{"id":17661,"date":"2023-05-18T11:17:24","date_gmt":"2023-05-18T15:17:24","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/?p=17661"},"modified":"2023-05-19T08:51:13","modified_gmt":"2023-05-19T12:51:13","slug":"former-hillsong-nyc-pastor-carl-lentz-says-hes-no-longer-in-ministry","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/2023\/05\/former-hillsong-nyc-pastor-carl-lentz-says-hes-no-longer-in-ministry","title":{"rendered":"Former Hillsong NYC Pastor Carl Lentz Says He&#8217;s No Longer in Ministry"},"content":{"rendered":"<figure id=\"attachment_17667\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-17667\" style=\"width: 768px\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\"><a href=\"https:\/\/wp-media.beliefnet.com\/sites\/140\/2023\/05\/carl-lentz-hillsong-church-credit-fx-networks-youtube.png\"><img decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-17667\" src=\"https:\/\/wp-media.beliefnet.com\/sites\/140\/2023\/05\/carl-lentz-hillsong-church-credit-fx-networks-youtube.png\" alt=\"carl lentz\" width=\"768\" height=\"502\" \/><\/a><figcaption id=\"caption-attachment-17667\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">FX Networks\/YouTube<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p>Former Hillsong NYC pastor Carl Lentz recently shared that he\u2019s no longer in ministry and discussed how his sins led him to some \u201cdark places\u201d despite news that he joined Pastor Michael Todd\u2019s Transformation Church in Oklahoma.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.instagram.com\/p\/CsCZNDmvr8H\/?hl=en\">In a public letter posted on Instagram,<\/a> Lentz said, \u201cEven though I\u2019m at an amazing church that loves and supports us, I\u2019m no longer in ministry. I\u2019m not preaching, not overseeing people. My role is to help give perspective and insight where I can.\u201d The letter comes after FX Networks released a two-minute teaser promoting a new docuseries called \u201cThe Secrets of Hillsong,\u201d set to premiere on May 19th.<\/p>\n<p>The docuseries will feature Lentz\u2019s first public interview since he was fired in November of 2020 from Hillsong NYC over a leadership and sex scandal. In the letter, Lentz said that fighting for his wife and kids has been his only priority for the last three years. Lentz wrote, \u201cIn order to do that, seeking sobriety and healing had to run parallel with those goals. Honestly, nothing else mattered. None of the noise, the lies, none of the half-truths that were said about me and or us mattered. All I wanted was to prove to my wife and kids that I could show up for them like I had never done before.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>He continued, \u201cAlthough we have a long way to go, with a lot of hard work, a lot of honesty and a lot of prayer, we have found ourselves in a beautiful, happy, and deliberately honest place. So much so that we not only celebrated our 20th anniversary on May 5th, but we got to do that in the purest way. Unfortunately, that came through a lot of humiliation, embarrassment and heartache.\u201d<\/p>\n<p><iframe title=\"YouTube video player\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/KSgiyTf5GH8\" width=\"560\" height=\"315\" frameborder=\"0\" allowfullscreen=\"allowfullscreen\"><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p>In November 2020, Lentz was fired from his post at Hillsong NYC over moral failures and \u201cleadership issues,\u201d including being unfaithful to his wife with multiple women, including a Hillsong NYC staff member.<\/p>\n<p>Details from an internal investigation\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.christianpost.com\/news\/carl-lentz-allegedly-caused-mental-illness-in-staff-report.html\">shared with The Christian Post in 2022<\/a>\u00a0that was conducted on behalf of Hillsong Church by the New York City law firm Zukerman Gore Brandeis &amp; Crossman, LLP, alleged, among other things, that he manipulated some former staff and volunteers so severely it caused them to suffer mental illness.<\/p>\n<p>It had been rumored for months that Lentz and his wife Laura wanted to get paid for their story and had been shopping an exclusive interview, but in his letter, Lentz said they chose to do the docuseries to help them heal from their failures in ministry and heartbreak. He said, \u201cPart of the healing from that heartache led us to the decision to be part of a documentary that we do not control, that we don\u2019t have any say in and that we haven\u2019t even seen yet. We\u2019ll see it when the world does. We were not interested in blame shifting or responsibility deflection; we focus on my mistakes and the context for what transpired.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Lentz said it gives him \u201cjoy and hope\u201d knowing that he can use his experience to help others, saying, \u201cRepentance and life change is proven over time with consistent choices, and that\u2019s a road I look forward to.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Former Hillsong NYC pastor Carl Lentz recently shared that he\u2019s no longer in ministry and discussed how his sins led him to some \u201cdark places\u201d despite news that he joined Pastor Michael Todd\u2019s Transformation Church in Oklahoma. In a public letter posted on Instagram, Lentz said, \u201cEven though I\u2019m at an amazing church that loves&hellip;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":657,"featured_media":17667,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"fbia_status":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[32,4],"tags":[3588,3591],"class_list":["post-17661","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-christian","category-faith","tag-carl-lentz","tag-hillsong-nyc"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v23.9 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>Former Hillsong NYC Pastor Carl Lentz Says He&#039;s No Longer in Ministry<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"In a letter post on Instagram, former Hillsong NYC pastor Carl Lentz said he&#039;s no longer in ministry while admitting that sin led him to dark places.\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/2023\/05\/former-hillsong-nyc-pastor-carl-lentz-says-hes-no-longer-in-ministry\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Former Hillsong NYC Pastor Carl Lentz Says He&#039;s No Longer in Ministry\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"In a letter post on Instagram, former Hillsong NYC pastor Carl Lentz said he&#039;s no longer in ministry while admitting that sin led him to dark places.\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/2023\/05\/former-hillsong-nyc-pastor-carl-lentz-says-hes-no-longer-in-ministry\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Beliefnet News\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2023-05-18T15:17:24+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2023-05-19T12:51:13+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/wp-media.beliefnet.com\/sites\/140\/2023\/05\/carl-lentz-hillsong-church-credit-fx-networks-youtube.png\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"768\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"502\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:type\" content=\"image\/png\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Lauren McKeithen\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"Former Hillsong NYC Pastor Carl Lentz Says He's No Longer in Ministry","description":"In a letter post on Instagram, former Hillsong NYC pastor Carl Lentz said he's no longer in ministry while admitting that sin led him to dark places.","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/2023\/05\/former-hillsong-nyc-pastor-carl-lentz-says-hes-no-longer-in-ministry","og_locale":"en_US","og_type":"article","og_title":"Former Hillsong NYC Pastor Carl Lentz Says He's No Longer in Ministry","og_description":"In a letter post on Instagram, former Hillsong NYC pastor Carl Lentz said he's no longer in ministry while admitting that sin led him to dark places.","og_url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/2023\/05\/former-hillsong-nyc-pastor-carl-lentz-says-hes-no-longer-in-ministry","og_site_name":"Beliefnet News","article_published_time":"2023-05-18T15:17:24+00:00","article_modified_time":"2023-05-19T12:51:13+00:00","og_image":[{"width":768,"height":502,"url":"https:\/\/wp-media.beliefnet.com\/sites\/140\/2023\/05\/carl-lentz-hillsong-church-credit-fx-networks-youtube.png","type":"image\/png"}],"author":"Lauren McKeithen","twitter_card":"summary_large_image","schema":{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/2023\/05\/former-hillsong-nyc-pastor-carl-lentz-says-hes-no-longer-in-ministry","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/2023\/05\/former-hillsong-nyc-pastor-carl-lentz-says-hes-no-longer-in-ministry","name":"Former Hillsong NYC Pastor Carl Lentz Says He's No Longer in Ministry","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/#website"},"primaryImageOfPage":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/2023\/05\/former-hillsong-nyc-pastor-carl-lentz-says-hes-no-longer-in-ministry#primaryimage"},"image":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/2023\/05\/former-hillsong-nyc-pastor-carl-lentz-says-hes-no-longer-in-ministry#primaryimage"},"thumbnailUrl":"https:\/\/wp-media.beliefnet.com\/sites\/140\/2023\/05\/carl-lentz-hillsong-church-credit-fx-networks-youtube.png","datePublished":"2023-05-18T15:17:24+00:00","dateModified":"2023-05-19T12:51:13+00:00","author":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/#\/schema\/person\/67183b7ec4ffc995620174c78f9cc68a"},"description":"In a letter post on Instagram, former Hillsong NYC pastor Carl Lentz said he's no longer in ministry while admitting that sin led him to dark places.","breadcrumb":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/2023\/05\/former-hillsong-nyc-pastor-carl-lentz-says-hes-no-longer-in-ministry#breadcrumb"},"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"ReadAction","target":["https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/2023\/05\/former-hillsong-nyc-pastor-carl-lentz-says-hes-no-longer-in-ministry"]}]},{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/2023\/05\/former-hillsong-nyc-pastor-carl-lentz-says-hes-no-longer-in-ministry#primaryimage","url":"https:\/\/wp-media.beliefnet.com\/sites\/140\/2023\/05\/carl-lentz-hillsong-church-credit-fx-networks-youtube.png","contentUrl":"https:\/\/wp-media.beliefnet.com\/sites\/140\/2023\/05\/carl-lentz-hillsong-church-credit-fx-networks-youtube.png","width":768,"height":502,"caption":"FX Networks\/YouTube"},{"@type":"BreadcrumbList","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/2023\/05\/former-hillsong-nyc-pastor-carl-lentz-says-hes-no-longer-in-ministry#breadcrumb","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"name":"Home","item":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"name":"Former Hillsong NYC Pastor Carl Lentz Says He&#8217;s No Longer in Ministry"}]},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/#website","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/","name":"Beliefnet News","description":"Top Religious News From Around the World","potentialAction":[{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/?s={search_term_string}"},"query-input":{"@type":"PropertyValueSpecification","valueRequired":true,"valueName":"search_term_string"}}],"inLanguage":"en-US"},{"@type":"Person","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/#\/schema\/person\/67183b7ec4ffc995620174c78f9cc68a","name":"lmckeithen","image":{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/wp-content\/wphb-cache\/gravatar\/113\/113fb9cc9b1ebdaacbc1f17d658ad52ex96.jpg","contentUrl":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/wp-content\/wphb-cache\/gravatar\/113\/113fb9cc9b1ebdaacbc1f17d658ad52ex96.jpg","caption":"lmckeithen"},"url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/author\/lmckeithen"}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17661","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/657"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=17661"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17661\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":17676,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17661\/revisions\/17676"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/17667"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=17661"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=17661"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=17661"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}