Andy Stanley walked into his pastor's office, filled with dread.

The minister sat in a massive chair behind an enormous desk. He spread his arms across the desk as if he were bracing for battle. His secretary scurried out of the office when she saw Andy coming.

The pastor had baptized Andy when he was 6, and groomed him to be his successor. But a private trauma had gone public. And Andy felt compelled to speak.

The minister stared in silence as Andy gave him the news. The "unspoken dream" both men shared was over.

After Andy finished, the pastor looked at him as tears welled up.

"Andy," he said, "you have joined my enemies, and I'm your father."

'I understand drive-by shootings'

He won't wear a suit or a tie in the pulpit. There's no special parking space reserved for him at his church. Everyone calls him "Andy."

As a teenager, Andy decided he was going to be a rock star after seeing Elton John perform live. Today he has found fame, and infamy, on another stage.

Andy Stanley is the founder of North Point Ministries, one of the largest Christian organizations in the nation. A lanky man with close-cropped hair and an "aw-shucks" demeanor, he is alone as he steps out of his office to greet a visitor to his ministry's sprawling office complex in suburban Atlanta.

At least 33,000 people attend one of Andy's seven churches each Sunday. Fans watch him on television or flock to his leadership seminars; pastors study his DVDs for preaching tips; his ministries' website gets at least a million downloads per month.

"I tell my staff everything has a season," he says, leaning back in an office chair while wearing a flannel shirt, faded jeans and tan hiking boots. "One day we're not going to be the coolest church. Nothing is forever. As soon as somebody thinks forever, that's when they close their hand," he says, slowly clenching his fist. "Now they have to control, maintain and protect it. ... Things get weird."

At 54, Andy knows something about weirdness. He was swept up in a struggle against another famous televangelist -- his father, the Rev. Charles Stanley, a Southern Baptist megachurch pastor and founder of In Touch Ministries, a global evangelistic organization. The experience enraged Andy so much it scared him:

"I understand drive-by shootings," he told his wife one day. "I was so angry at my dad. I was trying to do the right thing."

The experience wounded his father as well.

"I felt like this was a huge battle, and if Andy had been in a huge battle ... you'd have to crawl over me to get to him," Charles Stanley, now 80, says." I would have stood by him, no matter what. I didn't feel like he did that."

There's no father-son preaching duo quite like the Stanleys. Imagine if Steve Jobs had a son, who created a company that rivaled Apple in size and innovation -- and they barely spoke to one another.

That was the Stanleys. Neither man has ever fully explained the events that tore them apart 19 years ago -- until now.

'I was the heir apparent'

Charles Stanley remembers the first time he heard his son preach.