The Double Edge of Church Critique
I always appreciate when a friend reaches out with concern or a heads up about walking into a bad church situation — especially when it concerns my family’s spiritual growth.
What I DON’T like is when I notice a blatant double standard about the types of churches or people that get “whistleblown” on, and others that get a free pass because of their theological leaning or background.
For example, many followers of John MacArthur are quick to jump all over charismatic preachers when they fail or teach poor doctrine but never call out their “godfather” for some pretty serious allegations within his ministry.
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2 years ago, when we were looking to settle into a new church home after a move 3 hours away, I posted some Instagram stories of our journey “touring” churches and celebrated the church we were in that Sunday. We really liked it, and we felt at home after visiting 7 different churches. We didn’t realize what lay below the surface…
One of my posts drew a direct message from an acquaintance I’ve made through getting to know each other in similar ministry circles. He shared some concerns about the church we chose. He knew previous staff members that were a part of it, and had a lot of negative things to say about the lead pastor, his narccisitic behavior, and harmful leadership practices.
I acknowledged the message, and appreciated where he was coming from. However, I also took it with a grain of salt – this person had been wounded (spiritually) by leaders in a similar leadership vein, so I did question how pure the allegations were. After talking to my wife about it, we agreed to “proceed with caution” and we plugged in. We got very connected, and I even worked with them on social media and video stuff.
After a year, we left the church, not because of the aforementioned narcissistic patterns, but mainly because of some concerns within the children ministry. Mainly, the church was growing too fast and could not handle the logistics of a healthy kids ministry very well. I let me concerns be made known to the proper leadership in the church, and we slowly began stepping back and searching for a new church. Although I could see some glimpses of unhealthy leadership, I did not personally experience any wounding or spiritual abuse there, and that was not at all why we left.
We found a new home that worked amazingly well for our family and has been a breath of fresh air. It’s in a very different theological stream than our background, and offers a vibrant and healthy ministry to kids.
After some research into the background and story of this church, we learned that not that long ago, they went through a VERY MESSY scandal. They were previously a campus of a larger DFW church, and split off to become their own autonomous church in 2019. That’s not the messy part. The week the separation was implemented, which was planned and healthy, the lead pastor of the “new church” was found out to have been involved in an extramarital affair with the worship pastor’s wife. It had happened years prior, but was discovered in the fall of 2019. Later in 2020, it was discovered that not only was it an affair, but that apparently the campus pastor, worship pastor, and their wives were living in a swingers lifestyle – and intentionally grooming members of the church to join them in their sexual escapades.
Horrible! A teaching pastor, leading services every week, and a worship pastor, leading in song every week, hiding some awful sinful activities.
We knew this awful history, and we started attending the church despite it. Why?
It had been dealt with appropriately. The people responsible were removed from leadership, victims were heard out and empathized with, and the church made the issues known to the congregation. What was hidden had been brought to light and reckoned with.
Here’s the rub.
When we left the first church that my friend had warned me about, I followed up with him a year later to let him know our experience. I told him I could see maybe some glimpses of what his friends had experienced, but that was not our story there.
We had a great conversation, and he ended it by asking what church we attended now.
I told him, and he seemed happy for us. He told me he knew many people at that church, and that he had worked a lot with leadership there before it branched off from the larger church entity. He spoke very positively of the church.
Not a word of the scandal. No wrongdoing to warn us about, no leadership issues, no whistle to blow. Despite the fact that in reality, the abuse and sin that happened here was far worse than the allegations he had for our previous church.
My mind wandered after that chat.
I couldn’t help but wonder if it was a theological alliance – that it’s okay to overlook certain issues or not bring theem to light because the circle is different. It seems like it’s incredibly popular to crap all over charismatic churches right now – and part of that is correct; what’s happening at IHOP is a disaster and deserves to be called out and investigated.
Problem is, a lot of issues are happening in Baptist, Protestant, and Reformed circles now as well — but we tend to ignore or gloss over “our own”, don’t we?