February 26, 2007
Guarding the Closet Door
On February 19, 2007 the Associated Press gave an update on the situation surrounding Ted Haggard’s encounter with a male prostitute. The report coming from Colorado Springs says, “Numerous individuals reported knowledge of New Life Church founder Ted Haggard’s struggle with a ‘dark side’, leading to his departure from the mega church, a member of the church’s board of overseers told parishioners Sunday.” I find it disturbing, but not surprising that numerous individuals had knowledge of Haggard’s dark side and yet did not expose him. I think the church resembles the world when it comes to being a whistle blower. We too are afraid of losing ministry positions, of being labeled a dissenter and of being expelled if we dare speak up. Does it seem to you that we fear men more than we fear God?
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Gail;
The preacher at my church for two weeks has crossed the topic in his sermons that it is “my church”. Last week he reasoned against objections to the terminology which insisted that it was rather Jesus’ church. Of course he acknowledged that truth, but he demonstrated that as the physical provision of this particular piece of the body was in our care it was our church.
The Bible gives us a greater obligation than providing the physical means for the functions of the church. God’s Word draws a definitive frame around behavior in the body, separating the acceptable from the unacceptable. Although we are directed to mind our own business about those behaviors that can only be inferred from the Bible as right or wrong, we are given an obligation to address behaviors the Bible clearly and definitively prescribes and proscribes. In this sense the church is also our church. So we have a similar obligation in our churches that we have in our homes 1) provide for it, and 2) keep it clean.
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