Reflection on Abuse in the Church
Trigger warning: abuse, sexual immorality, violence
It started to hit me when I saw the headline "Hundreds Accuse Independent Baptist Pastors of Abuse" (Christianity Today 2018). #MeToo and #ChurchToo were not new to me at this point, but I grew up in a Baptist church. Not an independent fundamental church, but still Baptist. I didn't know these women who survived abuse from their leaders, but I very well could have.
Accountability for church leaders is necessary and valuable.
Many Baptists prefer their leaders to have a lot of control and that their church exists independently from other churches, but these reports should cause them to consider a different structure.
How does the Bible address sexual abuse? I used OpenBible.info to find most of these verses.
1 Cor. 6:18 ESV "Flee from sexual immorality. Every other sin a person commits is outside the body, but the sexually immoral person sins against his own body."
Matt. 5:28 ESV "But I say to you that everyone who looks at a woman with lustful intent has already committed adultery with her in his heart."
Leviticus 18:19-20 ESV “You shall not approach a woman to uncover her nakedness while she is in her menstrual uncleanness. And you shall not lie sexually with your neighbor's wife and so make yourself unclean with her."
Deut. 22:25-27 ESV “But if in the open country a man meets a young woman who is betrothed, and the man seizes her and lies with her, then only the man who lay with her shall die. But you shall do nothing to the young woman; she has committed no offense punishable by death. For this case is like that of a man attacking and murdering his neighbor, because he met her in the open country, and though the betrothed young woman cried for help there was no one to rescue her."
Many of us talk about the church as a family; we think of church as a safe space. Mistrust and violence have no place in this space.
Some people say, "Forgive your abuser." "Forgive and forget."
Forgiveness is important, but that doesn't mean people can ignore their actions and live without repercussions of them. As various church leaders rise to and fall from power, we congregants could learn from this. Who holds the leaders accountable?
How could your church handle a situation of abuse?
I pray we learn to value everyone in the Church, not just those we like or those in power.
Amos 5:24 TLV "But let justice roll like water and righteousness like an ever-flowing torrent."
It started to hit me when I saw the headline "Hundreds Accuse Independent Baptist Pastors of Abuse" (Christianity Today 2018). #MeToo and #ChurchToo were not new to me at this point, but I grew up in a Baptist church. Not an independent fundamental church, but still Baptist. I didn't know these women who survived abuse from their leaders, but I very well could have.
Accountability for church leaders is necessary and valuable.
Many Baptists prefer their leaders to have a lot of control and that their church exists independently from other churches, but these reports should cause them to consider a different structure.
How does the Bible address sexual abuse? I used OpenBible.info to find most of these verses.
1 Cor. 6:18 ESV "Flee from sexual immorality. Every other sin a person commits is outside the body, but the sexually immoral person sins against his own body."
Matt. 5:28 ESV "But I say to you that everyone who looks at a woman with lustful intent has already committed adultery with her in his heart."
Leviticus 18:19-20 ESV “You shall not approach a woman to uncover her nakedness while she is in her menstrual uncleanness. And you shall not lie sexually with your neighbor's wife and so make yourself unclean with her."
Deut. 22:25-27 ESV “But if in the open country a man meets a young woman who is betrothed, and the man seizes her and lies with her, then only the man who lay with her shall die. But you shall do nothing to the young woman; she has committed no offense punishable by death. For this case is like that of a man attacking and murdering his neighbor, because he met her in the open country, and though the betrothed young woman cried for help there was no one to rescue her."
Many of us talk about the church as a family; we think of church as a safe space. Mistrust and violence have no place in this space.
Some people say, "Forgive your abuser." "Forgive and forget."
Forgiveness is important, but that doesn't mean people can ignore their actions and live without repercussions of them. As various church leaders rise to and fall from power, we congregants could learn from this. Who holds the leaders accountable?
How could your church handle a situation of abuse?
I pray we learn to value everyone in the Church, not just those we like or those in power.
Amos 5:24 TLV "But let justice roll like water and righteousness like an ever-flowing torrent."
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