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The following is an edited transcript of a Christianity Today telephone interview with Gary Ezzo, president of Growing Families International. CT's deputy managing editor Timothy Morgan conducted the interview in August, 2000.

CT: What is your explanation for why Living Hope Evangelical Fellowship ex-communicated you?

Gary Ezzo: Well, first there has to be some context put to this, and some explanation obviously. The exercise that Living Hope went through six weeks after our departure and our withdrawal of membership was not church discipline or biblical ex-communication by any New Testament standard.

You simply cannot ex-communicate people who do not belong to the church and I know that you are aware of that, unless a process began before the departure. We were very much aware of that. But in our particular case, there was not only no process, there were no allegations of wrongdoing or misconduct ever brought to us until after we pursued the elders on issues of concern.

We went to them. We shared our concerns. We felt that, if we could not support our spiritual leadership in good conscience, then the best thing for us to do was to leave and to leave quietly. That's what we did. So, after our departure and only after our departure, did they bring these charges. Now the charges, most people are not aware of what the charges are. For some reason, the elders of Living Hope ... do not want to release [them]. I'll tell you what the charges are. The charges were five specific charges, all of them dealt specifically with this one thing. That some time in the past that I falsely accused the pastor and his wife and a third party of gossip.

Now we don't know when this happened. The elders refused to substantiate this. There is no dialogue, we were just given an ultimatum with those charges that you will return to Living Hope in one week or else we will go through the process of discipline. So six weeks after we were sitting in another church, they went through what they called disfellowshiping. Now I'm not sure if they're thinking the same thing as ex-communication, which is the common term, or church discipline.

But the fact that so many people have already looked at this, and then given the timing of the elder's letter, given the fact that neither the pastor or his wife ever came to us according to Matthew 18, given the fact that not a single allegation of wrongdoing ever came forward until after we brought our concerns to the elders, the idea of the threat of church discipline against a national leader and the motive behind it, is at least somewhat suspect.

I can't tell you why they did it, obviously, that would be looking into their heart. I can only give you the facts that you may not be aware of. Basically, even now the time that the elder's letter first was received to the present, the elders of Living Hope have refused to substantiate again their charges, produce any witnesses, justify their claims to anyone with any reasonable explanation. And with their unwillingness to engage in conversation to us or our pastor or any outside mediator, there's really nothing we can do.

So that we can be above reproach, we obviously called in other people to evaluate this. We did this at Grace Church. We called in Ken Sande's ministry; we were willing to let him evaluate us ... Grace was not willing to be evaluated. In this case, we brought two committees in and said look, this thing needs to be evaluated because of our public position, our integrity.

The church we're in does not recognize what Living Hope has done. It's just an unfortunate situation but we have to live with it. We have to put down all of these rumors and obviously we have to answer articles and interviews on this topic. That's really the story. There were no accusations, there was not church discipline process. ... We did not know before we left about any action being taken. It was just, an unfortunate situation. Their response to our concerns, I believe it was slightly overreact[ing]. The other side of it is that if you have the Ezzos in your church and if the Ezzos are leaving for some reason that does create a dilemma. If you have any sense of insecurity, if the church may not be as well established, and we appreciate that also. But that does not justify the action that was taken.

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October (Web-only) 2000, Vol. 44