This story at the New Zealand Herald brought back memories–none of them good.
Before reading the story below check out the Churches website, and ask yourself, if you go by appearance only, does this look like a cult in the making or a cult leader? Then come back and read the article below.
Appearances are deceiving folks…
From their “about us” page:
Destiny Churches have extended their influence beyond New Zealand and have planted a church in Brisbane, Australia. The church corporate relates closely with New Birth Missionary Baptist Church in Atlanta USA, which is the home of Bishop Eddie L. Long, spiritual father to Bishop Tamaki.
Eddie Long; why am I not surprised.. anyway,
The leader of Destiny Church, Brian Tamaki, who not long ago anointed himself bishop of the church he founded, has now proclaimed himself the church’s “spiritual father” and designated the male members of the church as “spiritual sons”.
At a special service during the church’s annual conference in Auckland at the weekend, about 700 male members of the church swore a “covenant oath” of loyalty and obedience to Mr Tamaki and were given a “covenant ring” to wear on their right hands.
A church document describes the covenant as “a solemn oath of commitment that is binding, enduring and unbreakable. You are bound to covenant … Covenant is an irrevocable, undissolvable oath of commitment”.
The document, entitled Protocols and Requirements Between Spiritual Father & His Spiritual Sons, contains the text of the “covenant oath”, the guts of which is that “Above all, we stand here today in the presence of God to enter into this sacred covenant with our man of God, Bishop Brian Tamaki”.
It says:
“To you Bishop we pledge our allegiance, our faithfulness and loyalty. We pledge to serve the cause that is in your heart and to finish that work. Success to you and success to those who help you – for God is with you.”
In its introduction, the church document says that proof of a man’s covenant with God is how they “submit to God’s chosen man …
We are blessed to our spiritual father through whom this principle is being restored. The fruit of his ministry is self-evident, so much so that his call and influence is discerned at many levels in both the Christian and non-Christian communities here in New Zealand … Spiritual fathers are extremely rare … For us it is about discerning the special anointing and function God has put on Bishop’s life … “
In the document comes a section entitled “Protocols towards our spiritual father”, which takes 1300 words to describe in jaw-dropping detail how the “spiritual sons” shall behave towards their “spiritual father”.
Under “Public Conduct”, the sons will in all conversation always speak of Mr Tamaki in a favourable and positive light; and in formal and/or public occasions, they will always address him and his wife, Hannah, first in acknowledgments and addresses at meetings “as a sign of respect to the father of the movement”.
If any “son” is honoured either by the church or secularly, he is to mention his “mentors and role models” – Mr and Mrs Tamaki – “because Bishop is one of God’s best-known representatives in our country”.
Under “Conduct Towards Bishop”, the “sons” are told that,
“Bishop is the tangible expression of God”, so they need to understand how to properly approach their man of God “to protect the anointing and not transgress this special relationship”.
Under “Discernment”, the “sons” are told they must,
“feel Bishop’s flow and be attentive to his thoughts and directions”, which “gives unity and power to what God is saying and doing through him”.
They must endorse what Mr Tamaki endorses, fully support what he promotes and ensure that what he is involved in is supported and successful.
“Whenever Bishop speaks all other talking stops: give him your full attention. Be careful not to cut in on him when he is speaking and ensure others don’t either.
“Don’t start talking or gesturing to somebody else while Bishop is speaking.”
The “sons” must never openly disagree with Mr Tamaki in front of others and must “be careful not to become familiar (which can lead to contempt)” with him “due to his friendliness and openness”.
Under “Etiquette”, the “sons” are told that when Mr Tamaki and his wife enter a room, they must stand and acknowledge their presence. They may sit only after the Tamakis are seated.
And if they dine with him they wait until he has started eating before they start eating, unless he indicates otherwise.
Under “Church Service (in house) Protocols,
the men are encouraged to sit as close as possible to the front of the church to be nearer to Mr Tamaki and to be vocal during his preaching, affirming what he has to say with “amen” and “that’s right”, clapping, shouting and laughing. This sort of participation is said to build “an atmosphere that is conducive to supernatural events”.
More: Tamaki’s 700 ‘sons’ swear oath of loyalty
Also see the excellent information gathered on Destiny Church and Brian Tamaki at Religion News Blog
"If the professed convert distinctly and deliberately declares that he knows the Lord's will but does not mean to attend to it, you are not to pamper his presumption, but it is your duty to assure him that he is not saved. Do not suppose that the Gospel is magnified or God glorified by going to the worldlings and telling them that they may be saved at this moment by simply accepting Christ as their Savior, while they are wedded to their idols, and their hearts are still in love with sin. If I do so I tell them a lie, pervert the Gospel , insult Christ, and turn the grace of God into lasciviousness."
This will not end well. Anytime you find people swearing allegiance to a mere man. The end is just not going to be good. History is littered with such examples. The whole stuff is blasphemous and demonic. This phrase “Bishop is the tangible expression of God”, is a play on Heb 1:3. I pray these so called sons will see the light!
Jim Jones was my first thought! It is frightening to think that 700 men blindly took this oath! A disaster waiting to happen,….. or maybe it has already begun!
Gee is they have to do-sounds like the focus is on “the man of god” not God Almighty
[...] PJ states, from their “about us” page: Destiny Churches have extended their influence beyond New Zealand and have planted a church in Brisbane, Australia. The church corporate relates closely with New Birth Missionary Baptist Church in Atlanta USA, which is the home of Bishop Eddie L. Long, spiritual father to Bishop Tamaki. [...]
Is this serious?!
What kind of “men” are these? dont they know their bibles. I suspect we will see more of this, in these times people focus more on the man then on the God of man.
I curse this to the root!
PJ,
What you may not know is that Eddie Long is part of Mark Hanby’s organization…. Hanby is all about “alignment” and spiritual fathering and sons etc. He was in with Earl Polk a few years back and considered him a spiritual father.
If there’s someone who needs to be checked out, it’s him…. He’s on his second or third divorce…. http://www.hanby.org/
It has been a long, slow process for these people as they’ve become more indoctrinated into the beliefs of this man.
At first, Destiny seemed like any other of our mainstream churches, preaching what seemed sound biblical teaching, with the emphasis on family values. Why that appealed to so many was that we have a relatively high divorce rate, and then our government decided to legalise same-sex ‘civil unions’.
But while Destiny were amazingly vocal about their opposition to this (they held a nationwide rally on the steps of parliament which was extremely reminiscent of Hitler’s early rallies), inside the church the requirements for being a member were being put in place. It is all kept very quiet, not many people speak about it even after they leave (I guess, just in case they are seen to be running down a fellow Christian brother maybe).
When this article appeared, though, I asked someone I knew who had left Destiny why they left. They said it was because at the time Tamaki declared himself a Bishop, they were at the gathering in Auckland, and the person felt very uncomfortable with it all. They sensed it wasn’t of God, that it was man-made and promoting the man. It was interesting to me that the person I was speaking to still refers to Tamaki as “Bishop” as in… “Bishop was preaching then” etc. The person caught himself a couple of times, and changed it to “Brian” but I could see the foundation there of calling Tamaki Bishop was a heavily indoctrinated one.
Cultwatch have upgraded the listings for Brian Tamaki and Destiny Church to Red – Danger.
God help this Brian Tamaki. He needs to move to New Guinia, in South America with his close related family
I pray no one will follow him and will open their eyes before its too late.I was 28 yrs old when Jim Jones took his cult to New Guinia, its something you never forget. If he believes he’s King David, let him go.
Please open your eyes, this is not Christian Behavior.
Out of the frying pan and into the fire for these young men, who extricate themselves from lives of crime, alcohol and drug dependency only to be flung into yet another dependency, on a self-aggrandizing megalomaniac self-anointed bishop.
God help anyone who also happens to be gay – their lives will be made a misery. Time and again, the most homophobic ministries have been proven to be championed by twisted, closet homosexuals who perpetuate the repression they suffered in the worst way in much the same way as wife bashers do. There is no reported evidence of this in Tamaki, yet, but looking at the likes of ‘Bishop’ Eddie Long and George Rekers (NARTH) makes one wonder what is next. Why does a man feel it necessary to be surrounded by obsequious slaves? Why can he not take criticism like the rest of us and learn from it, improving himself in the process?
Dictators throughout history who have killed off or otherwise silenced their critics, thereby surrounding themselves with yes-men, never come to any good. It was no doubt Hitler’s yes-men who thought invading Russia to be a fabulous idea, just because the Fuhrer thought of it.
We need to continue to expose this kind of exploitation of the vulnerable and nip it in the bud before it becomes uncontrollable.
Yeah, this a cult for sure! There’s nothing in that “protocal” that even hints of humility. Tamaki sounds like an ego maniac. There’s nothing Christian about this AT ALL!
Stay tuned. Stories of abuse & “how I escaped” are sure to follow.