Sex abuse

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Steve Alford should not replace Tom Crean...

People are pushing for homeboy Steve Alford to replace IU basketball coach Tom Crean. Some hope not, and for me, this is enough of a reason.

Note the intervention by Evangelical parachurch ministry Athletes in Action. Well-intentioned I'm sure, but really.


Sexual abuse: church coverups don't justify witch hunts...

[NOTE: After reading this post, Mary Lee was confused about whether or not I thought Marie Collins's resignation was justified or not? I have no idea, and that's my point in writing this post. Concerning sexual abuse and its coverup, the truth is harder to come by than we think or wish—and certainly harder to come by than those fomenting witch hunts would have us believe. Thus my recommendation of hard investigatory work and careful procedure.]

There's a witches brew of websites stirring steaming cauldrons of rebellion and mockery against male church officers faithful to Scripture. On these sites, no theme is more popular than sexual abuse committed by men—unless it is the coverup of male sexual abuse by male church officers. But note: you will never read about the sexual abuse committed by women on these sites. The women who write and comment are uninterested in any abuse that fails to strengthen their narrative of male oppression, so sexual abuse committed by sisters and mothers never shows up. And this despite female sexual abuse's steep growth curve.

Before we get to the point of this post, let me make it clear that nothing has consumed more time and tears among our pastors, elders, and Titus 2 older women at Clearnote Church, Bloomington than the sexual abuse of children and young people. We've done this terribly sad and difficult work for many years now, both in our own congregation and as advisers and helpers to other congregations around the country. We've worked with congregations from the Pacific Northwest to the Southeast... 


Women, incest, and the internet...

For this is the will of God, your sanctification; that is, that you abstain from sexual immorality... (1 Thessalonians 4:3)

If you want to see this sort of father-daughter sweetness in your home...

In Corinth, sexual perversion and immorality were everywhere, starting with their houses of worship. This "everywhere" included the Christian house of worship where the congregation was very proud while their brother in Christ lived in their midst incestuously, with their full knowledge of the fact.

This is America and the church of America, today. We are proud of our religion; of our deep theological understanding and grace-centered living. Meanwhile, our children view naked flesh and commit incest. You could call it secret, but we don't ask or put up safeguards around them, so these sins in our homes and church are don't ask-don't tell public sins.

Your daughters should never ever shower with their father! What, are you crazy? You think your husband's above that? You think your daughter would...


Gay priest Sam Allberry is LivingOut...

When Gospel Coalition puffed the LivingOut.org two-minute video by Anglican priest Sam Allberry, did you think it hit the sweet spot culturally and Biblically?

Sorry to disappoint, but no. Though parts of it were true, Pastor Allberry's testimony was carefully wrong at several key points—but in such a highly nuanced way that it's little wonder many people missed it. Pastor Allberry was wrong in the kind of way that listeners had to be highly educated to miss.

This sort of sound-bite plea of the pain of victimhood combined with sophisticated half-truths is what LivingOut.org specializes in, and there's a reason all men speak well of them.

Pointing out these errors Gospel Coalition keeps promoting is the subject of the book Juergen Von Hagen and I are close to finishing, now. We spent the past week...


Hillary Clinton: follow the money...

But I have this against you, that you tolerate the woman Jezebel, who calls herself a prophetess, and she teaches and leads My bond-servants astray so that they commit acts of immorality and eat things sacrificed to idols. (Revelation 2:20)

President-elect Donald Trump says he's worth billions and Hillary is worth around $350 million. So who spent what in their respective presidential campaigns, and where did it come from?

Trump raised $340 million and he himself gave $66 million of it. Clinton raised $581 million and she herself gave none of it.

This is the soul of that species who have usurped for themselves the name "Democrats." They love you and have a wonderful plan for your life.

Not their lives. Your life.

You give them money and they...


Stone Gate Ministries: pastoral care for sinners...

Harry Schaumburg and Brian Bunn invited a group of pastors and elders up to Port Washington, Wisconsin, this past week. Harry is the author of two classic books written to help Christians on the road of repentance for sexual sin. The books titled False Intimacy and Undefiled are an extension of the one-week Biblical intensive counselling program Harry provides...


You blew it...

We had our largest attendance at a pastors conference yet, this year. Over a hundred and it was a joy to be together, although the work was hard. So this post doesn't come out of disappointment in our numbers.

Sometimes a pastor needs to say to his people, "you blew it."

So, permit me to say to those of you who should have been here for the conference on child abuse and incest, you blew it. And I'll go further than that: it's my conviction that some of you didn't attend, not because you thought the conference wouldn't be helpful, but because you knew it would be. You're a pastor, elder, elder's wife, or women's ministry director and you simply didn't want to spend time thinking about how best to discover and minister to those children in your congregation who are being raped by their father, uncle, brother, or molested by their sister. 

It's easier not to know, isn't it?

Well, you can take a mulligan...


Sexual Abuse in the Church: conference audio available...

Here's the audio from our 2016 Shepherds Conference, "The Enemy Within: A Conference on Sexual Abuse in the Church." I'd particularly recommend "Recognizing Sexual Abuse" and "Shepherding the Sexually Abused."

Please let us know any criticisms or suggestions you have for us. We'll be doing a similar conference next year on the church's ministry to those suffering the gay/lesbian/transexual/BruceJenner/bisexual temptations. Here's the conference title and dates:

Not Ashamed: Gospel ministry in a post-Obergefell world

February, 15-17, 2017

Here then are the audio files for this year's conference on the sexual abuse of the church's children...


Why women are being encouraged to attend The Enemy Within: Sexual Abuse in the Church...

This year we hope women will attend our February 17-19, 2016 conference, The Enemy Within: Sexual Abuse in the Church. Previous years we called this conference a "Pastors Conference" or "Church Officers Conference," and only men attended—men who are officers and men who aspire to holding office in the Church.

This year, though, our subject demands the most intense work and wisdom on the part of pastors, elders, and deacons, and that work cannot be done and that wisdom cannot be gained without the help of wise women of the church, including officers' wives. So we've opened up registration, not just to the wives of pastors, elders, and deacons, but also to women, single or married, who obey the command of God given in Titus 2:3-5, to serve the church by "teaching what is good."

My wife Mary Lee and I will be talking about the necessity and helpfulness of church officers working with Titus 2 women in the protection of children of the church. If elders and pastors don't have...


The Enemy Within: Are you registered, yet?

Conference information.

Conference registration.

How many souls are suffering incest, child molestation, and other forms of sexual violence in your own family and church without you realizing it or helping them?

In our culture of sexual wickedness, we are missing opportunities to show the love of Jesus Christ to the least of these burdened with shame, tormented by fear, and distrustful of authority. When they suffered, no one in their church knew the signs of incest. No one heard their cries for help. No one protected them.

Your church has men and women, boys and girls who are suffering because of present and past incest and child abuse.

Do you know who they are? Do you know...


The Enemy Within...

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Sexual abuse is an epidemic in modern America, and our churches are no exception. This is why you are invited to Clearnote Fellowship’s conference, The Enemy Within: A Conference on Sexual Abuse in the Church, February 17-19, 2016...


Patriarchy: lessons from Bethlehem...

Over the years, I've often repeated a truism I'd heard as a younger man concerning the sins typical of men during our youth, middle, and old age: we begin with sex, then move on to money; but we end with pride. The past few years this has come home to me with great intensity as I've watched men I respect suffer because of their pride. They have lost others’ respect for them. Their church or religious organization has imploded. Their leadership has become grossly attenuated. Their families have privately suffered severe conflict.

I’ve talked with my wife and closest pastor friends about this quite a few times the past couple of months and we have come to wonder whether we have not gotten things wrong with respect to what God hates? We think He hates rebellion and antinomianism—which He does, of course. His Word tells us that rebellion is as the sin of witchcraft.

But then this...


Child abuse: I'm for grace!

...each one of you is saying, “I am of Paul,” and “I of Apollos,” and “I of Cephas,” and “I of Christ.”  - 1Corinthians 1:12, 13

So, apparently, the sin of some in the Corinthian church was saying "I am of Christ."

A year and a half ago, I was talking with a Presbyterian counselor who was counseling an older single man who had physically and sexually abused several young men under his authority. Despite this predator's pastor and several of his elders a decade ago knowing of the specifics of his abuse of one victim, they had allowed the man to keep his job on the staff of their Presbyterian church where he continued to have young men under his authority. When his corruption of his first victim ten years ago became known, his pastor and several of his elders had refused to ask other young men under this man's leadership if he had abused them, also; nor had they warned them.

Now, the church's pastor and elders were finally having their noses shoved into the sins they and their predecessors had worked hard to avoid. They were finding out their church staff worker had abused more than the one man who had been known. Two more victims had come forward and were calling the church's session to acknowledge their past failures and bring this ministry leader under discipline and I was hoping to get the counselor to help with that process.

In our initial conversation, this counselor said he was...


Is our preaching inane...

Teachers, doctors, law enforcement officers, pastors, child protective service workers, deacons, judges, and lawyers can't escape the ravages of sin that others push the garage door close button to keep at bay. Take child abuse, for instance; we see it in the eyes before the mouth ever speaks. We choose to ignore it or to ask the hard questions depending on whether or not we fear God. That's pastors, deacons, and teachers. The others have no choice. They're told the gruesome facts, whether they like it or not, and it's their job to clean things up as best they can. Or can't.

This past year the following inquiry came across an e-mail list for attorneys... 


We all stumble in many ways...

Under the post, "Rachel Miller's straw men...," one reader wrote:

There is simply no room for error in your teaching.

My response:

This couldn't be further from the truth. Is there any pastor who goes a month, week, or day without having the Holy Spirit remind him of His warning:

Let not many of you become teachers, my brethren, knowing that as such we will incur a stricter judgment. For we all stumble in many ways. If anyone does not stumble in what he says, he is a perfect man, able to bridle the whole body as well. (James 3:1, 2)

"For we all stumble in many ways." Pastors know this is true of us in what we write online and in books, what we preach and teach, how we speak and are silent in session meetings and pastoral counseling, at home and school, in the car on the way to church Sunday morning, etc. We see our stumbles in many ways, and we tell our congregations about them. We apologize after session meetings for our anger or passive-aggressiveness. We all stumble; we all sin in many ways.

This should satisfy you that you are wrong, but sadly, I doubt it. Why not?

Because what people really want is not for us to admit we have error in our teaching where that error truly exists, but where it doesn't exist. In other words, those who accuse us of refusing to admit error in our teaching won't agree we've admitted error in our teaching until we admit that we have sinned against half the human race by teaching God's Creation Order—that is the only place where our admission of error would ever count...


Don't give a penny to Indiana University's "For All" Bicentennial Capital Campaign...

If Indiana University is the alma mater (lit. "nursing mother"), not just of her students, but also the town and county that surround her, it's time to bite the hand that feeds us.

Living in Sodom and Gomorrah can inure us to wickedness, so in the interest of waking God's people up...

Indiana University's latest president, Michael McRobbie (pictured), just announced a capital campaign on the occasion of IU's bicentennial. The announcement was made at a "celebration" held at the Indiana State Fairgrounds. There a large gift was also announced to spur on the campaign. President McRobbie and his fellow administrators set their goal at $2.5 billion...


Cincinnati Children's Hospital mutilates children...

Son Joseph over at the blog of the Cincinnati church plant he serves, Christ Church, has written an excellent post that begins...


Dealing with sexual predators: objections answered...

Let's dive further into the discussion of how to deal with God's people concerning sexual abuse, both the perpetrators and their victims, but also the weak, potential victims and potential predators. Why now?

Because it just so happens that this is a giant problem in the church today, whether reformed, evangelical, libertarian, homeschool, credo or paedo, family-integrated, or program-central. Of course, somebody might object that right now is not the best time because there's a war on. Or maybe they'll say that discussing it now is going to cause undue pain to a particular perp or victim. Consider this your trigger warning, if you're that sensitive, and stop reading now. 

Cross-fire and friendly fire are part of the terrain in war. We don't stop fighting the war out of fear of such things. And yes, we correct one another and redirect our friend's attention to bigger problems even while screaming orcs are trying to kill both of us. Remember when Aragorn yells at Legolas in the middle of the battle of Helm's Deep? Legolas doesn't respond with "Can't you see orcs are attacking me?" Both of them know full well that orcs are attacking everybody good on all sides. He assumes, rightly, that if his friend is yelling a warning at him... 


Sex abuse in the church; some clarifications...

A couple things as the discussion of pastoral care for child abusers and their victims in the church continues.

First, Pastor Toby Sumpter wrote a helpful post in which he disagrees with me on...

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The pastoral care of men and women who are sexual predators against children...

Here is a hypothetical situation. The details are likely similar to many situations faced by the pastors and elders of churches around the country, including Christ Church in Moscow, Idaho. This is no surprise since the sexual abuse of children is so pervasive in our wicked nation today.

This post is written out of two decades working with children and adults who are victims of these crimes, as well as the criminals who committed the crimes. I hope these thoughts will be helpful to church officers and Titus 2 women who may be wondering what principles to follow in their own congregation.

* * *

Let us assume a case in which an adult man1 who confesses faith in Jesus Christ is found guilty in civil and church courts of multiple acts of predatory sexual violence over several years time against minor children unrelated to him by blood or marriage. Regardless of whether this man confessed Christian faith or appeared to be remorseful and repentant, Christians of sound spiritual judgment would, I believe, not condemn the penal codes of many centuries of Christendom which put such a man under sentence of death. We would agree that capital punishment of this crime against children is just to all concerned, from the sinner himself, to his victims and their families, to the church and her members, and society at large. Our Lord warned...