Dealing with Moral Failure

My wife and I watched the video recorded at the First Baptist Church of Hammond, Indiana’s Wednesday night service as the Deacons reported on the dismissal of their pastor, Jack Schaap for inappropriate behavior with a minor. I’ve read that a Deacon picked up the pastor’s cell phone from the pulpit and noticed a picture of the pastor and a young teen kissing. That lead him and others to investigate and it turned out that last Monday night the Deacons met with the Pastor to confront him with the evidence to which the head Deacon indicated he made full confession.

That’s a church of some 15,000 members. The spiritual damage is incredible. And sneer of the unbelieving world grows towards the whole Body of Christ.

As I’ve served on our district denomination’s discipline committee, I can resonate with the pain and heartache that the Deacon Board and church is feeling. My own church suffered the loss of some precious ministers because of inappropriate relationships. And so as I watched that video, there were a lot of emotions that resurfaced. It’s caused me to think again about how God would have us handle and deal with sin like this.

I applaud the Deacon board for the swiftness with which they dealt with the issue. The rumor mill didn’t get a chance to get turned on. I hope that they did their homework and their decision was not based on hearsay or conjecture. I also hope that behind the scenes there is a lot of love and concern being poured out to the Pastor Schaap and his family as well as the affected teen and her family.

That is one aspect that I would have like to have seen more of. Those who spoke in the video talked a great deal about how their actions were all about their love for and concern for the church. But there was a missing element of their love for the Pastor and his family. It wasn’t quite that “throw him under the bus” feeling, but I would have appreciated a bit of humility and brokenness from the leaders for their now former pastor.

This morning in my devotional readings I was in Psalm 143. Verse 2 says, “Enter not into judgment with your servant, for no one living is righteous before you.” One of the things that I’ve come to expect when I’ve been involved in a discipline case or just hear about horrendous happenings like this is that I begin to examine my own heart, mind and life. When I went running and was mediating on the verse I thought about Jesus’ words in the sermon on the mount … “But I tell you that anyone who looks at a woman lustfully has already committed adultery with her in his heart. Matthew 5:28.

And then with the woman caught in adultery Jesus challenges the throngs that the person who is without sin can cast the first stone. To which they all turn away.

The ramifications of a pastor’s moral failure are especially devastating and Paul admonishes Timothy: “Do not entertain an accusation against an elder unless it is brought by two or three witnesses. ²⁰ Those who sin are to be rebuked publicly, so that the others may take warning. 1 Timothy 5:19-20. So the actions of the First Baptist Church’s Deacons is appropriate.

Dr Schaap should be embracing a long season of repentance to deal with all that led him to this sin. But may we always rebuke in love and not wrath.

Too much on "suffering?"

I’ve been wondering if this series on 1 Peter isn’t a little morbid. We’ve been stuck on suffering for quite a long while. The whole purpose of the book is helping people be ready for times of intense persecution and suffering, just for being Christ-followers.

My bother-in-law, Ralph Trainer is the director of Beulah Beach near Vermillion, Last we he told me that his son, Joel had decided last spring that he wanted to study the book of 1 Peter during the staff worship and devotional times during the summer. What’s with a 20-something wanting to dive into the subject of preparing to suffer? Is God pointing his church to these critical passages to study as a means of readying us for some difficult days ahead? I’ve found a number of preachers and themes related to this issue of dealing with trials, suffering and afflictions.

Here is video excerpt of Tullian Tchividjian (grandson of Billy Graham speaking about suffering. His basic thesis is that suffering itself doesn’t rob us of joy. It’s when suffering begins to take away from us things that were more valuable than God. Idolatry he states is in reality what robs us of joy and peace.  Check it out:

  

The Danger of Spiritual Viruses

   Our church has been in pursuit of "helping a friend move one step closer to Jesus." It has been an emphasis to encourage and equip our family of faith in how to build intentional redemptive relationships with those who have yet to put their faith in Christ. The objective is to help them move, even if its just one step closer to a full relationship with Christ.

    We're now encouraging our people to utilize the National Back to Church Sunday as a place to put things into practice. It's time to quit talking about reaching out and actually doing it. National BTC Sunday is September 18. We're then following it up with a series called "GodQuest" that invites people to continue to seek out a relationship with Christ by addressing some of the most significant faith issues that people face.

    But ... isn't it always the case when God's people begin to do God's work in God's ways that there is opposition? Sometimes is obvious and pronounced. But other times the opposition stealth. It isn't obvious and even when it's pointed out many folks still don't recognize it.
 

    In several conversations over the past couple of days a couple of issue keep coming up. A CRITICAL SPIRIT and AN OFFENSE TAKEN. Someone has even been offended that it was suggested to them that they have a critical spirit. This is NOT to say that there are times for evaluation and constructive criticism and evaluation. But there can be a spirit of criticism that takes root and begins to find fault in everyone and everything. The result is destruction and disillusionment.

    That is really bad for the unity of the Body of Christ! Jesus said that his disciples would be known by the manner in which they loved one another. Evangelism and outreach are closely tied to the level of unity and harmony there is in the Church.

    With that in mind I began to think about relevant passages of scripture that the Lord would want to say to me and to my CrossPoint family of faith. Here they are ...

For we do not wrestle against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the cosmic powers over this present darkness, against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly places.

Ephesians 6:12 (ESV)

⁴ For the weapons of our warfare are not of the flesh but have divine power to destroy strongholds. ⁵ We destroy arguments and every lofty opinion raised against the knowledge of God,  and take every thought captive to obey Christ.

2 Corinthians 10:4-5 (ESV)

¹⁴ Work at living in peace with everyone, and work at living a holy life, for those who are not holy will not see the Lord. ¹⁵ Look after each other so that none of you fails to receive the grace of God.
Watch out that no poisonous root of bitterness grows up to trouble you, corrupting many.

Hebrews 12:14-15 (NLT)

In our strategy to help our friends take one step closer to Jesus we must recognize that there is a tremendous spiritual battle raging. This is an act of war against the Kingdom of Darkness and we must confront the enemy if we are to rescue souls from His prison.

There is, admittingly, an “external” spiritual battle taking place. Those who we are attempting to reach out to, will have thoughts and schedules that conflict with what God is directing us to do. We also have our own issues of time, opportunity and fears that keep us from being what these folks need us to be. Lord willing we’ll focus on that next week.

But the greater threat to being all that God wants us to be are spiritual strongholds within – spiritual viruses that make us spiritually weak and ineffective. One of the greatest spiritual viruses is the stronghold of a critical spirit. Consider what a critical spirit does to us …

(1)    It breaks down spiritual unity of the Body of Christ.

(2)    It diverts incredible amounts of mental and emotional energy away from eternal matters.

(3)    It is a path of increasing passivity.

(4)    It gives our ego a place of worship in our souls.

(5)    It leads us down into the dark valley of discouragement and discontentment.

S.S. Salvation Ship

I heard James MacDonald make a great analogy of the relationship between holy living and salvation. It goes something like this ...

Salvation is a great ship that takes us to heaven. The way you get on this ship is through repentance and faith. We could ever earn our way on to this ship and there is no precondition for getting on the ship called holiness. But once on the ship, holiness becomes a consuming passion. Those who are truly on the salvation ship can think of only one thing, how to live on the ship the way they will when they reach their destination. Holy Living. This is one sure way to know for sure if you are on the right ship.

There are plenty of other ships in harbor that look like they'll get you to the same destination. The Cultural Christian Cruise Line, the Religious Piety Boat and the Christian Heritage Line.

But it is on the Salvation Ship that we discover a yearning for the ways and things of God that exceed anything on any other ocean liner. If you have no longing for holiness, you've got to check out and see if you got on the right boat. If it's been a while since there was a hunger for righeousness and holiness in your life, then you need to spend some time seeking out the Captian of the Ship and stirring up your hunger for His holiness.