The Crossover Project of City Harvest Church
A Critique by Dr Yap Wai Ho
“And Jesus came and spake unto them, saying, All power is given unto me in heaven and in earth. Go ye therefore, and teach all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost: Teaching them to observe all things whatsoever I have commanded you: and, lo, I am with you alway, even unto the end of the world. Amen.” (Matt 28:18-20).
The Great Commission in Matthew 28:18-20 is a commandment by our Lord Jesus Christ for born- again believers to make disciples of all nations. The scope of evangelism is thus universal and encompasses the sharing of the Gospel to all unbelievers. The primary motive for the preaching of the Gospel should thus be obedience to our Saviour, and love for the unsaved. However, in plain contradiction to the pure preaching of the Gospel and the belief of the Holy Spirit’s work of convicting the hearts of sinners to repentance, many churches have sought to make the gospel more “attractive” as though the Gospel and the Spirit in and of themselves are not powerful enough to save. In so doing they have adopted worldly methods to promote the cause of the Gospel which contravene scriptural principles. This article seeks to examine and evaluate, on a scriptural basis, a so-called “evangelistic” method, namely, the “Crossover Project” of the City Harvest Church (CHC).
The City Harvest Church
CHC is one of the megachurches in Singapore. It was founded by Kong Hee and his wife Sun Ho in 1989. It has a current congregation size of about 23,000. About 45% of its church members are below 25 years of age, with the average age of the congregation being 30. Most of its members are young urban professionals and CHC seeks to project an image of a young vibrant Church. CHC is a member of several inter-church organisations including the National Council of Churches, the Festival of Praise Fellowship and the Evangelical Fellowship of Singapore. CHC also has about 50 affiliate churches worldwide in countries including Malaysia, Taiwan, India, Indonesia and Australia.
Although CHC claims to be non- denominational, its core values are based on Charismatic and Pentecostal teachings. The ministry of CHC takes its reference from Matthew 22:37-40 and is built upon three aspects, “the Great Commandment” to love God wholeheartedly; “the Great Commission” to love people fervently; and “the Cultural Mandate” to engage culture creatively and to be light and salt in the marketplace. Among CHC’s manifold ministries are the drama ministry which produces drama and plays for its worship services, the marketplace ministry which is an outreach to working people, the strikeforce ministry which teaches youth rhythm and dance; and community services which caters to social needs.
CHC also operates a school of theology and claims to have trained over 5,000 students. It adopts the “health and wealth” or prosperity theology which teaches that financial blessing and physical health is the will of God for Christians. The Church also uses contemporary Christian music with a wide range of modern electronic instruments in its worship services.
CHC has from the beginning used a seeker-sensitive approach towards promoting church growth. This is based on a philosophy that seeks to fashion the church into a society that the unconverted can feel comfortable in so as to increase church attendance. Their worship services for instance are conducted in a worldly manner by using contemporary Christian music that has a rock beat our tune, and with musical instruments and dancers that are common in rock concerts.
In their services, sermons are watered down and hard Christian doctrines are not preached for fear of antagonising the congregation. Instead, the prosperity gospel that God is someone who is interested only in blessing believers with health and wealth is preached. Popular psychology is used to make people feel good about themselves without regard for sin.
The Crossover Project
The Crossover Project is based on one of CHC’s objectives called “The Cultural Mandate”. It is an extension of their seeker-sensitive approach, with the emphasis of building a “church without walls”. The primary goal of the Crossover Project is to reach out to the unchurched in society and get them into church. One way to do this is to use secular entertainment to draw them in.
In 1999, Kong Hee preached in Taiwan and found the youth ministry there to be lacking. He claimed that he received the Holy Spirit’s instruction to bring about revival in Taiwan and to evangelise the Chinese-speaking world. The following year, when he revisited Taiwan, he observed that the people were not interested in his sermons, but in the music and the singing led by his wife. It was then that he discovered the potential power of secular entertainment to reach the unsaved, especially the youths. Although he admitted that this was an unorthodox approach, he subsequently claimed that God in a series of personal experiences gave him four confirmations to embark on this new approach to reach out to the world. He claimed that the final confirmation was scriptural. It came from his mentors Phil Pringle, Ulk Ekman and AR Bernard who all quoted the same verse to him, “Let us cross over the other side” (Mark 4:35). From this verse, Kong Hee named the new approach as the Crossover Project. The Crossover Project started in 2002.
The practical approach of the Crossover Project is to organise and conduct pop concerts in public places such as stadiums, concert halls etc. The programme of the concert would be interspersed with evangelistic sharing and personal testimonies. The Crossover Project sought to achieve two goals: (1) to share the Gospel with the unchurched especially those who are resistant to the idea of visiting a church and (2) to encourage Christians in the entertainment industry to proclaim their faith. After a decade of using this approach, CHC claims that thousands have been saved through this ministry and that many in the entertainment industry have thrown in their support.
A Worldly Church
The Crossover Project which uses a worldly approach to evangelism has no scriptural basis whatsoever. A worldly approach to evangelism is certainly not taught in the Bible, certainly not in the Great Commission (Matt 28:18-20). It attracts people for the wrong reasons.
When our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ ministered on earth, we find the multitudes following Him but for the wrong reasons. Some followed Him because He could heal. Others followed Him because they wanted to be entertained by miracles. Still others followed Him because of free food especially after He fed the 5000. In fact, many who at first followed Him later left Him after He preached to them about their need for spiritual salvation and their need to repent of their sins (John 6:66). Our Lord certainly did not use worldly methods to preach the Gospel.
The approach of the Crossover Project denies the sufficiency of Scriptures and the sovereignty of God. By using worldly means, the power of the Word of God (Heb 4:12; 2 Tim 3:16) and the work of the Holy Spirit (John 16:8-11; 1 Cor 6:11; Tit 3:5) in convicting and converting souls is denied. The work of the Holy Spirit is undermined when worldly methods are used. In many of the spiritual revivals of the past, many souls were saved just by the simple and plain preaching of God’s Word. There was no need for worldly gimmicks and fleshly methods to lure and entice people to believe.
The approach of the Crossover Project violates the doctrine of biblical separation. Romans 12:2 commands all believers not to be conformed to this world. 1 John 2:15-17 reminds us not to love the world or things that are of the world for in it lies the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes and the pride of life. The word “world” is taken to mean any system of values, thought or practice that goes against God’s Truth. This certainly includes anything deemed sinful or worldly in the light of God’s Word. This definitely includes the pop and rock songs, and the culture that the world promotes. Sun Ho has portrayed herself as the pop-star wife of a pastor. In her bid to be trained as a pop singer, she has associated herself with Hollywood, the epitome of worldliness and ungodliness. Her actions have brought disrepute to Christianity in general and Christ in particular. The Bible says that friendship with the world is enmity with God and whoever is a friend of the world is an enemy of God (Jas 4:4).
The Crossover Project takes a very shallow view of salvation. Belief is simply paying lip service to Christ. The Gospel is diluted with little or no mention of repentance from sin and the judgement to come. This is done in order not to offend the hearers. Herein lies the danger. Many may think they are saved when in actual fact they are not. Indeed our Lord says in Matthew 7:21, “not everyone that saith unto me Lord, Lord shall enter the kingdom of heaven”. Not every professing Christian is saved, but only those who have truly repented of their sins and accepted Jesus Christ as their Lord and Saviour and show the fruits of repentance in their lives.
The Crossover Project is primarily about numbers. For seeker-sensitive churches, reaching out to the world is about numbers and statistics with little care or concern for the genuine salvation of the individual. Often these figures are published in their church website as an “advertisement” to show how successful they are and to encourage unbelievers to attend their services. Indeed many of these churches also have the wrong notion that large numbers means blessing from God. They fail to realise that success is measured by one’s faithfulness to God and His Word and not by the size of one’s church or congregation.
In an attempt to promote church growth, many churches today have adopted a principle based on the idea that successful evangelism requires bridging the gap between the church and the world so as to make the church acceptable to the world. This has resulted in the church today looking very much like the world. The church today talks like the world, walks like the world, sings like the world! The Bible clearly says that the church, though in the world, must not be of the world. By using a secular and worldly approach to evangelism, the Crossover Project has clearly violated the biblical mandate of Christ in His Great Commission to His Church.
(Dr Yap Wai Ho is a member of Calvary Pandan Bible-Presbyterian Church, and a Master of Divinity student at Far Eastern Bible College)
