The Rev. Robert A. Schuller is no longer the senior pastor of Crystal Cathedral and hasn’t been for the past two weeks following a quiet resignation that managed to elude the media spotlight until this past weekend.
“The Executive Team of Crystal Cathedral Ministries has received and accepted the resignation of Rev. Robert Anthony Schuller as Senior Pastor of the congregation,” the church announced in a statement dated Nov. 29. “It is expected that Robert will make an announcement soon regarding plans for his new ministry. The leadership and congregation wishes him all the best as his plans unfold.”
Schuller’s resignation came one month after his removal from the “Hour of Power” television program which for three decades served as the voice and face of Schuller and his father, Crystal Cathedral founder Robert H. Schuller.
The older Schuller said he felt called by God to build bridges between Crystal Cathedral Ministries and other powerful ministries and wanted his listeners and followers to hear other "amazing preachers," including Bill Hybels of Willow Creek Community Church and Kirbyjon Caldwell of Windsor Village United Methodist Church.
But the vision to expand the program beyond a single personality in order to reach a broader audience strained relations between Schuller and his son, who disagreed with the move.
"For this lack of shared vision and the jeopardy in which this is placing this entire ministry, it has become necessary for Robert and me to part ways in the Hour of Power television ministry to each pursue our own unique God-ordained visions,” the older Schuller said in a statement on Oct. 28.
According to Crystal Cathedral, the younger Schuller is expected to announce his new ministry plans “soon” and the Garden Grove, Calif., church has begun the search for a new senior pastor.
In the meantime, interim senior pastor Juan Carlos Ortiz and executive pastor Jim Poit are leading the pastoral staff at Crystal Cathedral in cooperation with Rick Mysse, executive director of the Far West Classis of the Reformed Church in America (RCA) – the church’s denomination.
Church leaders have asked congregants to pray for the Schuller family during the “difficult yet exciting time of transition.”
RSS
awwww..daddy gave him the boot.
SAG has legion leading men available who will accomplish presenting the script (not scripture) IAW the prescribed guidelines.
The truth surely must abound and if the Gospel is not preached and Crystal Cathedral is built around a man, it will close ICHABOD is the Biblical description. Romans 1 v 16
Is this a Bible believing, Bible teaching church? Never has been, will it ever be? It's the only place in Garden Grove that all the movie stars come to speak as guests and then sell crystal trinkets. All is beautiful, that being said with the big bright smile of Schuller. Tell me anyone who has attended their what have you learned of Christ Jesus?
For most father and son who work close together there takes a great effort to work together and as a team. I am pleased Robert Jr. is now following his own calling of the Lord.
Consider that any pastor that follows a pastor that has been in that position for many years, faces a difficult transition. Most ministers that follow a long term pastor seldom last any length of time, especially so if the previous pastor is still there in the congreation, say nothing about if the previous pastor was your dad!
Personally, I think Robert Jr. has a greater impact on the conserative evangelical believers. Shuller Sr. is more liberal neo-orthordox, which is more in line with the denominstion and the Crystal Catherdral.
farout
tallguy, you'll need to talk to Noah Webster on that one!:)
You guys just kinda make things up as you go along don't you?
Bishop and pastor both meant the same thing in the early (pre-Roman) Church. IMO, Bishop is a title meant to bring esteem on the holder, not on Christ. So what difference does it make WHERE the bishop sits?
tallguy, from Webster's New World College Dictionary, 1. the main church of a bishop's see, containing the cathedra 2. loosely, any large imposing church. Having seen this place on television I'd say it very easily meets the criteria of #2.
believer, you coulda looked this one up yourself:
A cathedral (Lat. cathedra, "seat") is a Christian church that contains the seat of a bishop. It is a religious building for worship, specifically of a denomination with an episcopal hierarchy, such as the Roman Catholic, Anglican, Orthodox and some Lutheran churches, which serves as a bishop's seat, and thus as the central church of a diocese.
So by definition Robert A. Schuller is not a bishop and has not right calling his building a cathedral.
What? know ye not that your body is the temple of the Holy Ghost which is in you, which ye have of God, and ye are not your own? (1Corinthians 6:19).
Let us not focus on external structures . . .
tallguy, okay I'll bite, why is it not a cathedral?
ahhhhh.....too bad, I'm going to miss my Sunday morning showtime
It's NOT a Cathedral....!
Maybe they'll actually get somebody who will preach the gospel at the Crystal Catherdral. We can only hope.
For as long as I can remember, when anybody mentioned the name Schuller you automatically thought of the Crystal Cathedral.
May the Holy Spirit continue to work in this ministry as a new "branding" takes place....in the name of Jesus.