stan mitchell gracepointe wife

But because he'd opened a conversation in the church about LGBT issues, Mitchell felt he had to state its formal position on LGBT roles outright "I was a little sad, but I understood it," Compton says.

"Mitchell told CP that he considered the Walton column to be "fair" in its assessment of his church. Not true.' The two had met at GracePointe 10 years ago, and Popham had wanted Mitchell to perform the ceremony in the first place. They're just bound to a conviction that they had grown up with their whole life. He grew up, as he puts it, "a homophobe from the deepest part of rural Arkansas ... with a pathological fear of being tortured forever." "You can do the math pretty quickly and see that's not going to work long term," he says. "I'm working on my congregation." Join Facebook to connect with Stan Mitchell and others you may know. Compton had always felt welcome at GracePointe, and he was OK with the waiting. "And new members are making their way to GracePointe. "I am expanded to whatever the parameters of Stan Mitchell are." On Jan. 11, Pastor Stan Mitchell stood before the congregation of GracePointe, a nondenominational church in Franklin, and steeled himself for the most momentous 20 minutes of his ecclesiastical life.As he finished an otherwise ordinary sermon on the Epiphany — Christ's manifestation to the world as the Messiah — a strange calm came over him. He'd married in college (the marriage didn't last) and now has a grown son. "It was sad to me that this wasn't an eruption of joy.

It was established in 2003. '"Up to that point, Wederetz had seen Mitchell's attempts to hold the congregation together as "a people-pleasing thing." "I am at peace," he says. And you have to make your decision about what you want to do with that,'" continued Mitchell. So for the time being, Mitchell felt he had to enforce GracePointe's formal position, which the pastor describes as, "welcoming, loving, even membership, but not the "Isn't that gross to think about?" "Like Stan, I believe it is important—vitally important—to think seriously about issues like the one he has spoken about," he writes in his letter.

Indeed, for Mitchell, the moment seemed inevitable, as if everything that came before had led him here, to do "I felt equal parts foreboding and relief," he recalls. "That moment came in December 2014. "I never thought about leaving, not once," he says.

I think you cease being an orthodox Christian," he tells the But Scott says he respects Mitchell for taking a firm stand and acknowledges the social price he will pay. At its peak, GracePointe had a regular worship attendance of 800-1,000, which dropped to below 500 two weeks after the pro-LGBT announcement.Jeff Walton of the theologically conservative Institute on Religion & Democracy penned a column published by The Christian Post on Tuesday, noting that the decline continues. In early February, Scott posted an open letter to his congregation at Christ Church explaining the theological basis for his differences with Mitchell.

They were never faced with someone who was gay. "Our people actually had lived a better theology than was the dogma," Mitchell says — meaning that folks had simply treated each other with respect and kindness. You don't change people. Everything he feared most happened: He But the world did not end, he says, and that has unburdened him mightily. "They were about to lose the group that was ready. It was the beginning of a long intellectual and theological journey — one that terrified and thrilled Mitchell, and ultimately carried him away from northeastern Arkansas and Pentecostalism and into the pulpit of a sleek new church on Franklin Road.Mitchell founded GracePointe 12 years ago with a small group of people, most of whom, like him, grew up in evangelical traditions. Which is why Compton stuck it out at GracePointe, even when Mitchell asked him to step down from singing in the choir. "The fissures were in danger of splitting wide open. They didn't love the unspoken "don't ask, don't tell" homeostasis the church had fallen into when it came to LGBT issues, but it worked — for the moment. But David Schwab stayed. "Throughout the restrained ovation, Mitchell kept his eyes closed.

"He was a very articulate, talented young man," Schwab says. Life changes people.

This was no abstract theological debate. "Then I saw it was a strategy, of not rushing," she says. Soon, he was attending regularly and volunteering to help clean the campus. "I was the founding pastor of the church and founding pastors of nondenominational churches generally carry a good bit of equity," said Mitchell.

"Compton didn't come out until later in life. "I knew they weren't haters. "On a Sunday in early June, the auditorium fills as Greene's band winds down and Mitchell takes the stage to deliver a sermon on courage.

"I stuck it out because I believed in Stan's heart. "Before, we felt like we had to tiptoe, or speak in code."

"That was six months ago, and the media furor that greeted Mitchell's announcement has largely died down.

"I had the capacity to make that decision when the majority of the board who are good friends of mine did not agree and a large part of the congregation didn't agree. The senior pastor is Josh Scott.