Phill Sacre

Tag: friendship

  • Another scandal. We desperately need spiritual reformation

    Another scandal. We desperately need spiritual reformation

    What can we learn after yet another prominent Christian leader falls to sexual temptation? Is there a problem in the way we preach the gospel? Here I argue that the church desperately needs another spiritual reformation.

    The preacher and evangelist Ravi Zacharias died recently. It didn’t take long after his death for reports of sexual misconduct to come up. One example is that he sexually harassed some women working at one of the spas he co-owned. According to the article:

    “He would expose himself every time, and he would touch himself every time,” one of the women told CT. “It was where he went to get what he wanted sexually.”

    Zacharias masturbated in front of one of the women more than 50 times, according to her recollection. He told her he was burdened by the demands of the ministry, and he needed this “therapy.” He also asked her to have sex with him twice, she said, and requested explicit photos of her.

    These deeply sad and troubling accusations are happening hard on the heels of revelations about Jonathan Fletcher last year. It seems that we’ve had a string lately of high-profile Christian leaders who have been embroiled in sexual scandals. I think this should trouble us as the church, particularly evangelicals: why is it that so many leaders have fallen this way?

    Christian Leaders do not belong on a pedestal

    One lesson that it’s very important to learn is that leaders are people, just like everyone else. Everyone has the same temptations – leaders are not immune from them. Christians should not put anyone on a pedestal, except for Jesus. Only he is sinless!

    One of the problems with our society today is that we are very ‘celebrity’ obsessed. I think the modern media, especially social media, exacerbates this problem. We tend to flock around people who we like to listen to. The Christian world is far from immune. I can recognise it in myself: when I go on Christian conferences or teaching days, I like to recognise the names of the people who’ll be speaking. In itself I don’t think this is necessarily a problem – but the problem comes when we expect people gifted to teach and lead to be perfect. The Messiah complex!

    So, let’s remember that Christian leaders are Christians. They can fall, and they need our prayers. As a Christian leader myself, albeit in a much smaller capacity than Ravi Zacharias – I hugely value people praying for me.

    So, all Christians are liable to fall to temptation, and it’s good to remember that. But I think there is a deeper issue here. Does the fact that so many Christian leaders have fallen in this way suggest that there is a problem with the gospel being preached?

    Is there a gospel issue?

    I wonder if part of the problem is that many evangelical churches have come to reduce the definition of the gospel. I wrote about this before, and again recently when I wrote about grace. This is what I wrote back in July of last year:

    One of the ways I think evangelical churches (including, and perhaps especially, conservative evangelical churches) subtly distort the gospel is by portraying the Christian life like this: it’s all about avoiding sin.

    It’s a bit like one of those car-racing video games – every time you see a pothole or an obstacle coming, you have to move so you don’t hit it. I think we often unconsciously visualise the Christian life in this way: we live our lives day-to-day, trying our hardest to avoid sinning, and asking God for forgiveness when we fail and the help not to sin again. I call this view ‘almost the gospel’ – it’s so close, and yet not quite there.

    This applies to sex and sexuality. Our culture says that our happiness will be found when we are most sexually fulfilled. But God says we will be most happy when we submit our sexuality to him. Only he can fill our deepest longings. This is something which I think a lot of churches don’t really focus on. Or at least, they may talk about it intellectually but it hasn’t really hit home emotionally.

    I wonder if this is the problem when it comes to Christian leaders falling sexually. I mean, the things they’re accused of doing are not little slips. It’s not like accidentally switching on an adult channel in a hotel late at night. It’s directly abusive of others. It reminds me of 1 Corinthians 5v1: “It is actually reported that there is sexual immorality among you, and of a kind that even pagans do not tolerate”. The kinds of things RZ and JF have done, or been accused of doing, would not be tolerated in our secular society.

    We need spiritual reformation

    Christian leaders are sinners, but they should be mature Christians. They should have a knowledge that God’s ways are best, that God alone can satisfy. I just can’t conceive of someone doing the kinds of things that Ravi Zacharias or Jonathan Fletcher are accused of doing without understanding that it’s deeply wrong and sinful. Someone who slips up and sins out of weakness is one thing. Someone who has an established pattern of sin over the course of several months or years – that’s another level.

    I honestly think the real need of the church at the moment is for spiritual reformation. We need to learn deeply the truth of these words:

    Taste and see that the Lord is good;
    blessed is the one who takes refuge in him.
    Fear the Lord, you his holy people,
    for those who fear him lack nothing.
    The lions may grow weak and hungry,
    but those who seek the Lord lack no good thing.

    Psalm 34:8-10

    Over the last few months and years, I’ve begun to realise the truth of this Psalm in a way that I don’t think I’ve ever been taught before. God is not some kind of arbitrary rule giver, who gives us rules to stop us being happy. One of the reasons we are so tempted by sexual temptation is because it promises us happiness beyond what we think God would give. But the truth is the exact opposite: only God’s ways can give us true happiness, in every area.

    Is the reason that we keep on falling this way is because much of the church simply does not recognise the goodness of God?

    This is vital for the health of the church

    A few days ago I read a helpful article by Jay Stringer about Ravi Zacharias. In that post he said:

    When a man will not engage his sexual brokenness, the inevitable outcome is a system that heavily polices cross gender relationships.  We don’t honor women by refusing to extend relationship or leadership to them. We honor women by doing everything possible to locate the sexual brokenness and manipulation that exists within. Being like Jesus means that we learn how to have close relationships with female friends in a way that is marked with humility, honor, and delight. The image of God is both male and female (Genesis 1:27). If you want to know who God is, but you want to “protect” yourself from women, you’re excluding a whole lot of God.

    I think this is spot on. We live in a society which is going made about sex and sexuality. I just think so many people, especially young people, don’t know which was is up any more. What the world doesn’t need right now is the church failing in exactly the same area! In fact, we as the church should be like a city on a hill – showing the world the light and life that comes from knowing Christ.

    We should be transformed by the renewing of our minds (Romans 12:1). We should start treating each other like family, as that is in fact what we are. And we should be walking in step with the Spirit (Galatians 5:16), rather than trying to use our own personal version of the Billy Graham rule to stay pure. This means men and women treating each other like brothers and sisters, like true friends. God has the power to overcome the idols of our society and remake us in his image.

    Can men and women be friends after all?

    A couple of years ago, Aimee Byrd wrote a book called “Why can’t we be friends?” Subtitled – “avoidance is not purity”. This sums it up for me: I think many churches teach a kind of ‘avoidance’ strategy when it comes to purity. This isn’t going to work, and I think this is why too many Christian leaders have fallen.

    If you think of the Christian life primarily as being about avoiding sin, then your greatest enemy is temptation. It’s only a matter of time before you fall – even more so for Christian leaders. This is a particular problem when our society seems to be so sex-obsessed. One effect means that we will only see members of the opposite sex in terms of temptation.

    If, on the other hand, we see the Christian life as being about seeking after the Lord, his goodness and his ways, then it will be a different story. We can start to see others as people made in God’s image, given his beauty. We can start relating to them with the love given by the Spirit, beyond merely human love.

    I believe we in the Western church right now need to seek after the Lord like we haven’t done in a long time. It’s time to stop talking about doctrine and instead to start believing it.

    Lord, please send a spiritual reformation upon your people.

  • Mike Pence, the Billy Graham rule and the gospel

    [Jesus said:] ‘You have heard that it was said, “You shall not commit adultery.” But I tell you that anyone who looks at a woman lustfully has already committed adultery with her in his heart. (Matthew 5:27-28)

    If you haven’t seen the news this week, the internet has been astir with the news that Vice President of the US Mike Pence follows the ‘Billy Graham rule’. Basically, to avoid temptation, he takes measures to avoid being alone with another woman, or being at a social function with alcohol involved where his wife is not present. The rule is named after Billy Graham, with which it originated. (See the link above for more information about the history of the rule).

    It’s been interesting to look at the responses. Some people have ridiculed Mike Pence on a number of fronts – how, in this day and age, can a man not have a business lunch with a woman (for example)? On the other hand, some Christian folk have stood up to defend him and commended him for taking steps to protect his marriage. Marriage breakdown is a huge issue, and it’s right to be concerned about it.

    Personally, I have mixed feelings. As a Christian, I believe we should be concerned with sexual purity – both within and without marriage. Hebrews 13:4 puts it starkly: “Marriage should be honoured by all, and the marriage bed kept pure, for God will judge the adulterer and all the sexually immoral.” I’ve argued before that sexual sin is serious business – and I stand by what I said then. However (and you knew this was coming, didn’t you?), I believe the Billy Graham rule is misguided.

    Let’s start with Jesus’ words from the Sermon on the Mount that I quoted to begin with. “You shall not commit adultery” – one of the Ten Commandments. You’d think that one would be a relatively straightforward one to keep, right? Either you’ve slept with someone you’re not married to, or you haven’t. Unfortunately, it’s not so simple. Jesus makes the commandment far beyond what we do with our bodies – he extends it to include our minds as well. Any man who has ever looked at another woman lustfully has already committed adultery with her in his heart. (And, of course, this applies for women too – lust is not an exclusively male problem).

    Jesus was here was speaking against the Pharisees – those who believed that they were righteous because they were almost fanatical about obeying the law. Jesus said shortly before these verses, “unless your righteousness surpasses that of the Pharisees and the teachers of the law, you will certainly not enter the kingdom of heaven” (v20). The message is striking: what God demands of us is moral perfection – a perfection that we cannot achieve by following the Law. The Pharisees made a big show of obeying the law, they probably had laws (way beyond the Ten Commandments) about what you were allowed to do and not do with women around. But Jesus says, no – the righteousness God requires is an internal righteousness – one which goes to the heart. The heart is where evil springs from – the heart is what must be changed. We cannot impose righteousness on ourselves by rules – only God can change our hearts.

    I’ve recently been reading Colossians, and these verses sprang to mind:

    Since you died with Christ to the elemental spiritual forces of this world, why, as though you still belonged to the world, do you submit to its rules: ‘Do not handle! Do not taste! Do not touch!’? These rules, which have to do with things that are all destined to perish with use, are based on merely human commands and teachings. Such regulations indeed have an appearance of wisdom, with their self-imposed worship, their false humility and their harsh treatment of the body, but they lack any value in restraining sensual indulgence.

    Paul here says that there are rules in the world which people follow, rules that – although they have an appearance of wisdom, actually ‘lack any value in restraining sensual indulgence’. I think this is what’s going on with rules like the Billy Graham rule. Those who follow these rules appear to be doing something wise, appear to be taking appropriate precautions – but actually the rules themselves do not have any value in preventing sin. (I wonder how many people who followed the Billy Graham rule have fallen into sexual sin?) It would be perfectly possible, for example, to follow the Billy Graham rule and yet be addicted to pornography. The outward appearance looks very different from the inward reality.

    So how should we live in the way that God wants us to? More than that – how can we? This is what Paul addresses in Galatians 5. I won’t quote all of it, but the summary is this: there are two ways of living – either according to ‘the flesh’, or according to the Spirit. The flesh means our natural desires, our sinful state where we desire what is contrary to God’s will. This, of course, includes sensual indulgence. But Paul’s genius is that he extends this to include legalism as well – that is, living by a set of rules. If we live by a set of rules, we may appear to be godly – but we are simply fooling ourselves. The only way to live a godly life is to live by the Spirit of God, to live a life of love as we are transformed by the Spirit, as we walk in step with Him.

    The problem with laws – legalism – is that it only focusses on the ‘Thou shalt not’. How can I, as a man, love my female neighbour if I have a law which prevents me from getting to know her?
    In fact, as I hinted at above, legalism may in fact exacerbate the problem. If a man believes he’s doing OK because he’s keeping the Billy Graham rule, and yet spends a lot of time fantasising about women he’s not married to, then he’s simply fooling himself.

    A personal anecdote…

    I’d like to put some flesh on what I’ve written above by sharing a little of my life story. I wanted to share how this has worked out in my own life, and how I believe my experience shows that the Billy Graham rule is not correct.

    I spent a lot of my time at theological college was spent worrying about adultery. I knew in my heart of hearts that I wasn’t strong enough. We often heard and talked about stories of pastors who had failed in this way, and how it wrecked their ministries and personal lives. I spent quite a bit of time in prayer asking God to help me!

    I also tried to steer clear of getting ‘too close’ to a woman – especially any woman I found attractive. Although I didn’t consciously live by the Billy Graham rule, I think subconsciously I followed something like it: it was very rare that I would ever have a one-on-one private conversation with a woman. However, I still didn’t feel ‘safe’ – I still didn’t feel like the laws I lived by would help me.

    Fast forward to today: God has indeed answered my prayers and changed my heart. I feel like I have a whole new perspective on the world. It’s too long to go into here (maybe another blog post… or a book…) but I have come to believe that God has designed men and women for each other – not just within marriage – and intends men and women to be friends. This is exactly what Joshua Jones argues in Forbidden Friendships: Retaking the Biblical gift of male-female friendship.

    As I said above, the problem with the law is that it stops with ‘Thou shalt not’. Christians, on the other hand, are called to do more than that: Christians are called to love one another. Peter says “love one another deeply, from the heart” (1 Peter 1:22), and I believe that includes love across the gender divide. Sexual sin is a horrible thing – but I have come to believe that one of the best antidotes we have to sexual sin is healthy relationships with those of the opposite sex.

    Clearly, more needs to be said on this – and the Forbidden Friendships book is a good start – but this is a blog post and I don’t want to go on forever. The ‘in a nutshell’ of all this is that I am much more open to forming good friendships with women and believe that this actually (1) fulfils better the great commandment (to love God and our neighbour) (2) better equips me to combat sexual sin.

    Conclusion

    I applaud anyone who takes sexual purity seriously. Our culture seems to value fidelity a lot less than in days gone by. Mike Pence is honestly trying to protect his marriage, I believe he is sincere, and should be commended. I also think it’s not right to jump to conclusions about what someone does and does not believe – I don’t want to critique the man, only the rule itself at face value.

    However, I believe that the gospel calls us to a more radical heart transformation. The gospel calls us to love, not simply to avoid 50% of the population of the world because we might be tempted to sin. The Pharisees were using their laws to get out of their obligations to love their neighbour. We may laugh at them, but our human hearts are tempted to use the law in the same way.

    I’ll leave the last word to the apostle Paul:

    You, my brothers and sisters, were called to be free. But do not use your freedom to indulge the flesh; rather, serve one another humbly in love. For the entire law is fulfilled in keeping this one command: ‘Love your neighbour as yourself.’
    … Those who belong to Christ Jesus have crucified the flesh with its passions and desires. Since we live by the Spirit, let us keep in step with the Spirit. (Galatians 5:13-14, 24-25)