Lord, Have Mercy!

Dear friends,

I am so thankful for the kind words of support that have filled my inbox and been spoken to me personally in the past two days. (See Friday night's blog post, which has had over 1,000 page loads so far.)  It's been quite the journey that past few years, learning more about the mercy and grace of God.  This morning, I definitely looked forward to being spiritually refreshed at Lake Baldwin Church. I was particularly excited that our pastor, Mike Tilley, would be preaching on Colossians 2:6-15.  Mike spoke about 5 things in our walk with Christ:

A Growing Walk in verses 6-7:

So then, just as you received Christ Jesus as Lord, continue to live in him, rooted and built up in him, strengthened in the faith as you were taught, and overflowing with thankfulness. 

A Careful Walk in verse 8:

See to it that no one takes you captive through hollow and deceptive philosophy, which depends on human tradition and the basic principles of this world rather than on Christ. 

A Christ-Centered Walk in verses 9-10: 

For in Christ all the fullness of the Deity lives in bodily form, and you have been given fullness in Christ, who is the head over every power and authority. 

A Freedom Walk in verses 11-14:

The Crucifixion"
by Matthias Grunewald,
National Gallery of Art

In him you were also circumcised, in the putting off of the sinful nature, not with a circumcision done by the hands of men but with the circumcision done by Christ, having been buried with him in baptism and raised with him through your faith in the power of God, who raised him from the dead.  When you were dead in your sins and in the uncircumcision of your sinful nature, God made you alive with Christ. He forgave us all our sins, having canceled the written code, with its regulations, that was against us and that stood opposed to us; he took it away, nailing it to the cross. 

A Victorious Walk in verse 15:

And having disarmed the powers and authorities, he made a public spectacle of them, triumphing over them by the cross.

All of these words from Colossians 2 are so relevant to me right now!  I don't need empty religion, but fullness in Christ.  Not everyone who teaches the Bible is Christ-centered.  So much of what we hear can be misleading and actually turn us astray from truth.  We need to know it for ourselves, reading Scriptures and meditating on what the verses say.  Even a paragraph or a chapter a day can make such a difference.   Nurturing our personal relationship with Christ will help us to endure the temptations brought by suffering, peer pressure, loss of spiritual emotions, the hypocrisy of other Christians, and our own failures and sense of unworthiness.  Since Christ has taken the punishment for our sins, we can be free to walk in a new life of victory as the Holy Spirit works in our hearts.

I thought you also might enjoy one of the songs from this morning.  I actually recorded the congregational singing on my iPod, but you can hear my voice and it's not exactly in tune...  (When I lamented about that to Thad, he patted my arm sweetly and said, "What's really important is singing joyfully."  I was doing that, from the heart.)  So instead, let me present a YouTube version of Michael Smith's classic "Lord, Have Mercy" as sung by Eoghan Heaslip.  The lyrics are on the screen...



I leave you with a poem I wrote several years ago about the mercy of God.

Rhapsody in M

by Virginia Knowles (Advent 2006)

Myriad mercies:

more and more

merited? no!  no merit in murky miserable me

Mystery:

manic malice meted on Messiah Martyr

Mighty and Meek

Miracle:

manic malice meted on my Mediator misses me

marvelous mercies ministered on me

Majestic Master:

master me

move massive mountains in me

make merry melodies in me

mirrors of Thee in mere me

more and more

myriad mercies  

~*~*~ 

But when the goodness and lovingkindness of God our Savior appeared,

he saved us, not because of works done by us in righteousness,

but according to his own mercy…  Titus 3:4-5a

Let us then with confidence draw near to the throne of grace,

that we may receive mercy and find grace to help in time of need.  Hebrews 4:16

The steadfast love of the Lord never ceases;

his mercies never come to an end;

they are new every morning;

great is your faithfulness. 

Lamentations 3:22-23 

Christ's mercy on you and yours...
Virginia Knowles
(This post first appeared in my Weekend Gratitude series on www.virginiaknowles.blogspot.com.)

My Thoughts on CJ Mahaney and Sovereign Grace Ministries

Welcome to my commentary about CJ Mahaney and the current crisis in Sovereign Grace Ministries.  Please note that this post, originally written on July 8, has been substantially revised, reorganized, and updated as of July 16.  I have also deleted many comments (mostly my own!) because I either incorporated the information into the main blog post or I felt that they detracted from the flow of the conversation. If you have comments about this or any other post, I would be delighted to hear from you, even if I can't always respond right away.

As a followup, on July 16, I also wrote My Recommendations for CJ Mahaney and Sovereign Grace Ministries. This new post also includes my responses to concerns brought up by readers of the original post that you will read below.  

Please note: I am adding in a few comments at the bottom of this post as of December 3, 2011 and again on October 17, 2012, and again on February 15, 2015.

Dear friends,

On July 6, I was quite surprised to receive the news that C.J. Mahaney, the president of Sovereign Grace Ministries, had stepped down temporarily for a season of evaluation and repentance in the midst of grave allegations about his leadership.   One paragraph from Mr. Mahaney reads, “Over the last few years some former pastors and leaders in Sovereign Grace have made charges against me and informed me about offenses they have with me as well as other leaders in Sovereign Grace. These charges are serious and they have been very grieving to read. These charges are not related to any immorality or financial impropriety, but this doesn’t minimize their serious nature, which include various expressions of pride, unentreatability, deceit, sinful judgment, and hypocrisy.”

Why should this matter to you, and why does it matter to me?  It should matter to you because Mr. Mahaney is a well known author and conference speaker who is lauded as a leader among Reformed evangelicals like John Piper, Al Mohler, Ligon Duncan, Mark Dever, Mark Driscoll and others.  His young protégé Josh Harris is also a popular author and speaker. As such, Mr. Mahaney has a lot of influence, and how he behaves reflects on the church at large.  It matters to me because for 8 years, I was a faithful member of SGM.  Most of my family and I left the local SGM church last year, but we still have an adult daughter and many dear friends who are members there. (Note: As of fall 2014, the local church we attended is no longer a part of SGM. I am glad.)

I would like to share with you some of the back story, starting with how it became more of a priority for me.   A little over three years ago, while corresponding with a Mormon friend about our respective faiths, I started researching not only the Latter Day Saints church, but the dynamics and doctrines of other contemporary religious movements. I focused particularly on ones with authoritarian leadership styles and/or unusual beginnings.   (Later this study would also expand to the patriarchal segment of the Christian home schooling movement, where there is much overlap. I have written a series on Gender & Authority.)  By what I would call divine coincidence, I stumbled on a pair of blogs written by ex-members of SGM, www.sgmsurvivors.com and www.sgmrefuge.com.  In the posts and comments, they shared raw tales of abuse of authority, church dysfunction, and pastoral mishandling of serious situations such as child molestation, domestic abuse, substance abuse, mental illness and suicide. Other recurrent themes are the intense sin-focus, the inward and outward legalism, the lack of grace, and the quenching of the transforming power of the Holy Spirit – all of which I was already noticing more and more as the months and years rolled by. 

What about the authoritarian leadership model? Another observation was that SGM (then known as People of Destiny International or PDI) had its earliest roots in the shepherding movement, which advocated invasive scrutiny of members’ lives by pastors and home group (aka care group) leaders, while at the same time not holding these leaders themselves accountable to their own congregations. The “shepherding movement” was founded by the Ft. Lauderdale Five: Derek Prince, Don Basham, Bob Mumford, Charles Simpson, and Ern Baxter. Most of these five men realized the danger of what they started, and later publicly disavowed the model and methods as being dangerous.  A former PDI pastor named Chris wrote to me questioning details of PDI/SGM’s early associations and influences with these men and their followers, and suggesting that PDI invented their own “creative brand of control” that resulted in fostering “the amazing blogs that have flourished” (referring to Refuge and Survivors).  On the other hand, I have been told by an ex-member that the shepherding movement’s New Wine magazine was often read by PDI pastors.  Either way, the general consensus among ex-members is that the organization did indeed adopt an unhealthy level of control at all levels.  Chris (the pastor) did join others in pointing to the influence of Bill Gothard, whose conferences and materials about family life (Institute of Basic Life Principles) and home education (Advanced Training Institute) were popular among PDI leaders.  (As a side note, I have been reading countless tragic stories by people whose lives and families have been shattered by IBLP’s and ATI’s legalistic requirements and rigid emphasis on authority. There is an entire web site devoted to former members at www.RecoveringGrace.org.)  Whatever the formative influences were, I believe that SGM never completely outgrew that paradigm, though it has softened somewhat over the years. Typically, in this kind of environment, there is a pervading atmosphere of fear among both pastors and members. 

• fear of failure if someone in leadership isn't telling you what to do
• fear of taking initiative on new projects because that will be seen as pridefully “putting yourself forward”
• fear of being seen as unsubmissive (especially the wives and young adults)
• fear of being dismissed as proud and bitter if you try to bring up something bothering you
• fear of being publicly shamed, asked to leave the church, or shunned by the members
•         fear that you will lose your children to “the world” if you choose not to do it their way, which in SGM circles usually  means home schooling and courtship
• fear of other evangelical Christians not in or approved by your group (as evidenced by which quotes are mentioned from the pulpit and which books are sold in the church bookstore)
•  fear of trained mental health professionals, Christian or secular
• fear of the culture around us

Did all of this drama affect our own congregation in Orlando?  Yes, most certainly. I am not going to detail specific incidents that were personally troubling to me. That would be unnecessary and perhaps hurtful to those who were involved. However, I will say that I was noticing enough “red flags” to really bother me, primarily in home groups, women’s events, congregational meetings, and church discipline situations. In addition, while I like to think that I am normally a cheerful and easy going person, I experienced periodic depression and anxiety. While there certainly may be other factors (like having 10 children in 18 years) I attribute the increase in symptoms to an atmosphere of neo-Puritan “worm mentality” and fear. (See my poem “It Became to Me a Dark Thing".) Increasingly distressed and trying to stay objective, I was putting up with all of it the best I could for the sake of my relationships there and out of a sense of loyalty to the church.  However, there were a few trigger incidents which I could not let slide by without speaking about my concerns to the pastors, especially regarding the nature of grace in the Christian life.  They listened carefully and politely, and I respect them for that.  They also preached a wonderful series on the grace of God, which was a huge blessing to me. I started to hope that there might be some meaningful change in the atmosphere of the church. Then in early 2010, our worship pastor resigned, citing irreconcilable differences with the other pastors over a period of years. All of the sudden, people in the pews who had been blissfully ignorant of any on-going problems got a really rude awakening. They started asking questions and demanding answers. Congregational meetings got quite heated. Other disturbing things happened as well. For many of us, it was just too much to stay. From what I’ve been told, about 300 people, maybe more, have left the church since then. (This kind of mass exodus has happened in other SGM churches as well.) A sizable percentage of those who left had been members for over 20 years.  Many of them had been pillars of the church, serving as leaders in the home groups and other vital ministries.  We were among those who transitioned into other congregations. Our family eventually settled in a small Presbyterian (PCA) church where the pastors and elders are more accountable to the congregation. Please know that I do not bear any animosity toward the pastors or the people in our former local church. The pastors have always been very kind to me personally, and I wrote a blog post nearly two years ago sharing what I appreciated about each of them. You can find it here: Appreciating the Pastors at Metro Life Church. On July 22, I wrote Ten Things I Appreciate About Metro Life Church. My primary protest is against the SGM leadership, polity, and overbearing emphasis on pastoral authority and the sin nature that is propagated from the top of the organization to the bottom. I think it is unfortunate that local pastors have gotten stuck in that mess. I hope that is clear from what I write.

And somehow that brings us to the July 6 announcement from Mr. Mahaney. Many people have started congratulating him for being so very humble and honorable to come forward. I seriously don’t believe that such praise is warranted in this sobering time. Unfortunately, I think his announcement is too little, too late. He speaks as if he intends to take a short sabbatical season away from his duties so that his offenses against a group of select disaffected former pastors can be evaluated and corrected by a team of men. Then he intends to return and lead SGM into a future of fruitful ministry.  Hello?!?

In addition to the aforementioned protest blogs, hundreds of pages of careful documentation by former SGM Brent Detwiler were anonymously uploaded to the web. I have only read excerpts and summaries, but from what I understand, the evidence is quite incriminating about severe dysfunction within the organization. Coupled with the decades of serious stories about spiritual abuse and grossly mismanaged family crises that have already been reported by ordinary former members from every single SGM congregation, we’re taking deep trouble throughout the entire organization. This is a top down systemic infection, not an isolated bump here and there. If even a fraction of what has been reported is true, I personally think Mr. Mahaney’s poor job performance has disqualified him from ever returning to a prominent position in ministry. I don’t think that his peers on the SGM board of directors are qualified to restore him to it, since by many accounts they too have been complicit in this sorry situation for a long time. 

The odd thing is, that just a week after announcing that he would step down for a season until his sins could be evaluated by an independent third party, the SGM board has now decided that he is fit for ministry and leadership. They are still going through with the outside evaluation, so this latest announcement seems to be quite a bit premature and presumptive. Ostensibly they are basing this on the grounds that Mr. Detwiler failed to follow their prescribed means of redress to their satisfaction, and therefore they are discounting the validity all of the charges presented in his exhaustive documents. I think these are two separate issues. As a mother, I do not say that one of my children is innocent of all manner of household transgressions just because his or her sibling has tattled with an obnoxious attitude. The legitimacy of the grievances must be dealt with separately from the legitimacy of the means by which they are brought. 

I know it seems harsh for me to say all of this about disqualifying CJ Mahaney and the board of directors. This is obviously my own fallible opinion from the peanut gallery. I don’t personally know Mr. Mahaney, though I have heard him preach on numerous occasions. Nor do I have an accurate window into his heart in the past, present or future. But here is my reasoning: to extend grace and forgiveness is one thing, but restoring real trust is quite another. The recent admission of problems by Mr. Mahaney and the SGM board of directors is also seen by many as preemptive posturing of humility in the face of increasing public exposure and impending humiliation, rather than as evidence of genuine repentance and responsibility. I think SGM’s credibility has pretty well been shot. I am not ready to glibly forgive-and-forget-and-restore-the-man-to-power when there are so many wounded by SGM who have been almost completely ignored in the past few decades. I am astounded that public figures like Southern Baptist Theological Seminary president Al Mohler are so quick to endorse Mr. Mahaney’s character and move on. Maybe this is sincere loyalty and admiration from Mr. Mohler, but detractors have been quick to point out that donations (in excess of $100,000?) to the seminary by Mahaney and SGM had something to do with that. Oh my.  


All that aside, though, think about the logistics of the corporate world for a moment. If you had a man or woman applying to be the CEO in your business or non-profit, and candidate’s previous personnel file revealed the kind of mismanagement that Mr. Mahaney has been charged with, would you hire or promote this person? Not likely! And if they were already “on board” you would probably fire them very quickly and very permanently.  But, you might object, Mr. Mahaney founded this organization!  It’s his ministry! Oh no, it’s not! The church belongs to our Sovereign God.  Leaders must be accountable, first to the Lord and then to the people. The church is the whole body of Christ: the people, not just the pastors. If a pastor is not serving his people with integrity and skill, and is instead causing grave harm, he does not belong on the job no matter how penitent he is. That is especially true of the man at the top, who sets the pace and the protocol for everyone else. If Mr. Mahaney was the president of another church denomination such as the Baptists or Presbyterians, where leaders are accountable to and elected by members, would he be reelected with his reputation? I don’t think so. How does the concept of grace and forgiveness automatically equate with his qualification to lead in the future? It’s not about him. It’s about the effectiveness and health of the church. Even if he totally changed his ways, there would be that element of distrust and disrepute hanging on to him – and to the church he continued as its top leader.

People need to hear the truth in plain words, even if it is excruciatingly painful.  Do over 50,000 hits in less than 12 hours on July 9 at the www.sgmsurvivors.com web site mean anything? Charges of “gossip and slander” against those who speak out aren’t going to cut it anymore. See here for a very insightful article by Bob Bixby called What Bitterness REALLY Is. Let’s not play the “bitterness trump card” and blame the victims, like Mahaney’s T4G conference colleague Ligon Duncan does when he calls on his ministry constituents to “ignore the assaults of wounded people on attack websites and blogs, and that you discount the opinings of those who have no real knowledge of these matters or relation to SGM or authority to comment upon them…” Yes, sir, that’s quite the way to dismiss the legitimate concerns those who have been hurt by their very real firsthand knowledge of life within SGM! NOT! The anguished appeals for reform have already been exhausted over and over again for decades. The leaders of SGM – not just CJ Mahaney – have chosen to be above any real accountability for too long. Now they have to pay the piper and face the music. 

Do I want to bring others down?  No, I want to lift others up, to see the downtrodden restored to their dignity.  Will CJ Mahaney "go down" in the process?  I don't know. I do hope that the man who wrote the book Humility: True Greatness will, through true humility, find that true greatness. That is the greatness of really serving (in deeds, not just platitudes) and restoring the thousands of "the least of these" who have been so devastated as a result of his actions over recent decades. I do think Jesus would be most honored and glorified if he did that. Then "the gospel" that SGM has proclaimed truly would be the Good News of Jesus that it was intended to be. So whatever their initial motives were, I hope and pray that Mr. Mahaney and his colleagues will indeed use this opportunity for true repentance, evidenced by actual restitution and reconciliation with members and ex-members at all levels, not just pastors. He has often preached about the local church being “the happiest place on earth” – but many who came will never darken the door of a church again because SGM broke their sacred trust. Others have fortunately found refuge in grace-filled churches that respect individual people in the pews, not just the leaders. 

What is going on with Josh Harris, senior pastor of SGM’s 3000 member flagship congregation, Covenant Life Church? My first thought about Mr. Harris was amazement that he allowed dissenting comments on his blog announcement of Mr. Mahaney’s temporary resignation. I totally respect that! Mr. Harris is garnering the appreciation of many observers by his forthright admissions about the severity of the problems, his acknowledgement of the truths contained in the blogs and the uploaded documents, and his stated determination to see this situation through to resolution. This includes, I am told, a new CLC church constitution approved by the members of the congregation. You can listen to his Sunday morning sermon addressing the situation at CLC here: The Father’s Discipline. However, Mr. Harris’s approach is not necessarily shared by the SGM board members. Due to disagreements with how to proceed through this time of correction Josh Harris has resigned from the SGM board of directors, though he will continue to attend the meetings.  The board issued a statement of Where We Differ and Where We Agree. This young man is certainly in my prayers!  He has made a good start, and I hope he works to keep this process moving in the direction of integrity and responsibility. 

I also need to humble myself and share the SGM blame in my own small ways. For years I quieted my own conscience, my own God-given sense of right and wrong.  For years I was so proud (let’s make that arrogant!) that I belonged to THE church that featured what I thought were right doctrine and right living. (Ginny Jacobson, who attends our former church, addresses this tendency in her insightful blog post here: A Fallen Idol - One Man's Sin Exposed My Own.) Where else could I find that unique blend of Reformed / Baptist / Charismatic teaching, amazing worship music, and devout fellow members who took their lifestyle choices like home schooling and courtship seriously? I advertised SGM conferences, books, and CD’s in my e-magazine and on my blogs. I always alerted my friends whenever CJ Mahaney would be in town, so they could come hear him preach. For years, I told friends what a wonderful place our church was to raise children, not fully aware of how many of the young people were struggling and straying because of their experiences there. Beyond our tithe to the local church, we gave extra offerings to SGM until the last year, when I couldn’t do that in good conscience any more. We were deeply involved in all sorts of activities and ministries at church. (I do not regret this, because we have wonderful memories and dear friends from these times.) But it seemed like we were always there, taking somebody to something at the church building almost every day of the week. I was so committed that I thought I would be a member of that church until I died. And lo and behold, I did start dying, inside, little by little. And I let it happen with only a squeak or two here and there, until God mercifully poked me hard and woke me up.  

I have a few seemingly random mental images to share before I close this note. There are others in my mind, but these should suffice.

The Berlin Wall: Ronald Reagan calling on Gorbachev to tear it down and the freedom-loving people of Germany dismantling it chunk by chunk. It’s time, folks. Call for truth and freedom. Don’t settle for anything less. Pull down the barriers until the truth is known and the arrogance, fear, and control come tumbling down.

The tale of “The Emperor Who Wore No Clothes”:  His royal tailors assured him that his finery was crafted from such a special fabric that only the wise could see it. And all the people, including the emperor himself, “saw” his beautiful clothes because they wanted to be thought wise.  Then a truly wise little boy cried out, “But he doesn’t have anything on at all!” And they all realized what fools they had been. Some of you have suspected something amiss for quite some time, but feared being labeled as foolish or non-compliant if you dared to speak up. Call it like it is, dear little flock. Be bold. Speak truth to power. You don’t need to feel naked or vulnerable yourself, because Christ himself clothes you in his very own righteousness, the garments of joy and praise instead of the spirit of heaviness. 

“With liberty and justice for all”: the last phrase of the Pledge of Allegiance.  Sweet Jesus, under your victory banner, bring that liberty and justice to the least of these my brethren. Bring your healing and grace. Help us to cling to our precious identity in Christ, and never let anyone snatch it from us.  Help us to reclaim the transforming  dignity that as believers we are (as 1 Peter 2:9 so gloriously declares) “a chosen people, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people belonging to God, that you may declare the praises of him who called you out of darkness into his wonderful light.”  Help us to focus on you, the perfect life you lived, the victory you won over death through your resurrection, how you promised the Holy Spirit would indwell us so that we could be more than conquerors “through him who loved us”!

One final word to my friends who are members of Sovereign Grace Ministries, including my own former pastors. Even if you are upset at what I have said, I hope you can respect that I am trying to be true to what I believe. I love you dearly, and I miss you. I know many of you may be shocked and even offended by my words, but I write from my heart because of my concern for you. Please consider my words and pray about how this affects you. My brothers and sisters, cry out to Jesus, the Good Shepherd, who truly gave his own life for you, who bids the weary to come and find rest in his gentle yoke, who leads us on the true path.  Writing this reminded me of a short story that I wrote for my Mormon friend.  You might enjoy it as well.  You can find it here: Parable of Grace.

As a followup to this post, I wrote My Recommendations for CJ Mahaney and Sovereign Grace Ministries. The new post also includes my responses to concerns brought up by readers of this original post.  I also ask you to read Ten Things I Appreciate About Metro Life Church and add your own list in the comments.

Update on October 17, 2012: Three more recent developments:

1. Sovereign Grace has moved its headquarters to Louisville, Kentucky, where they have also started a new church plant. Sovereign Grace Church brings history, controversy to new Louisville launch
2. SGM is also being sued by three women.  "The plaintiffs allege a conspiracy spanning more than two decades to conceal sexual abuse committed by church members. The alleged abuse happened in Maryland and northern Virginia in the 1980s and 1990s. The lawsuit accuses church representatives of permitting suspected pedophiles to interact with children, supplying them with free legal advice to avoid prosecution and forcing victims to meet with and “forgive” the person that had molested them."  Lawsuit claims evangelical church group concealed sex abuse allegations in Md., Va
3. Local churches are starting to dis-affiliate from SGM.  I believe that I have heard of four so far, three of them in Florida.  Here is one link: Sovereign Grace Church of Daytona Beach Leaves Sovereign Grace Ministries

Update on December 3, 2011: After nearly five months, there does not appear to be any substantive progress at the national level.  Here are the top ten  developments, with links to articles and blog posts from various sources, including www.sovereigngraceministries.org, www.sgmrefuge.com, www.sgmsurvivors.com, and www.larrytomczak.com. 

1. The pastors of Covenant Life Church (led by Josh Harris) are seriously considering withdrawing from the SGM organization, which has been headquartered in the church building.  (See the "Family Update" letter to CLC members.)  
2. Mr. Mahaney and much of his extended family (which includes other pastors) left Covenant Life Church and attended a non-SGM church (Capitol Hill Baptist) for a while before moving on to Solid Rock, a more sympathetic SGM congregation in Maryland.  
3. Mr. Mahaney has retracted his confession (see transcript from November pastors' conference, with added commentary by Kris of SGMSurvivors) and continues to speak publicly in various venues, including a message at the conference.  
4. Also at this pastors' conference, attendees were instructed to go back to their congregations and root out “divisive” members.  
5. Brent Detwiler, the insider who released hundreds of pages of incrimination documents, has been publicly shamed and shunned by his former congregation. Members have been told to avoid talking to him, as well as encouraged to defriend him on Facebook. 
6. Jared Mellinger, a pastor in one of the Pennsylvania churches, warned his church that it was more destructive to read anti-SGM blogs than to go to a porn site.  (That’s a real head scratcher!)
7. Larry Tomczak, who co-founded PDI (now SGM) has issued his own statement about his departure from the organization in 1997, acknowledging the blackmail and cover up. 
8. Todd Twining (my friend and former MLC worship pastor) wrote about his own departure from SGM.
9. Ambassadors of Reconciliation has been doing in person and phone interviews with people who have been adversely affected by SGM and will eventually present its conclusions and recommendations.
10. The SGM board is conducting its own review by setting up three panels of current pastors do investigate the issues.

I personally have a hard time believing that the leaders of SGM are planning to change course in any significant redemptive way.  Right now, they seem to me to be in full damage control and spin mode.  I would concur with Mr. Tomczak that they all need to step down.  Their integrity and credibility are in serious question. I am more confident than ever that I made the right choice to leave SGM last year.

February 2015:

I can't even begin to update you on all that has happened within SGM in the last few years since I wrote on this, other than to say that there were even more serious allegations of sexual abuse against children. You can read more here Sovereign Grace and Saving Face and Abuse Thrives in a Culture of Shame and Silence.

The key thing for me, which I mentioned as an update in the article, too, is that the local church of which I was a member has since disassociated itself from Sovereign Grace Ministries, as have many other congregations. Though I still attend another church, I am currently active in the homeless outreach ministry at this former SGM church in the Orlando area and maintain many dear friendships there. 

With love,

Virginia Knowles

www.WatchTheShepherd.blogspot.com

On Mommy Blogging: Image, Identity, Authenticity and Freedom

Dear friends,

Are you ready for my musings on the subject of blogging? Thanks!  Don’t mind if I do!  

A bit of background, shall we?  I have been writing for the on-line community on the topics of education, spiritual life, and family life for 13 years now through my Hope Chest e-magazine, and blogging for over three.   I technically have seven blogs, though I only post at least weekly on a few of them: my “life” blog, a blog of encouragement for moms, and a preschool/elementary education blog.  I think there are about 550 articles on them, including excerpts from two of the home schooling books I have written.  Most of my posts are about whatever is on my mind at the moment that I think might be interesting, inspiring, amusing or otherwise useful to someone else out in cyberspace.  I try to be intentional about what I write, and think about who might be reading it and how it will affect them.  My thoughts have certainly morphed over the years, definitely more divergent and less rigid, and hopefully for the better. 

Writing, for me, is a potent means of self-expression.  It helps me think.  I’ve often said that I can’t NOT write.  It is an integral part of who I am.

Not only do I write about who I am, I write myself into who I am becoming.

Meander with me a moment longer into perhaps unfamiliar territory?  I regularly read two blogs written by ex-members of a church organization of which I too am an ex-member.  Some of it is pretty dicey stuff, which is understandable since it is written from grief, confusion, pain, and justifiable anger over distressing, long-term, unresolved issues.   I take it with a grain or two of salt, realizing that most of it is valid, but still trying to use discernment.  I agree with enough of it to keep reading and occasionally contributing my own comments.  It helps me to realize that I am not crazy to be concerned about the things that were red flagging in my mind for years.  It helps to know that I am not alone.  I think one thing that strikes me about these blogs is that while they are a bit raw with emotion and assertions, there is reality and authenticity to them. Maybe because most of the people there post their comments anonymously, they relish the liberty to express their deeper feelings that they had squelched for so long out of fear and peer pressure.  They work it out and find healing and refuge as they write and interact with each other. I have my own angst as I write, but I try to be civil and encourage others to consider their words carefully, too.   I try to reflect the heart of Jesus no matter where I am and who is reading.

One of the minor themes I’ve noticed lately on one of these protest blogs is a disdain for young mommy bloggers (within this group of churches) who write as if they have all of the righteous answers to dish out to the unenlightened, who are perfectly submissive wives, sage mothers, uber creative homemakers, chirpy friends, sentimental photojournalists.  Yet there is often also a paradoxical element of self-deprecation, with a constant thread of “I am such a sinful person, I need to repent about this and this and this.”  This little bunny trail complaint about bloggers is that these young women are projecting an unrealistic image of their lives so that others will know they are piously committed to the whole devote-my-entire-life-to-this-particular-rigid-model-of-church-and-family-roles-and-only-in-my-four-walls-homemaking-lifestyle-even-though-I-am-such-an-unworthy-little-worm.  Wow, that was a mouthful!

You know, I really couldn’t say one way or another whether that is true.  Maybe for some of them, some of the time?  Many of the young mommy bloggers in our old church are my friends, and I don’t see that in them.  To be honest, I really don’t know what is going on in their minds, and it’s not my place to conjecture or judge.  I want to give them the freedom to blog in their own style, for their own reasons, whether they tell it like it already is or tell it the way they aspire to be.  What they say is a blessing to me.

Speaking just for myself, I can get a bit Pollyan-ish and rose colored glassy on my blogs.  Sometimes it’s because things really are going well for me at the moment, and I want to capture it in my memory before it disappears.   Other times I blog about something cheerful just because it’s the only way I can keep my sanity when another element of my life looks dark.  I write my own light.  There is a purpose to all of it.  I trust God is going to use what I write no matter why or how I write it.  I try to be appropriately aware of my inner impulses as I write, but it is not healthy for me to over-analyze this.

The truth is that we all project our images.  We all have our identities – public and private -- and blogging is certainly intertwined with that.  Perhaps my blogs make it seem like I think I have it all together, that I have all the answers.  I sincerely hope I am not casting that impression.  I personally wouldn’t mind being more transparent about my struggles, but there is a matter of prudent discretion.  My family has a right to privacy.  Plus, you never know who is reading what you are writing, and how they are taking it and what they intend to do with your information.  Do you know what I mean?  So I might come across like one of the Happy Clone Bloggers at times, too.  My utmost apologies.  I’m really a worm in disguise.  No, not that either.  There must be a happy medium somewhere!

The ironic thing is that a while back, one of the pastors of our former church (whom I still appreciate, despite the problems there) was preaching about something or other and tried to encourage the women, “Don’t feel like you need to work at having the best blog.”  I don’t know quite why he said that.  In hindsight, I think maybe his point was that we should avoid the performance mentality of comparing ourselves to others in a way that makes us feel inadequate.  But I felt a bit miffed and unsettled. Maybe I took it wrong. Maybe I read something else behind the words, based on my lingering impressions of that church culture as a whole.  Part of it was that I had the uncomfortable sense that he was pointing a proverbial finger right at me – one of the most prolific bloggers in the church and an independent thinker. But even apart from that (most likely imagined) personalized impression, I felt like the pastor was subtly communicating to all of us that blogging was a frivolous hobby, a waste of time that we should be devoting to something else.  That we shouldn’t bother pursuing excellence, thinking for ourselves, and expressing our own divergent opinions.  That our words, feelings and attempts at Titus 2 mentoring don’t matter as much because we aren’t the ones behind the podium.  I felt dismissed, minimized, as a woman and as a Christian created to be creative in the image of an amazing Creator. 

I do work hard at blogging, not to prove that I’m a better person but to become a better person -- and to help others do the same.

So what is the “take away” point of this post?  I’d like to share a word of advice to blog writers, and another one for blog readers.

To my fellow blog writers:  Find your own voice and write from your heart.  You are your own person and you don't need to conform to groupthink.  At the same time, feel free to dabble in a new idea or style that you see on someone else’s blog.  (I get a lot of mental sparks from bloggers like Ann Kroeker, like the "Curiosity Journal" and "Food on Fridays" memes that are meant to be imitated.)   Even as you borrow ideas, put your own unique twist into whatever you do.  Don’t feel like you have to be stuck in a single genre; variety is the spice of life.  Write the kind of things you like to read.  And don’t feel like you must protect your image or prove your worth. Our kids are terrific topics for mommies to write about, but don’t put them in a fish bowl or on a pedestal.   Be real.  Be discrete.  Be creative.  Be authentic.  Be kind.   Be truthful.  Be yourself.  Be like Jesus.  That is not a contradiction, because he does not create cookie cutter clones.  Each person can be like Jesus and still be completely unique.  Each member of his body reflects him in a different way (2 Corinthians 12).  Think about what will bless and equip your readers.  Golden Rule: “Do unto others as you would have them do unto you.”

To my fellow blog readers: Don’t take everything you read too seriously and don’t feel like you (or your children) have to measure up to everything you see.  Glean what you can use, and buzz past the rest.  Read blogs from a variety of viewpoints to stretch your perspective and hone your own convictions.  (On a practical note, using Google Reader is a handy way to keep up on blogs you like, without having to go hunting around to see if there is a new post.  You can read all the current posts from all your favorite blogs in one place!  I have a bunch in my Google Reader.)   As you read from different blogs, respect where people are – either in their “season of life” or their background or in the way they see things.  They aren’t just like you, and that’s a good thing!   There are some blogs that I stop reading because they just consistently irritate me and I don’t need that extra stress.  There are others I stop reading because I don’t relate to them as well, and I don’t have all the time in the world.  If I add in new blogs, I look at removing others that I’m not as thrilled about anymore.  I have to be selective and read what feeds and challenges me.  I try to read, reflect, and respond.  Bloggers need feedback!  Feel free to leave a comment and share your opinions if they will be helpful.  Encouraging words are manna to a bloggers soul.  But be careful about flaming a blogger with a sharp comment if you disagree with their post.  Endless blog arguments are a waste of time and can be quite agitating to the soul.   Again, the Golden Rule: “Do unto others as you would have them do unto you.”

I guess that's about all I have to say right now, but I wrote two articles a while back that are closely related to my thoughts here: 

•        Do It Well, But Keep It Humble 
•        Calling All Mentors

Thanks for reading!  I’d love to hear what you think about any or all of this!

Blessings,

Virginia Knowles

www.ComeWearyMoms.blogspot.com

A Sacred Romance in the Deeper Places of Our Hearts

“The inner life, the story of our heart, is the life of the deep places within us, our passions and dreams, our fears and our deepest wounds. It is the unseen life, the mystery within – what Buechner calls our “shimmering self.” It cannot be managed like a corporation. The heart does not respond to principles and programs; it seeks not efficiency, but passion. Art, poetry, beauty, mystery, ecstasy: These are what rouse the heart. Indeed, they are the language that must be spoken if one wishes to communicate with the heart. It is why Jesus so often taught and related to people by telling stories and asking questions. His desire was not just to engage their intellects but to capture their hearts. Indeed, if we will listen a Sacred Romance calls to us through our heart every moment of our lives. It whispers to us on the wind, invites us through the laughter of good friends, reaches out to us through the touch of someone we love. We’ve heard it in our favorite music, sensed it at the birth of our first child, been drawn to it while watching the shimmer of a sunset on the ocean. The Romance is even present in times of great personal suffering: the illness of a child, the loss of a marriage, the death of a friend. Something calls to us through experiences like these and rouses an inconsolable longing deep within our heart, wakening in us a yearning for intimacy, beauty, and adventure. This longing is the most powerful part of any human personality. It fuels our search for meaning, for wholeness, for a sense of being truly alive. However we may describe this deep desire, it is the most important thing about us, our heart of hearts, the passion of our life. And the voice that calls to us in this place is none other than the voice of God.”


Many years ago, during a time of midlife crisis, God graciously broke through into my soul.  Early one morning after a night of fitful sleep, I began to see a vision of my heart at two levels.  The crevices of the deeper region were mostly packed in with decades of debris.  On top of this hard crust, I had piled on the outer workings of my daily life: wife, home school mother of 10, homemaker, church member, writer, and other duties.  I realized that even in my spiritual life of Scripture study and prayer (which have been so very valuable), I often live in the “oughts” and not from true desire or spiritual passion.  As I wrote these newer insights into my journal, the crust to the deeper places started to crack open. Visiting a friend later that day, I tried to put into words what I felt God was saying to me.  Her mouth dropped open, and she ran to get a book she had just started reading.  I flipped through the pages, and my mouth dropped open. Everything I had just tried to say, everything I had just written in my own journal, I found on the pages of the book she handed to me, The Sacred Romance by Brent Curtis and John Eldredge.  The quote above is from a chapter by Brent Curtis.


When I included this quote in an article I wrote back in July 2006, a friend at the church we were attending then wasn't too pleased that I would refer positively to a book by co-author John Eldredge.  She even e-mailed the pastors to ask them to keep an eye on me.  Well, I guess that's one way of getting attention! ;-)  I found it ironic a few years later to find the exact same quote in a book called One Thing: Developing a Passion for the Beauty of God by Sam Storms, an author whose books were promoted in the pulpit and sold in the church bookstore.  I'm not saying I agree with everything that Eldredge has ever written, but this quote from that book reached deep inside of me at such a critical moment in my life.  It was like a life line thrown to a drowning woman, and certainly a milestone in a complete paradigm shift that was taking place in my life then.  This and many other things eventually led to us leaving that church last year.  And the quote, which was from a chapter by Brent Curtis, still speaks to me.  A friend shared a different quote from The Sacred Romance on Facebook this morning, and it brought my own favorite quote from it back to mind.  I'm so glad that I took the opportunity to go back and read it, think about it, and share it in a few places.  I know I will be pondering on it more in the days to come, and I hope you will, too.


Life is not a dry system, folks. It's not even all about rooting out the sin in our lives so that we can be acceptable to God and others.  It's not about rules of hierarchy and control and spiritual authority.  It's not about religion.  It's not about sharing pat spiritual band-aid answers with friends who are hurting. 


It's about experiencing the 
  beauty...
     grace...
        healing...
           liberty...
              hope...
                 authenticity...
                     acceptance...
                         and LOVE of our heavenly Father 
                            that he has offered through Jesus.  


No one can do that for you.  No one can write your life script for you.  No one can ever know you and love you like God does.  If like me, it feels like that kind of life has been quenched out of you again, maybe it is time to sit and soak in it once more?

If these words resonate with you, please read my poems It Became to Me a Dark Thing and This Is My Song and I Sing and visit my blog www.comewearymoms.blogspot.com where I often address the themes of beauty and the deeper life.   

I would love to hear your thoughts on this, so please leave a comment or send me an e-mail!

Blessings,
Virginia Knowles
www.VirginiaKnowles.blogspot.com

Holy Week: The Resurrection and Doubting Thomas

Dear friends,

Happy Easter to you! 

"Saint Thomas Putting his Finger on Christ's Wound" by Michelangelo Merisi da Caravaggio

This morning in church, introducing his sermon with this Caravaggio masterpiece, our pastor Mike Tilley told the story of doubting Thomas. He was the disciple who wasn't there when Jesus first appeared to the others on the day he was resurrected. Even though the others told him about it, Thomas said he wouldn't believe it until he saw it for himself, until he could feel the wounds on Christ's body. Jesus appeared again about a week later, suddenly in a locked room. Nothing could keep him out! The thing is that Jesus didn't chew out Thomas for doubting.  He greeted him with "Peace be with you!" and invited him to see and touch the wounds so he could fully believe.  And when Thomas saw him, he exclaimed, "My Lord and my God!" I think he got it right that time.  Thomas understood his relationship with God personally and he also responded with a heart of surrender, acknowledging Jesus as his Lord.

Mike encouraged the doubters among us to freely come to God with our honest questions. There is more than one kind of doubter.


Some aren't sure that there is even a God, or that Jesus is God. I remember, as I once wrote in a poem, "looking for a skylight in the floor of my upside down world." I not only didn't believe in God, but I was mad at Christians for trying to tell me about him. I was quite some doubter. Maybe you are, too. There is nothing wrong with exploring the historical evidence to find out if what the Bible says is true and asking God if he is really real. Josh McDowell and Lee Strobel, both solid skeptics, dared to do this -- and ended up convinced of the claims of Christianity. McDowell later wrote the books Evidence that Demands a Verdict, More than a Carpenter, Don't Check Your Brains at the Door and many others. Strobel penned The Case for Christ, The Case for the Creator, The Case for Easter, and more.

Other doubters, also like me, have served God for years, even decades. I've been a Christian for 35 years as of this July. I have read the Bible all the way through multiple times, memorized large portions of it, read hundreds of Christian books, gone to church nearly every week, served on missions and evangelism teams, taught Sunday School, home schooled my 10 kids, written Christian books/e-magazines/blogs, and talked about God to groups of people more times than I can remember. Do I have all the answers by now? Not by a long shot! I have my own perplexing questions about God, too. There are times that I just don't understand what he is doing or why. There are times when I am angry at God and wonder if he is really a loving Father after all. Is he really good? Is he really just? Will the burdens ever lift? How badly will I mess up, and will he be able to fix it when I do? Does he really have it all under control? Will it really come out all right in the end? With all of the varieties of Christian teachings out there, some of them at odds with one another, how do I know what to believe and how to behave? And how do I take what I know in my mind and make sure that is seeps all the way into my heart, too, so I can trust him? Lord, have mercy!

Fortunately, God is big enough to handle angst, confusion, and cynicism. And it helps to know that devout Christians throughout the centuries have faced the same doubts and spiritual insecurities. It is just reality until we get to Heaven and see him face to face. For now, it's better to be honest, wrestle the doubts, and ask the hard questions, even while knowing it's not all going to come clear until eternity. For me, it helps to read the Bible and pray, even when it is hard to sense God's presence. Another thing that is an immense encouragement is to read and hear the testimonies of other believers about how God has been faithful and real in their lives during the most difficult times. And oddly enough, getting out there, putting one foot in front of the other, and serving him the best I know how somehow draws me even closer to him. I don't always know just what I'm doing when I start out, but seeing God work through me -- in spite of me -- is something of a miracle to behold.

I am thankful, too, that the good folks of Lake Baldwin Church welcomed me in when I was feeling more than a bit lost in transition last year. It's been a safe place for me to be just me. Even a few simple hugs and kind words from my sweet sisters-in-Christ there gave me a powerful boost toward more faith this morning. God might not be moving in spectacular ways, but I think he's at least whispering tenderly in my ears.

Peace be with you!

Virginia Knowles


http://www.virginiaknowles.blogspot.com/


P.S. If you haven't read my other Easter posts this week, you can click here: Holy Week.