Warren Throckmorton

From: Calvary Chapel Auckland <info@calvarychapel.org.nz>
Sent: Saturday, November 28, 2015 3:16 PM
Subject: To Calvary Chapel Auckland concerning Gospel for Asia
To: Calvary Chapel Auckland <info@calvarychapel.org.nz>

Dear Church,

For approximately 17 years, Calvary Chapel Auckland has supported the work of Gospel for Asia which is now primarily The Believer’s Church.

Originally there was close alignment between Calvary Chapels generally and the work of Gospel for Asia.

However the organisational and ecclesiastical direction of Gospel for Asia has radically changed so that it is now antithetically different.

We do not believe in transubstantiation (this is supposedly that the bread actually becomes the body of Jesus, and the cup actually becomes the blood of Jesus), total submission or focus to a man, calling the leader “father,” or Priest, taking a vow of total submission to that leader and his successor for life, or crossing ourselves in a liturgy.

It is said that a picture speaks a thousand words so here are some photos, which visually depict some of the differences, but allude to many of the other contrasts that now exist: the metal image (used in Believers Churches, for all convocations, including countries other than India), the lighting of candles, the wearing of robes, etc.. The photos below are from The Believer’s Church Website and Carmel Engineering College (Believers Church own and operate this) as identified in the heading.

This group has amassed somewhere over $200,000,000.00 (one report says USD$250,000,000.00) US Dollars that are on deposit in India.

They now have an Engineering University, own a Hospital, a Rubber Plantation and other businesses that generate from $35,000,000.00 – $70,000,000.00 US Dollars annually.

The three Calvary Chapel Pastor’s who were on the GFA USA Board have all resigned after a lengthy investigation into the organization in many (if not all) of its various entities.

Brian, Gina, and Andrew Malcolm have decided their season of serving – 12 years now, of sacrificial, dedicated service, has ended.

The elders of Calvary Chapel Auckland have therefore decided to stop support for Gospel for Asia.

The Gospel for Asia office upstairs at the church has closed down and existing supporters of GFA will soon receive a letter from them explaining the position and your options.

We’ve been told KP Yohannan will write a letter but please understand in advance that it doesn’t alter our position here at Calvary Chapel Auckland, nor the greater Calvary Chapel family of churches.

You are of course free to decide whether you want to continue supporting Gospel for Asia.

Calvary Chapel Auckland is establishing our own missions budget (which almost every church has) and we are developing a clear and precise focus for outreach in New Zealand, the South Pacific through Calvary Chapel Radio (broadcasting now for over 10 years to Samoa, and more recently Rarotonga), and in other ways to spread the Gospel and help those in need in other countries.

May the Lord bless you all,

Calvary Chapel Auckland

Phone: 09 918 8000
Calvary Chapel Auckland

Calvary Chapel Bookstore NZ

Calvary Chapel Radio NZ

Due to a demand from Gospel for Asia to take down this transcript of their May 14 staff meeting from my Patheos blog, I am posting the transcript here. In this transcript, David Carroll and K.P. Yohannan describe how nearly $20 million dollars was sent from a board under the auspices of Believers' Church to Gospel for Asia in Texas to help complete their $45 million dollar compound and headquarters.

David Carroll: There is, I don’t want to call it a rumor, a story, an inquiry about, what about the $19 million anonymous gift that was given for the campus back a year or so ago? What’s that all about? Did that come from the mission field, from field funds? So I want to explain that gift to you so that you know.

In about April of 2013, as we were building the campus here, we were running pretty critically short on money. We went to a bank at the time, City Bank of Texas, they’re located in Lubbock. Many of you might remember, we were still at the other building and A group of 11 bankers came, talk about a room, 11 bankers and an accountant and John [Beers]. That’s 12 bankers and an accountant. That was a rip-roaring time. Anyway, um, they came interested in our project to loan to it. So we brought them out here, we showed them the whole thing, we explained our vision, and actually we were working toward finalizing that loan, we were at the place of getting terms from them and when we realized the cost of the loan, Brother KP mentioned it to some of the folks in Asia and mentioned that we were not able to do any better than that. We couldn’t, we would loved to have borrowed money from one of the Asian banks cause actually it’s much better terms, it would be much less costly, we weren’t able to do that being a foreign corporation.

And so, what the people in Asia did, and it is a board that is under Believers’ Church umbrella, but Brother KP’s not on that board, it wasn’t his decision. The decision was made by them that since GFA North America had sent so much money to us from undesignated field funds, where needed most funds over the years, and since this campus to us is seen as an international headquarters which will be leadership training, it will be RYPs, which are always fruitful for the field, every time we have an RYP, the field tends to benefit from that. It will save the ministry somewhere between 4 and 5 million dollars a year when we’re at capacity here which is about 350 people. When that happens, we’re going to receive a lot of that extra money back and so they made the decision while we were in that bank loan process, that rather than go with that bank loan, we would like to make an anonymous gift for the campus fund.

And they did that. Was it field funds that should have gone to Nepal for earthquake victims or

K.P. Yohannan: – (Unintelligible)

DC – I was just getting to that.

KP – Sorry

DC – That’s fine. No, it wasn’t. But what they did on the mission field is they actually took a loan from one of their sources to replace that money so they could use it for the purpose it had been designated for there. So in essence, they got our loan. There are several income producing entities in Asia. That’s why partly why we have 35% of our church is self-sustaining, by God’s grace now in Asia. And they felt they could pay that loan off very very quickly. They made that decision to give us that money and they wanted it to be anonymous. And I’m a little sad that it’s not anonymous, but I did want to explain to you where it came from, and the reasons behind it, and so, in their minds it was an investment.

KP – It’s legal.

DC – It’s completely legal, thank you. There’s a board member, board documents as I understand it, I don’t live in Asia, but there’s board documents on the other side. The whole thing was done in complete legality.

By the way, one question, one part of that question was, is this a related party transaction? And the answer is no. It is not a related party transaction because the board members here, they’re not the same board members as there. In other words, the leadership here did not influence that decision there. Brother KP mentioned it but it was not his decision. He had to get permission, actually they told…

KP – I think David, it is important for people to know the person I am. It’s like Paul said in one place he’s a doulos, he’s a servant, another place he’s an apostle, another place he’s a brother, and my role is being a spiritual father of right now about 2.7 million people scattered throughout all these nations and I do not have any legal say or decision about legal matters. My role is a spiritual leadership. You may not have asked that but there are hundreds of trusts and entities in all these countries. I don’t sit on any of those things. There are their own people. And my role is the spiritual leadership. And I hope to some extent that is here also.

I am about to move the blog to WordPress. For awhile there will be a transition of sorts. New posts will be over there but comments will no doubt continue here as people come to posts from search engines and the like. I like the functionality of WordPress.

Here is the new address: www.wthrockmorton.com. Go on over and tell me what you think. Leave a comment here or there; I will be reading both places for awhile.

UPDATE: THE NEW SITE IS READY FOR A SPIN. HEAD ON OVER TO THE NEW BLOG AND COMMENT THERE.

Fruitfly research is pretty hot stuff and this new study is sure to find its way on to late night television.

Fighting Like a Girl or Boy Determined by Gene in Fruit Flies

BOSTON, Nov. 20 /Standard Newswire/ -- Fighting like a girl or fighting like a boy is hardwired into fruit fly neurons, according to a study in the Nov. 19 Nature Neuroscience advance online publication by a research team from Harvard Medical School and the Institute of Molecular Pathology in Vienna. The results confirm that a gene known as "fruitless" is a key factor underlying sexual differences in behavior. The findings mark a milestone in an unlikely new animal model for understanding the biology of aggression and how the nervous system gives rise to different behaviors.

I'll bet the boy fighters call each other dude and drink Gatorade between rounds.

Reality show idea combining this and the last post - Get men and women to fight and have raters decide if they are gay or not by how they fight. The raters go off the show if they are wrong. The celebrity version of the show would be huge. Anyone want to suggest a name for it?

Michael Bailey is quoted extensively in this article regarding his research on gaydar. Social psychologists study stereotypes and the "I knew it all along" feeling (e.g., I just knew he was gay). I suppose I have furthered a few stereotypes by my support of Daryl Bem's Exotic Becomes Erotic theory.

I had to chuckle a bit at this aspect of the article where Dr. Bailey puts his gaydar square on Haggard: "The one blip on his Ph.D.-caliber gaydar was Haggard's broad grin."This is total speculation, we haven't done studies yet, but I think gay men tend to have much more expressive smiles. That's one thing that struck me about Haggard.'"

And here I thought it was because he was the pastor of a megachurch. Silly me.

Well, winter approaches in the US which turns one's thoughts to -- penguins.

Just to show that a good controversy over a short-legged critter can have, uh, long legs, here comes Roy, Silo and Tango again. If ex-gay is off the table, what shall we call Silo?

AP's David Crary covers the Haggard issue with comments from the usual suspects.

This article covers some of the same ground as the Denver Post article on November 12. I was struck by a couple of points in this article. There was a certain dogmatism to the APA commenters. Doug Haldeman said there is nothing good that can come from conversion therapy. This is an extreme statement that is at odds with the experience of many who have been involved in it. Possible harm, yes; but "nothing good?" - I think that is easily falsified and is actually contrary to some of Dr. Haldeman's writings in APA journals.

I thought Joe Nicolosi made a good point by pointing out that each individual has the perogative to determine what same-sex attractions mean to him within a valuative framework. However, in my opinion, he undermined his position to some degree by assessing Mr. Haggard's history, apparently without any knowledge of him (one hopes it is without experiential knowledge), as needing to face "...the realities that you [Haggard] did not get certain central affirmations from your mother or your father..." How would one know that?

Mr. Crary correctly points out that:

There have been numerous studies, with varying conclusions, on how homosexuality originates and whether it can be changed. But there has been no authoritative study - accepted by both sides - examining the effectiveness and possible ill-effects of reparative therapy.

And so dogmatism on any side seems unwarranted.

I have interviewed the anonymous author of the new book Unprotected and briefly reviewed the book. Released tomorrow, the book provides a very sobering look at unrestained sexuality on campuses and how campus health services are often accomplices in the risky behavior (not at GCC of course :).