Gabriel Mills (41) was terminated from his position as Guest Experience Pastor of Journey Church in Kenosha, Wisconsin, and arrested after he was accused of sending photos of a woman to himself without her consent from her husband’s phone. The victim and her family are members at the church.

The incident allegedly occurred during a life group meeting at Mills’ home. Mills asked to use the phone belonging to the victim’s husband during the meeting in order to download an audiobook application Mills wanted to share with the husband. The husband is an employee of the Racine Police Department.

According to the criminal complaint filed on Oct. 2, Mills searched for intimate photos of the church member’s wife on the phone and sent them to himself via AirDrop.

RELATED: 86-Year-Old Pastor Charged in Child Sex Abuse Material Case Still Appears To Be Preaching

The victim stated that, after life group was over, she discovered Mills had sent himself the photos. She saw Mills holding his phone in a way that he didn’t want others to see it. After talking to Mills, the woman stated that “he lowered his hand and phone to his side and [she] could see displayed on the phone a picture of [herself] in thong style underwear where she was bent over at the waist posed for the camera.”

The victim recognized the photo as one she had sent to her husband.

The victim then “stated that she became furious as to how that private photo ended up on the [pastor’s] phone, and [she] was concerned what else [Mills] might have on his phone of her as she had sent other photos to her husband on previous occasions.”

RELATED: Texas Pastor Known for Work in Community Arrested on 2 Sexual Assault Charges

The woman then said that she “tapped on [Mills’] phone which relit up the picture of her in the thong underwear and the [pastor] looked down at his phone and saw what [she] could see.” The victim stated that Mills “turned ‘white as a ghost’ and began to tremble and apologize to her repeatedly.”

Mills then reportedly became frantic and pleaded with the woman not to tell his wife. He even tried to block her exit to one of the stairways in his house and told her that the image was of his wife, not her.

Lysa TerKeurst sat down with her husband, Chaz Adams, Wednesday night for a “behind the scenes conversation” about their relationship. In the livestream, the couple revealed how they met, how they have built trust in their relationship, and that they continue to navigate past griefs even in the mist of their “redemption story.”

“I am so grateful to have found you, and I know you’re grateful to have found me,” TerKeurst told Adams. “And there are still moments that, because the previous relationship that you had in marriage and the previous relationship I had in marriage, because those didn’t work out and they ended in such hard ways, there are still ramifications of grief that happened.”

“But I love the fact that you and I are able to talk about those things as well. And I think conversation’s really important,” she continued. “I think more relationships die, not because you attempt to have hard conversations, but because there are conversations that are desperately needed but just never had.” 

Lysa TerKeurst and Chaz Adams Discuss Their ‘Redemption Story’

Lysa TerKeurst is the president and chief visionary officer of Proverbs 31 Ministries and the author of several New York Times bestsellers. Throughout Wednesday’s conversation, she related her and her husband’s story to concepts in her new book, “I Want to Trust You, but I Don’t: Moving Forward When You’re Skeptical of Others, Afraid of What God Will Allow, and Doubtful of Your Own Discernment.”

At the end of the stream, TerKeurst announced that people can buy a copy of the book and get one free for as long as supplies last starting then until the book is published on Oct. 8. 

TerKeurst also recently had a conversation about trust with Dr. Ed Stetzer and Daniel Yang on “The Stetzer ChurchLeaders Podcast.” That interview will be released Oct. 9.

“We’ve been together for a long time and lots of people have asked so many questions,” said TerKeurst as her conversation with Adams began. “I am excited we’re going to get to tell a little bit of our story tonight.” 

Navigating Past Grief and Building Trust

Part of TerKeurst and Adams’ story is how they have developed a new relationship with each other given the pain of their pasts. In 2017, TerKeurst announced that after 25 years of marriage, she was getting divorced because of her then-husband’s infidelity.

However, a year later, the couple was still together. In December 2018, the two renewed their vows, celebrating the restoration of their union. Sadly, on Jan. 1, 2022, TerKeurst revealed that she was ending her marriage to Art TerKeurst for good, as he had continued to be unfaithful.

In June 2023, TerKeurst shared that she had a new love interest, and in January of this year, she and Adams married in a romantic ceremony in the French Alps.

RELATED: ‘Tears of Pure Joy’—Lysa TerKeurst Marries Chaz Adams in Beautiful Ceremony in the French Alps

Meeting Each Other: A Chance Encounter on a Dating App

By far the most asked question Adams and TerKeurst receive is how they met—which was on a dating app. “I don’t particularly love our story being that we met on a dating app because I always said I will never go on dating apps,” said TerKeurst. However, she picked one she believed was “pretty safe,” and she made sure to involve her girlfriends throughout the dating process. 

Michael Jennings, a pastor arrested while tending his out-of-town neighbors’ yard, can sue the city of Childersburg, Alabama, and three police officers involved in the case.

On Friday (Sept. 27), a three-judge panel of the U.S. 11^th Circuit Court of Appeals unanimously reversed a lower-court ruling that had dismissed Jennings’ lawsuit. The officers aren’t protected by qualified immunity, the panel said, because they had no probable cause to arrest Jennings.

Jennings, who is Black, was confronted by police in May 2022, after a white woman called 911 to report a “suspicious individual” in a neighboring yard. The pastor, who identified himself verbally but refused to show his ID, said friends had asked him to water their flowers while they were away.

RELATED: Alabama Pastor Arrested While Watering Neighbor’s Flowers, Prepares Discrimination Lawsuit

Body camera footage released a few months later shows Jennings being handcuffed and placed in a police vehicle. “Y’all racially profiled me,” he told the officers after they arrested him. A charge of obstructing government operations was dismissed days later.

Attorney Calls Ruling ‘A Win for Justice’

Alabama’s “stop and identify” law, which permits officers to demand identification, applies when police have “reasonable suspicion” that someone is committing a crime, the 11^th Circuit Court ruled.

“While it is always advisable to cooperate with law enforcement officers, Jennings was under no legal obligation to provide his ID,” said the court. “Therefore, officers lacked probable cause for Jennings’ arrest…because Jennings did not commit an independent unlawful act by refusing to give ID.”

Jennings, pastor of Vision of Abundant Life Church in Sylacauga, Alabama, said the officers “dehumanized” him and violated his constitutional and civil rights. Jennings’ lawsuit claims he suffers from “ongoing emotional distress,” including PTSD-like symptoms, nightmares, and flashbacks.

Harry Daniels, the lead attorney for Jennings, said Friday’s ruling was “a win for Pastor Jennings and a win for justice.” Daniels claimed the body-cam video showed that officers were intent on arresting the pastor but “then tried to rewrite history claiming he hadn’t identified himself, when that was the first thing he did.”

Daniels added, “Finally, Pastor Jennings will have his day in court and prove that wearing a badge does not give you the right to break the law.” The ruling could impact other civil rights cases throughout Alabama, according to the attorney.

Pastor Michael Jennings Thanked God for Sparing Him

As ChurchLeaders has reported, Jennings said he holds no grudge against the neighbor who called police on him. “I don’t hold anything against my neighbors. I still speak to them,” he said in 2022. “Matter of fact, I’ve talked to [the woman’s] husband since the incident, and he was telling me how bad she feels about it.”

RELATED: Pastor Arrested While Watering Neighbors’ Flowers Extends Love to the Woman Who Called 911 on Him

“I love that neighbor just as well as I love the one where I was watering their flowers,” said the pastor. “May not have to like them all the time, but we have to love them anyway.”

On a recent episode of the “Lights On” show, Carl Lentz responded to viewer questions alongside his wife, Laura, including one question Lentz said he is asked frequently: Is Hillsong Church a cult? 

The Rise and Fall of Carl Lentz at Hillsong NYC

Lentz was once one of Hillsong’s most promising pastors, launching Hillsong NYC in 2010. Under his leadership, the church grew to become a multisite congregation, and Lentz served as pastor to a number of star athletes and musicians.

However, in 2020, Lentz was dismissed from the church after admitting to an extramarital affair. Later, Lentz was accused of spiritual and sexual abuse, allegations he has vehemently denied.

Hillsong’s Widespread Scandals and Leadership Fallout

The scandal surrounding Lentz’s leadership and conduct was one among many that plagued Hillsong in a span of just a few years. These scandals spanned several Hillsong churches, as well as its college. In 2022, Brian Houston, who founded the church in 1983, resigned in disgrace amid allegations of sexual misconduct and substance abuse. 

As such, the global megachurch, which produces worship music used by congregations of diverse theological stripes around the world, has come under scrutiny from legal professionals and journalists alike. The church is even the subject of at least two investigative docuseries, “Hillsong: A Megachurch Exposed” and “Secrets of Hillsong.”  

RELATED: ‘I Was Becoming What I Hated’—Radio Host Charlamagne Tha God Talks About His Mental Illness With Carl Lentz

Carl Lentz Responds: ‘Is Hillsong Church a Cult?’

“Is Hillsong Church a cult?” Lentz read from a list of questions in a video published Wednesday. Smiling, he said, “I mean, the question is tossed to us a lot.”

“Easy answer is of course it’s not a cult,” Lentz said. “And this is my perspective. And my perspective is probably different than anybody else’s. But first of all, we gotta talk about, ‘What is a cult?’ Everyone has their own definitions now.” 

Lentz defined a cult as a religious community a person cannot leave “without fear of death or ridicule or extraordinary manipulation.”

“A cult is known for its welcoming arms in and closed doors when you wanna get out,” Lentz said. “That’s a very, very layman’s definition of ‘cult.’”

RELATED: ‘I Don’t Identify as the Disgraced Former Pastor’—Carl Lentz Reflects on Scandals in New Podcast

“I think why our church—our former church—got hit with that so much is just because it’s influential,” he continued. “And our Taylor Swift fans—are they in a cult? They are way cultier than any church I’ve ever seen. Beyoncé’s fans? Way cultier.”

(RNS) — In the summer of 2022, a dozen pastors from different backgrounds and traditions gathered in Grand Rapids, Michigan, to answer one simple question.

Won’t you be my neighbor?

The question was inspired by the teachings of Jesus and one of his most well-known modern followers — Fred Rogers, who greeted millions of children for decades with that simple but profound question. Over the next year, the group of pastors — conservative and progressive, men and women, gay and straight, Black, white and Asian American — gathered to see if they could disagree and still stay together.

RELATED: God Calls Christians to ‘Risky Kindness’–Andrew Erwin Speaks About His New Movie, ‘White Bird’

Would friendship and shared faith prove stronger than polarization? The answer, at least at the beginning, was: “I don’t know.”

“If I don’t know the answer, that makes an interesting story,” said Nicholas Ma, a filmmaker who followed the pastors on their journey.

The result was “Leap of Faith,” a new documentary that debuts Friday (Oct. 4) in Grand Rapids, Nashville, Phoenix, and a handful of other cities before expanding to wider release later in the month. The film was inspired in large part by a 2018 documentary about Rogers, which Ma produced. During screenings of that earlier film, Ma — who appeared on “Mister Rogers’ Neighborhood,” the long-running children’s program, with his father, the famed cellist Yo-Yo Ma — recalled that people would often ask, “Where are the Fred Rogers of today?”

Pastors in the “Leap Of Faith” documentary answer questions in a line exercise by going to different areas based on their answers. (Photo © Picturehouse 2024)

“It felt like a question that needed to be answered,” said Ma, especially in the days after the 2020 election, when it seemed like the county was coming apart at the seams.

Around that time, Ma came across an article in The Wall Street Journal about a church in Michigan trying to bridge some of the culture’s divides. Helping them was the Rev. Michael Gulker, leader of the Colossian Forum, a Grand Rapids-based nonprofit specializing in conflict resolution.

Ma called Gulker and the two started talking about collaborating. One option was gathering leaders from different parts of the country. But Gulker felt that might lead to good feelings but no lasting change.

“When you are not sharing a backyard, this kind of work becomes abstract — and ends up like a group hug,” he said. “When you’re dealing with the same people in the same city with the same local politics, it has a different kind of feel.”

The film follows the pastors through a series of retreats — as they first get to know each other and talk about their hopes and aspirations, and then as they deal with the reality that friendship won’t erase their differences.

“Leap of Faith” film poster. (Image © Picturehouse)

At one point, the pastors gather in the center of a room and answer a series of questions. Those who answer “Yes” go to one side, while the “No’s” go to the other. The questions start out lighthearted. For example, the Rev. Molly Bosscher, an Episcopal priest, is the only person to have memorized the names of the books of the Bible in order.

Then the questions get more serious.  When asked if they would officiate a same-sex marriage, the group is split in half.

The discussions that follow reveal the pain that theological divides cause. The Rev. Joan VanDessel, a married lesbian United Methodist minister, says she hoped the growing friendships would change her fellow pastors’ minds about the topic. When that did not happen, there was a sense of betrayal and pain.

“The response to that was a lot more painful than I expected,” VanDessel tells the group. That leads to a discussion where the pastors see the human cost of the divide on that issue and how they don’t want that disagreement to tear them apart.

A key part of that discussion was vulnerability and accepting differences.

“Why can’t we be who we are and that be OK to the next person?” asks Chase Stancle, pastor of Unison Christian Church, at one point. “Why do we try to make everybody believe and feel the same way?”

Through the discussion, the pastors formed a sense of belonging that was stronger than their differences and wanted to build a Christian community that made room for all of them.

(RNS) — In the days since Hurricane Helene swept through mostly rural areas of nine states, Kevin King, executive director of Mennonite Disaster Service, has been working to make plans for how to best respond, despite spotty phone service due to downed cell towers and roads and bridges that have been washed out or blocked by fallen trees.

On Tuesday (Oct. 1), King was cheered as disaster relief workers from Mennonite communities around Ohio and Pennsylvania arrived outside Asheville, North Carolina, with chainsaws and earth-moving equipment to help clear the back roads as government services focus on main thoroughfares as well as search and rescue. “It’s good to hear sounds of chainsaws bringing hope,” he said.

Six more Mennonite heavy equipment operators are expected to start work Wednesday, bringing the total volunteers on site to about 30, said King.

RELATED: After Hurricane Helene, Faith Groups Ramp Up Disaster Relief

“It’s hard to say how long this will continue,” he said. “A disaster this complex, with roads and bridges washed out, there’s still communities that are hard to get to.”

While the Mennonite efforts are most immediately aimed at helping stranded households get out of their neighborhoods to seek supplies, King suspects that a full recovery will take years, given the scope of damage. He compares the devastation of Helene to that of Hurricane Katrina, which hit New Orleans in 2005.

The group is currently based in Fairview, North Carolina, but one of King’s tasks this week is to locate a long-term site where Mennonite disaster volunteers can be housed as they help with cleanup and rebuilding over the long haul.

“What we will be looking for is a place we can set up for three to four years,” King said.

Workers with Mennonite Disaster Service survey damage from Hurricane Helene near Asheville, N.C., Oct. 1, 2024. (Photo courtesy of Mennonite Disaster Service)

He said other groups, such as Southern Baptist Disaster Relief and Samaritan’s Purse, have also been active in North Carolina, but so far, the Mennonites have not run into them, as the devastation from the storm covers such a wide area.

Tom Beam, Southern Baptist Disaster Relief’s director for North Carolina, reported that volunteers are working in eight counties in that state.

“We have experienced, in some areas, total destruction from the storm,” Beam told Baptist Press, an official SBC publication. “We have people who are hungry. We’re trying to get meals to them as fast as we can. We’ve got people in communities that we don’t know yet if they’re OK because we can’t get to them.”

Helene left many rural communities without power — which knocked out the pumps that supply well water to homes in those communities. The storm also damaged water mains in Asheville, some of which were washed away in the storm, leading to a shortage of drinking water.

Water Mission, a South Carolina-based engineering nonprofit that helps supply clear water around the world, has staff that live in storm-affected areas. In response, the nonprofit, which has recently begun doing disaster relief in the U.S., sent six water filtration systems and 175 generators to affected areas.

Water Mission workers load supplies onto a helicopter to be delivered to a remote North Carolina mountain community after it was cut off by Hurricane Helene. (Photo courtesy of Water Mission)

“We emptied our warehouse of all the generators we had, we put safe waters systems on a truck and drove up here within 24 hours,” said Brock Kreitzburg, head of disaster response for Water Mission. “We just want to help.”

Author, speaker, and apologist Sean McDowell serves as associate professor in the Christian Apologetics program at Biola University. He recently posted a video that boldly addresses and refutes how many Christians have been taught to tithe.

“Despite what you may have heard your whole life,” argued McDowell, “the Bible doesn’t teach that Christians are supposed to tithe 10%.”

Sean McDowell Argues What the Bible Says (And Doesn’t Say) About Tithing

Through his writings and videos, McDowell hasn’t shied away from tough topics for Christians and non-Christians alike. He has explored topics including what the Bible says about slavery, navigating deep grief, and understanding atheism—and now a common misconception about tithing.

RELATED: ‘God Has Used This To Open Up My Eyes’—Apologist Sean McDowell Shares Health Update, Lessons Pain Has Taught Him

McDowell boldly began his video by saying, “The Bible doesn’t teach that Christians are supposed to tithe 10%.”

McDowell acknowledged that viewers might have heard the opposite for their entire lives.

“I know, I’ve heard it in church, too,” offered McDowell.

McDowell further explained that pastors often quote Malachi 3. Specifically in Malachi 3:8-10, God addresses the finances of his people:

Will a mere mortal rob God? Yet you rob me. But you ask, “How are we robbing you?” “In tithes and offerings. You are under a curse—your whole nation—because you are robbing me. Bring the whole tithe into the storehouse, that there may be food in my house. Test me in this,” says the LORD Almighty, “and see if I will not throw open the floodgates of heaven and pour out so much blessing that there will not be room enough to store it.”

McDowell explained that pastors offer this passage and then simply say, “We’re supposed to give 10%.” But in those days, tithes and offerings were given to pay for needs of the priests and religious leaders who served the people, McDowell said.

 

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