By Kate Shellnutt and Morgan Lee
“I do not want to be the source of anything that might detract from our church’s mission.”
After nearly 20 years as lead pastor of Seattle’s Mars Hill Church, Mark Driscoll has resigned. Driscoll, 44, had faced mounting criticism over church leadership and discipline within Mars Hill and how he wrote and promoted his popular books.
The decision came less than two months after Driscoll stepped down from leadership while the church investigated charges against him. Earlier in August, he had been removed from the church planting network he founded, Acts 29.
In a statement, the church’s board of overseers accepted his resignation, but emphasized that they had not asked Driscoll to resign and were surprised to receive his letter.
They concluded Driscoll had “been guilty of arrogance, responding to conflict with a quick temper and harsh speech, and leading the staff and elders in a domineering manner,” but had “never been charged with any immorality, illegality or heresy. Most of the charges involved attitudes and behaviors reflected by a domineering style of leadership.”
The board—composed of longtime members Michael Van Skaik and Larry Osborne as well as business leaders Jon Phelps and Matt Rogers (who were added after popular evangelical speaker Paul Tripp and Harvest Bible Chapel’s James McDonald resigned over the summer)—also added that many of the formal charges that had been levied against him were “altogether unfair or untrue.”
Dave Bruskas, an executive elder at Mars Hill Seattle will serve as the primary teaching pastor during the transition.
In his resignation letter (initially obtained and reported on by the Religion News Service), Driscoll noted that the board’s investigation into the formal charges against him had ended …
Read more here: Mark Driscoll Resigns from Mars Hill