Randy Alcorn's Blog, page 73

Christian Leaders Need Accountability to Guard Our Lives and Ministries

My next few blogs will follow up on my three previous posts and continue to allude sometimes to what happened with Ravi Zacharias. Why? So that as Christian leaders and laypeople, we can learn from it and avoid sexual immorality ourselves.

I believe this is right despite comments on social media such as this one: “What a bunch of sanctimonious sensationalism to gain attention. Why don’t these ‘godly’ commentators lead millions to faith in Jesus Christ first and then talk about ‘living like Ravi Zacharias’? It’s the same as those who talk about King David being an adulterer and murderer and terrible father. Any of you had God call you a man after my own heart? I DON’T THINK SO!”

God doesn’t want us to look the other way when these things keep happening. I have rarely written anything about ministry sex scandals in the last ten years, but perhaps I’ve failed in that regard. I believe God desires to bring beauty out of ashes (Isaiah 61:3). He put stories in the Bible so we could learn from them, and wise people will do so. In fact, God’s Word tells us why accounts of people committing sin are recorded in Scripture:

God was not pleased with most of them; their bodies were scattered in the wilderness. Now these things occurred as examples to keep us from setting our hearts on evil things as they did. Do not be idolaters, as some of them were; as it is written: “The people sat down to eat and drink and got up to indulge in revelry.” We should not commit sexual immorality, as some of them did—and in one day twenty-three thousand of them died. We should not test Christ, as some of them did—and were killed by snakes.  And do not grumble, as some of them did—and were killed by the destroying angel. (1 Corinthians 10:5-10)

Many commenters said things like Holly did: “I personally need help processing this and you are providing sound counsel.” And Scott: “Please keep writing about this.” And Chad: “I’m grateful for careful counsel and sound biblical observations of what we believers can learn from all of this and apply to our lives.”

Those voices confirm to me that God desires for His people to learn from this, so I’m choosing to continue.

Accountability and Why We Need It

Nothing is talked about more and acted on less than being “accountable.” Some fear accountability, while others imagine they’re being accountable when all they’re really doing is eating breakfast and socializing, with an occasional spiritual discussion but no going beneath the surface.

Nothing’s wrong with a regular gathering with friends that doesn’t have an agenda. But if friends are serious followers of Christ, there’s also a need to talk about Jesus and share and encourage each other. And when people see us in a group setting, especially with our spouses, they will pick up things—perhaps that we seem to be correcting our spouse a lot in front of the group, or we seem to be nicer to someone else’s spouse than our own. We need that kind of feedback. I don’t know whether Ravi Zacharias and his wife were in groups like that.

With his travel schedule, flying from time zone to time zone to do events and meet with heads of state, I doubt if there was much time left for Ravi Zacharias to meet with regular people from whom he was receiving input rather than giving input. In retrospect, perhaps that could have served to keep him from the isolation and exhaustion that feeds vulnerability, loss of perspective, and the  entitlement-based rationalization that “the rules don’t apply to me” and “God owes me something for serving him so diligently and sharing the gospel with so many, so he won’t mind if I satisfy my sexual urges.” (Never mind how doing so will hurt the victims, as well as my wife and children and my witness for Christ.)

The investigative report into the accusations against Ravi Zacharias said this:

He insisted on remaining separate from official RZIM communication platforms, and his phones were on a separate plan rather than the RZIM plan. He also used private email addresses rather than an RZIM account, and while at RZIM headquarters he used the public wireless access rather than RZIM’s virtual private network. He claimed this was for security reasons, but the end result was that no one at RZIM would have had administrative access to his devices or email communications. He also used encrypted communications platforms including BlackBerry Messenger and What’s App, from which messages are not retrievable once deleted.

For this to happen, a number of people who worked with Ravi would have had to be aware these weren’t wise choices. Who stepped forward to say, “This is wrong and extremely dangerous”? Privacy is one thing; secrecy is another. (And what in the culture of the ministry kept those who had concerns from speaking up? Understand that if this scandal were unique and other ministries and churches didn’t have these same problems, I wouldn’t be talking about it. My desire is not to beat up on one ministry, but to point out principles and practices affecting countless ministries and churches even if disaster hasn’t yet struck them. If these things aren’t corrected, it will.)

When someone close to the ministry told me Ravi traveled frequently with a female masseuse, I was stunned. Yes, he had back problems, but why not a male masseuse, and even then, during massages having a door open (gender doesn’t ensure a lack of temptation)? And why wasn’t someone else from the ministry always present in the room, even if they were just checking emails? The simple presence of a third person can head off flirting and other inappropriate behavior.

Godly people who knew his schedule were aware of all the time Ravi was spending with masseuses. But maybe they thought they had no right or ability to raise questions. I remember many years ago when a man told his teenage son that he didn’t want him to park and be alone in a car with his girlfriend after going out for dinner. His son responded, “Dad, don’t you trust me?” I’ll never forget what his dad told him: “Alone? In a car? With a girl? At night? I don’t even trust myself. Why should I trust you?”

The point is not to be legalistic and allow rule-keeping to obscure the grace-driven desire to honor God. But if it takes rules and guidelines to reduce temptation and help us avoid sin, isn’t that better than the sin? God says, “Run from sexual sin!” (1 Corinthians 6:18). Not “stay in the same place and try to fight it,” but RUN!

Several staff at RZIM have spoken out that part of the ministry culture was to never question Ravi because everyone should trust him, and it was considered disloyal to ask questions:

RZIM’s public relations manager Ruth Malhotra has shared a 26-page letter she wrote to the board chairman earlier this month. Journalist David French, a longtime friend of Malhotra’s, reports on the missive, saying it reveals the “withering internal resistance” Malhotra and other concerned RZIM employees faced when they pursued answers about the unfolding scandal.  (See RZIM PR Manager Says She Was Shunned For Asking Questions)

Unfortunately, one of the ways once trustworthy people become untrustworthy is by being blindly trusted, even when they are doing something that is at best unwise, if not downright immoral. Perhaps Ravi was once a man of integrity, but since he wasn’t accountable, he gradually slid into his double life. Living a double life required friends, family, and coworkers to be kept in the dark. Someone needed to help him put guardrails in his life, but it sounds like he pushed back on attempts to do that. If a pastor or Christian leader isn’t open to dialogue or correction, someone must challenge him and insist that he do the wise thing for the sake of the ministry that other staff members invest their lives in and countless people financially support. (Still other victims of this meltdown are the many faithful Christ-centered employees and supporters of RZIM who were not in the inner circles and had no clue about the lack of accountability.)

My Experience with Accountability

Many years ago, in 1986, when I was still a pastor, our church had seven full-time and several part-time pastors. Realizing that we were too busy going over agendas and not staying in touch with each other’s spiritual lives, we started committing the first two hours of our weekly staff meeting to sharing personal struggles and joys. In the process we often told each other where our spiritual lives were at and the areas where we needed prayer and help. We made sure no one was left out. We asked each person “How are you doing?” and if the answers were vague or something seemed wrong, we probed deeper. If someone didn’t feel like talking sometimes it was fine, but other times we could see he was the one who most needed to talk. Those closest to him would often reach out to him afterward, one on one.

This is risky—it involves entrusting our reputation to others and opening ourselves to examination and even criticism (though, in fact, what comes out is usually positive encouragement). But the risks are small compared to the rewards. After working at it, eventually we no longer felt alone in pastoral ministry. We learned each other’s imperfections, and gradually had less to prove to each other. These hours of honesty and accountability became weekly therapy, and no matter how full the agenda, we committed ourselves to keeping in touch with each other’s inner lives.

After several years of doing this, though, I realized that for me it just wasn’t enough, partly because often urgent agenda items pushed aside personal sharing. Our staff meetings were large enough that we could fake it or slip through the cracks. Consequently, I started two accountability groups—one with three other pastors and another with four laymen. We began each week with a passage of Scripture we’d memorized. Then each of us in turn answered several key questions:

How are you doing with God?
With your spouse or the person you’re dating?
With your children?
What temptations are you facing, and how are you dealing with them?
How has your thought life been this week, in terms of sexual purity?
Are you consistently living for Christ in your workplace?
Have you been spending regular time in the Word and prayer?
Who have you been sharing the gospel with?
How can we pray for you and help you?

After just a few of these meetings, men in both groups expressed that this was the most meaningful 90 minutes of their week. For some it was the first time a brother in Christ had ever asked them these questions. One said, “Why, for so many years, have we talked about sports and hunting and business and everything else under the sun, and not talked about the most important part of our lives?” Another said, “I’ve gotten to know you men in one month in a way I don’t know people I’ve been with for ten years.” Our key verse was Proverbs 27:17 (“As iron sharpens irons, so one man sharpens another”), and we saw its reality over and over again.

It’s now 35 years later, and though we haven’t been on the same staff together for 30 years, I still get together with one of those same pastors every week. While we are less structured in our get-togethers, we still talk openly and honestly about how we’re doing with Jesus, in our ministries, and in our marriages. We know how to pray with each other, and do it both in person and over the phone.

Every accountability group has its own personality and will sometimes make changes to avoid stagnancy. There is no magic formula, but the key is always to get back to the basic questions. You or your group may wish to come up with some of your own. Often the best questions to ask in an accountability group are the very questions we least want to answer! Write those questions down and put them on the top of the agenda each time you meet. Howard Hendricks suggested that the last question on the list be this: “In your answers to any of the previous questions, have you lied?”

Even simple and spontaneous attempts at accountability can produce amazing results. Once I was undergoing hours of sexual temptation, and finally called a brother I was scheduled to have breakfast with the next morning. I said, “Please pray for me, and promise to ask me tomorrow morning what I did.” He agreed. The moment I put down the phone, the temptation was gone. Why? I’d like to say it was because I was so spiritual, that the fact that I knew God was there with me was enough to overcome temptation, but the truth is there was no way I was going to face my friend the next morning and have to tell him I’d sinned! If this is a crutch, OK, sometimes I need a crutch. When it comes to battling temptation, I’ll take all the help I can get!

Of course, it’s not just accountability to people that keeps us from sin. Our primary accountability is to the Lord whose judgment seat is the only one we will stand before. Praise God He sees us not just as servants but friends (John 15:15). Paul prays “that He would grant you, according to the riches of His glory, to be strengthened with power through His Spirit in the inner man” (Ephesians 3:16).

The Holy Spirit guards and empowers us. But God chooses to use His people in each other’s lives as instruments of grace and truth.  We need each other! To keep us from buying into “the cunning and craftiness of people in their deceitful scheming,” we’re told, “ Instead, speaking the truth in love, we will grow to become in every respect the mature body of him who is the head, that is, Christ” (Ephesians 4:15-16).

Steps That Can Help Us Save Each Other from Sin and Save the Church from Scandal

If pastors, support staff, or parachurch co-workers have questions or doubts about the ethics or practices of someone in your ministry, including those in authority above you, go to the person directly and make them known. (Pastoral staffs and elders should call upon their co-workers to do this for the glory of Christ and good of the ministry; it should never jeopardize their position.)
If leaders in authority positions will not allow people to speak into their lives, and if they get defensive and expect people to blindly trust them despite their questionable actions, they may be demanding respect, but they aren’t earning it. If you reject respectful accountability, you are not qualified to serve.
Don’t name a ministry or a church after a man, unless it is the God-man, Jesus Christ. Yes, I know there are good ministries that have been named after wonderful founders, such as Billy Graham and Josh McDowell. There are churches named after the men who founded them, and there’s less probability of a scandal coming out years later, but it’s still possible.
Call upon your church leaders and the ministries you support to have true accountability. Not to be legalistic, but to be full of grace and truth.
Remember that “Smart people can fool smart people.” A friend of mine who was also a friend of Ravi’s said this to me a few weeks ago. I’ve seen it to be true. The smarter you are, the better you are with words, the more you can justify your actions and win arguments that you should lose. Don’t let a smart, articulate person lower the standards of your organization, and ultimately bring shame to Christ and the ministry.
Recognize that your problem is your sin nature, lust, and habits of thought—not women (though of course they have their own thought life and habits they must deal with). Melissa Kruger says, “It’s good to have accountability. Have people in your life who will ask you tough questions. Put protective software on your electronic devices. Avoid shows and songs that stir up wrong desires. Be careful, though, that you don’t communicate to women that they are the problem.”
By all means, use resources that help you and your children avoid viewing impure images, but realize they aren’t infallible. Tech savvy people can get around the accountability software and anyone can access pornography elsewhere. We love VidAngel, use it frequently, and highly recommend it. If you use services like Amazon Prime and Netflix, it allows you to check boxes that will remove sex scenes, the f-word, blasphemy, etc. However, I was watching a movie recently when the editing didn’t work and suddenly I was seeing people have sex. I scrambled for the remote and turned it off quickly, but it was too late to unsee what I never should have seen in the first place. It’s up to us, not software or a device, to guard our minds! “Set your minds on things that are above, not on things that are on earth” (Colossians 3:2).

Closing Thoughts

I honestly don’t know whether Ravi Zacharias regularly met with a group that asked direct, probing questions of each other. Being head of a large ministry and a man of great intellect, likely few of the people around him thought of themselves as his peers. If he did something that seemed questionable, like traveling with a female masseuse, maybe people felt like they had no right to suggest he shouldn’t.

If Ravi had been required to be part of an accountability group, it might have changed him. God might have used those guardrails to keep him from going off a cliff. Would it really have made a difference? Maybe not, because we can always lie and fake it. But if he knew he would have to look into the eyes of a band of brothers week after week and answer the question, “How has your thought life and sexual purity been this week?” I wonder if that might have helped keep him off the path of destruction.

It’s too late to help Ravi, and now it’s time to help his many victims, who certainly need and deserve support. But it’s not too late for us who are still here to raise the bar of sexual purity in mind and body. To stop tolerating inappropriate jokes and sexual comments and innuendos. To determine that we be held accountable to higher standards and greater transparency with the right people (not the wrong ones). This could save our marriages, our witness for Christ, our spiritual lives from ruin, and our churches and ministries from shame and self-destruction.

Browse more resources on the topic of purity, and see Randy's book The Purity Principle and his booklet Sexual Temptation.

Photo by William Fortunato from Pexels

What Christian Leaders and Ministries Must Realize So We Don’t End like Ravi Did

I continue to receive comments on my previous blogs such as, “Let it go. The man is dead, and he’s already been called accountable for his sins.” And “I am so disappointed in you right now, Randy. I’m grievously saddened that you’ve jumped on the media band wagon to further bury Ravi which further discounts the mighty ways God used him. ...I wonder if Jesus were standing here as all these stones are being thrown in the name of righteousness, would He also be throwing one? Would He be publicizing the sin?”

What people don’t seem to understand is that everyone in the secular media, in nearly every outlet, is talking about this. The sin has already been publicized. For every Christian article about it there are easily fifty secular articles or newscasts. The difference is, they are not bringing a biblical perspective, nor should we expect them to. If we fail to address this head on, the only viewpoints God’s people will hear are ungodly ones.

It is hopelessly naïve to think that if only we don’t talk about it, somehow it will just go away. That’s why I will continue to write about it as a segue into dealing with issues of pride, sin, secrecy, and lack of accountability in our lives, churches, and ministries. (As to the charge that we shouldn’t talk about this on Facebook, the reality is that social media is where many people go to get information and interact. Our ministry has always shared links to my blog posts on social media.)

Scripture directly addresses sins and in a number of cases, calls out people by name. In this case, we are not calling out Ravi, as he has already been called out. This is not about punishing Ravi or throwing stones. He will not stand before our judgment seat. We’re trying to address how we should view this and process the lessons God has for us. Respectfully, if you don’t want to read it, just don’t. But also, don’t be upset that some of us believe we need to learn what God may wish to teach us.

Many people in their comments have quoted Matthew 7:1, “Don’t judge.” The context Jesus said this in, and many other things He said, show that it doesn’t mean we shouldn’t use moral and spiritual discernment. (See my further thoughts on this. Jon Bloom has some great insights on Jesus telling us not to judge and also, with a different meaning, telling us to judge.)

It is certainly true that there’s nothing we can do about Ravi’s life now. That is done. But there’s a lot we can and should do about our lives. And families. And churches. And ministries. That’s the whole point: not to wallow in what Ravi did, but to ask ourselves what we can do so that at the end our lives, God can say to us, flawed though we be, “Well done.”

What Lessons Can We Learn?

Journalist David French has written a significant article as a believer in Christ with far more knowledge of RZIM than most journalists. In fact, he wrote a tribute to Ravi Zacharias after his death, as did I and countless others. French laments his failure to carefully investigate the initial claims of sexual abuse. His article covers a lot of ground, but these paragraphs stood out to me and should speak to every Christian ministry, including the one I founded and direct, and every church, including the one I once pastored and still attend:

What are the lessons we can learn? …When family members of founders occupy the controlling heights of an organization, they are placed under immense strain and face an obvious conflict of interest when their father is accused of misconduct. Rigorous, independent investigations should be mandatory when accusers come forward. Compliance with reasonable investigatory requests (such as turning over phones and other communications equipment) must be required. Governing boards should be powerful, independent, and transparent.

…Nondisclosure agreements—especially in Christian ministries—are poisonous and enable additional abuse. Do not trust instincts over evidence. Never say, “I know this man, and he would never do anything like this.” The goal of any organization facing claims of abuse should be discerning truth, not discrediting accusers. All accusers should be treated immediately—publicly and privately—with dignity and respect. 

But it goes even deeper. Christian ministries are populated by leadership teams who derive not just their paychecks but also their own public reputations from their affiliation with the famous founder. They’re admired in part because the founder is admired. They have influence in part because the founder has influence. When the founder fails, they lose more than a paycheck. There is powerful personal incentive to circle the wagons and to defend the ministry, even when that defense destroys lives.

The zeal to protect the leader and punish or discredit the accuser can also rest in a particular brand of arrogance. “My ministry is necessary.” “Souls are at stake.” “Look at all the good we’re doing.” In reality, God will accomplish His purposes, with or without any of us, regardless of our gifts or talents. 

We have seen the same story again and again. A pastor is accused of sexual immorality or financial impropriety or leadership by bullying, and typically the church board defends him and says it isn’t true. Finally it’s no longer possible to deny the pastor’s sin, but the board members have lost all credibility. By the time leaders resign and the church tries to start over, the most principled staff and many of the core people have already left. The same happens with Christian ministries.

Coming to grips with the realities of what French wrote could save church and ministry boards from having to say what Ravi Zacharias’s ministry said last week.

Thirty years ago I wrote my booklet Sexual Temptation for pastors and Christian leaders, as well as the churches and ministries they serve. Sadly, it has proven to be timeless because immorality has continued. The booklet contains clear, preventive guidelines we can follow to avoid immorality. If I could get one main message from that booklet to Christian leaders right now, it would be this: ministry is not just a task. It is a sacred trust between the under-shepherd and the flock (or the parachurch minister and the larger Christian community) which has been entrusted to him by God. To misuse and violate that trust to achieve sexual conquest, or even emotional dependence, is a deplorable behavior. It is using spiritual authority and power to exploit another person.

Even the secular counseling profession considers it the highest breach of ethics to enter into a romantic and/or sexual relationship with a client. Indeed, sexual involvement with one who has come to seek emotional help or spiritual guidance should not only be considered fornication or adultery—it should be considered sexual abuse.

How much has our reputation as Christ’s servants suffered? How much credibility have we lost because of the highly publicized immoral exploits of those in ministry? After hearing of yet another fallen Christian leader, years ago a committed Christian woman told me in tears, “Every time I listen to a Christian leader now, I can’t shake the thought that he’s likely living in immorality.”

Here are three critical facts we must understand:

Critical Fact #1: We are targeted for sexual immorality.

Some years ago, there were weighty rumors about an international “hit list,” a calculated plan for paid assassins to murder strategic world leaders. A terrifying thought, isn’t it? Yet I’m convinced that the enemy, Satan, has maintained such a hit list throughout the millennia. And there’s every reason to believe that mature Christians are at the very top of it.

If you have a ministry of any sort—public or private—as a teacher, preacher, leader, helper, or as any kind of salt and light in the world (Matthew 5:13-16)—then take heed: you are a targeted man, a marked woman. The forces of evil have taken out a contract on you. There is a price on your head. Satan is out to get you. Why? Because he wants to nullify your ministry. Because you bear on your shoulders the reputation of Christ.

Our battle is not against flesh and blood, but against spiritual forces of evil in the invisible realm (Ephesians 6:12). These desperately evil beings have vested interests in our moral collapse. They will do everything in their power to strike out at Christ and His church. “Be self-controlled and alert. Your enemy the devil prowls around like a roaring lion looking for someone to devour” (1 Peter 5:8).

Critical fact #2: We are vulnerable to sexual immorality.

In the early 1980’s, while still in my late twenties, I began researching my first book Christians in the Wake of the Sexual Revolution, which was released in 1985. I was alarmed at the degree of sexual immorality I knew of already as a young pastor. Sadly, this wasn’t just among sheep but among shepherds (who, by the way, are first and foremost sheep and should be viewed as sheep by themselves and others, even as they lead as shepherds). When the book was first released, many critics expressed skepticism that immorality in the ministry was as widespread as I indicated, and expressed it wasn’t helpful to talk about it. A few years later the dramatic moral falls of Jimmy Swaggert, Jim Bakker, and others changed some people’s minds.

All Christians are susceptible to sexual sin. The myth that we are morally invulnerable dies slowly, even in the face of overwhelming evidence. There is not and never has been some mystical antibody that makes us immune to sexual sin.

“Pride goes before destruction, a haughty spirit before a fall” (Proverbs 16:18). What level of pride is required to believe that sexual sin could overtake Lot, Samson, David (“a man after God’s own heart”), Solomon, the Corinthians, and many Christian leaders today, but not me? Paul’s warnings deserve a prominent place on our mirrors, dashboards, desktops, and computers: “But watch yourself, or you also may be tempted” (Galatians 6:1); “If you think you are standing firm, be careful that you don’t fall!” (1 Corinthians 10:12).

In response to my first blog about Ravi Zacharias, where I quoted from both the investigative report and the open letter from RZIM, many responded by saying, “I don’t believe this is real.” One elaborated, “This is part of the cancel culture. Can’t you see? They had to have a valid reason to pull his books and declare him ungodly and untrustworthy because his teachings are sound and many seekers like listening to him. In order for the great reset to happen they have must get rid of America and Christianity.”

Why is it impossible for some to believe that a Christian leader can be guilty as charged? Partly because we kid ourselves into thinking it just can’t happen. What’s the result? Not taking action to prevent it. If you’re sure you won’t be robbed, you will leave your cash on the windowsill and the window open. Why not?

One of several friends who knew Ravi well emailed me about the apologist’s international travel schedule that left him utterly exhausted, crossing time zones like they were mile markers. I think of how exhaustion has sometimes fed my own vulnerability to wrong thinking and makes it easier to be tempted toward impatience, anger, or lust. Perhaps Ravi’s schedule and the expectations he and others put on him turned his “ministry” into a set-up for burnout, rationalizations, and patterns of grievous sin.

To be clear, that absolutely doesn’t in any way justify his abuse of women, but it could be part of the explanation of how his life was derailed, and as another friend who knew him well put it, led to him “living a double life.”

Perhaps instead of flying around the world at the pace he did, he could have spoken half as often and not become exhausted and given in to impulses that I hope at one point in his life he viewed as forbidden by God. Retrospect is always easier, but I suspect now that his family and friends and board wish they would have insisted he speak and travel less, and rest more and commune with God and have ongoing accountability with godly men. One commenter on Facebook wisely wrote, “I am beginning to think that those in ministry, especially those leading ministries, need to have a couple of weeks at least twice a year to sit with accountability partners and talk through their struggles. They also need time to be encouraged by others and have time to allow the Holy Spirit to speak into their lives both encouragement and correction.”

Speaking of flying, I’ve long been struck by the spiritual application when flight crews announce, “If you’re traveling with a child or someone who requires assistance, in the case of an emergency, secure your own oxygen mask first before helping the other person.” Those instructions apply to everyone in Christian ministry. In order to tend to anyone else’s spiritual lives, we need to first tend to our own relationship with Christ.

Perhaps the rationale was, push yourself to the limits so you can reach as many people with the message as possible. But that’s the problem, isn’t it? Because only a tiny percentage of the millions who would have read his books and watched his messages for at least generation or two will do so now. Doing more, or appearing to do more, for God’s kingdom then without proper spiritual growth, accountability, and rest nullified his future ministry.

(Many have commented that Ravi’s books, videos, and insights are just as true and needed now as ever. However, separating a man’s life message from his patterns of abuse is difficult, isn’t it? Will anyone ever get the same good feelings from The Cosby Show that they once did? Will others recommend and watch it, no matter how good it once was? At least one of Ravi’s publishers has already stopped selling his books. A builder can commit murder, but his buildings will still stand. Not so with the messages of a man who wasn’t just imperfect but betrayed the most basic beliefs he advocated. Fortunately, there are other defenders of the faith who are addressing the same questions Ravi did, though his gifts and communicative skills and manner were remarkable.)

Critical fact #3: We are fully responsible for our moral choices.

It’s often said that people “fall” into immorality. That expression is as revealing as it is faulty and dangerous. The very term fall betrays a victim mentality. It sounds as if we were walking down a street and someone tripped us. It implies that moral collapse comes out of nowhere, that there is little or nothing we could have done to prevent what happened.

We do not fall into immorality. We walk into it. Indeed, sometimes we run headlong into it. We must realize from the beginning that immorality is a choice. It is not something that happens to people. It is something that people make happen.

We may do everything in our power to achieve physical health, yet we can still get cancer. But this is not true of immorality. If we depend on our Savior and the Holy Spirit’s empowerment, and take deliberate and ongoing steps to cultivate purity and avoid immorality, we can avoid it. It does not choose us. We choose it—or we choose to avoid it. That’s why God says this to us: “Do not set foot on the path of the wicked or walk in the way of evildoers. Avoid it, do not travel on it; turn from it and go on your way” (Proverbs 4:14-15)

Is Immorality Inevitable?

One woman in ministry said to me, “There’s so much immorality among Christians now that I’m living in constant fear. It’s happened to those more godly than I, so I keep thinking that it’s probably going to happen to me. It almost seems inevitable.”

God does not want us to be presumptuous, but neither does He want us to be paranoid. We do not have to live each day teetering on the edge of immorality or paralyzed by the fear of a sudden fall. In the context of resisting sexual temptation, the wise man says this to his son:

My son, preserve sound judgment and discernment,
do not let them out of your sight;
they will be life for you,
an ornament to grace your neck.
Then you will go on your way in safety,
and your foot will not stumble;
when you lie down you will not be afraid;
when you lie down, your sleep will be sweet.
Have no fear of sudden disaster
or of the ruin that overtakes the wicked,
for the LORD will be your confidence
And will keep your foot from being snared.
(Proverbs 3:21-26)

If we walk daily with Christ, being alert to what’s happening in our minds and implementing steps of righteousness and wisdom, only then we can go our way “in safety” and “not be afraid.”

Browse more resources on the topic of purity, and see Randy's book The Purity Principle and his booklet Sexual Temptation.

Photo by Luis Quintero from Pexels

Evaluating Our Responses to the Ravi Zacharias Scandal

In my previous blog, “In the Wake of Ravi Zacharias’s Sexual Abuse of Women,” I quoted from the detailed investigative report from a law firm which was commissioned by Ravi Zacharias International Ministry.

I also quoted from the “Open Letter from the International Board of Directors of RZIM on the Investigation of Ravi Zacharias.” The board says they believe the investigative report to be true, and they are the ones who made it public. In their letter they apologize to the many victims and lament their own failure to believe and properly investigate the claims made against Zacharias.

My Perspective after Reading the 900 Comments on My Previous Blog

In this blog, I want to address the responses to my previous article, which I think are very enlightening in evaluating our different views of the moral failures of Christian leaders.

My Friday, February 12 blog came out twelve hours after RZIM released the report from the investigators. In the first ten hours after posting, over 700 comments came in on my Facebook page. I read every one of those, including the comments on comments. The next day I read the subsequent 100 comments, and today 100 more. What I’m going to say now comes out of that.

Grief and Empathy for the Victims

First, I was very moved by so many who demonstrated broken-heartedness. People were so sad, as well as shocked. They expressed great concern for the victims, and empathy for Ravi’s family who will live with this for the rest of their lives.

Many also affirmed our faith should be in Jesus, not people. No one should lose their faith in Jesus, the morally perfect God-man who went to the cross for us, because anyone else, no matter how gifted and well-known, fails terribly.

A number of commenters mentioned their own abuse at the hands of Christian leaders. This ranged from sexual abuse to bullying to misappropriating funds for personal use. While we can’t know what happened in every case, we should all know such things do in fact happen, far more often than they should. When they do our hearts should be broken, and we should pray and seek to help people however we can.

Denials That the Claims Are True, and Believing a Righteous Man Unable to Defend Himself Is Being Slandered

Many said things such as, “These accusations only came out after he died and can no longer defend himself.” In fact, accusations go back at least several years, and Ravi did defend himself by lying about them. That is all documented. See the detailed report issued by the independent investigative firm after interviewing over fifty people and finding hundreds of inappropriate photos of women on Ravi’s devices and incriminating texts he sent to them.

This response was frequent. Maybe some just didn’t bother reading the blog or didn’t follow the links to the statement by the law firm hired to find the truth, and the apology by the RZIM board. Please, don’t make statements against what you’re unwilling to actually read.

If you did read it and still don’t believe it, then you are not believing the people, including at least one family member, who knew Ravi best, have been the most loyal to him, and once unswervingly defended him but now say the claims against him are true.

One comment simply said: “I just don’t believe it.” Legally someone is “innocent until proven guilty” but that’s not where we’re at now. It’s “seen as guilty only after having been proven guilty.” When Christians refuse to believe facts based on over 50 objectively conducted (the law firm was hired and paid by RZIM) interviews of those with direct knowledge, that’s an indication we don’t believe Jesus when He says, in a different context, “the truth will set you free” (John 8:32).

In that same passage He says of Satan, “He was a murderer from the beginning, not holding to the truth, for there is no truth in him. When he lies, he speaks his native language, for he is a liar and the father of lies” (John 8:44). This passage pertains both when innocent people are being falsely accused and when guilty people have been proven to be guilty. In either case don’t believe the devil.

I addressed in the previous blog the viewpoint “don’t condemn a man when he’s dead, he’s not here to defend himself.” That didn’t stop people from repeatedly saying that in the comments. The truth is that Ravi did hear the accusations from Lori Anne Thompson while still alive, and over the course of years continued to deny them, including many that the investigative firm and the ministry board now affirm to have been true all along. 

The Claim That We Can’t Trust Pastors and Christian Leaders Any More

Some commenters, sadly, said they no longer trust any Christian leaders, including local church pastors. True, there have been many well-known and lesser known Christian leaders who have sinned sexually, financially, and through bullying those who work “for” them (that’s one of the problems—people should be viewed as servants of Jesus, not servants of Christian leaders).

I believe that while disappointment is understandable and inevitable, we should not lose trust in all pastors and Christian leaders because some or even many have abused people’s trust. Likewise, a few commenters said they have lost their trust in all men. But no matter how many men do bad, there are many men of integrity and true humility before God. I say this because I know many of them myself! Could I be wrong about some? Yes, I was wrong about Ravi. I’m sure I will be proven wrong again.

But isn’t this part of the fall and living in a world under the Curse? To recognize that some people are phonies and wolves in sheep’s clothing is simply to believe the Bible. To conclude that all are phonies and wolves makes no sense. The same Bible that shows flawed people and immoral and prideful spiritual leaders also shows people of integrity growing in grace and genuinely serving Jesus. The Bible also says, “Remember your leaders, who spoke the word of God to you. Consider the outcome of their way of life and imitate their faith” (Hebrews 13:8). So let’s look at positive spiritual outcomes and the way of life of God’s people and follow what we see in them. The negative spiritual outcomes will always be there in some, so just don’t follow those. But don’t throw out the baby of godly leaders with the bathwater of ungodly leaders!

The Holy Spirit would never have put forward the stringent character qualifications for pastors in 1 Timothy 3 and Titus 1 if such men did not exist. They did exist, and they still do. “They are all phonies” and “you can’t trust any of them” are just more lies from Satan.

Some people have given up on churches because of their bad experiences. I understand, but I also know that God intends for us to be part of churches, and the devil doesn’t want us to be. This is based on much more than Hebrews 10:25, though it includes it: “Let us not give up the habit of meeting together, as some are doing. Instead, let us encourage one another all the more, since you see that the Day of the Lord is coming nearer” (GNT).

Find a church that includes fellowship, Bible teaching, pastoral leadership, baptism, the Lord’s supper, discipleship, evangelism, and all the things associated with being a New Testament Church. If you decide to start a church, fine, but remember that your church will be started by a sinner, and joined only by sinners. The old saying is true: “If you find a perfect church don’t join it, because then it won’t be perfect anymore.”

It’s reasonable to expect leaders should live up to biblical qualifications. If they fail morally, they should be removed from leadership. (This is in the best interests of the church, the rest of the staff and themselves.) Christ will not give up on the church, and He says ultimately the gates of Hell won’t prevail against it (Matthew 16:18). Instead of giving up on church, we should help raise the bar of moral accountability. If we are in churches where we believe pastors are unqualified to lead based on biblical standards, if the leaders don’t agree and we remain convinced of it, we should find another church where leaders are character-qualified. Many such churches really do exist, believe me. (Keep looking!)

True, as Ravi painfully demonstrated, we can’t always know what people are doing in their private lives, but in the right kind of team ministry in churches and parachurch organizations, there can and should be true moral accountability and honesty. (My next blog will be devoted to that subject.)

Ravi Zacharias and King David: A Comparison That Falls Short

Some commenters pointed out the Bible is full of deeply flawed people who God uses. It’s also full of genuinely godly people such as David, who committed adultery and effectively ordered the murder of a loyal friend to cover his adultery with Bathsheba and permit him to marry her. It doesn’t get much worse than that.

Read the account in 2 Samuel 7 of how Nathan boldly confronted David, who came to repentance, and was forgiven of his sin, which still bore lifelong consequences. Nathan serves as an example of what people who work around pastors and Christian leaders should do when they become aware of their sin, or are aware of leaders putting themselves in places of temptation and moving toward sin.

Those mentioning David often pointed out he is called a “man after God’s own heart” (1 Samuel 13:14, Acts 13:22). But when people compared David to Ravi, as a number of commenters did, they failed to mention that David agonized over his sins and confessed and repented of them (see Psalm 32 and 51). Had David not listened to Nathan and confessed and repented, we would not remember him as a man after God’s own heart. That’s where the comparison to Ravi breaks down, as I’ve heard no indication of confession and repentance, only of denial.

Arguing the Women Were as Guilty as Ravi

It disturbed me to see a number of people say this. Certainly, we are all guilty of our sinful choices, but that does not mean we are equally guilty. This is something I wrote years ago in Sexual Temptation, a booklet geared to pastors and Christian leaders:

Sexual involvement with one who has come to seek emotional help or spiritual guidance should not only be considered fornication or adultery—it should be considered sexual abuse. Sexual activity that comes out of a ministry context is comparable to child sexual abuse, where the supposedly mature and stable adult figure takes advantage of his or her authority and credibility to initiate or allow a sexual encounter with the immature and vulnerable. In such cases, the person in ministry is not a victim but a predator. And it is all the worse because we are trusted representatives of Christ.

When various commenters said, “These were adult women who were consenting adults,” they failed to recognize the imbalance of power between an established Christian leader with great verbal skills who is in the obvious power position and who exerts influence on someone. While it isn’t a righteous response, it’s understandable that someone could not only be flattered by the man’s interest but also reason, “I thought doing this was wrong, but he knows the Bible far better than I do, maybe it’s really okay.” Is that rationalizing? Of course. But when Jesus talked about abusive leaders being wolves among the sheep, surely he wasn’t putting equal blame on the sheep as on the wolves.

Failure to Understand That the Christian Life Must Be Spirit-Empowered, Not Just Duty-Driven

Some comments seemed to reduce the Christian life to having the willpower to not sin. But  the answer isn’t “I’ll just try harder to resist temptation”—even though indeed we must try. We need to not just say “you have to do better,” but depend on Christ and call upon His grace and strength to empower us:

For the grace of God has appeared that offers salvation to all people. It teaches us to say “No” to ungodliness and worldly passions, and to live self-controlled, upright and godly lives in this present age, while we wait for the blessed hope—the appearing of the glory of our great God and Savior, Jesus Christ, who gave himself for us to redeem us from all wickedness and to purify for himself a people that are his very own, eager to do what is good. (Titus 2:11-15)

Sure, we should work hard, but all that work should be empowered by Him as we yield ourselves to him: “For this I toil, struggling with all his energy that he powerfully works within me” (Colossians 1:29).

Comments That Seemed Self-Righteous, Angrily Condemning Not Only Ravi But Also Other Commenters

I didn’t know best how to respond to some of the comments that concerned me most. God wonderfully came to my aid when an email came in from a friend I haven’t been in touch with for many years. He read the blog and some of the comments, as well as comments on other sites. I asked his permission to share some of what he said:

Randy, I wanted to say thank you for your post on Ravi…. I knew Ravi and know those at RZIM.

I think it would be immensely helpful for the evangelical world, especially those who will post and leave footprints, to realize that the unbelieving world isn't just won over by our “positive” righteousness and our “good, virtuous” witness and testimony; but also, if not sometimes more so, by our brokenness, helplessness… and God's unilateral grace in saving us, shaping us, and loving us anyway ... despite ourselves.

In my personal experience, the air and attitude of self-righteousness has contributed far more to unbelievers’ resistance to Christianity than the sins of Christian leaders, though that can and has served to reinforce their resistance, of course. Yet, our spirit of judgment (not the righteous kind, but the Matt. 7:1 kind Jesus commanded us not to have) and its accompanying ethos have really been the biggest stench and hindrance to our testimony, in my engagement with unbelievers. We could be technically and propositionally correct in our assessments and perspectives, but something about the evangelical spirit has also been very predatory, grooming, abusive, and downright evil, leaving so many badly hurt and repulsed…

The spirit of the posts and comments I’ve been reading by the believing world has largely been missing an awful lot in terms of spirit and attitude. It sounds and reads much like the unbelieving world in so many ways.

I was stung to see the lack of grace in a number of the comments. What are we thinking? The proper way to respond to public sin is not to point fingers at everyone else and argue over word choices, but to come with deep grief, righteous anger on behalf of victims, and self-awareness of our own sin and the danger it presents to ship-wrecking our own lives. In the following blogs I will address this and more. My hope is that our response to this terrible episode will drive us to our knees and cause us to search our hearts and examine our own lives before our God, as David did:

Search me, O God, and know my heart;
test me and know my anxious thoughts.
Point out anything in me that offends you,
and lead me along the path of everlasting life.

Psalm 139:3-4

Photo by Jon Tyson on Unsplash

In the Wake of Ravi Zacharias’s Sexual Abuse of Women

A few months ago, Ravi Zacharias International Ministry (RZIM) released a statement about the external investigation into allegations against Ravi Zacharias. That preliminary statement was very disturbing, but the twelve-page final report released late yesterday, February 11, is horrific. Here is just a small sample, but there are much more graphic depictions, which I’d encourage you to ask God whether or not you should read:

She [a massage therapist] reported that he [Ravi Zacharias] made her pray with him to thank God for the “opportunity” they both received [by having sex]. She said he called her his “reward” for living a life of service to God, and he referenced the “godly men” in the Bible with more than one wife. She said he warned her not ever to speak out against him or she would be responsible for the “millions of souls” whose salvation would be lost if his reputation was damaged.

This next quote is a small part of the response to this report by the RZIM board, also posted yesterday: “We regret that we allowed our misplaced trust in Ravi to result in him having less oversight and accountability than would have been wise and loving. We also regret the ways that many of us have publicly extolled Ravi’s character and the impact this will have had on victims of his abuse. We now know our words have been hurtful, and that causes us deep sorrow.”

They go on to say, “We are shocked and grieved by Ravi’s actions. As Ravi Zacharias was the founder of our ministry and the leader of our staff, community, and team, we also feel a deep need for corporate repentance.”

One of the saddest things I’ve ever had to do was realize in December that we should take down from our website various blogs, articles, and videos concerning Ravi Zacharias.

I didn’t know Ravi well, but as it turns out I didn’t know him even as well as I thought I did. I had two conversations with him over the years, both at a big booksellers’ convention. The second of those times, my daughter Angela was with me. Ravi stopped and talked with us, making both him and us late for radio shows, but he was so kind and gracious to my daughter that we were struck with his humility and servant-heartedness. This same character quality came out in many of his debates and Q&As—he could disagree with people while still being kind and respectful.

Because of this, I was truly shocked when I first read credible and later irrefutable evidence that Ravi had a long-term pattern of sexual immorality that involved many women. This part of Ravi, according to family and close friends, was unthinkable to them. It was invisible, and that’s the most troubling part, because sin and abuse thrive in the dark.

I am always disappointed by (but sometimes not shocked by) the moral failures of evangelical leaders. I say that with great sadness. God says, “Pride goes before destruction, a haughty spirit before a fall” (Proverbs 16:18). Sometimes pride is conspicuous to nearly everyone but the person guilty of it. When a Christian leader—or anyone else—often comes across as proud and arrogant it may be simply because that’s what he really is.  Pride and arrogance weren’t the first things most of us saw in Ravi. What we saw was apparent humility and devotion to Jesus. When these qualities are the genuine fruit of God’s Spirit, they are beautiful; when they are not, they can become tools to manipulate others into gratifying our sinful desires.

I know enough of the ugliness of my own pride that at least I am sometimes, though regretfully not always, aware of it when it rears its ugly head.  

Here are some first thoughts in response to this tragedy, actually these many tragedies, because each incident did harm to others as well as to the reputation of Christ:

Let’s be quick to confess and repent. Most Christian leaders I know are like me, sinners saved by grace and growing in Christlikeness but nonetheless prone to sometimes dishonor God. That’s why quick and sincere confession and repentance before God and others needs to be a regular part of our lives. If we postpone repentance we will be dragged deeper into sin.
Let’s “finish well.” My friends and I often encourage each other to do this, especially as we get closer to that finish line, which each of us do every day. Clearly Ravi did not finish well. He finished in what appears to have been grievous sin that was unconfessed and unrepented of. Of course, only God knows what happened in his final hours or minutes. But all the books and messages and debates he ever engaged in, all the good he may have done, could not begin to compensate for his disobedience. Jesus says, “If you love me, you will keep my commandments” (John 14:15).
Let’s not trust ourselves too much by putting ourselves into temptation: “Do not think of yourself more highly than you ought, but rather think of yourself with sober judgment” (Romans 12:3).
Let’s not act as if we are spiritually or morally stronger than we are: “So, if you think you are standing firm, be careful that you don't fall!” (1 Corinthians 10:12)
Let’s decisively run away from sexual temptation: “Flee from sexual immorality” (1 Corinthians 6:18).
Let’s realize Satan has targeted us for destruction. “Be sober-minded; be watchful. Your adversary the devil prowls around like a roaring lion, seeking someone to devour” (1 Peter 5:8).
Let’s lean on each other for moral strength and support. “As iron sharpens iron, so one person sharpens another” (Proverbs 27:17).
Let's remember we can’t keep dark secrets from God, the Audience of One. And we can keep them from people only a short time, even if that short time is decades. “There is nothing concealed that will not be disclosed, or hidden that will not be made known. What you have said in the dark will be heard in the daylight, and what you have whispered in the ear in the inner rooms will be proclaimed from the roofs” (Luke 12:2-3).

Who Can We Trust?

Many people question their faith when Christian leaders fall. When they fall to the degree Ravi did, what is a person who came to Christ hearing Ravi speak, or reading one of his books, supposed to think?

While we should all live consistently with the gospel, our obedience and virtue should never be the foundation or object of anyone else’s faith. Christian leaders are not God. They did not create you and didn’t die for your sins. If your primary faith is in Christian leaders instead of Jesus, then you need to lose that faith and replace it with Jesus alone, the only proper object of your faith. Put your ultimate and absolute faith in no man except Jesus, the God-man.

However, that previous paragraph isn’t where we should stop. As 1 Timothy 3, Titus 1, and other passages make clear, Christian leaders are responsible to be people of integrity. Blameless, loving what is good, upright, holy, self-controlled. In a word, trustworthy. We should be growing in Christlikeness and set an example for others in recognizing our own weaknesses, temptations, and sins. We should be examples both in living righteously and in seeking to prevent moral lapses and dealing with them decisively if they happen, in confession and repentance.

Only when this is done will people be able to trust leaders. Church and ministry boards and staff should make sure to have true accountability. So in one sense of course Jesus is the only one we ultimately and unconditionally trust. But as we become more like Jesus people should be able to trust us also!

Paul said, “Be imitators of me as I am of Christ” (1 Corinthians 11:1). Hebrews 13:7 says, “Remember your leaders, who spoke the word of God to you. Consider the outcome of their way of life and imitate their faith.” Churches and ministries desperately need these kind of leaders! And they should do all they can to cultivate and find them.

A dear friend wrote, “My prayer now is that everyone hearing of Ravi’s sins will be driven to the Savior. That we will each confess our own sins and pray for our brothers and sisters in the Lord as waves of abuse roll over the church and Christian ministries. I pray that each one will remember that God cannot fail, no matter what men do. I pray that new safeguards will be put in place by Christian ministries to minimize the chance of such a thing happening again.”

Why Talk about a Man Who’s Dead and Can’t Defend Himself?

Part of the answer is that, as the report shows, Ravi consistently covered up and lied and manipulated to protect himself so that he wasn’t caught when he was alive.

“Let him rest in peace” isn’t a good response. We can’t let something like this rest by covering it up and therefore making the next abuser think he can get away. Suppose U.S. Olympic team doctor Larry Nasser had died prior to U.S. gymnast Rachael Denhollander accusing him of sexual assault. Should she have not spoken up if he’d already died? Should the other 155 women who came forward have remained silent if he’d died? Many of these women testify to the beginning of healing because they spoke up, and in their case testified against a sexual predator at his trial. And they sent the message to the victims “speak up” and to the victimizer “you won’t get away with it.”

What I Regret: Not Believing Lori Anne Thompson

When I first heard of the woman who accused Ravi a few years ago, based on the information given by the ministry, I thought that a false accusation was possible. I was told it was motivated by financial gain and that this couple had done the same thing before. I have often said to pastor friends how careful we have to be because a single false accusation that we could not disprove—and in many cases it’s impossible to prove innocence—would take us down and ruin our reputations forever even if there wasn’t a shred of truth in it. That’s why innocent until proven guilty is my assumption.

In Ravi’s case it turned out, as the new report verifies, there was a lot of contrary evidence that was silenced when they settled out of court with a nondisclosure agreement. I remember my first reactions when I heard about that agreement. Do innocent people actually pay to silence evidence from being made public? Why would Ravi agree to that if he were innocent? When I was told Ravi confessed he was unwise, that he should never have texted with her in the first place so she couldn’t send those inappropriate photos to him, I chose to give the benefit of my doubt to Ravi, who I thought I knew, instead of to people who I didn’t know and heard weren’t credible. That is a big regret. I should never have made the assumption I did.

Lori Anne Thompson, this woman I didn’t know, earlier this week posted a video on her webpage, describing her relationship with Ravi Zacharias as "the most traumatizing, soul destroying, faith crushing season in my life.” Watching this sixteen-minute video by Lori Anne was painful in the extreme, though any pain on my part of course is the tiniest fraction of her and her husband’s pain. She says, “I knew the world to be an unsafe place before I met Ravi Zacharias—but I yet had hope that there were some safe and sacred spaces. I no longer live with that hope. I trusted him. I trusted Christendom. That trust is irreparably and catastrophically shattered.”

Let the weight of that dear woman’s pain fall on you as it did on me. Of course we can say others have been abused by people and still trust Jesus, but when someone seems to be the voice of Jesus in your life and then treats you so horribly, it can close up your heart.

After watching her video, I asked God’s forgiveness for believing the statements by RZIM in which they characterized her and her husband as extortionists attacking a character qualified Christian leader. When you have to ask God’s forgiveness for believing a Christian leader and a Christian ministry, it means something has gone terribly wrong. I pray for Lori Anne Thompson and her husband now. I think if you watch that video, she may be on your prayer list too. What a picture of the consequences of a Christian leader’s sin!

In their statement issued yesterday, to their credit the board of RZIM apologized to the Thompsons. “We believe Lori Anne Thompson has told the truth about the nature of her relationship with Ravi Zacharias,” the board said. “It is with profound grief that we recognize that because we did not believe the Thompsons and both privately and publicly perpetuated a false narrative, they were slandered for years and their suffering was greatly prolonged and intensified. This leaves us heartbroken and ashamed.”

Broken Hearts and Tragic Consequences

I have never enjoyed working on a blog less than this one. My heart is broken, and I ache for the victims of Ravi Zacharias. I ache for seekers who had been influenced by Ravi’s words and now will dismiss them. I ache for younger people in our churches, and older ones too, who keep seeing and hearing story after story of Christian leaders being bullies, money-lovers, and adulterers. And in this case, a sexual predator. If it breaks my heart this much, what does it do to the heart of Jesus? Surely it also stirs his anger, and unlike ours, righteous anger is the only kind he has. “It is a terrifying thing to fall into the hands of the living God” (Hebrews 10:31, CSB). Perhaps there is no more tragic consequence to the sexual sin of Christians than its effect on non-Christians. Nathan said to David, in the wake of his sexual sin, “by doing this you have made the enemies of the Lord show utter contempt . . .” (2 Samuel 12:14).

Let’s all pray for Ravi’s wife, daughters, and son. I can’t imagine the depths of their grief. They lost him in death less than a year ago. Now they are losing him again in a way far more difficult than death.

There is more to be learned from this great tragedy, including the need to wake up and take precautions, to change structures and cultures in ministries and churches, and to foster mutual moral and spiritual accountability. And the need to recognize Satan’s power and plans to deceive and destroy us and our service for Jesus through sexual immorality. I’ll address all that in an upcoming blog. 

For more, see Randy’s book The Purity Principle , and his articles Counting the Cost of Sexual Immorality and The Sacred Trust of Pastors and Christian Leaders .

Image by Pexels from Pixabay

Black History Month: 20 Stories You Should Know

In honor of Black History Month, Christianity Today has a compilation of 20 stories that Christians should know. The stories of Harriet Tubman, Sojourner Truth and Frederick Douglas are some of my favorites. Harriet Tubman was incredible, arguably the bravest guide of the Underground Railroad. And Sojourner Truth, the name she adopted after truly coming to Jesus, has to be one of the greatest names in history. (If you haven’t seen the Harriet Tubman movie, don’t miss it! Nanci and I loved it.)

As for Sojourner Truth, she once said this while speaking to a crowd:

That man over there says that women need to be helped into carriages and lifted over ditches and to have the best place everywhere. Nobody helps me any best place. And ain’t I a woman? Look at me! Look at my arm. I have plowed, I have planted, and I have gathered into barns. And no man could head me. And ain’t I a woman? I could work as much and eat as much as man—when I could get it—and bear the lash as well! And ain’t I a woman? I have borne children and seen most of them sold into slavery, and when I cried out with a mother's grief, none but Jesus heard me. And ain’t I a woman?

You may also be interested in what I wrote about the hymn “Amazing Grace” and its connection to black history.   

Why does Black History Month matter to me? One reason is that the U.S. history I learned in school almost exclusively featured white people like me. I felt like I knew George Washington and Patrick Henry and Benjamin Franklin. I was taught that slavery existed, but I didn’t learn anything personally about the slaves. I didn’t know them. Besides Martin Luther King and Rosa Parks, I didn’t know anything about black people. I didn’t hear names like Frederick Douglas, Harriet Tubman, and Sojourner Truth. Even the heroes I learned about who helped end slavery were Abraham Lincoln and Harriet Beecher Stowe, good white people, but still white people.

Black History Month is an opportunity to see another side of U.S. history and look at the lives of accomplishments of African Americans who are 13% of the U.S. population, and over 30% of the population of seventy major metropolitan areas. (If anyone wonders “Why don’t we have a White History month?” the simple answer is, historically for the vast majority of the past, every month has been White History Month.)

God cares about and wants justice for women as well as men, people of all races, and all children, both born and unborn. Of course, not everything that people call “justice” conforms to true biblical justice, yet justice is not a word we should fear but embrace, provided we see it as a central part of the Christian worldview. We should never pursue justice instead of the gospel, but we should pursue it because of the gospel.

Meditate on these passages about justice and compassion and the ministry of Jesus in our lives:

The Spirit of the Lord is on me, because He has anointed me to preach good news to the poor. He has sent me to proclaim freedom for the prisoners and recovery of sight for the blind, to release the oppressed.  —Jesus (Luke 4:18)

He has told you, O man, what is good; and what does the Lord require of you but 1) to do justice, and 2) to love kindness, and 3) to walk humbly with your God? (Micah 6:8)

Here [in Christ and in his church] there is no Gentile or Jew, circumcised or uncircumcised, barbarian, Scythian, slave or free, but Christ is all, and is in all. Therefore, as God’s chosen people, holy and dearly loved, clothe yourselves with compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness and patience. Bear with each other and forgive one another if any of you has a grievance against someone. Forgive as the Lord forgave you. And over all these virtues put on love, which binds them all together in perfect unity. Let the peace of Christ rule in your hearts, since as members of one body you were called to peace. And be thankful. (Colossians 3:11-15)

Common Christian Myths About Happiness

Puritan preacher Thomas Brooks said, “God is the author of all true happiness; he is the donor of all true happiness. . . . He that hath him for his God, for his portion, is the only happy man in the world.” English evangelist John Wesley said, “When we first know Christ . . . then it is that happiness begins; happiness real, solid, substantial.”

Happiness is what we all want, and believers throughout the centuries, like Brooks and Wesley, have affirmed that it is a good desire when we seek it in Christ. Unfortunately, countless modern Christians have been taught various myths about happiness.

Is God Concerned Only with Our Holiness?

As a young pastor, I preached, as others still do, “God calls us to holiness, not happiness.” I saw Christians pursue what they thought would make them happy, falling headlong into sexual immorality, alcoholism, and materialism. The lure of happiness appeared at odds with holiness. I was attempting to oppose our human tendency to put preferences and convenience before obedience to Christ. It all sounded so spiritual, and I could quote countless authors and preachers who agreed with me.

I’m now convinced we were all dead wrong.

To be holy is to see God as he is and to become like him, covered in Christ’s righteousness. And since God’s nature is to be happy (Psalm 115:3; 1 Timothy 1:11), the more like him we become in our sanctification, the happier we will be. Forcing a choice between happiness and holiness is utterly foreign to Scripture. If it were true that God wants us to be only holy, wouldn’t we expect Philippians 4:4 to say, “Be holy in the Lord always” instead of “Rejoice in the Lord always”?

Any understanding of God is utterly false if it is incompatible with the lofty and infinitely holy view of God in Ezekiel 1:26–28 and Isaiah 6:1–4, and of Jesus in Revelation 1:9–18. God is decidedly and unapologetically anti-sin, but he is in no sense anti-happiness. Indeed, holiness is exactly what secures our happiness. Charles Spurgeon said, “Holiness is the royal road to happiness. The death of sin is the life of joy.”

Is Happiness Just a Matter of Chance?

It’s common to hear objections to the word happy based on its etymology, or history. One commentator says that “Happy comes from the word ‘hap,’ meaning ‘chance.’ It is therefore incorrect to translate [the Greek word makarios] as ‘happy’” (The Pursuit of Happiness: An Exegetical Commentary on the Beatitudes). This argument may sound valid, but our language is full of words long detached from their original meanings. Enthusiasm originally meant “in the gods,” but if I say you’re enthusiastic, I’m not suggesting you are a polytheist.

When people say they want to be happy, they are typically making no statement whatsoever about chance. D.A. Carson argues in Exegetical Fallacies, “The meaning of a word cannot be reliably determined by etymology” (32). King James Version translators wouldn’t have used happy and other forms of the root word happiness thirty-six times or translated makarios as some form of happy seventeen times if they thought its word history disqualified happy as a credible biblical word.

The fact is, the Puritans, Jonathan Edwards, Charles Spurgeon, and many others used the words happy and happiness frequently in biblical, theological, and Christ-centered contexts. When they called on believers to be happy, they weren’t speaking of happenstance or chance, but of enduring delight and pleasure and good cheer in Jesus.

Is Joy More Spiritual Than Happiness?

Oswald Chambers, author of the excellent My Utmost for His Highest, was one of the earliest Bible teachers to speak against happiness. He wrote, “Happiness is no standard for men and women because happiness depends on my being determinedly ignorant of God and his demands” (Biblical Ethics, 14).

After extensive research, I’m convinced that no biblical or historical basis whatsoever exists to define happiness as inherently sinful. Unfortunately, because Bible teachers such as Chambers saw people trying to find happiness in sin, they came to think that pursuing happiness is sinful. Chambers said, “Joy is not happiness,” and continued, “There is no mention in the Bible of happiness for a Christian, but there is plenty said about joy” (God’s Workmanship, and He Shall Glorify Me, 346).

That simply is not true. In the King James Version, which Chambers used, Jesus tells his disciples, “If ye know these things, happy are ye if ye do them” (John 13:17 KJV). Speaking of faithful Christians, James said, “We count them happy which endure” (James 5:11 KJV). Peter said to fellow believers, “If ye suffer for righteousness’ sake, happy are ye” (1 Peter 3:14 KJV) and “If ye be reproached for the name of Christ, happy are ye” (1 Peter 4:14 KJV).

Chambers also wrote in My Utmost for His Highest, “Joy should not be confused with happiness. In fact, it is an insult to Jesus Christ to use the word happiness in connection with him.” I certainly respect Oswald Chambers, but statements like this are misleading. It’s hard for me to conceive of a greater insult to Jesus than to effectively deny what Hebrews reveals about his happy nature: “God, your God, has anointed you with the oil of gladness above your companions” (Hebrews 1:9 NASB).

It also seems insulting to say that the best Father in the universe doesn’t want his children to be happy. In reality, the Bible is a vast reservoir containing, not dozens, but hundreds of passages conveying happiness. I’ve found more than 2,700 Scripture passages where words such as joy, happiness, gladness, merriment, pleasure, celebration, cheer, laughter, delight, jubilation, feasting, exultation, and celebration are used. Throw in the words blessed and blessing, which often connote happiness, and the number increases.

The English Standard Version doesn’t use the word happy nearly as often as many other translations, but it’s still there:

Happy are you, O Israel! Who is like you, a people saved by the Lord! (Deuteronomy 33:29)
Judah and Israel were as many as the sand by the sea. They ate and drank and were happy. (1 Kings 4:20)
How beautiful upon the mountains are the feet of him who brings good news, who publishes peace, who brings good news of happiness. (Isaiah 52:7)

Scripture is clear that seeking happiness — or joy, gladness, delight, or pleasure — in sin is wrong and fruitless. But seeking happiness in him is good and God-honoring.

Redeeming ‘Happiness’

The modern Christian avoidance of happiness is completely counterintuitive. This is no minor semantic issue. Historically, philosophically, and practically, happiness is a vital word. But for too long we’ve distanced the gospel from what Augustine, Aquinas, Pascal, the Puritans, Wesley, Spurgeon, and many other spiritual giants said God created us to desire and what he desires for us: happiness.

We need to reverse this trend! Let’s redeem the word happiness in light of both Scripture and church history. Our message to the world should not be “Don’t seek happiness,” but “You’ll find in Jesus the happiness you have always been seeking.”

Browse more resources on the topic of happiness, and see Randy’s related books, including Happiness and Does God Want Us to Be Happy?

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As a thank you, we’re offering an additional 20% off the already discounted prices of our entire store. To apply this offer, enter the code APPRECIATION21 at checkout.

Offer ends Sunday, February 28 at 11:59 P.M. PT.

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Chasing the Wind: The Futility of Materialism

The book of Ecclesiastes is the most powerful exposé of materialism ever written. Solomon recounts his attempts to find meaning in pleasure, laughter, alcohol, folly, building projects, and the pursuit of personal interests, as well as in amassing slaves, gold and silver, singers, and a huge harem to fulfill his sexual desires (Ecclesiastes 2:1-11). The more Solomon had, the more he was tempted to indulge. His indulgence led to sin, and his sin brought misery.

Solomon makes a series of insightful statements in Ecclesiastes 5:10–15. I’ll follow each with my paraphrase:

“Whoever loves money never has money enough” (v. 10). The more you have, the more you want.
“Whoever loves wealth is never satisfied with his income” (v. 10). The more you have, the less you’re satisfied.
“As goods increase, so do those who consume them” (v. 11). The more you have, the more people (including the government) will come after it.
“And what benefit are they to the owner except to feast his eyes on them?” (v. 11). The more you have, the more you realize it does you no good.
“The sleep of a laborer is sweet, whether he eats little or much, but the abundance of a rich man permits him no sleep” (v. 12). The more you have, the more you have to worry about.
“I have seen a grievous evil under the sun: wealth hoarded to the harm of its owner” (v. 13). The more you have, the more you can hurt yourself by holding on to it.
“Or wealth lost through some misfortune” (v.14). The more you have, the more you have to lose.
“Naked a man comes from his mother’s womb, and as he comes, so he departs. He takes nothing from his labor that he can carry in his hand” (v. 15). The more you have, the more you’ll leave behind.

As the wealthiest man on earth, Solomon learned that affluence didn’t satisfy. All it did was give him greater opportunity to chase more mirages. People tend to run out of money before mirages, so they cling to the myth that things they can’t afford will satisfy them. Solomon’s money never ran out. He tried everything, saying, “I denied myself nothing my eyes desired; I refused my heart no pleasure” (Ecclesiastes 2:10).

Solomon’s conclusion? “When I surveyed all that my hands had done and what I had toiled to achieve, everything was meaningless, a chasing after the wind; nothing was gained under the sun” (v. 11).

Consider this statement, “Whoever loves money never has money enough; whoever loves wealth is never satisfied with his income” (Ecclesiastes 5:10). The repeated word never is emphatic—there are no exceptions. There’s an unspoken corollary to this statement: To become satisfied, you must change your attitude toward wealth.

Money itself is never the answer. What we need is a radically different perspective on money and a genuine opportunity to do something with it that will make our lives meaningful instead of meaningless.

See more resources on money and giving, as well as Randy's related books, including Giving Is the Good Life and The Treasure Principle.

Photo by Tim Wildsmith on Unsplash

My Favorite One-Star Reviews of My Book Heaven

I asked one of our EPM staff members to look through the one-star reviews on Amazon for my book Heaven and compile them for me. There are about 4,000 ratings and over 2,500 reviews of the book. Of the reviews, fortunately only 66 are one star (there are 1,760 five-star reviews, so I’m grateful!).

People are entitled to not like any book, of course, and I always welcome criticism of my books, and while they’re not fun, I usually manage not to take bad reviews personally. But in some cases, the reasons for giving Heaven the lowest possible rating were entertaining, and other times enlightening. (My writer friends talk about this a lot—and we often laugh about it, though for some it is admittedly frustrating, since reviewers tend to get the last word even when they misunderstand and misrepresent what an author actually said.)

So here is something I’ve never done—respond to reviews of my books. I hope it doesn’t sound defensive, or like I’m fishing for positive feedback. I get plenty of that, so don’t feel sorry for me! Please allow me this indulgence, and also understand that I am speaking on behalf of other authors who frequently see their books misrepresented in reviews. Let me also assure you that I am writing with a smile and a sense of humor, not a frown and a sense of feeling hurt.

Loved the book so they gave it one star, thinking that’s the highest rating (it’s actually the lowest ):

“A MUST READ for everyone."
“Highly recommend this well researched investigation of what the Bible has to say about Heaven. ….Very uplifting, even life-changing.”
“Great book for everyone to read.”
“Loved it. I'm really excited about the new earth.”
“I loved this book! It is the very best book I have ever read on Heaven! It lines up with the scriptures, which I looked up as I read the book. Heaven is presented in such an exciting and real way; I can hardly wait to get there! I rate this book 5 stars, but I can't seem to get it corrected.”

You should hear writers talk about this one: “People don’t want to buy a book with bad ratings, obviously. But some of my reviewers who sincerely love the book give it the lowest possible rating without understanding what they’re doing! Most people don’t read the reviews, they judge by the ratings. So some people will not read my book because those who love it accidently give it a terrible rating! They think, what could be better than #1, so I’ll give this book I love a one-star review!”

Had an issue with the seller, so gave it one star:

“Did not get my order.”
“Not received.”
“I received the book, however, there was no DVD included in the back of the book. Very disappointed and will probably return the book!”

This is something writers talk about privately, often with laughter but sometimes with angst. “Because Amazon, God bless them, sends the wrong book, delays shipping two-weeks, or delivers it to the wrong house or in a rain-damaged package, they give my book a terrible rating. Could someone please explain that a book review or rating is ABOUT THE CONTENTS OF THE ACTUAL BOOK, not about the bookseller, the delivery process, whether the jacket is torn, or the snowstorm that delays delivery, or the delivery person who leaves it on the wrong doorstep.”

I should add that I often order through Amazon and while there is an occasional delivery problem, for the most part I find them remarkably efficient and dependable. I’m grateful for that, because if they weren’t my books would get a lot more bad reviews!

Thought the book was too religious:

“Had I known better, I would not have bought this book. Full of evangelical ideologies, ignores any other goodness apart from Christianity. Now that I'm thoroughly depressed, I have to pay for Cognitive-Behaviorial therapy to heal from reading such depressing content.”

I must quote here a comment by Stephanie Anderson, my wonderful editor and EPM staff member. She didn’t intend for me to quote her, but I’m going to overrule her if she tries to edit it out: “This review is hands down my favorite. Heaven is depressing and you’re responsible for therapy!????”

“My sister was so thrilled with this book. She encouraged me to read it. I have read many books on religions and I found this book very boring and in fact never finished it. It is a Born Again book and denies that Heaven is for anybody but those who are in the Christian religion. I can't believe this. The book quotes many passages from the bible to make it's [its] point, but I believe that you could make any point from the bible by selecting the quotes that suite [Sic] your need. This book was a waste of my money and I'm glad it wasn't expensive. And believe [me] I really tried to read it through.”

Can you imagine a book about Heaven that is not religious? Seriously, we’re talking about the afterlife! Living forever with God and God’s people in a place that’s better by far than the only place we’ve ever known? Doesn’t this intrinsically imply the supernatural, i.e. the religious? While books are not born again, people are. Jesus said, “I tell you the truth, unless you are born again, you cannot see the Kingdom of God” (John 3:3, NLT). Heaven is in fact for anyone and everyone who recognizes Jesus and believes in Him and submits their life to Him, the Jesus who said, “I am the way, the truth and the life, no one comes to the Father but by me” (John 14:6).

“This is the height of Fundamentalist Christian dribble. Having said all of this, it is pretty entertaining. It includes such hilarious stuff as, (AND I AM NOT MAKING THIS UP) such probing questions: ‘Will heaven be boring?’, ‘Will there be sex in heaven?’ and my favorite ‘Will there be sports in heaven?’ If this guy ‘makes it to heaven’ leave me out. Such silliness!”
“Not really sure the point of this book other than to ask some very irrelevant questions in regard to what heaven will be like. To me it does not matter what it will be like.”

Unlike some reviewers who are atheists or agnostics and don’t believe there is a God or Heaven, this person doesn’t seem to be questioning whether there is a Heaven. She just thinks it’s irrelevant and that it doesn’t matter. But if there is a Heaven, or even if there possibly is a Heaven, how could it not matter what it’s like? If you were moving to a new home, would it matter to you what it would be like? If you were going to live there forever, wouldn’t it matter all the more?

Commented and gave it one star, but apparently haven’t read the book:

“As a Christian, it sounds like a book where the author just wrote something to make a living.”

This is another thing that writers comment on: that some reviewers take off on the comments of other reviewers, and judge the book by what the others say, not what the author said. Now the other reviewers’ criticisms certainly may be valid, but it would be great if each reviewer expressed their own opinion without leaning on what others say (especially when you haven’t read the book). You see this often when reviewers comment on other reviewers and reinforce their opinions even when they don’t deal with what the author actually said. I suppose it’s cheaper and faster to echo the comments of others than to actually buy and read the book.

Disagree with some aspects of my doctrine, so gave the book one star:

“This is another one of those ‘born again’: books that does not even mention ‘PURGATORY’. I am sorry but you do not know Jesus if you don't believe in ‘the cleansing fires’ Another ‘proof’ book full of holes. Stay away!”

And finally, my personal favorite (and that of EPM’s Anna Wright, who compiled these gems, thanks Anna!). They gave it one star because I quote Lewis and Tolkien, the book mentions aliens, and I’m a fan of some sci-fi:

“1). Refer page 446: ‘When we get excited reading Tolkien's The Lord of the Ring trilogy or Lewis's Chronicle of Narnia…’

First thing I don't understand why author used so many quotes from C.S. Lewis who was the author of ‘Narnia’. As you know ‘Narnia’ is all about white magic, or occult which is clearly condemned by God.

I did a quick google search about C.S. Lewis, he turned out to be a catholic just like his close friend JRR Tolkien. …so that's why.

2). Refer page 448: ‘whether God might inhabit new worlds with new creatures is not provable but certainly possible’

So Author believes in alien and is a sci-fiction fan.

From my understanding, Alien is a propaganda used by Satan and his fallen angels to deceive the world. When Christian is raptured in the second coming of Jesus. The world can't say this is Christian being raptured, instead they say they are being abducted by alien.

If the world says Jesus has taken his believers, then Jesus must be the truth then, Jesus is God. People will believe in Jesus thus saved. This is not Satan wants. Satan doesn't want you to believe in God, but fabricated a lie like ‘alien kidnapping’.

…So the whole time, Satan is planting these ideas
- there is not God, but alien (but we know we have God, Angel, Fallen Angel, and us Human, not mentioned of alien in bible)
- Alien abduction
- alien fabricated a prophecy about his returning thousand years earlier, but return to claim earth via his favorite channel Hollywood to churn out tv series like ‘Star Trek’

...So my question is why a reformed Christian Author wants to indulge in sci-fiction which is clearly motivated by Satan with a hidden agenda?”

I also did a search on Gene Roddenberry, it appears that he is freemason related.”

First, the reviewer is wrong in saying C. S. Lewis was a Catholic. He was Anglican, which means he was a Protestant. J. R. R. Tolkien was a Catholic, whose belief in Christ was a significant influence in Lewis becoming a Christian. There were some tensions between Tolkien and Lewis because Tolkien wanted him to become a Catholic.

Second, the Narnia books are emphatically not about the occult.

Third, though there is no biblical evidence that God has created beings on other planets, or that He ever will, there is likewise no clear statement to the contrary. I am not arguing that God will create other beings besides humans, animals, and angels to inhabit the future universe. I am only saying the infinitely creative God can do whatever He wishes, and is free to do so regardless of our opinions.

When people read reviews, they typically assume that the reviewer is accurately representing what the author actually says. (For instance, you might get the impression that I endorsed or even mentioned Gene Roddenberry, which I did not, though I have enjoyed some Star Trek.)

Here’s what I actually say in my condensed (with a long title) book Everything You Always Wanted to know About Heaven:

No Scripture passage proves that God will or will not create new races of intelligent beings, either on Earth or on other planets spread across the new universe. It’s not speculative, however, to say there will be a new celestial universe of stars and planets. Scripture is clear on this point; that’s what “new heavens” means. Whether God might inhabit them with new creatures is not provable but certainly possible.

Some people say, “To imagine that God would populate worlds with new beings is just science fiction.” We may have it backward. Science fiction is the result of mankind’s God-given sense of adventure, wonder, creativity, and imagination. It emerges from being made in God’s image. It’s not our sinfulness that arouses that excitement. It’s our God-given hunger for adventure, for new realms and new beings, for new beauties and new knowledge.

God has given us a longing for new worlds. Considering that his higher glory and praise come not from inanimate objects such as stars and planets but from intelligent beings such as people and angels, it’s no great stretch to suppose he might create other intelligent beings. It’s up to him, not us. But won’t it be fun to find out?

Running Your Business to the Glory of God

In her article How ‘Christian’ Should My Small Business Be?, Laura Baxter offers five principles for business owners wondering how to honor Christ with their companies. As she emphasizes, Christians in business should set fair prices and honest scales (Deuteronomy 25:13-16; Proverbs 16:8; Proverbs 20:10). Believers will tell the truth—the whole truth—when they sell a car, house, product, or service. They know that God is watching and will hold them accountable for how they conduct their business (2 Corinthians 5:20).

I would add one more point to her article: Seek to honor Christ with the resources He has entrusted to your business. (When a reader asked about whether as a business owner they should tithe on their gross or net income, here was my answer.)

John Piper writes in Desiring God, “God does not prosper a man’s business so he can move from a Ford to a Cadillac. God prospers a business so that 17,000 unreached peoples can be reached with the gospel. He prospers the business so that 12 percent of the world’s population can move a step back from the precipice of starvation.” 

I had a phone conversation with a man who had recently read The Treasure Principle. He owns a profitable business and now believes for the first time that he knows why God has blessed him financially. It’s not so he can drive nicer cars and live in a nicer house. It’s to give it to build God’s kingdom. As I told him about a dozen different missions groups, pro-life projects, prison ministries, and ways to help persecuted Christians, he was moved by all the wonderful investment options. He finished our conversation determined to liquidate more assets to dramatically expand his eternal investment portfolio. I wish you could have heard the excitement in his voice. This man isn’t a reluctant, guilt-ridden giver. He’s a man who has been released from material bondage. He’s thrilled to have finally gotten onboard with what matters!

In sharing this, I don’t want to dismiss that it’s been a challenging last year for many small businesses. My heart goes out to business owners who have struggled to keep their businesses afloat. Honoring God with the resources He’s entrusted to us doesn’t always mean things will go smoothly, that we’ll have a prosperous business, or that God must always give back to us exactly what we give up, or ten or a hundred times more, in some kind of karma-like transaction. Sometimes He gives us joy or patience or endurance as we make real sacrifices for Him—and such intangible gifts are precious.

Consider these stories about Christian business owners, from my book Giving Is the Good Life. Their examples can inspire us and give us footsteps to follow:

Out of a deep love for Jesus, Pete and Debbie Ochs decided to acquire a business constructing industrial products in prisons. They employ inmates, some of whom have committed violent crimes. They invest in these prisoners’ lives by offering life lessons on topics like parenting, finances, and relationships. Pete says, “In one of our life lessons, we presented this whole concept of generosity and challenged [the prisoners] that we would match dollar for dollar any dollar that they gave to one of a number of charities and we gave them a list. It was amazing the amount of money that these prisoners gave to charity. . . . Most of the charities . . . existed to help the victims of the crimes that they committed.”4

Pete’s ministry to prisoners reflects the heartbeat of Scripture. Ephesians 4:28 says, “Anyone who has been stealing must steal no longer, but must work, doing something useful with their own hands, that they may—”

That they may what? Have only enough to live on so they no longer have to steal? No. “That they may have something to share with those in need” (NIV, emphasis added). Giving isn’t just for those with squeaky-clean records; it’s for all of us.

Pete and Debbie’s overflowing good life has not only brought these men the gospel but has also introduced them to the overflow of joyful giving so they, too, can experience abundant life.

Henry Kaestner’s company, Bandwidth, received a lucrative contract they really needed to stay afloat. When they discovered that business’s affiliation with the adult entertainment industry, Bandwidth could have looked the other way. But they knew that would put them at odds with God’s principles. Heeding the warnings in his Word, they canceled the deal. Soon their financial position looked bad.

Sometimes making ethical business decisions reduces profits. Refusing to compromise morally can even result in a failed business.

In Henry Kaestner’s case, Bandwidth turned around dramatically after that decision, becoming the fourth-fastest-growing privately held company in the country. For a while, Henry and his wife, Kimberley, gave away 20 percent of their income, thinking double tithing was impressive. But Henry said, “[God] wants our hearts. Now we can give much more radically. We intend to give away half, and the lion’s share of the rest is invested in Christian-led private companies in Asia.”

Henry added, “There’s an incredible joy when you participate in the work of God. It’s remarkably fulfilling, because it fills up the hole that would otherwise contain idols that take the place of God.”

Dave and Jessica Lindsey were invited to help build a house for a Mexican family, which dramatically changed their perspective on generosity and what it means to love the poor. Later, they and their three children served for three months in Japan with a mission group. They shared their one-bedroom apartment with three single staff men, who slept in the living room. They had one bathroom and a tiny kitchenette. That challenging experience heightened their sense of world need and made them want to do more to make a difference.

The Lindseys decided they shouldn’t keep these experiences to themselves. So their $450 million company, Defender Direct, now sends hundreds of employees and their families to Mexico every year to build homes, paying all expenses.

The giving only grew from there. Defender employees are also given days off to volunteer, and they are invited to participate in what the Lindseys call the Super Service Challenge. After employees volunteer with a ministry, they’re asked, “What would this nonprofit do if they were given $5,000 or $10,000?” The chosen teams win that amount of money for the charity they serve. Dave says, “We went from being a giving company to a company of givers. It is really fun to work at a company full of givers.” He adds, “There is a greater purpose for our business than simply making money.” That purpose is not only to give away profits but also to create a climate in which people see giving consistently modeled. Generous giving becomes the conscious norm rather than the occasional exception.

When he was young, Matt McPherson sought the Lord’s direction for his life. Matt built archery bows and asked God for the wisdom to build the best bows in the world. He developed the single cam bow and now owns one of the world’s largest archery bow companies.

Matt started other business ventures, including McPherson Guitars, which he began with his father. Their goal is to make money to impact the world. They now fully support more than seven hundred missionaries worldwide.

Matt’s story is another one that makes me thank God for furthering His Kingdom by not calling some people to spend their lives as pastors or missionaries—people such as Stanley Tam, Art DeMoss, David Green, and a number of others whose stories I tell in Giving Is the Good Life. There are millions of faithful business and professional people, including musicians, artists, and athletes, spread across the world. If Matt has fully funded seven hundred missionaries, how many tens of thousands of other missionaries have been able to go do their work because believers in secular vocations have faithfully used their gifts and passions to build businesses that generously send and support them? And while supporting missionaries, they themselves serve Christ in the unique mission fields of their businesses and neighborhoods.

Photo by Christin Hume on Unsplash

God’s Word Is Precious to the Persecuted

In addition to the challenges that come with COVID-19, our brothers and sisters in Christ around the world continue to suffer persecution, sometimes very severe, for following Jesus. Each year Open Doors USA releases their World Watch List Report, which lists the 50 places around the world where it costs the most to be a Christian. They say,

Around the world, more than 340 million Christians live in places where they experience high levels of persecution, just for following Jesus. That’s 1 in 8 believers, worldwide.

In this excerpt from my novel Safely Home, business executive Ben Fielding, who is staying with his friend and former college roommate Li Quan in China, makes a surprising discovery. May this story remind us how precious God’s Word is to believers in places where it is costly and difficult to have a Bible:

Ben spent Friday evening at a dinner meeting with a Pushan business executive. He pulled into Quan’s place much later than usual and put his hand on the doorknob. It was locked.

“Who is there?” came the voice from the inside.

“Ben.”

“Alone?”

“No—I’m with the Chinese joint chiefs of staff.”

Quan opened the door.

“What’s going on?” Ben asked.

“We have visitors.”

Ben walked in and saw what looked like two families of three. A man, woman, and teenage boy were on Quan’s bed. Another man, woman, and teenage girl were on Ben’s bed. Ming sat at the desk and Shen on the floor at her feet. All had two open books in front of them, and ballpoint pens in their hands.

“What are you doing?”

“Making copies of Shengjing. Those printed Bibles will soon be picked up by the donkey and passed on to others. But while they are here we can use them, can’t we? Shen and I are copying from my mother’s Bible.”

With a proud smile Shen held up his grandmother’s Bible to Ben. Then he picked up his own handwritten copy, handing it to Ben for inspection.

“Shen is a good scribe,” Ben said.

“Father checks my work,” he said, beaming.

“As we copy,” Quan said, “the words of Yesu are written on our hearts.”

Is this legal? Ben wondered. He remembered all the reassurances of religious freedom he’d been given over the years. But seeing these people huddled like this, it was obvious they were convinced it was illegal. But he didn’t want to hear the words. If something hit the fan, he wanted to maintain deniability with Martin and the Getz board.

Ben was about to go for a walk, anything to get him away from this, when he looked closely at Quan’s mother’s Bible. “It’s beautiful. The characters are so small but clear.”

“Mother copied it carefully. She would borrow a Bible whenever she could. She’d work for hours by candlelight, praying the words aloud as she copied. I wish I would have listened more closely. Often she would rest her head on Shengjing. Sometimes she would giggle with delight. It was a labor of love. Months, even a year, went by when she had no Bible to copy. It took her eight years to finish her whole Bible. Six months before she died, Mother finished copying Shengjing’s final book. A leather worker in church bound it for her.”

“And you kept it all these years?”

“No. She had loaned it to another woman who was copying it at the time. After I returned from Harvard, they heard I had become a Christian. The church gave it to me.”

Ben flipped through the pages. “It’s been out in the rain.”

“No. Always it was carefully covered. Mother bundled it up before going outside. We do the same.”

“But the words are smeared in many places,” Ben said.

“It was not rain that smeared the words.”

See this article for ways to pray for the persecuted. You can also sponsor Bibles for persecuted believers through Open Doors USA.

Photo by chris liu on Unsplash