Crossroads Controversy

Back in the early 1980’s, I was listening one evening to a local talk show on Gainesville’s 850-WRUF. The topic was the Crossroads Church of Christ (now renamed and with new leadership and direction) in Gainesville, a church situated near the University of Florida on the west end of campus, near the College of Law. Its congregation was largely students, and it was very aggressive in evangelizing and recruiting. The show was about Crossroads’s tactics. Besides the moderator, there were some parents (from out of town) of students who had joined up with this church, as well as the coordinator for an organization nowadays called the CMC (Campus Ministry Cooperative). This guy had a position that was supposed to handle issues concerning churches and their relationship with the student body. So he was an obvious choice for a guest. Crossroads was invited to send a representative to the show, but declined.

The front part of the program was all about parents laying down their grievances about Crossroads. Their precious children, it seemed, were taking this Christianity thing way too seriously. Why, they themselves belonged to main-line denominations, but this idea of making Christ first in one’s life and feeling the burden to evangelize was a bit over the line for them. They also charged the church with having their children shun them and that their children were encouraged to take out loans to give money to the church. Through all this the “coordinator” never questioned any of their statements, but added his own criticism of Crossroads, saying that they refused to be part of his group of churches. The moderator, after all this time of criticism, decided it was time to open up the phones. Most of the calls were critical of Crossroads as well. But one caller, obviously supporting Crossroads, began to quote a biblical verse that was clearly intended to explain where this church was coming from. He barely got a few words out of his mouth when the moderator abruptly cut in, declaring that we can’t have all this Bible reading on the air. And the religious coordinator chimed in with the moderator (against the lone dissenting voice on the entire show up to that time), saying that anything can be quoted from the Bible out of context and you have to read the full text to discern the true meaning. But since the announcer refused to allow any of the Bible to be read on the air, then the book that this church (and supposedly the other Christian churches) based its doctrine and behavior on could not be used in the forum of talk show radio debate (at least on WRUF). More calls ensued, slamming Crossroads. Then, at the very end, an individual called and said that he worked with someone who went to Crossroads, and that person never bothered him about religion but simply lived a quiet, clean,and dignified life. He said he admired that individual and that it reflected well on the church. Quickly, the “impartial” moderator corrected the deluded but well-meaning caller, saying that it wasn’t the evangelistic techniques of Crossroads that were being called to question, but rather the complaints that the parents who were present had about how they treated their children. This after call after call after call condemning Crossroads for its evangelism techniques was accepted without criticism!

When I was a student at UF, I had a run-in with one of those evangelizing Crossroads students. I was in my dorm bedroom and he walked into the dorm uninvited and came into my room to give me the standard talk about salvation through Jesus. I told him to please leave, but he reacted to me like I was a sinner resisting the Lord instead of acknowledging and apologizing for the fact that he was trespassing and invading my privacy. Finally, I threatened to call downstairs and report him, and he left. So, I didn’t dig this church if this was how their members were taught to spread the word. But I decided not to condemn it for one bad experience. A couple of years later, a UF professor and his wife invited me to the same church, and I attended there a few weeks as well as some of the “soul talk” small group discussions that were held at his house. That was a positive experience. The fact is, there are positive and negative aspects to any church. Crossroads expected its members to dress up to go to church. Other churches were informal, especially the ones by UF. I think that the parents were confronted by an aggressive church that, in their view, displaced them and substituted church authority instead in their children’s lives. And that, I think, was the real underlying, unrevealed issue.

I think that some churches deliberately foster a sense of collective persecution from outside among its members in order to be able to control them more. Although the Bible does affirm that the outside world will persecute the church, it is a mistake for a church to lay too much emphasis on this. Otherwise, it creates an “us vs. them” mentality that runs the danger of over-insulation of the group from the "evil" outside and transformation into a cult-like organization. I got the impression back then that Crossroads was proud of its isolation within the Gainesville religious community and thought itself to be the only true voice for Christ in the area. And this played into the hands of those who accused it of being a cult.

But this being said, the radio show I heard was blatantly unfair to the church’s side of the argument. The parents’ claims about the loans and their kids’ aloofness from them were legitimate concerns that went unanswered on the show. It is true that Crossroads could have officially participated and didn’t, but at least the couple of callers who spoke in their defense could have been shown more respect. And just what kind of all-important religious authority was this “religious coordinator” that he felt empowered to make judgements on others' use of the Bible?!