Ep. 220: Celebration Church, Seattle Pacific University, the $100-M “He Gets Us” Campaign

On today’s program, a church does something it doesn’t often do.  It apologizes for its past.  We’ll share why.  We also look more closely at the $100-million evangelistic ad campaign called “He Gets Us.”  And we note the passing of an evangelical elder statesman.  Steve Douglass, who helped Cru grow into one of the largest ministries in the world, is dead at age 77.  We’ll have an appreciation.  We begin today with news that Celebration Church’s founders have reopened a defamation lawsuit against their former church. A final reminder that I’ll be hosting a lunch for MinistryWatch friends in Newport Beach, California, on November 15.  If you live in LA, especially Orange County, you should be getting an email from me with more information, but if you want to make sure that you get an invitation, please email me and I’ll make sure you get the details.  All of these lunches are FREE.  They’re just our way of saying THANK YOU for being a part of our work. Secondly, we’ve started something new here at MinistryWatch.  We’re doing a quarterly survey of the senior executive in each of the MinistryWatch 1000 ministries.  The first article based on that survey is on the website now.  And I describe the survey more fully in this week’s MinistryWatch EXTRA episode, so if you haven’t heard that episode, please check it out.  The producers for today’s program are Rich Roszel and Jeff McIntosh.  We get database and other technical support from Cathy Goddard, Stephen DuBarry, Emily Kern, Rod Pitzer, and Casey Sudduth. Writers who contributed to today’s program include Scott Barkley, Jeremy Schwartz, Jessica Priest, Alejandra Molina, Steve Rabey, Anne Stych, Jessica Eturralde, Christina Darnell—and you, Warren. Special thanks to The Baptist Press and ProPublica for providing material for this week’s podcast. Until next time, may God bless you.