WWUTT 2430 Q&A Church Discipline, Removing Pastors, Michael Tait, the Christian Music Industry

If a pastor was removed for adultery and the church was told about it, is that the right thing to do or should it have been more private? What other ways might church discipline be conducted? And how do we respond to immorality in the Christian music industry?

The answer is when we understand the text.

This is When We Understand The Text, a daily Bible commentary to help encourage your time in the Word, brought to you by Providence Reformed Baptist Church in Casa Grande, Arizona. For more information about our church or our ministry, visit www .wutt .com.

Here once again is Pastor Gabe.

Once again.

Once again.

Proverbs on Pride, Integrity, and the Michael Tait Scandal

I love it. Proverbs 11 too we're starting with here. For when pride comes, then comes disgrace, but with the humble there is wisdom. Verse three, the integrity of the upright guides them, but the crookedness of the treacherous destroys them.

Last week, we finished up the episode talking about the Michael Tate scandal. Michael Tate, who had formerly been a singer with DC Talk and then the lead singer of the Newsboys. We're going to come back to talk about those things again today.

At the time that we recorded that, we only had one source that were making some allegations against Michael Tate. And even though the story itself and the persons that they interviewed, all of that appeared to be credible, it's still just one source.

And Michael Tate had commented back on that.

And he had already even issued his apology and everything else. I said that we needed to be slow on that because more things were going to come out. And sure enough, that same day that this episode posted, The Guardian had done their own investigation, affirmed all the other allegations that had been made by Michael Tate, plus expanded their investigation to include more.

There have been other stories that have come out, including an article in Christian Post where Christian singer Corey Asbury, the singer behind the song Reckless Love, which has been so popular in churches the last few years.

He claimed that everyone knew about Michael Tate's history of misconduct and alleged that many other Christian artists are also living double lives.

Oh my.

Which is incredible that if you knew that and you didn't say anything.

No joke.

Corey Asbury's music shouldn't be performed or sung anymore either. But we'll get to that here. So we're going to come back to that story.

Oh man.

Since there were many other things that had happened.

I mean, it's not totally, you know, unheard of or unexpected. But at the same time, I'm appalled.

This is Christian music.

Yes. There is a standard.

This is the kind of stuff that happens.

Like, you're supposed to be Christian.

Yeah, right.

There's at least a basic standard.

Right?

Am I expecting too much?

Right. There's basic moral decency.

Apparently, I'm expecting too much.

Even unbelievers know that you have to have. And here, among Christian music, we can't even have basic moral standards. So, yeah. No, you're right. You're right.

Okay.

All right. We're going to get to that later.

We are going to get to some other questions.

We're going to shove that. Put a pin in it.

Now that I got you worked up.

Oh my goodness.

I got you worked up and we're going to save it.

That is the first I'm hearing.

Okay.

We're going to do that in the second half hour like we did kind of last time and touch on some of those things near the end. But in the meantime, if you want to send us a question, you can always email us when we understand the text at gmail .com.

I got some heavy questions toward the end of the week, stuff that would be kind of in.

Depth.

So I'm not going to be able to get to those today. I want to spend a little bit more time on those. So if you sent me a pretty serious, heavy question and we don't address it here, then.

Hang on.

It might be something that we get to next week. But again, you can email us to when we understand the text at gmail .com. Don't forget voicemail.

Yes.

So go to www .utt .com and click on the voicemail tab. And we'd love to hear a question from you or a comment that you may have like this one from Chris.

Good afternoon, Pastor Gabe and Becky. And this is Chris from North Carolina. And I just wanted to say that it was a really sweet thing to hear your little one come into the studio there. And so glad y 'all didn't cut that out.

Over the last couple weeks, I've been out in the California desert experiencing that heat y 'all are talking about and a couple hours away from seeing my own family soon. So I definitely cherish those times with the little ones with a family and just precious.

Every time.

So I just want to say it. Bless my soul to hear that little voice on the on the podcast. God bless. And y 'all have a great rest of the week.

Oh, thank you, Chris. So if you listen to the full podcast and you got that second half hour, yeah, you heard the toddler come in.

Yeah.

Somebody else had messaged me and said, now, what was he asking about?

Yeah.

Yeah.

He wanted blue teas.

Yeah.

Blue teas.

What was he talking about? I drink mostly sweet tea.

Right.

That's my beverage of choice. He knows that he can't have sweet tea, at least after a certain hour of the day because of how much sugar. I mean, I'm from the South. So yes, because of the sugar in the caffeine content.

Right.

So he knows this is a drink that he can't have. So anything else that is a sugary caffeinated drink automatically gets called tea.

Mm hmm.

Well, somebody had given us a pack of those coconut Dr. Peppers.

Yes.

Which I kind of like.

I kind of like it too.

Not as good as original Dr. Pepper, but they did it right.

Yeah.

And they've got a blue label on them. So he came in here asking. Exactly.

Supposed to like, I don't know, enhance it or something.

He was up from his nap. He knew that after a certain time of the day, he couldn't have caffeine. So he comes to us asking, can I have one of those blue teas? It was the coconut Dr. Peppers in the blue cans.

That's what it was. So that was his that was his inquiry. We did some investigation. That's right. We did some investigation and found out what it was.

Yeah, we had him go point because we had no idea what he was talking about.

Yeah, I know.

I had I had to have him show me a blue teas. I don't even know.

We don't have any blue tea. Kool-Aid. But we don't have.

Right.

Yeah.

What would it be?

Kool-Aid?

He knows Capri Suns. He doesn't. He's not confused about tea and Capri Sun.

And he's not as forbidden from those as he is from, you know, soda or something like.

That.

Yeah.

All right. Well, we got another question here. And this one is from Janie.

Hello, Pastor Gabe and Becky. I really love and appreciate you guys. I listen to the podcast faithfully every day. And Friday is my favorite day. I keep you and your children in my prayers. Annie, Zachary, Aria, Mariah and Ezekiel.

Do I have the names right? My question is a sad one. My beloved pastor has unfortunately confessed to having a physical relationship with a woman in our congregation. Do you have any thoughts on how this very disconcerting sin should be handled within the church?

My pastor was immediately terminated and the announcement of his indiscretion was announced to the church body. Consequently, this has had a devastating effect on my faith. Do you think that the severe disciplinary measure was warranted or do you think that a Matthew 18 would apply in this situation?

Any thoughts or commentary you could share would be highly appreciated. Thank you so much. By the way, my name is Janie.

So appreciate you listening, Janie.

Thank you.

And thank you for your prayers, too.

Yeah.

Just one quick minor correction. But Aria's name is pronounced Aria, not area. That's common.

Yes.

That's a very common mistake. The matter of fact, when she was born, I think you corrected me on that at one point.

I did.

I said area.

Yeah. Yep.

And I'm the one who named her.

Yep.

And I had to be corrected on the pronunciation. But yeah, you got our kids' names right and we so appreciate your prayers. That is very kind of you.

Okay.

This is a difficult and delicate subject as much as it is a public thing. I mean, obviously the church knows, but it's still a very sensitive thing to have to deal.

With.

It is.

It is.

Now, it's something that we've had to go through before.

Yes.

Because we had an elder, which would be in the same position as a pastor, held to the same standards. He was a teacher in the church. He may not be that main teaching pastor every Sunday, but he's nonetheless considered a pastor in the church.

This was in our church in Kansas. He was caught in adultery and he had to be removed from that position as well. So the things that we went through, things that I think we did right and stuff I definitely would have done differently if given the opportunity to do that.

Over.

Well, that's a terrible way to put it, but if I had to do it over again, there you go. If I had to do it over again, I know what I would have done differently. So is this, was this handled the right way?

Should it have been handled in a more Matthew 18 style, as she said? Becky's shaking her head.

No. No.

Let's look at Matthew 18 first, and then we're going to go to 1 Timothy 5, where these things are talked about considering elders receiving this kind of correction. So in Matthew 18, this is where we have Jesus laying out the guidelines for church discipline.

And it begins in Matthew 18, 15. If your brother sins against you, go and tell him his fault between you and him alone. If he listens to you, you have gained your brother. But if he does not listen, take one or two others along with you that every charge may be established by the evidence of two or three witnesses.

If he refuses to listen to them, tell it to the church. And if he refuses even to listen to the church, let him be to you as a Gentile and a tax collector. So we have here what is called a four-step process of church discipline.

The first step being that if your brother sins, and specifically it says if your brother sins against you, you go and tell him his fault. This would basically be that you've seen somebody else sin. And so you're calling it out.

And if you're able to gain your brother, if he's convicted over his sin and he would repent of it, then it doesn't need to go beyond that confrontation. It's a one-on-one thing. That's step one.

And it's taken care of.

And it's taken care of. What you would hope to have happened in that process has occurred. You have a person who's been convicted over their sin and repents, and the purity of the body is maintained. Because church discipline is really all about the purity of the church.

Even if someone doesn't repent, if you're following the disciplinary process the way that the Bible gives it to us, then the goal should be the purity of the church. Whether he repents or whether he is removed, purity has been maintained.

And that's important. That's an important distinction because a lot of people define a church discipline as the goal is repentance. That's certainly what we want to have happen, but if they don't repent, it doesn't mean that we failed, that we somehow were unfaithful in this process.

We still need to be obedient to what God has said in his word. So step one is this one-on-one confrontation. Step two, if he does not listen, take one or two others along with you that every charge may be established by the evidence of two or three witnesses.

So this even goes back to Old Testament law. No charge is to be brought against a person unless it can be established by the evidence of two or three witnesses. Now this does not mean that you get one or two people to go along with you to agree with you about whatever you're raising against this brother.

So you're not bullying a person.

Yeah, right. It's like I've got two or three others that I've convinced are correct and so therefore you're wrong. It needs to be that they have recognized the wrong that he's guilty of and he won't repent.

Of it.

That's what it needs to be. And so if he doesn't listen to them, the second step of this process, then verse 17, you tell it to the church. That's been interpreted different ways. Do you tell it to the entire body of the church?

Or the elders of the church?

Do you tell it to the elders of the church? Is there a disciplinary committee?

Oh yeah, there's that too.

Depending on how your church's polity is set up or something like that. Now something that Becky and I have mentioned in recent weeks is that we had a person in our church once who was making slanderous comments of other people.

And those comments we knew to be false. We had tested those comments, knew them to be lies. And so we were not going to allow this person to continue to spread that in the body. They remained unrepentant, would not acknowledge that what they were saying was wrong even when they were caught in their lies.

And so they had to be removed. In taking that before the church, we as elders knew what they had said, but we weren't going to bring it before the body because it was just going to spread gossip. So some of those comments remained hidden.

And we had brought this up with regard to Josh Bice. When he was removed as president of G3 and his websites were scrubbed, like the different social media sites that he was using to make slanderous comments about other people, brothers and sisters in the Lord, those sites were scrubbed and now we don't know what the comments.

Were.

So people are going, hey, we deserve to get to know what the comments were. No, you don't.

No.

Not if it's slanderous.

Right. Because it was slanderous comments made about another person.

It doesn't matter. Otherwise it keeps going.

Yeah, exactly.

And that becomes gossip.

They achieve what it was that they were out to achieve by making these comments. So in cases like that, you want to keep it contained and you want to keep it small. I don't agree with the interpretation that you need to take this before the entire body and let them decide.

Right.

No.

Well, no. That could just mean inform the body, not have them vote on it. You turn to majority rule and you end up with a golden calf.

Right.

When you see democracy practiced in the Bible in that way, it doesn't go real well.

Not usually. And there's nothing new under the sun.

That's right.

You know, it's going to happen again.

They put the son of God to death, you know, so there's other stories I can tell about that too, where, where a decision was given to the congregation that just really was not any of their business.

Yeah, I know.

I remember this was.

I can recall some too.

Yeah.

I'm like, Oh goodness, I'm cringing.

Within the first year or two that I was a pastor, there was a matter that we brought before the body and I won't go into the details of it because that would be name dropping. But it was something that had already been decided among the pastors and suddenly we're bringing it to the body and the body shot it down.

Yep.

And I was, I was not involved in, yeah, it was not my decision to bring it to the body. That was somebody else's, but I was still like, that's none of their business. They don't even know all the ins and outs that we know that we had to go through in order to make that decision.

And obviously the congregation didn't trust the pastors in order to lead well and shot it down anyway.

But the senior pastor went with the body's vote and even voted with them, though we as pastors had already voted the other way. And I was so upset about that. I was, I was like, obviously you're still hanging on.

I wanted to tell him you lied to me, but anyway, yeah, that's a, that's, that's another matter. But it all just goes to say, there are some things that just the whole church can't handle.

Together.

It can't be done by the whole body. It's not even, it's not even practical to do it that way. So understand what is meant by tell it to the church. You as a, as a church body, as a polity need to be able to define that.

And then if he refuses to listen, even to the church, let him be to you as a Gentile or a tax collector. In other words, he's a false convert. And so he would be removed from the body and not a member of the church any longer.

You would still want to share the gospel with him and hoping that he would repent. Exactly.

Yes.

Hoping that he repents and comes back in, he can be restored back to the body and then the grace of God would be displayed in your midst. That'd be a wonderful thing for that to happen. But if, but that's the four-step process there.

So you have one-on-one, you have the establishment of two or three witnesses, tell it to the church. If he refuses even to listen to the church, then he's to be removed and to be treated as if a Gentile or a tax collector.

Now there's another process in Titus 3 that is a three-step process.

Yes.

I was going to just touch on the fact that there's more than one way in the Bible to confront sin. And everybody goes to Matthew 18, because that's just a common one where, you know, sinning against a brother or a sister in Christ, it's the one that's most common.

Yes.

But there are other ones.

Yes, there are.

Okay.

So anyway, go ahead.

So with this one, and this is even given in a different context. So Titus 3 .10, as for a person who stirs up division after warning him once and then twice, have nothing more to do with him. Knowing that such a person is warped and sinful, he is self-condemned.

Now the context of this appears to be false teaching. So back to verse nine, avoid foolish controversies, genealogies, dissensions, and quarrels about the law, for they are unprofitable and worthless.

And Paul had previously told Titus about teachers that would be unqualified because they're teaching these kinds of things. So a person who stirs up division is dividing because he's teaching things that are wrong, that are causing division among the body.

So you warn him once, and hopefully after that warning, he's going to say, you're right,.

You're right.

These are tertiary doctrines, or they're out of left field, or whatever else. I need to be careful with saying these things. And then if he still persists in that, you warn him a second time. I know, it's a habit I need to break, thank you for confronting me in it.

Maybe removing him from the position until he can learn a bit better, or something to that effect.

Or unlearn the habits.

Yeah, unlearn bad habits. But then after that, after once and then twice, have nothing more to do with him. So that's a three-step process. One warning, two warnings, and then he's removed. Knowing that such a person as he persists in doing things that sow division and teach falsely would be warped and sinful.

And he's self-condemned. You're not condemning him by removing him from the body. He's shown himself to be self-condemned because he won't listen to sound judgment and reason and won't be shaped by the right teaching of the word.

Now he could even be introducing doctrines that you wouldn't necessarily call heretical, but they are matters that are causing, that are sowing division in the body in such a way, that it's not even about the commonality anymore, or even about the statement of faith that we've agreed upon as a church.

And now you're sowing these other things that are causing division. So it doesn't have to be a heresy that they're necessarily teaching falsely.

Right, just as long as it's making ripples in the church.

Exactly, yeah. It's dividing over non-essential things. And this person is not reasoning or they may even be taking doctrines and placing a fundamental importance on them.

Oh yeah, there's that too.

That the body doesn't consider to be fundamental. So that's the three-step process. The two-step process is given in 1 Corinthians 5. So you identify him, you remove him from the body, and specific sins are given there.

Sexual immorality, and then also idolatry, reviling, drunkenness, and swindling. Greed is also mentioned there as well. So 1 Corinthians 5, 11, where those things are mentioned, that person needs to be removed from the body.

And yet, still hoping that such a person would be convicted over their sin, and then could therefore be restored to the body. But you have some sins, therefore, that are treated with greater severity than others.

And even in the same context of this particular sin in the body that Paul is confronting in 1 Corinthians 5, it's in chapter 6 where he says that sexual immorality is committed against your own body. Every other sin is outside the body, but sexual immorality has a uniqueness to it that's different than every other sin.

We've talked about pastors that are caught in adultery before, and even citing from Proverbs the uniqueness of that sin and the severity of it. That he marks himself when he's committed adultery, and it has a more severe outcome to it than any other sin that we might commit.

Remember that adultery in the Old Testament in theocratic Israel, if you committed adultery,.

You got stoned to death.

You got stoned to death.

Right.

You got put to death for that. That was a capital punishment.

Yeah.

So a capital crime, capital punishment. Therefore, we need to treat it severely, even though we're not dragging our pastors out to the parking lot and stoning them.

Praise the Lord.

But it's still a serious sin that needs to be taken seriously and dealt with seriously.

Definitely.

So consider again, as I mentioned, the instructions that are given in 1 Timothy 5. It says in verse 19, do not admit a charge against an elder except on the evidence of two or three witnesses. So there you have that again, just like church discipline is given in Matthew 18.

But this with regards to an elder or a pastor in the church. Do not admit a charge against him. He's in a public position. He's in a position in which he's in front of other people. There are probably people even outside the church that recognize him as a man of God.

That's what the people in his church think of him as. He's a man of God. So therefore, he's like the leader of all of them. This is what unbelievers are going to perceive him as.

Right.

And so he's expected to have a certain kind of reputation.

Right.

Hence why in the qualifications for an overseer that you have in 1 Timothy 3, he must be above reproach.

That's what I was going to say.

Yeah.

And he must even have a good reputation among outsiders, it says. So if he has a bad reputation, like is anybody going to be interested in what that church stands for?

Right.

And the gospel that they share and things like that. So he must even have a good reputation among outsiders. But because he's in that public position, that position that's seen more so than any other people in the body, then it's likely he's going to take some shots other people in the congregation won't receive.

Like people are going to be delivering blows against him that most any other lay person is not going to experience. And so therefore, the church needs to give grace in those matters. When charges are raised against a pastor, don't admit a charge, except on the evidence of two or three witnesses.

And we've seen situations before too of like a pastor having to confront somebody in the.

Body.

Well, then that person's response is to fire back, to get revenge. I'm going to say all these things about my pastor and get people on my side.

So discord. As much as possible.

Yeah.

And we've seen that before too.

Yes.

So hence why this is important for the whole body to recognize, don't accept a charge against an elder, except on the evidence of two or three witnesses. Even when you have a friend that comes to you and said, do you know what the pastor said to me?

Not to say you shouldn't take that into consideration, whatever he may have said, but take with a grain of salt. If somebody has some bitterness against the pastor, I still need other evidence when you're making this kind of charge against his character.

Yeah.

Well, I mean, I've always talked about that filter of, you know, like whenever you're listening to someone, you're going to either take it as, oh, wow, they were very helpful. Or you're going to take it as, oh, well, the huh, you know, kind of attitude.

And so whenever you're being corrected, if you're being corrected by a pastor, especially, it's like being called into the principal's office when you were a kid, you know, kind of thing where you just automatically feel like you're being humbled.

And I don't know too many people who like being humbled. So, you know, at least at first.

It's humbling. It is.

It's very, very hard to do and to be put in that position of, but it's good for us, you.

Know.

So eventually you come back around. They may have taken what the pastor was saying in such a way that the pastor was not trying to communicate that to. Even though the words come out the same, the intent might be different, if that makes sense.

Yeah.

Right.

So anyway, going on in 1 Timothy 5 and verse 20, as for those who persist in sin, rebuke them in the presence of all so that the rest may stand in fear. So you do have a charge that's made against an elder.

You are able to establish it by the evidence of two or three witnesses. They won't come to repentance. And so therefore he needs to be rebuked in the presence of all. It needs to be known to the church.

Here is what he did. And that way the rest may stand in fear. They may recognize none of my sins are kept secret either. God knows what my sins are.

Yeah.

And so that they would stand in fear and desire holiness and would understand too that this man is disqualified. It's not good when a church removes a pastor and tries to conceal what it is that he's being removed for.

Right.

I can give you an example of this. This was either a year or two ago, but when Tony Evans stepped down at his church in Dallas because of some unspoken sin, he didn't say what it was and the rest of the church didn't say what it was.

Now my dad has loved Tony Evans for years and he called me up and was asking me questions about that. And I remember one of his questions too being something like, what can we learn from the Tony Evans situation?

And I said to him, nothing. We have no idea what he did. And so there's nothing therefore from that situation to even learn from it, except to learn that's not the way you handle this situation, whatever it was.

And I'm not persisting in this because I want some bit of gossip. It's what the Bible says. If he's guilty of a sin for which he needs to be removed, then he needs to be rebuked in the presence of all so that the rest may stand in fear.