John MacArthur

[RamistThomist]

I am sure thoroughly weighed the issue and found no fault.

I never said anything bad about JM himself. I'm just pointing out it isn't a fuzzy issue, he said she said. I think the child molester is in jail, so there is some objective guilt there known by all sides.

 

[davejonescue]

I never said anything bad about JM himself. I'm just pointing out it isn't a fuzzy issue, he said she said. I think the child molester is in jail, so there is some objective guilt there known by all sides.

Nobody is disputing what a man convicted of a crime did. The point of dispute is if Grace acted maliciously in their handling of the issue. I don't know, I wasn't there. All I know are Pastors I hold in high esteem also felt however they handled it, was not a reason to disfellowship or disassociate from Grace. As an outsider, its all I have to go on. If I have to choose between Joel Beeke or Julie Roys, I am choosing Beeke.

 

[lynnie]

I'm done talking about it. I wasn't there, he is dead. And like I said, other Pastors I hold in high esteem, I am sure thoroughly weighed the issue and found no fault. If you would like to, you are free to, and so is anyone else. Please, carry on.

Brother Dave, be careful. Many of these same men you admire and esteem did exactly the same thing about a dozen years ago, maybe a little longer, with CJ Mahaney of Sovereign Grace Ministries. We followed the story because we were once members of an SGM church. There were at least a few dozen SGM churches- Calvinist, Baptist. They were sort of a Piper-Grudemite combo with a lot of legalism and top down control thrown into the mix, although our experience in the 1990s managed to be a good one for the most part.

Mahaney ended up very tight with Together for the Gospel and Gospel Coalition guys, and was at most of the conferences as a speaker. Around 2011 a dam of sordid stories broke when the former #2 guy in the organization published a lot of serious allegations about Mahaney. It was kind of like Vinnie disclosing where Mario and Luigi buried all the bodies....the #2 was not a good guy himself, but he knew the history.

As I said, a dam broke. A lot of people spoke up who had lived in fear of the retribution if they dared to tell their story. The worst was all the bungled sex abuse cases, and the women being told to stay with pedophile hubby. Or the little kid being told they are a sinner too, and that moral equivalency being pushed to shut things up. One couple we had known had a hub in jail for molesting the kids, and child services said "doesn't your church know that if he comes back into the home, we have to remove the kids?".

There were so many stories, and some were personal testimony with no "proof", but some involved the perps in jail. I mean, the guys had confessed.

To make a long story short, the whole crowd of celebrity preachers some of whom you named all immediately defended Mahaney at first. They labeled it slander and gossip, and accused victims or the victims parents of being bitter and rebellious and all that jazz. It went on for quite a while-years. There was one blog I followed called SGM survivors which was a mix of people, but I read things by former SGM pastors and staff on there that was sorrow for the sheep, caring for the flock, and trying to get things made right. ( the blog hosts eventually didn't want to keep paying the bandwidth charges and took it down, once SGM was essentially defanged and broken up). And the accusations and libel by some celebrity preachers towards the SGM critics was just awful.

Finally a lawyer named Rachel Denhollender (sp?) got to meet with Al Mohler and laid out the facts, the main one being how Mahaney had lied. Mohler accepted the facts, admitted publicly that he had been wrong, that CJ lied to him and been responsible for much harm, and then he broke up with Mahaney and all the brother-stuff with seminary and conferences and so forth. And all of a sudden you didn't hear about any of the big celebrities hanging out with Mahaney and SGM any longer. Maybe its out there- I am so done with that crowd that I could miss the latest news of course.

The point here is- IT HAPPENED BEFORE!!! not long ago, and with many of the same guys. They are -well, were- doing the same thing with JM that they did before with Mahaney. I had looked in vain for a long time after Al Mohler went public about being wrong, for something similar from some of the big names out there. Were they sorry for what they had said? Did they ever on any level face that they had been duped? When I see-well, saw- the same people schmoozing with JM I wondered.

You need to be careful Dave. Peter joined the wrong celebrities in Galatians and even Barnabas was led astray, plus I assume much of the church. Meditate on that. Don't assume just because it is Peter the great preacher and apostle who worked miracles, and Barnabas, that they must be right about the guys they were hanging with. Those guys were not fine and anybody who assumed they were because Peter fell in with them, was led into serious deception- "under a curse, bewitched". You will see more of this someday I am sure, so don't check your discernment and investigative skills at the door just because of some guy you esteem.

 

[Beoga]

Two hundred years ago Christian men defended or were silent about slavery. They should have known better.

Twenty years ago, Christian men held marriage in high esteem and were so afraid of divorce that they encouraged even abused women to stay with their husbands. They should have known better.

I have heard that part of Pastoral training in Russia involves teaching these soon to be pastors to not beat their wives. They should know better.

There are things obvious to us today that the past should have known but didn't. I think we can properly recognize their errors and sins without holding them to the standards we have today.

I am fearful of the positions and practices that we hold to today, for which we should know better, that Christians in future generations will judge us for. Hopefully we will not be judged with the the same measure we have used to judge.

 

[TheInquirer]

The Gray abuse case isn’t the only troubling issue with MacArthur. There has been lies he’s been caught in (his college sports prospects, where he was during the MLK assassination), nepotism, harshness, pride, questionable financial issues regarding how much he was paid from the various non-profits he served, plagiarism (other’s work attributed to him including Master’s faculty) and false teaching (Dispensationalism, incarnational sonship which he thankfully publicly recanted of). There was also another shepherding issue I was made aware of regarding the rape of a Master’s College female by a Master’s male student when Rick Holland was college pastor who consulted MacArthur about what to do (the female was treated poorly) but I don’t have the full details on that one. I believe Rick Holland left not long after that and I wondered if there was a connection but that was quite some time ago. Then there is a doozy of the account of how he got his wife if you can get someone to tell you that one. And those are only the ones I know about. I wouldn’t be surprised if more comes out in time.

Even more troubling to me is the only time I have ever seen anything that remotely looked like an apology is his public statement regarding the eternal Sonship of Christ. - https://www.gty.org/articles/A235/reexamining-the-eternal-sonship-of-Christ

However, this is an example of the kind of language he used before he changed his position:

“Don’t let anyone tell you that Christ is the eternal Son...Christ’s Sonship began at a point in time, not in eternity...Christ was not a Son until He came into this world through the virgin birth" (The Superiority of Christ–Hebrews 1-2, 1986, pp. 52-54). - https://www.middletownbiblechurch.org/sonship/sonjm13.htm

Now imagine you are sitting under that kind of forceful teaching for years. He’s talked like that with all kinds of teaching and sometimes its good, sometimes not. A compounding factor with his teaching is he was truly elevated to an Apostle/Pope like status in his circles and many were afraid to oppose him. Does that sound like a humble, servant leader to you? Its no surprise the shepherding debacles turned out the way they did - my understanding is MacArthur’s word ruled, period.

Plenty of people knew what was going on in MacArthur land but I sensed a lot of fear of retaliation or blacklisting from those who would only talk privately. The excuses were always along the lines of - “Well, he’s doing a lot of good…” Heard that before?

MacArthur has no more chances to publicly repent. However, for this to have good outcome from it for those of us watching from a distance, we need to learn from these sins so we don’t repeat them ourselves or allow them to fester in our own churches if we have the chance to do anything about it. Unfortunately, too many of MacArthur’s sins have been replicated amongst pastors that have been trained up under him and have blindly followed his lead. Thankfully, some have seen, or are seeing, the light and have made good changes. Yet some, regardless of what facts have come out, or will come out, will refuse to listen which is tragic. The cult of personality is very, very strong around MacArthur.

I hope his death will actually provide some freedom and relief from pressure for those who knew there was something wrong with the entire system but were afraid to act, speak out, or make changes. However, if the cult of personality only strengthens after his passing, I’m afraid many of the problems will just keep persisting which is why I even bother with these debates.

Pastors like Joel Osteen are easy targets to pick on but few if any of us are influenced by him which is why I don’t even bother with guys like that. The bigger problems are the MacArthurs and Doug Wilsons in our own camp. We need to see more clearly what is going on in our own backyards and never, ever put any man on a pedestal and think his behavior or teaching can’t be evaluated or questioned according to the Word of God, no matter how unpopular it may be to do so.

 

[LilyG]

However, for this to have good outcome from it for those of us watching from a distance, we need to learn from these sins so we don’t repeat them ourselves or allow them to fester in our own churches if we have the chance to do anything about it. Unfortunately, too many of MacArthur’s sins have been replicated amongst pastors that have been trained up under him and have blindly followed his lead.

GCC prides itself in "following the biblical model" of church government by having elders appointed. But they have deprived themselves of the biblical model of outside accountability. It's heartbreaking for those in an independent congregation who have nowhere to turn for appeal.

 

[John Nyberg]

GCC prides itself in "following the biblical model" of church government by having elders appointed. But they have deprived themselves of the biblical model of outside accountability. It's heartbreaking for those in an independent congregation who have nowhere to turn for appeal.

All forms of church government are imperfect. An elder run baptist church is arguably preferable to a baptist church ran by a single individual. Abuse and cover up happen in presbyterian models as well.
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Brother John..... "Perhaps, instead of casting stones and accusations we should "Fear God and keep his commandments" (Ecclesiastes 12:13) in light of our approaching demise. This is the proper christian response to the death of a saint."

You could be correct if this was about beliefs on the rapture, Israel, the Jews, and the future. You could be correct ( I don't agree but it could be agreed to disagree) if it was concerns about many other things in the past at JMs ministry- plagarism, accusations, harshness, and all the many criticisms and concerns. One could even argue that adults who are mistreated can entrust their souls to God in faith and move on. Taking the logs out of our own eyes is always a good decision for our own life.

But little kids who were sexually molested and then essentially thrown under the proverbial bus by a church staff- no, absolutely not. There is only one response and that is to make sure that in no way at all, even by your silence, you cause one of these little ones to stumble. Better to hang a few cinderblocks around your neck and go drown yourself.

Anything short of public apology and public admission of serious wrongdoing to sexually molested children is, in the words of Jesus, worthy of death. Doing whatever you can to make things right where sexually abused children are involved is the proper Christian response. It is not to "believe they will stand before God in judgment based on the merit of their own personal (laundry) list of good deeds rather than the finished work of Christ!". No, it is not self righteousness. It is caring about the least of these, it is obedience to the Lord.

I appreciate the response, thank you for the food for thought, sister.

 

[LilyG]

All forms of church government are imperfect. An elder run baptist church is arguably preferable to a baptist church ran by a single individual. Abuse and cover up happen in presbyterian models as well.

Of course. But outside accountability is a biblical model for a reason. Stuff gets caught and corrected a lot more effectively.

 

[John Nyberg]

Of course. But outside accountability is a biblical model for a reason. Stuff gets caught and corrected a lot more effectively.

Agreed!

 

[Stephen L Smith]

A few years ago at a theology conference, pastor - theologian Dr Jim Renihan expressed his concern that the Elders at Grace Community Church in LA held to an absolute rule position on the Church. That is, the elders ruling on Church decisions was final.

If you wanted to disagree with the elders, you had to apply for a special 'dispensation'
[I could not resist ]

Seriously, the lack of checks and balances in this situation is troubling.

 

[Sovereign Grace]

For some odd reason, Dr. MacArthur's teachings never appealed to me. He seemed to be on point in the few sermons I did hear from him, but, as the old timers used to say, "I just didn't cotton to him."