Do you remember the primary time in your life that somebody you looked as much as as a spiritual leader had an ethical failure? I do.
I used to be a freshman in college at Liberty University studying for the pastorate. I had gone to chapel to listen to an awesome preacher expound upon the Word of God. The speaker was such a passionate speaker who knew the Word of God so well, that it inspired me to memorize Scripture and to hunt to know God like him.
As soon as chapel was over, I rushed to the library so I could know Scripture like he did. Before that day was over, I had read over 50 chapters in my Bible and had memorized over 60 verses.
Not long after that, I learned as did many others, that the person who had inspired me was a fake. He had made up his childhood story to sensationalize his life. He was a fraud and later was found to have had not just one moral failure but many in his lifetime.
I wish I could say that this only happened to me once in my 53 years of life and 27 years within the ministry, but sadly, I actually have had close pastor friends and spiritual heroes that I actually have looked as much as through the years who’ve let me down and caused me great pain and confusion. I’m sure you could have too.
It looks like lately there are such a lot of pastors having moral failures that we won’t even sustain with it. Decades of deception and repeated moral failures; sometimes it comes out while they’re in the midst of it and other times it comes out many years later.
If you might be anything like me, when these varieties of things occur to you, it shakes your faith, causes you to wonder, and plummets you into a mix of hurt, questions, doubt, and anger.
It arouses questions within the depth of your being like: was their influence and inspiration only a lie? I actually have heard some say that when their pastor fell morally that it was like their very own wife or husband failing morally. It hurt them that deeply.
We live in a world today where it’s difficult to seek out people we will trust. How could we be so duped by someone so near us? How could we glance as much as someone for therefore a few years only to seek out out they were a fraud?
Or were they? How could we be so naïve? Or were we? Maybe they weren’t fake. Maybe we weren’t naïve. Maybe sin is just that powerful. Maybe they underestimated the ability of sin. And perhaps we overestimated their power other than Christ.
The New Testament doesn’t give us an example of a spiritual leader who had a sexual moral failure, however the Old Testament does. The Bible says that King David was “a person after God’s own heart.” Would you want God and the Bible to say that about you? I’d.
What does it mean to be a person after God’s own heart? Being an individual after God’s own heart implies that your life is in harmony with God. David had done just that.
But David eventually found himself drifting in a direction that was the other of God. The Bible says that on the time when kings go to war, David stayed home. Was he burned out? Was he prideful? Was he bored with fighting God’s battles and desired to enjoy himself a bit of?
We do not know, the Bible doesn’t say, but what we do know is, it happened. David went out on his balcony, saw a really beautiful woman bathing, called for her, slept along with her, and she or he became pregnant.
What was he to do now? He had a fame to uphold. He called for her husband, but he turned out to be a greater man than David. He became desperate and sent him back with instructions that may eventually be fatal for Uriah. And if this wasn’t bad enough, he hid it and lived with the key until Nathan the prophet confronted him.
We know from the story that David suffered greatly for the remaining of his life as a consequence of his indiscretion. We know David suffered for his sin, but we also know that others did as well. Why? Because we who’ve been in close relationship with pastors who’ve fallen have felt a residual brokenness in us as well. A brokenness that lingers and even haunts us and hunts us years after our heroes have fallen.
So, how can we take care of the hurt and pain that fallen pastors and spiritual leaders have caused us? First, realize that any man or woman of God can fall in the event that they drift far enough. This shouldn’t be just true of some; it’s true of all. Second, realize that what they imagine and taught you about faith in Jesus remains to be true even in the event that they stopped living it.
The Bible tells us that the wages of sin is at all times death in a roundabout way. Remember that the devastation of their sin’s impact on you is proof that what they taught you is true.
Third, in some unspecified time in the future, you could have to forgive them. If you do not forgive them for his or her sin and what it did to you, they’ll eventually grow to be your excuse for falling back in your individual faith.
Fourth, seek to revive them to the religion if possible. This won’t be easy.
And last, don’t stop searching for role models in the religion, regardless that some have upset you or allow you to down.
What they taught you and I about Jesus remains to be value it. Let’s ask Jesus to heal us from the hurt they caused us, so He can stop the cycle of hurt with us and use us to influence others for His glory and their good.
