Hmmmm.....

I finally published a paper explaining my experience over the past few years and got out some things that to date I have not discussed publicly. I feel great! What is that, I mean I really feel good, at peace, content, ready to leave it all behind and just because I commited somethings to paper? I would have never imagined that it would have such an impact on me, yet it has and I am glad.

Weak or Wicked?

Over the past few years I have heard people give opinions on the failures of others, particularly those who have served in visible leadership positions in the church, as I once did. I have not been privy to what people have speculated in regards to my failures, but I have heard what has been said about others. It goes something like this, ' I can't believe 'Ernie' could do such a thing, he knew exactly what he was doing and yet he still went out and ministered. No wonder 'Pastor Joe' is so upset with him, he gave him a platform and was betrayed by him'. When you hear it you understand what the person is saying and in some cases that may be true, but I think there is another explanation as well. In fact when I heard this being stated I responded by saying, 'Well I guess that's true, if, 'Ernie' is an evil man. But what if he was simply weak?"
Not only have I experienced failure personally, I have known others well who have and frankly I can understand how they got to a place where they were able to act in a duplicitous way. Let us say that there is a person who is highly gifted, sought after and whose ministry is fruitful. Then let us say that this person is also has areas that are broken and unrecovered in his life. A person in such a state often finds themselves in great conflict when it comes to understanding how they can be at the same time 'blessed and gifted by God' and broken and susceptible to sinful behavior. The truth is the people around such a person for the most part become so enamored by giftedness that they ignore character issues, many times turning a blind eye to things that indicate that all may not be right. This too can confuse the gifted who for the most part they feel as if their brokenness is evident to all, yet no one seems to be to terribly concerned, which feeds their deception. By the way I'm not excusing anything here I'm simply trying to explain something.
So you have this gifted and fruitful person and I use fruitful intentionally because I am assuming only God can bring forth good fruit, which feeds the delusion of the gifted, yet broken. This person is losing the battle over sin in one arena, yet seems to be winning the battle over Satan in another! So this person is goes about their life and a temptation comes forth and they succumb to the temptation and sin. In the aftermath of the sin they feel great remorse, guilt and shame; they confess their sin, making promises to God that they will never act in such a sinful and evil way again. Soon thereafter they are placed in a position to minister and do so with great affect and with apparently bearing wonderful fruit. This can cause the person to believe that this is a sign of God's forgiveness and His favor and they feel greatly relieved and comforted by this fact, until......they are tempted again and succumb again! The pattern doesn't cease and ultimately the person is ‘found out’ and or ‘caught in sin’ and in many cases are written off as being liars and hypocrites, deceivers and such. When in reality they are weak, broken and confused, needing the Body to cover them in love and mercy, restoring such a one gently as the Bible says. I didn't say for the Body to 'cover up' for them, I'm not advocating ignoring disqualifying behavior and enabling the broken one. What I am advocating is, well, what the Apostle Paul advocated, 'When someone is caught in sin, you who are spiritual (you who are relying on the Spirit for your holiness) restore such a one with gentleness AND be careful least you fall into temptation yourselves.' The temptation is to judge ' Ernie is a wicked man, he knew what he was doing, therefore it is acceptable for us to act out our anger and take punitive action against him'. We can also succumb to the temptation to punish, of which there is no such mandate released to the church in the scripture.
The truth is most of our leaders do not fail in a vacuum; they generally don't get into a place where they have become delusional, calling wrong right and right wrong without some enabling behavior by those around them. It takes everyone’s co operation in most cases. But when a leader falls we generally like to let them fall alone, isolated as if we had no part in their failures. Which I doubt is true in many cases.
Hey if a person is evil and their intention is to deceive others, to abuse others, to exploit others, that is another thing altogether. My guess is that in most cases we have people like David, a man after God's own heart, or Peter, who of course would never betray Jesus, who on the one hand are people called by God, used by God, blessed by God, yet their own weakness leads them to deceive themselves and allows them to deceive others even if that wasn't their intention.
If someone is wicked we have clear instruction as to what to do with them and by the way even then we aren't the ones administering punishment, we are to turn such a one over to Satan for the destruction of their sinful nature. But if that isn't the case, if they are weak and caught in sin, then we have another clearly outlined mandate in scripture, 'restore such a one gently'
Wicked or weak, that is the question?