Hi all,
Separated by 3,000 years, it is easy for us to look at King David who had an affair with Uriah’s wife Bathsheba, got her pregnant, and tried to cover it up, and say; “Shame on him, but look at the grace of God.”
But in our day when a minister has an affair, it hits close to home. There is no need in this space to share names of pastors and ministers who have fallen. We’ve have all heard or seen the news. Scandals range from Australia to Nigeria, South Africa to Dallas, North Carolina to California, to New York City and cities and towns in between. We are all aware of the failures of numerous ministers in recent weeks and months. Pastors and those in ministry having affairs seems to be an epidemic.
There are two elements in common between King David and the modern minister who has fallen from grace: Long held lust in the heart, and then acting on that lust. People with lust in the heart that is not dealt with, at some point act on that lust, and the public finds out. It leaves us hurting and asking how we can trust anyone in authority in ministry today? It leaves us trying to figure out how people so gifted in the Lord and placed in such authority could do such things.
We expect a higher standard for leaders, for scripture supports that. But if all we see is the act that became public, we miss the point of why God judged them, allowing their sin to become public.
God’s point is to expose the lust that was never dealt with in the heart of the minister.
His hope is finally the lust will be dealt with. As Paul wrote: If we won’t judge ourselves we are judged of the Lord. If we are chastised of the Lord it is so we won’t be condemned with the world. The facade of their life has crumbled, and hopefully true holiness may have its way in their heart. I Cor. 11: 31-32
Jesus is the sword of the Spirit that divides between soul and spirit, and critiques our thoughts and motives (Hebrews 4: 12-13) In Matthew 5: 28 Jesus said to look on a woman not one’s wife with lust has committed an affair of the imagination with her in his heart.
Using 1st century Jewish teaching style, He said to pluck out the eye (the lust in the heart that makes a man look upon another woman), and cut off his hand (the action following the lust of the eye). Lust and acting on that lust is the issue. Lust comes first in the imagination, and leads to the act. In context of Matthew 5, adultery is the lust of the fantasy, fornication is the acting on that adultery/fantasy.
Jesus was, and is concerned about motives and secrets of the heart. In Mark 3: 1-6 Jesus exposed and was angry with the motives of leaders when He asked a simple question they knew the answer to, but refused to answer. In Matthew 9: 9-13 He exposed the arrogance of leaders who considered others to be sinners, excusing themselves. He did not chase after the Rich Young Ruler when his love of money and status was exposed. In Matthew 6 accused the leaders of hypocrisy, calling out their love of attention, and their preaching of one thing but doing another.
Jesus is the same today: Sin made public is the expression of lusts and imaginations not dealt with for years. Because leaders entertained those lusts until they acted upon them, Jesus allowed their lust and sin to become public knowledge, judging them that they might repent and deal with the lust.
The pyramid structure is prone to such moral failures in high places
If you have read my book Return of the First Church then you will remember I liken the auditorium church structure of the last 1700 years as a pyramid. When Israel first came out of Egypt in Exodus 18, Moses’ father in law Jethro, helped Moses set up the Federal Government of Israel.
Aaron as High Priest would set up the religious government of the tabernacle, but Moses needed a federal government in this newly formed nation to handle day-to-day issues. Jethro advised him to set himself up at the top of what would be a pyramid structure, with ‘captains’ over 1000’s governed large numbers of people. Their supervisors were over 100’s of them. Their supervisors were over 50 of them, and their bosses governed 10’s of them. Only the most difficult cases made its way through the 1000s, then through the 100s, then through the 50s, then to the 10s who selected what they told Moses.
It is the structure of any government today, and sadly, also the auditorium church. it is by its very nature, political. We could say Jesus had His 70, and then He had His 12, and of that He had His 3, and that is true. But Jesus continually demonstrated Himself at the bottom of a V rather than at the top of a pyramid by serving and reaching out to the lowest of the low directly. When the disciples tried to stop children from coming to Him, He rebuked them. Jesus is at the cornerstone, at the bottom of the structure, not at the top of a pyramid.
The church met in homes for the first 300 years…
…with the family being the foundation of the government of God. That has a built in protection against such sins of leader, to a degree, because people met (meet) in small family groups and everyone knows what is happening in each family. If something isn’t right in a marriage, it is noticed by all. It was and is now based on the family unit. Leaders serve and are at the lowest level like the bottom point of the letter V, following the example of Jesus the Cornerstone of the foundation, giving their lives for others.
When Constantine legalized Christianity and called them to meet in the former pagan temples, the V inverted, becoming a pyramid structure with a ‘Moses’ sitting at the top with the congregation way down at the bottom of the pyramid, propping up and supporting each ‘Moses’.
That is why the auditorium church is political in nature. That structure serves a federal government well, but Jesus said in Mark 10: 42-45 that a structure that causes a leader to be lording their authority over the others as non-believers do, ‘shall not be so named among you.’
Fast forward to our modern pyramid system called church, and we find ‘Moses’ isolated at the top with no direct accountability. He is separated from the real life of the average person who attends and gives, because he has captains over 1000’s, 100’s, 50’s, and 10’s to insulate him. It sets those with lust issues up for failure because faith has left the family, in favor of faith in a political structure called ‘church’.
How judgment works; How a sin moves from private to public
The Lord can deal privately and secretly with a person in their heart for years on any number of subjects. To one He might deal with them about their spending habits motivated by lust for things. To another about arrogance motivated by a lust to live the life of the rich and famous.
To another it might be a lust for food to self-medicate inner hurts. It could be any number of lusts and hurts we humans wrestle with in our soul – and the Lord keeps working on the inside of each person, maybe for decades. And it remains private, between them and Him.
But what we’ve seen in recent weeks and months are church leaders and s*xual sin. We know the ways of the Lord, we know He has certainly been dealing with each of them internally for years. Nathan’s confrontation with David was about his abuse of power. The parable he used in II Samuel 12: 1-9 was of a man being rich in sheep lusting after the 1 lamb of his poor neighbor, and stealing it. When David’s lust was acted on, manifest by an abuse of power, God judged him and made it public.
The person motivated by lust in the heart, to an expression of that lust, is what makes the headlines and stuns congregations. They are abuses of power which violate moral, ethical, and often legal boundaries. The pastor who runs off with the worship leader, the youth pastor who m*lests a young person, the leader who embezzles money, a pastor who fakes miracles. At some point those lusts not dealt with in the heart, grow to such a point the person acts on them. Why aren’t these dealt with by church leadership? Where is the accountability? How do they get promoted to such authority?
Next week I’ll share the usual pattern a modern church takes to deal with the sin of a leader, and how the Lord’s priorities should be in our hearts.
Until then, blessings,
John Fenn
