The ‘new Jerusalem’
Tamaki calls believers to Destiny’s ‘City of God’
BISHOP Brian Tamaki has raised the stakes with his Destiny Church followers, exhorting them . . . to join him at a ‘‘City of God’’ he is building in South Auckland.
At the church’s annual conference in Rotorua on Friday night, Tamaki spent his two-hour sermon talking about how God had told him to build the city and why his followers had to lose their loyalty and parochialism towards their home areas.
Tamaki announced at a New Year’s Eve service that Destiny Church had permission to build schools, a university and a massive auditorium at a property in Wiri, which he calls the ‘‘new Jerusalem’’.
The church has put its Mt Wellington headquarters up for sale to help fund the move, which is due in December.
It hopes to get more than $5 million from the sale.
Tamaki said on Friday he would unveil more details throughout the weekend.
He mentioned one building would be at least three storeys high – ‘‘the sky’s the limit’’. People were encouraged to give generously and buckets were passed around before Tamaki took the stage.
He was welcomed to the stage by a kapa haka group performing a haka in which Tamaki was described as ‘‘the mouthpiece of God’’ and a ‘‘prophet’’.
Tamaki said God had spoken to him through the Book of Hebrews, telling him to build a city.
In Abraham’s time people lived in tents in the desert, but Destiny members had to leave behind their ‘‘tent mentality’’ and aim for ‘‘far bigger, far greater . . . a City of God’’.
He acknowledged that when he first raised the idea five years ago, it ‘‘sent the movement into a tailspin. Some people even left’’.
But they were stuck in a rut and had a ‘‘tent mentality’’, meaning they were wedded to the idea of many different Destiny churches around the country.
‘‘I fought for 10 years, seven of those just trying to change the parochial spirit of my pastors and some had to walk away or we had to let some go or I had to tell some ‘go away’, because God is building a church that’s one – one vision, one people, one direction.’’
Tamaki said if people felt uneasy about his plan, ‘‘cool, just keep coming back tomorrow and the next day, and you’ll see God’s masterplan.’’