Bev Sterk

what is a man of God?  One who will do the right thing even in the face of fear, even at the expense of the "good old boys club",  exposing what is hidden in darkness, doing what is right in the face of resistance and opposition and persecution from their peers and leaders for standing up and doing what is right even though it will make the others look bad.

The man of God will speak out and protect those who have been harmed and abused by those in power, instead of operating in fear and damage control, instead of covering up and protecting the reputation of the leadership causing further harm to those who have been abused... remember Jesus and the woman caught in adultery?  The leaders who brought her to Him, didn't give a rip about her life... they didn't care if she was stoned, she was nothing to them, just an object to be used for their selfish purposes, yet they protected the man involved... don't do this!

The man of God will not shift the blame away from themselves, and will not change the narrative to minimize and distract from their wrong doing, or turn themselves into the victim.  I think of pornography and the horrible fruit which has caused extensive harm in so many ways, including objectification of people, especially women. the percentages of porn in the Church are horrific, beyond epidemic levels... and the CRC is not exempt...

http://www.provenmen.org/2014pornsurvey/pornography-use-and-addiction/

The man of God will confront and challenge his brothers, his friends, his peers in this area.  It is a lie that looking at pornography is no big deal.  It is a lie that looking at pornography doesn't hurt anyone.  It breeds horrible stuff...  including fueling human trafficking.  http://dojustice.crcna.org/article/how-porn-justice-issue   yet, it seems the Church, including the CRC (from my perspective, including research and anecdotal evidence through discussions with people on this subject) barely acknowledges/addresses this, only in secret it seems, behind closed doors, not openly. 

The man of God, will confess, repent, and tell his wife***, and walk in the opposite direction, honoring and protecting the dignity of these women, including his wife, who are made in God's image.  You will be free!  that is a man of God!

The man of God will then help others get free!  Bonhoeffer says... Nothing can be more cruel than the leniency which abandons others to their sin. Nothing can be more compassionate than the severe reprimand which calls another Christian in one’s community back from the path of sin.  Read more at: http://www.azquotes.com/quote/467189

The man of God that is truly remorseful and desirous of change, would seek the forgiveness of those they have hurt instead of blaming/attacking them, and instead of making themselves the center of attention, would turn people's attention to those they have hurt.  http://boz.religionnews.com/2015/12/11/an-unholy-alliance-when-mob-forgiveness-meets-selective-grace/

The man of God will be wearing well used armor... not shiny and new, but beaten up, scratched, dented, muddy and bloody.. that means this knight has been in action, serving Him!

Here is the Warriors Prayer (author unknown):

When it is all said and done, and I'm standing before God, I want to be there bloodied and exhausted and worn from the fight, haven given my all.  I want to place at Christ's feet a well used, yet still razor sharp sword, a battered shield with the Kingdom's emblem faded and dull from years of service, a breastplate with deep scratch marks where the enemy's darts scarred it when my shield of faith dropped low, a helmet of salvation marked by the blows from the mace of doubt being deflected, boots of the gospel resoled many times and lastly, a belt of truth that is as strong as it was when I received it. All to be turned in for my eternal garments of white and a new name given by my King, the King of Kings. 

we recently took our family to the force awakens, I'm not a star wars fan, but my kids wanted to see it...  and my favorite line that is well worth the $100 for our family to watch it, is the maverick droid dude's response to the question asked by the fighter pilot on why he rescued him... and the response is "because it's the right thing"...   Pres. Obama used the same phrase at least 3 times if I recall in the state of the union address...  back to the movie... in a battle, you see this droid start to realize something is wrong, that he is a part of something that is not what he wants to be a part of.  I hope and pray that our men will start to see that something is very wrong...  that the enemy is somehow using spiritual leaders to abuse those who are under them and that this is spiritual abuse, which is abuse of power...  recognizing our battle is not against flesh and blood...

I have had friends who have experienced spiritual abuse from Church leadership ask me "where have all the good men gone?"  "where are the good men in the Church?"  I know you are there and I know you want to be a man of God, so please speak up and do what is right! 

one of my prayers for 2016 is that we the Church will do the right thing..   Yes, it will be hard, and there has been and will be failure, but own up to it, deal with it, learn from it and grow stronger through it, instead of hiding it.

 *** tell your wife... this has been debated, with some recovery programs encouraging men to wait until they are porn free for 6 months to do so as well as the conventional counsel of the world, which pastors will use as well, will advise not to tell at all ...  I disagree and here is something from Lewis Smede's Forgive and Forget P11… Patronizing husbands lie to wives to spare them the pain of knowing the truth.EOQ  the truth will set you free!  confess your sins to one another, and you will be healed... that verse has been twisted in various ways to avoid telling the wife.   So men, do the right thing!  I'm praying for you as part of the Bride of Christ...  and the Bride has made herself ready...

 

 

I know this is months after the original post...  I struggle with how the Church has expanded and elevated confidentiality to conform to the patterns of the world instead of to scripture...  ie.. attorney client privilege, pastor-penitent privilege, the confidentiality of the "confessional", robert's rules of executive and strict executive session, non-disclosure agreements...  as one pastor shared with me... confidentiality is killing us...  there is something very unhealthy with the way we, the Church, practice confidentiality...  God's way is to bring things into the light so that it may be clearly seen that is was His way... the enemy's ways is to keep things hidden in darkness out of fear...

I Timothy 5 says to publicly rebuke a leader who is sinning, in the presence of ALL, without partiality, that the rest may fear and as a warning.  and of course the 3 steps of Matthew 18... with the 2nd and 3rd expanding it beyond 2 people.  Of course we do this with wisdom and discernment (see Bonnie's comment), but somehow we have sacrificed justice on behalf of those harmed on the altar of confidentiality. A significant reason is protecting reputations, especially if we like the person who did the wrong and so are not impartial and want to defend our friend, our colleague... so we protect the reputation of the one who did the harm, instead of protecting the dignity of those harmed (although leaders will say that they are protecting the reputation of the one bringing the charges, but they are empty words because in reality it is damage control and cover-up because this secrecy actually does more harm, and instead of validating, this response ends up being as harmful if not more so than the original situation and traumatizes further instead of being part of the healing process - there is a reason that many who have been harmed by the Church struggle with post traumatic stress).

I'm pretty sure that is not what God intended in Proverbs about keeping people's secrets.

 

 

several thoughts... agree with Frank on the prayer... it seems we have mostly missed the prayer side of Acts 6:4  and they devoted themselves to prayer and the ministry of the Word.  One person shared how in a pastor search survey, 85 qualifications were listed and not one of them was a person of prayer...

and agree on focus on youth... somewhere is a statistic that 85% of believers made a commitment to Jesus by the age of 17...  they are the biggest mission field... let's not miss the opportunity that is right in front of us...

and then a generally unaddressed area that i question... the prophetic... it seems historically, we/crc have indirectly and quietly married the office of pastor and prophet through preaching... our forms for ordination indicate this when in the form for pastor ordination in an established congregation it mentions that "through the pastor God Himself speaks"... and that when we "receive this man as a prophet we will receive a prophet's reward"...  sometimes that's the case, but interestingly, this same language is NOT used for the missionary, evangelist, or elders and deacons... it seems historically we have been fairly exclusive and unbiblical in assigning the gift of prophecy essentially solely to the pastor (and i have heard comments from crc members/leaders to this effect)...  this gift is for ALL flesh per Acts 2/Joel 2 which includes the missionary, evangelist, elders, deacons AND everyone else...  not saying pastors don't have this gift, but it is NOT exclusive to them as it seems from the ordination forms... since this type of language is not mentioned anywhere else as far as I can tell, it seems there is a CRC perception that the pastor is the only one who can "hear" God and speak prophetically.  Not true, and I think this is limiting/quenching the Spirit in ways that we don't intend to.  So on the one hand, i hear the crc saying... prophet = ordained pastor + pulpit... a man made equation... being an ordained pastor does not give anyone a blanket covering for being a prophet too, scripture mentions them as 2 different ministries, just like teachers and evangelists - we don't do this with any of the other callings mentioned in Eph 4...

on the other hand, being a pastor does not exclude pastors from the prophetic gift either, but it definitely is NOT limited to ordained pastors only or even primarily.

The prophetic is something hardly recognized in the crc for various reasons, but when it seems it is almost exclusive to the office of ordained pastor, whether intentional or not, it is something that's needs to be addressed and understood further.

 

 

Les Mis is one of my favorite stories...however, this is making me go hmmm... I get the concept and it sounds nice and very politically correct, so we aren't "sinners" anymore, instead people who make poor choices/mistakes sometimes...  and yes, sometimes the scripture lists it as those who do certain sinful things....  ie those who are greedy or see Galatians 5:19-21 for a list of sins.

also, I do struggle when people quote that all our deeds are filthy rags, and every intent of our heart is evil, instead of giving Jesus the glory for giving us, as believers, a new heart and making us a new creation in Him, and through His blood, cleansing those filthy rags into fine linen worthy of His Bride (Rev 19:8).. absolutely, we have a new identity in Christ.

but Apostle Paul uses all kinds of labels (I Cor 5:9-13)... Jesus did too...  "brood of vipers" =( ouch! not exactly PC... He didn't say "oh you people who act like snakes sometimes"...  and "blind guides" - not, "these people who don't see clearly all the time"...  He called Judas a "devil"...  He called people wicked and perverse... definitely not "nice" or politically correct, it's part of what got Him killed...

I know it seems harsh in our politically correct culture, but unless we have been translating the Word of God wrong, there is biblical precedent for "labeling" in scripture... it seems, particularly for those who were expected to be spiritual, but were actually walking in sin and un-repentance.

the following is an excerpt from the hope of survivors website which is about abuse by spiritual leaders (those who have authority/power in the Church):

To summarize what Marie M. Fortune wrote in her book, Is Nothing Sacred?, the proper steps to take when implementing justice and mercy (based on Micah 6:8) include:

1. Truth-telling (breaking the silence of the abuse)

2. Acknowledging the violation (in hearing the truth, the church acknowledges the violation)

3. Compassion (means to “suffer with,” to be present, acknowledge and listen, even when you can’t solve the problem)

4. Protecting the vulnerable (prevent further harm)

5. Accountability (based on Luke 17:1-4, it begins with confrontation and should end in repentance)

6. Restitution (making payment for damages is a concrete means of renewing right-relation)

7. Vindication (for the victim, it most often means exoneration and justification)

The bottom line: TAKE RESPONSIBILITY–DON’T HIDE!

thanks for being willing to look deeper, Robin... control is a huge issue (probably most abuse is about control) -and the control will manifest financially in different ways, as well as in other areas.  Control is not only an issue in relationships, but also in the Church...  it can be so subtle and hard to see...  and one struggles with is it real or imagined (spiritual/emotional abuse v physical/sexual abuse)...  a comment from an article on church abuse...

BOQ... But in the many many months I have spent on studying abusive churches and abusive tactics, there is a very common theme and many common words that churches use that are a substitute for "control". EOQ

if you've experienced it, you can discern the control lingo that's been spiritualized (which becomes spiritual abuse)...  here's an example this same person uses in another comment and her take on it...  the quoted part of the following excerpt is from a church website:

BOQ..."Finally, we understand that we will encounter some very significant challenges that may require the services of an outside trained professional counselor. If necessary, we can refer people to a trusted professional who employs a gospel-centered counseling approach, and who will work together with our community to help shepherd hurting people." In other words. If we decide you do need counseling, it will be with someone who we decide is appropriate. I've been around the block on that. I understand the wording. EOQ

I am amazed at those who have been abused/manipulated by leaders in the Church, how they pick up on this type of "control" and perceive it much quicker than those who have not experienced such abuse and manipulation...  the statements of leaders looks good, sounds good, but there's something amiss and those who've been on the wrong end of it, recognize the loopholes in it, while those who are in leadership often do not...  and that's why discernment is such a needed gift for the Bride of Christ.  hope that makes sense!