The founder and former global senior pastor of Hillsong Church Brian Houston has announced his plans to write a new book sharing his personal “story” after being recently cleared of criminal charges.
The 65-year-old announced his plan in a September 21 post shared on X previously known as Twitter.”I’m writing my story. It’s a big job and may take a while. But gee there’s a lot to praise God about”, he wrote.
In a subsequent Saturday X post, he said his book will “lift the lid and tell the untold story” as well as “tell the amazing story of God’s grace and blessing”.
Houston has become more active on social media since an Australian court found him not guilty of hiding his father’s sexual abuse of children.
In 2021, Australian police filed charges against him for not reporting the sexual abuse committed by his father Frank Houston in the 1970s. After discovering his father’s abusive behavior in 1999, Brian Houston reported it to church leaders and made numerous public allusions to it.
In August, a Sydney Magistrate Gareth Christofi stated that Houston had a reasonable reason for not reporting his father Frank Houston’s abuse of Brett Sengstock to police as as he believed that the victim did not wish for it to be reported to the authorities. “I feel a sense of relief that at last the truth has come out,” Houston said after the verdict.
Brian Houston established Hillsong more than twenty years ago but no longer holds any formal position inside the church, and the majority of his family members have also cut ties with the network.
Earlier this month, his daughter Laura Toganivalu and her husband Peter announced that their next line of action after resigning from their position as global pastors of the youth ministry, Hillsong Young and Free would be planting a new church in Sydney Australia.
I’m writing my story. It’s a big job and may take a while. But gee there’s a lot to praise God about.
— Brian Houston (@BrianCHouston) September 21, 2023
My book will lift the lid and tell the untold story. But it will also tell the amazing story of God’s grace and blessing.
— Brian Houston (@BrianCHouston) September 23, 2023