A Theft In Texas - Follow Up

 

The church in Texas that produced the musical Hamilton without permission, changing its content, has admitted wrongdoing, apologized, and is destroying all its recordings and images of the production. Furthermore, its pastor wrote:

 

"I recognize as the Pastor of the church that I have an obligation and responsibility to follow the law and educate our community about these protocols."

 

While this is certainly a smart legal move by the church and pastor, it is a smarter spiritual move, for when we have sinned, is there any better move than confession, repentance, and making amends when possible? Furthermore, when we sin publicly, ought we not to repent publicly? When leadership sins, ought it not to acknowledge such publicly?   

 

This is indeed an all too rare occurrence among Christian churches and organizations. The church in Texas indicated that it is looking at this as a learning opportunity and notice that it isn’t attempting to justify its actions, to make excuses. This is a model for both the professing church and the world – a model of how to receive correction and how to respond to correction – both as leadership and as the people of Christ. And note that in this case, the professing church received its correction from the world, not from within the church culture – perhaps we could also learn from this. When elements of the world look at the church and say, “This ought not so to be,” perhaps we ought to pay attention?

 

As Francis Schaffer used to say, the world has a right to judge the Church. Jesus gave it that right in John 13:34 – 35 and John 17:21 23; we should be judged by our love for one another and by our unity. From where I sit, we look like a pretty sorry bunch.

 

We can model reconciliation, we can model repentance, we can model what to do when we sin, when we do what we ought not to do – and the sooner we do it, when we are wrong, the better off we are all. I have found that when this is our way of life, that when we do this in what we think are small things, that we will also do it in large things (in things that may cost us dearly – but it will cost us more dearly if we don’t repent), and please understand that there are no small things, for there are no small people, no small sins, no small hurts, no small testimonies. May I give you some examples in my own life?

 

I recall a telephone conversation that escalated into loud voices when I was CFO of an organization. My door was open, and my entire team could hear me up and down the hall. The conversation, if it can be called that, terminated when I and the person I was speaking to hung up without closure. After I hung up I thought, “O my, what have I done?”

 

I immediately went into every person’s office and apologized for my behavior. Then I called the other person back and apologized, we then solved the problem at hand. The sooner we, by God’s grace, move to reconcile and make things right the better off we usually are, sometimes things can be more complicated, but as a rule, “the sooner the better” is the best course of action.

 

I think of another time I was having a phone conversation (telephones and emails can be challenging!) with one of my managers and I fell into sarcasm toward her (O what an idiot I can be!). After we concluded our chat and I quickly reflected on my attitude, I called her back and apologized. Now here is a critical thing, she said, “Bob, that’s okay, I know you are under a lot of pressure and you don’t need to apologize.”

 

I replied, “Susan” (not her real name), “I was wrong to have that attitude toward you and I need to tell you that I am sorry and ask you to please forgive me. You must never accept it when someone speaks to you like that, and I must never pretend it didn’t happen when I do it. I need your forgiveness; will you please forgive me?”

 

I’d like to give you two more examples that are a bit different. In the next example I was having a disagreement over the phone with another executive within our company, and while I was right in my position, I was wrong in the way I was handling the discussion. The other person got extremely angry and hung up. In this instance I did not immediately try to make things right, and upon reflection I’m not sure that I could have considering the nature of the disagreement and a few other dynamics…I’m not making excuses, I just don’t know what I might have done in the circumstances. The situation was exacerbated in that our offices were located in different regions of our state and we had never met – in fact this was the first time we had ever spoken.

 

After a few weeks I emailed her and asked if we could have lunch, I really felt that we needed to meet face to face due to the nature of our disagreement and the fact that we’d never met face to face.

 

Lunch was great, we tried to beat each other with the first apology, and other than that we got to know each other – we did not talk about the substance of our disagreement and I think that was fine in this instance. What mattered was hitting the reset button on our relationship. From that point forward we had, I believe, a good relationship and I never sensed any stress or tension and I certainly came to understand her in a way that, perhaps, I would not otherwise have had we not had our disagreement and subsequent lunch.

 

I’ll share my fourth example and have some more reflections in my next post.

 

100 Days of Dante - Again!

 Baylor's Honor's College is doing 100 Days of Dante again. For those of us who missed it last year, here's another opportunity. Since I started late last year I had to play catch up, but it was worth it and I plan on taking the journey again beginning August 31. 

For the most part, the presenters are very good; there were a couple that weren't. Each presentation usually lasts from 7 - 12 minutes, some are a bit longer. The presenters come from various traditions, Protestant and Catholic, and from both North America and Europe.

This is unfamiliar territory for most of us, but that's the way we learn and are challenged. For sure, the Inferno ought to remind us that sin is real and not to be trifled with. As for Purgatory, the principles contained in it are well worth pondering; frankly, at this stage of my life I am convinced that we experience Purgatory one way or another. And by the way, just to clear things up - and even some of my Catholic friends don't know this - Purgatory isn't about getting a "second chance at salvation." Only those who know Christ already can enter Purgatory. I've experience a good bit of Purgatory in this life...what about you?

As for Paradise, I dearly love this section of the Divine Comedy - can you possibly improve on, "In His will is our peace"? This is a wonderful taste of God's glory and our eternal destiny.

Okay, that's my pitch for Dante!

Info is below - you may have to click on the Baylor link twice, once on this page and once on the next page.

Much everlasting love,

Bob

Dante Lovers, We are back! Maybe you made it all the way through Paradise, and want to make the journey again. Or maybe you got bogged down in Purgatory and want to start over. Either way, we are inviting you to participate once again in the world's largest reading group of Dante's Divine Comedy.   Starting August 31st, we are going to be sending emails with videos and questions every Monday/Wednesday/Friday, until Easter. If you want to join, head over to our newly redesigned website and sign up with your email for the reading plan that starts on August 31st. If you don't, you will not hear from us again until we have some new, cool project that we want to tell you about. That's right: you will only receive emails if you sign up again at 100DaysofDante.com. When you get there, you'll discover that you can also sign up for the "power user" plan, which gives you 100 emails in 100 consecutive days. Go for it! Whatever you decide, we would love it if you would forward this email to three friends from church, work, or school and help us form the world's largest Dante reading group (again). Until our paths cross again, then, thanks for your support of this project. Let's keep reading together. -The 100 Days team

A Bumper Sticker

 

A Bumper Sticker

Robert L. Withers

           

I thought You were a bumper sticker

How stupid could I be?

I thought You were a pithy saying,

“I Found It” I proclaimed.

 

Then I thought You were an experience,

Which I needed to join the club.

Then it was that special doctrine,

Distinct to just a few.

 

But of course You were really all about music,

A certain sound and type.

And then it was a worldview,

And then a certain flag.

 

Then a political party, came to save my soul,

Did I mention health and wealth, or eschatology?

But then I left them all behind,

So that I could follow You.

 

Cause You ain’t no bumper sticker,

Or any of these other things,

You’re Jesus Christ the Son of God

And You died and rose for me.

 

And I will glory in nothing else,

For there is no one other than You,

To Whom my soul belongs,

Jesus Christ, I’ll follow You!!!

St. Jerome

 

St. Jerome

Robert L. Withers

 

I’ve not read much from St. Jerome, but I like him.

Why?

Because he is said to have been irascible.

 

Cantankerous, cranky, feisty, grouchy, testy.

Irascible.

I can’t hang with Jerome with intellect, but maybe I can with temperment.

 

Hey, I’m better than I was…I think.

But, I still have that trait of being….irascible.

I can see it now, at the gate to Mount Purgatory.

 

Peter looks at me and says, “Ah yes, Bob, irascible.

“You’ve got a long climb.”

“Just glad to be here,” I reply.

 

I am better than I was…I think.

Maybe?

Just maybe?

A Theft In Nashville (2)

 

As I’ve pondered the tragedy of sexual sin propagated by clergy and other religious leaders, here are some more thoughts:

 

Quite a few years ago, a ministry with which I was associated as its interim director, was domiciled on the campus of a large church. One day our female administrative assistant came to me with a complaint about an employee of the church and his uninvited behavior toward her, a behavior with sexual currents.

 

When I brought my colleague’s concerns to the church’s executive pastor, he was completely unprepared to respond to our concerns and my colleague’s fear of the future. It is not fruitful to provide anymore details, other than to say that the church’s lukewarm response, and its apparent lack of concern to protect my female colleague who felt threatened, exacerbated the situation.

 

Contrast this large and prominent church with business firms I have worked with, in which it was mandatory for all personnel to have annual training in preventing sexual harassment, and in which it was mandatory to report all instances of sexual harassment and of a hostile work environment. Furthermore, these firms had a protocol in place that was to be followed whenever incidents of sexual harassment or of discrimination were reported.

 

How can it be that the women who work in these firms are safer than many women who attend church, or otherwise work or attend school in “Christian” settings? Is some of it related to the fact that there are less legal protections in religious settings than in the business world? For example, while businesses cannot discriminate in hiring because of age, churches can stipulate that a pastoral candidate be in a certain age range. They might as well say, “Moses need not apply.” (Moses was 80 years old when God sent him back to Egypt to deliver Israel. Consider, we elect people to be our nation’s president who are well beyond the age at which many churches would consider as a pastor).

 

Ought not the standards of all religious groups be higher than the surrounding culture? Ought not organizations that profess Jesus Christ be the safest places on earth, rather than places which cover up sin?

 

“Christian” organizations are often some of the most closed and opaque organizations, seeing transparency as the enemy – and I suppose with good reason. What a contrast to the transparency of the New Jerusalem of Revelation chapters 21 and 22!

 

 

A Theft In Nashville

 

A Theft In Nashville

Robert L. Withers, August 20, 2022

 

As you may have heard or read, the United States Department of Justice is investigating the Southern Baptist Convention regarding sexual abuse. There is a long history behind this, and, as is often the case, it contains heartbreaking stories of those who were sinned against being silenced by those in power. Here is an excerpt from a statement made by the leadership of the SBC on August 12, 2022, in response to the DOJ investigation:

 

“While we continue to grieve and lament past mistakes related to sexual abuse, current leaders across the SBC have demonstrated a firm conviction to address those issues of the past and are implementing measures to ensure they are never repeated in the future.”

 

This statement demonstrates that the leadership of the SBC, if we may call it such, doesn’t get it, anymore than the Roman Catholic Church seems to get it, anymore than – I suppose – most church organizations and “ministries” and “Christian” schools and colleges get it.  It seems we always have an excuse, a reason, a denial, a cover up…even as we inflict yet more pain on victims by telling them to shut up or paying them to just go away with non-disclosure agreements. Or, as in the case with residential schools, whether they be in North America or Ireland or elsewhere…we literally bury our “mistakes” and excesses.

 

Biblical language is vital to a professing Christian’s thinking, as is obedience to God’s Word. When we substitute other images and ideas and use language which does not portray Biblical language and clearly communicate Biblical thinking, then we have a problem, then we have a smokescreen, then we have denial. Consider the following from the above SBC statement:

 

“…grieve and lament past mistakes related to sexual abuse…”

 

What happened to sin? What happened to the heinousness of sin? What happened to repentance? What happened to accountability to God, His Word, and the Church? What happened to the disgusting way in which people in power, in offices of ministry, use that power and trust to gratify their sinful lust by stealing innocence and trust and purity and peace from women and men and boys and girls and families and congregations? And then others in power engage in cover up, protecting these men – and they do it within systems that allow and encourage them to propagate the cover up…where is the acknowledgment of this?

 

If a system and culture allow such things to happen, and protects those in power, often crushing those who have already been deeply hurt – ought we not to look at the system? Ought we not to consider that the system itself is sick and sinful?

 

“Sexual abuse”?  “Mistakes”? Really now. What about sin? What about a class of sin that the Bible clearly portrays as being from the pit of hell? I am speaking of false teachers who take advantage of those in their power (see 2 Peter Chapter 2 and Jude). Yes, there are levels of sin, and certainly the most egregious sin (if we can use such a term) is that of those in a position of power, whether minister, priest, pastor, elder, teacher, counselor, or physician (or a political leader), who use their position to prey on others – whether by false teaching or other sinful actions. The Bible is replete with passages condemning and judging those in power who deceive and misuse and sin against those they lead and are called to serve…whether these people are within or without the professing People of God – though most of the Bible’s focus is on those within the Kingdom of God.

 

The therapeutic language used in the above quote from the SBC is indicative of the language used by other “Christian” organizations for sin, and this is a repudiation of the Bible in that Jesus Christ did not come to redeem us from mistakes, but from sin; and in that the Bible does not judge our mistakes, but our sin; and further in that the Church of Jesus Christ is not called to judge mistakes within herself, but rather sin.

 

This language minimizes the harm and violence and desecration perpetrated on the innocent, as well as upon the Bride of Christ. It displays an absence of the fear of God (2 Cor. 5:9 – 11; 1 Tim. 5:20; 1 Cor. 3:16 – 17).

 

Furthermore, such thinking downplays the high calling of Gospel ministry, for Gospel ministry is a position of sacred trust; trust that God and the Church have placed within those called to serve others. When positions of trust are violated, the violators must be removed from their positions of trust and not be reinstated. The Flock of God needs to be protected, just as patients need to be protected when a physician perpetrates sin on those who trust him.

 

Those who coverup sin and give violators protection, allowing them to continue in their wickedness, for it is indeed wickedness, become partakes of these sins.

 

As we see in 1 Timothy 5:20 and 2 Corinthians 5:11, fear is a good thing; and while we all ought to fear sin, those in positions of authority ought to especially fear violating the sacred trust which they have been given – and they ought to know that should they violate the trust which God and the Church have placed in them, that they will be removed from their positions never again to serve in such capacity. Godly fear protects us all. A physician ought to fear losing his medical license for violating patients, and those in Church leadership ought to fear the consequences of perpetrating sexual sin on others.

 

A high view of the Bible, of the Bride of Christ, and of leadership within the Church (which is really servanthood (Matthew 20:24 – 27), brings with it a recognition that a violation of trust has dire consequences. Attorneys can be disbarred, doctors can lose their licenses, C.P.A.s can lose their certifications; barbers, real estate agents, taxi drivers, contractors, electricians, plumbers – all of these men and women can be removed from their positions if they violate ethical and legal standards – how much greater ought to be the consequences when a minister, priest, teacher, or elder perpetrates sexual sin on other people?

 

And let’s keep in mind the violence done to the victim’s heart, mind, and soul; the pain inflicted on families, on congregations, and the discredit done to the Gospel of Jesus Christ. How can we use therapeutic language in light of the foregoing? Such language is yet another coverup, yet another theft.

 

 

A Theft In Texas

 

The phone rang about noon on a Sunday.

“Hello.”

“Hi Bob, this is Susan, I’m sorry to bother you but we have a problem.”

Susan was the property manager at an apartment community in my portfolio in Baltimore, MD, for her to call me on a Sunday wasn’t good.

“What’s going on Susan?”

“I was showing a prospect an apartment in building “C” and as we were walking, I happened to look down the street at the shed we use to store window air conditioners. I saw Jeremy’s van backed up to the shed and saw Jeremy, our assistant maintenance manager, loading air conditioners into it. Since I knew he wasn’t working today, and that even if he was, that there are no apartments that have malfunctioning air conditioners right now, I called the police.

“They arrived in just a few minutes and when we confronted Jeremy he told them that he was going to keep them in his van for safety.”

“Say that again please.”

“Jeremy told the police and me that he was loading them into the van so that they would be safe.”

“Then what happened?” I asked.

“The police asked me if he had authorization to take the air conditioners and I said ‘No.’

“They asked me if I wanted to press charges and I said ‘Yes.’ Then they took Jeremy away and I called Don [the maintenance manager] to please come to work and put the air conditioners back in the shed and change the lock.”

“Okay, thanks Susan, unless you need me for something right now, I’ll be over at the property first thing in the morning. Thanks so much for handling this, I really appreciate it.”

A few weeks later Jeremy was before a judge in a Baltimore City court. After Susan and the police testified, Jeremy took the stand. When his attorney asked him why he was on the property on a Sunday morning, when he was not scheduled to work, and why he was loading air conditioners into his van, this is what he said:

“I couldn’t sleep Saturday night because I kept thinking about the air conditioners in the storage shed. I was worried that the lock on the shed was so old that it would be easy for anyone to break it and steal the air conditioners. I decided the best thing to do would be for me to load as many air conditioners as I could in my van for safekeeping.”

The judge asked Jeremy, “Did you get permission from either the property manager or the maintenance manager to do this?”

Jeremy answered, “No sir. I thought that the situation was so critical that I needed to safeguard the air conditioners as soon as possible.”

The judge did not believe Jeremy and found him guilty of grand larceny.

Jeremy’s theft happened many years ago in Baltimore, MD. There was recently a theft in Texas that I want to talk about, a theft which is particularly sad because it was done by a pastor and his congregation. It has been in the media for the past few days and it is yet one more stain on the professing church. I will not go into the deep background or the many details, the basic facts are what I want to focus on.

A church produced the musical Hamilton without permission of the copyright holder. Not only did it produce the musical without permission, it altered the content of the production. When you take something that doesn’t belong to you, it is theft. There may be other legal words to describe what happened, but from a Biblical perspective it is theft. The theft is compounded in that the church altered the property it took, it used the musical to generate money, and it used the musical to propagate a message that is at odds with the intent and philosophy of the legal owner of the musical.

When I was in Massachusetts, our church musical group decided to produce a CD of its music. I still recall how careful they were to procure permissions from the copyright holders for all the songs they used that were not in the public domain. A group in the same church decided to present a production of Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat. Again, they were careful to obtain permission from the copyright holder and to pay any necessary fee – and by the way, the production was an astounding success.

During the preparation of Joseph, I asked the head of the group if we could alter a word or two in one of the songs, I didn’t care for words, “Any dream will do.”  She checked with the copyright holder and was told that we couldn’t; we honored that stipulation. Since we couldn’t change those words, I wrote a short piece for the playbill that talked about God having a special plan, or dream if you will, for each of us and that it is found in Jesus Christ. We had a contractual obligation to the copyright holder to present the musical as it was – not as we wanted it to be. The property did not belong to us and we needed to honor the fact that we were simply given a license to produce the property/musical as it was written.

It is important not to steal from people, whether the property is an air conditioner or a musical; and professing Christians, above all others (I hope), ought to know this and to know that nothing justifies such theft, such taking of property that does not belong to us.

Aren’t we already doing enough to disgrace the Gospel? Do we really need theft added to the stain on our garments?

 

 

 

 

 

 

Rhubarb or Rutabagas?

 

 

I saw them to the left of the parsley, above the radishes, below the leeks – long and pink they were, and they were there for me; finally, at last, a special pie was, the Lord wiling, in my future. I tore a green translucent plastic bag off a nearby roll and placed a few of the pink stalks in it, then closed the bag with a twist-tie (usually there are no twist-ties in the store, but today was my special day in the produce department).   

 

After finishing my journey through the store, I entered the checkout line. There was a young man at the register with an older lady bagging and coaching him; he was the trainee and she was the trainer. I am a regular customer at this grocery store and it was the first time I saw Frank, while Gloria, the woman doing the coaching, was a familiar face.

 

As Frank was scanning the bar codes of my purchases he picked up the green plastic bag and quizzically looked closely at the pink stalks – no bar codes – terror! While most produce items now have bar codes these pink stalks, unattached to each other, did not – before I could enlighten Frank, Gloria spoke up, “Those are rutabagas.” No sooner had those words come from her mouth than the word “rhubarb” came from my lips.

 

There was a momentary silence, brief, almost imperceptible. Followed by an explanation from Gloria, “Well, different people call them different things.”

 

At that point I launched into the merits of a rhubarb-strawberry pie and how while many people have never tasted this delicacy, that I was certain that such delight was in my future owing to these pink stalks and my wife’s enduring love for me, a love often manifested in baking.

 

After arriving home and unpacking the groceries, I scanned the sales receipt and saw that my rhubarb was indeed shown as rutabagas on the receipt.

 

Two days later I was back at the grocery store for more rutabagas (rhubarb); I needed more for the pie. The same young man awaited me at the register, and this time when he picked up my rhubarb he did it in utter and complete confidence. Naturally, when I got into the car to drive home I first looked at the sales receipt – behold, I had once again purchased rutabagas!

 

To the best of my knowledge there is no recipe for a rutabaga pie. Rutabagas are a cross between a turnip and a cabbage, in case you were wondering. Historically they have been popular with Swedes and Finns, so popular with Swedes that I’ve read that our British cousins call them “Swedes.” Is this akin to Tom Hanks calling a basketball “Wilson”?

 

However, while I began this meditation on rhubarb and rutabagas somewhat fancifully, I’ve since come to a sobering thought. At first I thought it was a great illustration that many people have Gloria’s attitude about life, “People call it different things.” Meaning that we often assign names and meanings to ideas and concepts without any foundation, just because we feel like it or because we heard it from someone else and adopted it for our own - without any investigation. I’ve often seen this in congregations, among friends (both Christian and non-Christian), in academia, and in our society. I’d say that the news media, from the left to the right, have finely honed the art of calling rhubarb rutabagas…as have more than one popular preacher or “Christian” media personality or author.

 

How often do we read a Bible passage and deny that it is rhubarb and instead insist that it is a rutabaga? We can always respond, “Well, people call it different things.”

 

But here’s the thing that transported me from fancifulness to sobriety, I asked myself, “How many times have I done this? Am I doing it now?”

 

I can look back over my life and see that there have indeed been times when I not only called rhubarb rutabagas, but I also vehemently defended my position. I not only defended my position, but more than once I used my position as a litmus test for fellowship, for relationship, for acceptance of others.

 

I have, by God’s grace, made some major theological changes in my life…and I am still seeking and still learning. I have also made some major changes in my thinking about society in general. So I know by experience what it is to call a rhubarb a rutabaga, my present concern is…am I doing it now?

 

What about you? When have you realized that you’ve been calling a rhubarb a rutabaga? Chances are…that if you can’t think of an example in your own life…that perhaps…just maybe…there could be a possibility…that you might do well to review the sales receipt and consider just what it is you’ve purchased.