Schuller Institute: Glitz and dreams

Christian Century, Feb 28, 2001

Glitz, glamour and glass" was what the place seemed to Kirbyjon Caldwell at one time--almost two decades before the United Methodist pastor would garner a bit of the Schulleresque limelight himself. A bit skeptical, Caldwell attended his first Robert H. Schuller Institute for Successful Church Leadership nearly 20 years ago. He now calls the sessions a source of deep spiritual encouragement for him.

Caldwell was a featured speaker at the 32nd annual institute at Schuller's Crystal Cathedral in Garden Grove, California, less than two weeks after delivering the benediction at the inauguration of President Bush. His Windsor Village UMC in Houston, tabulations only recently showed, is the denomination's largest congregation.

Caldwell shared the stage at the four-day event with speakers and performers who mirrored the ethnic, gender and theological diversity of its attendees. The 1,325 pastors and lay leaders who came to the late January event represented at least 29 denominations, said Claudia Holloway, spokeswoman for the Crystal Cathedral, the grandiose latter-day name for what was once the Garden Grove Community Drive-in Church.

The institute attracted people from across the globe. Bill Gray, pastor of the Oban Parish Church in Oban, Scotland, praised the "accepting, nonjudgmental, loving, caring people" he encountered. Layman Manfed Schuler traveled from Germany. "Eight years ago I wasn't a believer," Schuler said, but watching Schuller's Hour of Power TV program brought him back to Christianity. He now worships in a Lutheran church.

Schuller, a Reformed Church in America minister, challenged the institute's opening crowd to think of the dreams God would inspire. "I think God specializes in giving us ideas that are impossible until we connect with him," he said.

Bill Hybels, pastor of the Willow Creek Community megachurch in South Barrington, Illinois, recalled years when a mere 150 pastors would travel to Garden Grove in search of ideas. "If God has called you to do something, he will empower you to do it," said Hybels in a keynote talk.

In his "conversation" with his audience, Caldwell hammered on the theme of individual vision. Speaking of five turning points in his own life, Caldwell said, "Decisions drive your destiny" When he came to his own fifth pivotal decision--his choice to introduce then-Governor George W. Bush at last summer's Republican National Convention--Caldwell got so personal he ordered that the tape recorders stop rolling.

The Houston pastor contended that the most important lessons participants get from the Schuller Institute are not the nuts and bolts of growing dynamic churches but "the passion, the motivation and the integrity, that's what's most transferable."

A ease in point was another speaker: Doretta Clark, single-mom-turned-pastor of the Mystic Congregational Church in Mystic, Connecticut. Clark, who graduated from Yale Divinity School in 1994, remembered her hesitant hope of becoming a minister when she attended the institute in 1990. Divorced, Clark recalled her worries over her children, and lacking both money and speaking ability After going to divinity school all day, Clark said, "I had to come home and be mom." Schuller "gave me permission to dream."

--RNS