Christ’s Message to the Church When a Leader Falls

Bill Hybels, pastor of one of the largest churches in the nation and founder of a movement of seeker-sensitive ministries and the Global Leadership Summit, resigned over alleged sexual indiscretion. Did he do it? In the #metoo age, it often doesn’t matter in the eyes of media and the court of public opinion, if he actually did the things of which he is accused. Insinuation alone can derail a ministry.

Unfortunately, such falls are not uncommon.  From televangelists Jim Bakker and Jimmy Swaggart, to Ted Haggard (then president of the National Association of Evangelicals), Frank Tillapaugh, and Southern Baptist leader Frank Page, fallen pastors have been piling up like cordwood. Evangelist Ravi Zacharias recently faced extortion over sexting charges, ending in a court settlement. These were all considered great men of God. One thing is clear: No Christian leader (including any of us reading this) is above falling into sensual/sexual sins.

We in the Christian community deal with such “falls” in a couple of ways. First, we understand that prominent Christian figures have a target on their backs and the enemy takes special aim at them. Causing them to fall reverberates in the media and wrecks their testimony, and we grieve but we are not surprised. A second response, almost as common, is to circle the wagons and refuse to believe the facts about such a fall, creating a collective sense of denial in the face of accusations.

But what if we looked at these cases differently? What if we stop asking, “Did he do it?” and asked instead, “Lord, why are you allowing your Church to suffer such public disgrace? And why now, at such a time as this, when she already endures a steep decline of influence?”

I am in my mid-50’s. My two younger brothers have experienced significant heart problems. Is there a message for me in their diagnoses? You bet! In the same way, Jesus uses the pain of these prominent moral failures to speak to His Church. Andrew Murray writes that the sword coming out of Jesus’ mouth in Revelation 1:16 is designed to cut away sin. If Jesus uses the pain and humiliation of Christian leaders falling to speak to His Church with the intent of cutting away sin, here are several possible messages to us:

• A deep corruption exists among the Body of Christ. Have not thousands of local church leaders fallen in like fashion to these more prominent figures? Most of us know personally of several that didn’t make the front page. The ministries of many local churches have become a shadow of their former selves because of such sins. Through the failure of key leaders, Jesus raises His voice to us about the Church’s fallen condition.
• He uses the point of the sword of His mouth to see whether we respond properly to the pain. His sword awakens us to how wrong it all is, how His name is dishonored, and how the Church grows arrogant and does not grieve as it should; nor does it reflect and repent.
• Like John Donne’s great statement: “Do not ask for whom the bell (declaring someone’s death) tolls; it tolls for thee.” These sins of our leaders belong to all of us, and we must own them and grieve. However, we have become so spiritually insensitive that we no longer recognize the Divine hand humbling us. The Lord does not lead any Christian leader into sin but allows it for a purpose. That purpose is generally redemptive, but it requires reflection and repentance on the part of God’s people first.
• He lets us know that praying for revival is pointless until His Bride starts listening to Him. The larger Body of Christ is made up of hundreds of thousands of local churches in North America, most of which have stories of immorality, splits, and other ugliness in their histories. Every time some prominent Christian falls, the Lord challenges churches to grieve and address their own failures, rather than throw stones.

Jesus longs for us to address the things we’d rather leave covered in our histories. Every time a Christian leader falls, His light exposes the true condition of us all and our churches. But instead we put on sunglasses rather than gazing on that Face which is shining “like the sun in its strength” and into those “eyes like a flame of fire.” Yet with every new revelation of sin in the camp, He calls us to corporate repentance. He says, “Do you hear Me now?”

Rev. Mark Barnard serves as President of Blessing Point Ministries which helps facilitate healing in ministries that have been wounded by painful crises. Mark authored The Path of Revival: Restoring Our Nation One Church at a Time among other works. For more information visit blessingpoint.org or contact mark@blessingpoint.org.