Christianity & Sex Abuse Scandals
By now, many of you have probably heard about the huge amount of sex abuse scandals plaguing the Southern Baptist Convention. One article that I came across provided a basic synopsis of the problem. This article was titled “Hundreds of Southern Baptist leaders, volunteers accused of sexual misconduct in bombshell investigation” written by Anna Hopkins and published on February 10, 2019 on Foxnews.com.
As the title of the article explains, hundreds of sexual abuse incidents occurred for many years in many Southern Baptist churches all over the nation. Sadly, many of these offenders even continued in their positions after convictions! The numbers of this abuse are staggering with 220 people convicted or accepting plea deals over the course of 20 years. Most of the 700 victims were young people, even as young as 3 years old! Additionally, reporters allege that the Southern Baptist Convention opted not to track the offenders allowing them to move and continue serving in positions in other churches citing “local church autonomy” (local church self-governance) as the reasoning.
The current Southern Baptist Convention president, J.D. Greear, admitted the need to take sexual abuse allegations and convictions more seriously and said, “The Bible calls for pastors to be people of integrity, known for their self-control and kindness. A convicted sex offender would certainly not meet those qualifications.” He also commented that the abuses were “pure evil” and agreed that change was required. This isn’t the first embarrassing headline for the Southern Baptist Convention recently. Last year, the president of the Southern Baptist Convention’s Executive Committee, Frank S. Page had to resign due to a affair of some sort.
I am always disappointed to hear of these scandals in our Christian churches and communities. People expect church to be a safe place where you can focus on your relationship with God and draw closer to Him. We bring our children so that they can grow up learning about God, and we expect everyone to be at church for that same purpose, but that is not always the case.
How should we, as Christians, respond? The world is looking for a reason to hate Christianity. The world wishes to blame its problems on God and therefore targets His children – Christians. Sadly, any time these types of scandals emerge in the Christian community, people shun away from Christianity and the kingdom of God is hurt. So, how do we handle this situation?
I do believe that J.D. Greear issued the correct response condemning what happened as evil and contrary to the Bible. I also liked that he acknowledged that any type of this sexual misconduct is Biblically not allowed for a leader in the church. By the way, this includes not only non-consensual but also consensual sexual sin such as in the case of Frank S. Page. The Bible demands that our leaders are held to the highest of standards. Of course, EVERYONE in the church should strive to live up to these standards, but they are required for the leaders.
1 Timothy 3:1-13 (KJV)
3 This is a true saying, if a man desire the office of a bishop, he desireth a good work.
A bishop then must be blameless, the husband of one wife, vigilant, sober, of good behaviour, given to hospitality, apt to teach;
Not given to wine, no striker, not greedy of filthy lucre; but patient, not a brawler, not covetous;
One that ruleth well his own house, having his children in subjection with all gravity;
(For if a man know not how to rule his own house, how shall he take care of the church of God?)
Not a novice, lest being lifted up with pride he fall into the condemnation of the devil.
Moreover he must have a good report of them which are without; lest he fall into reproach and the snare of the devil.
Likewise must the deacons be grave, not doubletongued, not given to much wine, not greedy of filthy lucre;
Holding the mystery of the faith in a pure conscience.
And let these also first be proved; then let them use the office of a deacon, being found blameless.
Even so must their wives be grave, not slanderers, sober, faithful in all things.
Let the deacons be the husbands of one wife, ruling their children and their own houses well.
For they that have used the office of a deacon well purchase to themselves a good degree, and great boldness in the faith which is in Christ Jesus.
Note that the qualifications listed here extend beyond the leader to the leader’s wife and children. Titus 1:6-9 also provides similar qualifications and even extend higher standards to the “aged” men and women (elders who disciple the younger) and then to the young men of the church as well in Titus 2:1-8. Everyone who teaches, whether as pastor or in a lower position, must be beyond reproach.
So why the strict standards? Apostasy! It seeps in to our churches through false teachers who do not represent the truth. As 1 Peter 5:8 reminds us, “Be sober, be vigilant; because your adversary the devil, as a roaring lion, walketh about, seeking whom he may devour.” Satan and demons actively seek out people of God. It only makes sense. Why focus on the souls you already own? They want to lure people away from the truth. For example, in Job 1:6, we see that Satan was among the “sons of God” while they were offering a sacrifice to God. It was then that God called Satan out. Satan wasn’t hanging out with the evil men over yonder, but with the believers. The same is true today.
Some of us have become convinced that once you believe on Jesus, you are good to go. Just resist your sin nature as much as you can and love Jesus and you’ll be in heaven. Yes, faith in the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ as payment for our sins is vital. But, that is only the beginning. From that point, we live for Jesus EVERY day. We take up our cross, EVERY day. After all, Satan knows that Jesus died and resurrected for our sins. When we accept Jesus Christ as our Saviour, we enter into a precious covenant with God based on our faith. Our genuine faith leads to our outward obedience to Him. Just as Israel’s covenant with God to stay in the promised land was based on obedience through faith, so too is ours. Note: obedience though faith! Our actions come about not of ourselves but though our faith in Christ who is the only one who was perfectly righteous to begin with. When we fall into this comfortable “one saved always saved” mentality, we are tempted to discount Satan and the demon’s temptation. But they are present in our churches and they enter in along with individuals who are wolves in sheep’s clothing – fake Christians.
As Christians, we need to hold our leaders to the Biblical standards. For example, I have noticed a decline in churches dealing with divorce and remarriage Biblically. They basically ignore Matthew 19:1-9 even in the case of church leadership. In so doing, we have allowed adultery to enter into our churches. One sin always leads to another eventually. We need to take all sexual sin seriously and teach our children that just because you are at church doesn’t mean people who only pretend to be Christian won’t come in.
Christians must hold offenders accountable with transparency so that misconduct of this sort can be addressed and cast out! Why?
1. We set an example of fighting apostasy in our local church instead of hiding the truth in fear of what others will think. We have to do this in our individual lives and when we see it being correctly handled at church by the people of God, it will encourage us to handle apostasy in our own life by casting it out and upholding Biblical principles.
2. Paul and the other apostles (and of course Jesus) confronted apostasy and heresy head on and so should we! Jesus never shrunk back afraid to ‘damage’ His reputation! He always stood for God’s Word! We must put God’s Word before our reputation.
Do you have a question? Do you have something to add? Leave a comment below or on my contact page! I am more than happy to engage in friendly discussions. Thank you!