The following is a transcript of this video on abuse in the church.
We’ve also recorded a podcast from 2022 on Spiritual Abuse and will continue that series soon. You can read the transcript or listen to that episode here https://askingforme.org/2024/12/19/on-spiritual-abuse-part-1/
We’re at a time now in church history that was somewhat inevitable really, because a lot of us, for over a decade now, have been seeing these patterns and the avalanche was coming. It was like you see the signs of the avalanche and it’s just, it’s coming. And apart from an act of God, there’s nothing that could stop it.
One of those issues, of course, is abuse in the church.
I had a conversation one time with my friend Tim Keller about abuse. One of the things that I found really interesting about his work, because he had a whole lot of teaching on abuse and pastoral abuse specifically about what it means to abuse your spiritual authority as a pastor or an elder. Of course, depending on what circles you’re in, what denomination you’re in, you could become an elder or pastor just because you say that you’re called by God. And so there are certainly those churches where anyone with enough charisma and communication skills can put themselves into a position of leadership. And there’s no real vetting. There’s no real qualifying process. It’s just, oh, they’re great. You know, they’re great at preaching or they’re great at putting together a service. They can really rally the troops. And so yeah, let’s just make them a pastor. There’s that. And often, you know, we all know there’s, there’s plenty of churches, mega churches where that happens. You get all these people in leadership positions and there’s no sense of real qualifications. They’re just great people, right?
Now that doesn’t mean, which is part of the argument I had with Tim Keller, was that that doesn’t necessarily mean that the process of, say, the PCA or other denominations that have a grueling, in the PCA – as it should be, in the sense that they have to go to graduate school and have an advanced degree in the Bible, MDiv, etc. They need to pass ordination exams and there are specific guidelines to that. we have standards, they’re actually called the standards, or you have, you know, the Westminster Confessions, the Catechism, all that stuff, right? So you have all those things. Obviously, I never passed an ordination exam.
And so you have these standards that you’re saying, okay, we all adhere to, we’ve studied these things, and we agree with them. There are certain things, you’re actually allowed to take exceptions, which my husband always has, there’s a couple, and that always sends red flags to people because there are people in the PCA that don’t believe anyone should take exceptions to anything. And so you have that. But for the most part, you have to agree, this is how we do church. This is our ecclesiology, this is how we think churches should be read.
Now, let’s say, when I talk to Keller about the abuses in the church, and particularly when it’s elders who are abusing their congregations or each other, he said something on a podcast that, you know, Mark Driscoll, for example, could not happen in his denomination. And he walked that back a little bit at one point in the podcast. But I, you know, I’ve said it before, I practically fell off my chair when I heard him say that, because I thought, how could you possibly say that the PCA is not less likely to have arrogance and all things that we would accuse someone like a Mark Driscoll of? Because, gosh, the past five years alone, I could rattle off names of pretty public figures who have been accused of spiritual abuse and misconduct, a conduct of becoming a minister, you know, all things. And with credible evidence, I mean, credible testimony of people who’ve worked for them, people who’ve known them well, people who have tried to address their issues, who have tried to do things the biblical way.
By the time we hear about it publicly, often there’s been years of work behind the scenes trying to do the right thing. And that’s, you know, I want everybody to understand that. It’s like once we go public and it looks like we’re just going scorched earth on people, but we’re not. We have been doing the work all along. We have been trying to have You know, whether it’s a Matthew 18 process, which is not always what should happen by the way, but sometimes that’s exactly what should happen and it does.
And then we’re at the point of telling the church and that step, that’s the step we’re at. Tell the church. What does that mean? Did Jesus mean tell this select group of elders who happen to be drinking buddies with the person you’re accusing or does it mean that we need to go public and that there’s something about going public with the truth that sets the world on fire, doesn’t it? It really does. It sets the world on fire because everybody’s got their opinions, you know, court of public opinion, which by the way is not always wrong, but can be. Sometimes the information is misleading or not everyone gets the same story.
And so how do you deal with that? How does a wise, discerning leader navigate that process?
Now the process itself is something to have longer conversations about, but one of the things that I’ve realized over the years is that when you have someone who is directly involved in a situation, whether they’re the person who’s accusing or they’re the ones who are accused, if they’re the ones at the microphone and telling the story, you’re always going to have, you’re always going to have issues with that.
Now there are people who can be wise and discerning and reasonable and not biased, but when it’s your personal life, when your professional life, when you see your careers on the line, when you see that your livelihood is on the line, when you see that all that you’ve been working towards could just blow up and smoke, it makes you a different person. It really does. And it either makes you more like Christ or it doesn’t.
And to me, there are a lot of pastors and elders running around showing their cards. I mean, they really are. They’re showing everything they’ve worked for, everything that they believe they’ve been doing all this time. And it’s discouraging to me that we’re watching these people reveal who they really are. And a large majority, way too many people, just stick their heads in the sand as if they’re not seeing what we’re seeing. And they refuse to believe it. And they want to think the best. They want to give the benefit of the doubt. They don’t want to ask more questions. They’re scared. They’re distraught. They don’t know what to do with the new information. They don’t know what to do with what’s right in front of their eyes. And that’s concerning. It’s concerning to me that a lot of these people are in charge of things and are people who are making decisions.
And I don’t think they should be. I don’t think these people should be allowed to have authority in our lives anymore.
And it’s difficult. What do you do with that? Do you want to just burn everything down?
A scorched earth, right? No.
But sometimes.
And it’s concerning when the issues are big enough to shut things down. Like how big of an issue does it have to be before we take decisive, bold action?
You know, I think about the cost of recalling food product that’s been shown to possibly have poison. Of course they’re going to recall it. They can’t just pretend. And they’re not going to take the risk of actually killing people. So they recall the products, right? And they do a big wide sweep, like from these dates to these dates, if you’ve ever purchased this thing. And people can panic. But you can also try to be reasonable and try to be honest and transparent about what happened and what the risks are. But you eat the cost. You say, we cannot afford to kill one person or to harm one person. One person. Not one. And that’s where we’re at in the church.
There are people in charge who have told us in no uncertain terms, they’re willing to risk the lives of one person for everyone else. For the greater good. So that we can all feel comfortable. So we can all just go on, you know, with our copacetic little lives and get back to, you know, why can’t we just get back to the gospel?
This IS the gospel. It’s the gospel I know. I’m willing to be wrong about that, I’m willing to be wrong about the Jesus that I think I’ve been following and trying to follow.
I haven’t always been right about that. But I think we’re at a time now when it’s going to become clearer to some of us. And taking those risks are going to be hard and they’re going to look, they’re not going to look the way we want them to. And I, for one, I’m worried. And every day I’ve had to go to Jesus. I’ve had to say, I don’t know what’s happening. I don’t trust people. I don’t trust the people in charge to make the right decisions. I don’t trust people who are supposed to be Christ following people who are supposed to be following Jesus. I don’t. There are people that I absolutely do not trust anymore. I don’t respect them for the choices they’ve made. And I don’t think I have to. I have to love them, which is not the same.
But then I also have to make choices for myself and for my family that protect us from the harm and the potentials of danger that other people put us in. And I want to protect the people who are most vulnerable, people who are feeling incredibly scared and marginalized right now in our society. So much of the pushback that’s happening within churches right now are from women and from the LGBT+ community. I feel that the ways in which the evangelical church has warred against both of those groups. Women and LGBT people, it’s been evil. It’s been evil. And I don’t want to be part of that anymore. I don’t.
Culture War 2.0 is worse. It’s getting worse. And I think it’s time for a lot of churches to have a “Come to Jesus” moment and say, these are the lines that we will not cross and make that really clear. And you’ll have people leave. You’ll have people fall out, people upset with you. You’ll have people threatening to take away their tithes. Let them go. Go, take your money, and run. We don’t need your money. We don’t need your support. You do what you think is right. And so will we.
That’s where we’re at, where we have to be. In the days ahead, it’s only gonna get more complex and we need the clarity and there’s too many voices that are saying things that contradict themselves and are just this, you know, the Both Sides, middle of the road tactics of let’s just all live in peace. That ship has sailed a long time ago. We’re way past that now. There are people being killed. There are people dying because of the choices of other people. Way past both sides now and I hate to be the doom and gloom person but that’s where we’re at. That’s what time it is.
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