About Bethel

So now that I have been here a while, I can talk about what makes Bethel Bethel. I wrote the following to a friend, and decided to post it. just because it summarized so many things for me about Bethel's culture :)

First of all, I  believe that anyone would thrive here at Bethel :) There is really a family atmosphere here, and people are really free to be who they want to be, and express their beliefs without being looked down upon, but rather they are praised for being themselves. People honor you for who you are, and give you total freedom to be who God created you to be. You would think that people would abuse the freedom that they are given, but weirdly enough, they seem to settle on who they truly are. I think that they may make more mistakes at the beginning, but that they kind of get into a sort of flow of living in freedom. The leaders do watch over people to make sure that if people do make messes, that they clean it up themselves. The authority is totally into empowering you to do everything yourself, and they make you feel like a million dollars. They really call out the potential out of you, and love you more than you would ever think of loving yourself. And you can feel the love :)

I think they are more value based (why) than specifics based (what), so they have a lot of freedom, yet with strong core convictions. I think this is more a place that allows people to believe than it is a place of belief. The leaders don't agree on every point of doctrine, nor do they all have the same opinion about a matter... but the beauty is that they do not argue their differences, because they have agreed upon their core values. What each person believes is taken as their own opinion. You may be able to hear a few people talk on the same topic (e.g. honor), and each person will give you a different definition for honor. These view do not oppose each other, but rather gives you a greater picture of one topic. Three people with a different opinion on the same matter gives you a greater perspective than everyone conforming to one person's view.

I can speak more about the structure of how they run the church, put that may bore you :) If you have questions, then I can answer them...

Another thing is that they literally put kingdom in front of anything, and press in to find God's will for that area. They have kingdom business, kingdom dance, kingdom media, kingdom fashion, kingdom inventions, kingdom marriage, kingdom schools, kingdom anything. It is cool to see so many workshops filled with people that pursue the practical expression of the kingdom of God in every area of life. They keep it very practical, yet keep if God centered.

As a side note I would say that one of my purposes I came here was to be trained in walking in the supernatural. The way I thought it would look like was that we would practice, and they would instruct us. Well, the way that they do things here is totally different than I expected. Even though there is instruction, the instruction is more why based than what based (as I noted). The "what" they leave up to you. How you work it out is your own expression, and they give you the freedom to do it the way you want. There are boundaries and oversight, yet the fence is so far from where you are at, that you basically have to run to the fence to worry about it.

The leaders here believe that we are all responsible individuals, and that we are responsible for what we do with what they speak to us about. They can only suggest, but they can not force us to agree. To agree is up to us. On this point it is a funny thing to see so many people still hold to their own opinion, even though there was a talk about something in the past. But I think that that is the point... that it is not about conformity, but rather about responsibility.

If I could describe how Bethel (BSSM) operates, then I would say that it is more a developmental center (than anything else), that focuses on Kingdom truth, with a family leadership structure. They make any person feel like they have a place, in this family, no matter who or what they are.

Here we are free to dream, free to believe, free to express, free to be who God created us to be.