to I'm a broken record we're supposed to be disciples and that means we're supposed to be Discerning right and not everybody's Discerning at the same level right so if you are new in Christ you're not going to have a ton of discernment but for the people who who've made their homes in these churches and who who've risen to places of leadership you know these are the people that we trust to like have the really sensitive radar tracking and Laser tracking and can can instantly hone in on on like I said those red flag kind of issues yeah and I think you know a big big portion of that is probably just has come from the pulpit in the first place where it's like they're like hey jump into our pool but you're jumping into a pool in which you are in no danger of getting your ankles wet yeah just uh the teaching from the pulpit is is overly shallow is all I'm just trying to say cuckoo for Cocoa Puffs people should not be allowed at the at the top spot right yeah congregations need to up their game when it comes to Discerning who are the good leaders and the bad leaders but I guess if like you could boil this down to one point it's that no Pastor should ever ever ever ever be allowed to make unilateral decisions devoid of the support of the staff the elders and the congregations and pastors everywhere will chaff at this and I remember this at every church I've ever been to when members of the church are start questioning the way money is spent and every Pastor everywhere will go oh like your job is to tithe and our jobs are to be responsible stewards it's like well yeah but who's supposed to hold you responsible it's it's the congregation no Pastor anywhere ever should ever be allowed to make unilateral decisions ever oh no and and just to kind of like you know paint that into a practical picture um you like at my church you know our our setup you know the pastor is a member of the leadership team um but the pastor cannot act unilaterally there's there's the rest of the leadership team that needs to be uh de with in that situation um and then there's the the finance team which um like they are going to make um decisions about finances and whether or not like the leadership team can execute so it's like there has to be a lot of General agreement you know and then we also have a a uh pastoral uh uh Relations Committee uh which is deals with making sure the pastor's in a healthy place that that they are in they're interacting with the congregation and in a good way and in a healthy way and it's and it's a it's a two-way healthy relationship so it's like that is you know what my church at least does to try to you know live out what you're saying here last week we had a pastor who was who was so isolated and unhealthy that they took their own life this week we have a pastor who is so isolated and dysfunctional and unhealthy that he thinks he's King of the mountain right yeah yeah both of which are able to happen because one these pastors are able to live their lives in the shadows devoid of any accountability and two because the churches don't hold themselves and their pastors into these healthy accountability right and so yeah so thanks for reminding me about that because I did want to I thought that was an interesting thing at that interesting dichotomy between last week and this week yeah I think I think that's an awesome observation radical accountability radical transparency we we are broken records about this and we will keep saying it until somebody listens or until God takes us home you know one of the other we also didn't want to let this week pass without some pretty ginormous news in the world of uh Church goings on and the pope has announced that trans people can be baptized and whatever your feelings about that are it's a big piece of news as the pope generally speaks for all of Christendom and there is no one's Voice who Rings louder in in the in the world of Christian opinion and Christian punditry than the popes and as the pope goes so usually goes the rest of Christendom eventually might take a few years yeah no it takes time like Pope John Paul um he was the second he was pretty well liked by the normal person during his life but you come to find out after he after he passed away that Catholic leadership was not too crazy about him and his liberal ideas you know and the same thing seems to be happening with uh the current pope and it'll be interesting to see if the mantle of the pope is strong enough to lead the way in in a in a church that that is trying to find uh it way towards open arms or or whether they'll shut it down the way they shut down Pope Benedict yeah I mean somebody brought up the other day you know we need to try to convince the you know the Catholic Church to to start ordaining women you know we we need a woman Pope and and I I gave as a as a possible um you know kind of Middle Ground maybe we start off with like rup Paul as the next Pope so it's like he's he's just he's just a crossdresser right you know so it's like that that kind of soften them up to the idea maybe that's just an interesting concept of Middle Ground I got to say Brew Paul's Pope race I mean you want to see it I want to see it absolutely would tune in for that okay and lastly you know some weeks we have a total absence of great uh headlines um but this week there were just so many headlines that were too stupid not to mention of examples of church done wrong and so anytime we have a week like this where there's just so much cool stuff to mention we're going to mention it so this is too stupid not to mention first story which is um stupid and heartbreaking a grandmother was denied a church burial until her back tithes were paid in full H that that fills my mouth with vomit you know a lifelong attender of a church lay leader you know um found you know one of these like one of these people that you just see week after week year after year and that you look forward to seeing in the church and just because of um a financial situation they're going to deny her a burial in the Church Cemetery unbelievable next up uh defro Alabama priest returns to the US after taking an 18-year-old girl to Italy I mean 18 years old is like you know legally an adult so that makes me wonder if it's not so much that he took an 18-year-old girl is maybe like he just like took her in a piece of luggage to Italy or well when when when you're a priest you generally take a vow of celibacy oh yeah well there's that whole thing huh I guess there's that whole thing right I I didn't read the whole story but apparently he just like up and abandoned his church his Parish you know so h of course unbelievable and the last one and this one this one's wonderful because like the point of this show is like we're really talking to church leaders about stupid things churches do that cause people to walk away and the reasons why there was a new LifeWay research uh study that asked the question why do people change churches right and I think that's an interesting question and almost every Church anywhere will tell you that people leave churches for shallow reasons for shallow reasons right I got mad at the preaching this week or the music made me mad this week or something like like something shallow and stupid right M it turns out that 60% of the responders who have moved to a new church say the reason is for no other reason than they they just changed their residential home wow yeah SE that one coming people move and as a result they move churches oh gosh so I I feel obligated this point to to bring up an honorable mention so anybody if anybody out there is just if you want some real a good cringe um there was an article was 15 uh tattoos of Jesus people should probably repent for yeah I will make sure to put all the links in the show notes and descriptions absolutely it's got some Beauties in there you may have listened to this episode and thought man Scott and Mark they really don't like churches and church leadership and I just want to let you know that nothing could be further from the truth words is hard we love the church we're active inur church we want to see the church grow and be relevant and for the kingdom to be made real here on Earth um but stories like this make it all too easy to understand why people are walking away from churches so we collect those stories here as a sort of capsule for church leaders to answer the question why are people leaving so if you have a comment you want to add to this story uh you have something to say you agree you disagree by all means head over to YouTube and leave leave us a comment or a thumbs up or a thumbs down or a super thanks or whatever um if you listen to us over a podcast leave us a rating and a review and if you're the type who who likes to write and write and write and write send us an email to churches lame podcast gmail.com and with that go in peace and serve the Lord and hey if you got something out of this particular episode and you want to see more content just like it somewhere above is going to be a card that says leadership lunacy click on that to to uh go to our playlist that has a lot of content that's exactly like this thanks a

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