# Here is a Pastor that can use our prayers....



## ZackF (Mar 17, 2009)

Who's beyond God's grace???


----------



## OPC'n (Mar 17, 2009)

I think the pastor needs prayer but the guy should have never left prison even if he has been converted. If he hasn't really been converted, then the pastor has just endangered his family for whom is responsible and took an oath to protect from a predator. I guess I'm not being very gracious here....sorry, I just have a particularly difficult time with people like this even though it is only through God's grace I'm not in his shoes.


----------



## ZackF (Mar 17, 2009)

sjonee said:


> I think the pastor needs prayer but the guy should have never left prison even if he has been converted. If he hasn't really been converted, then the pastor has just endangered his family for whom is responsible and took an oath to protect from a predator. I guess I'm not being very gracious here....sorry, I just have a particularly difficult time with people like this even though it is only through God's grace I'm not in his shoes.



Not an easy situation. How many people did Saul have stoned to death?


----------



## Theoretical (Mar 17, 2009)

The problem is that the government should have executed this murderer instead of allowing him the easy out of a plea bargain second degree murder. If allowed to live, then he should never be released.

Now that he's out from the governmental system breaking down, may his conversion be a true one and he never commit another crime.


----------



## turmeric (Mar 18, 2009)

St. Paul's case is a little different - he wasn't driven by lusts which he never learned to control to commit unpredictable crimes against children - he was acting as an agent of a quasi-legal organization carrying out policy - admittedly with great zeal. It was still murder but a different kind, and more predictable. I would never place this guy in a home with children, even if his conversion is real. After all, sanctification is not instantaneous as a rule.


----------



## ZackF (Mar 18, 2009)

turmeric said:


> St. Paul's case is a little different - he wasn't driven by lusts which he never learned to control to commit unpredictable crimes against children - he was acting as an agent of a quasi-legal organization carrying out policy - admittedly with great zeal. It was still murder but a different kind, and more predictable. I would never place this guy in a home with children, even if his conversion is real. After all, sanctification is not instantaneous as a rule.



I'll grant you for the sake of argument Paul's case. Progressive sanctification is not instantaneous or it wouldn't be called progressive. While saying that, the guy has been in the dock for thirty-five years. I don't think I would have him stay either but the situation is a pastor, in his own fallible discernment, is up against a village with pitchforks and torches. 

A good friend of mine from church is a registered offender. He in no way puts himself ill at ease with the other parishioners, nor does he ever asks to be "trusted" or any such creepy behavior. He realizes the hereafter consequences of his actions include life long suspicion. My unbelieving friends do not know about his past because I fear that he would be verbally abused or that I would be looked down upon for associating with an offender. With that fear I can't imagine what that pastor is going through.


----------



## AThornquist (Mar 18, 2009)

Lord protect that community, especially the children, for Your glory...


----------

