Matt Chandler's Village Church in Church Discipline Controversy
The Village Church: Why we put wife of man with paedophile leanings under church discipline
It Takes a Village Covenant to Raise a Bitter Root
A Few Thoughts on The Village Church Controversy
The Village Church email on 5/23/15 to covenant members about Karen Hinkley and Jordan Root
Matt Chandler, The Village Church offer apology to Karen Hinkley
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Church Discipline as Maslow’s hammer: “I suppose it is tempting, if the only tool you have is a hammer, to treat everything as if it were a nail.”
Maybe I’m missing something in Scripture, but it seems to me that when the Biblical situation is clear, folks that were disciplined were trying to live unrepentantly and still be part of the church fellowship. But when someone goes ahead and separates from the fellowship, I don’t see the point of publicly discipline them except for maybe letting congregation know they left, and why. If the loss of the ministry of the church brings with it consequences, then they have unwittingly already brought the discipline upon themselves. And this isn’t the case with the woman in this story, but she left, the church has no leverage on her, just let her go.
Not sure if this article is accurate but if so perhaps her grounds were “fraud”.
http://nofaultdiv.com/texas_annulment.html
Fraud is a little harder to pin down. … If someone so grossly misrepresents themselves that you could have never known who they actually were, that would be fraud. Basically, it’s getting seriously conned by the person you married.
http://www.divorcenet.com/resources/annulment/annulment-basics/texas.htm
Fraud – one spouse lied about or hid something essential to the marriage. … A Texas court won’t grant annulment for fraud, duress or force if the spouses continued to live together after the fraud was discovered or the duress or force was no longer present. Only major fraud about something essential to the marriage will be enough for an annulment. For example, a Texas husband whose wife didn’t tell him about five of her eight previous marriages was granted an annulment. A spouse lying about being a virgin before the marriage, however, isn’t enough for an annulment in Texas.
The following is quite apart from the specifics of this case. I’ve been helping a dear friend go through a divorce for two years now and his own local church has been negligent and aloof in helping him or his ex wife. I get it. Pastors seem to be generally unprepared when it comes to divorce.
[Jonathan Charles]Maybe I’m missing something in Scripture, but it seems to me that when the Biblical situation is clear, folks that were disciplined were trying to live unrepentantly and still be part of the church fellowship. But when someone goes ahead and separates from the fellowship, I don’t see the point of publicly discipline them except for maybe letting congregation know they left, and why. If the loss of the ministry of the church brings with it consequences, then they have unwittingly already brought the discipline upon themselves. And this isn’t the case with the woman in this story, but she left, the church has no leverage on her, just let her go.
It depends on why someone is resigning. At my own former church (where SI member Ron Bean pastors) we had the case of a member resigning who simply stated “I do not believe myself to be a Christian. I do not believe this as I once thought I did.” In that case, we accepted the resignation of the member with sadness, but also knowing it was the responsible and honest thing for this person to do. Another case was “I am a Christian, but I think it’s OK to cheat on my wife openly. I’d like to resign my membership and go somewhere else.” In that case we did not accept the resignation and instead continued with church discipline.
In both cases, discipline was about aligning the church visible with the church invisible, and that isn’t limited to the local church only. Each local church should be doing what it can with its own members to make sure true members of Christ are also local church members and that false members of Christ are not seen as members visibly with their church, and warn these false members of their own potential hypocracy.
Regardless of the blog entry’s legal stance, it’s always safest to follow teaching and implications of Scripture rather than worrying about lawsuits.
When Karen sent the note to withdraw from church membership, she was NOT in church discipline. In that letter, she stated that she had filed for annulment, which was later granted by the State of TX. Annulment is different from divorce. It means that the State of Texas considers her marriage to be based on fraud and legally it did not exist.
It was after TVC found out about her filing for annulment that they decided to put her in church discipline retroactively, saying that she failed to uphold the membership covenant she signed that stipulated members are go to elders first before making important decisions on their marriage. So she is in church discipline for failing to abide by their polity, NOT because of any kind of gross and ongoing sin (the usual reason for church discipline). I don’t recall anything in the Bible about disciplining someone without an ongoing sin problem.
What she was seeing was a failure on the elders’ part to notify parents and church body of his predatory behavior (you can find a listing of his prior employment/volunteer work) which put him in close contact with minors. Because they were ready to accept his repentance freely, without putting appropriate safeguards in place, she realized that these elders would not be able to appropriately handle her marriage, and would likely force her to remain married to a self-admitted child pedophile who was still showing her signs of hiding and not fully disclosing to church leaders.
The last three articles (maybe more) detail this story including the primary source documentation. http://watchkeep.blogspot.com/
While I appreciate membership is important, a person should be able to leave at any time, under any circumstance. Joining a local church is not enlisting in the Marine Corps. After all, what is the point in spending time debating and punishing a person in absentia? If they want to come back then they can face the music, but until then let them go.
Also, while I hold marriage in high regard and desire to teach members to hold it in high regard, I can see that when a marriage gets muddy one of the spouses might see you or the elder board as being biased against them or for the other spouse. I think that is what happened here in the TVC case. It is then difficult to adjudicate it in a fair fashion like TVC claimed they wanted to do.
On the other hand Karen Hinkley seems to be acting like all that matters is what the state of Texas thinks about their marriage. Was God surprised at her husband’s child pornography issues? Does an annulment mean she was never married before the church and in the “eyes of God”?
I can see (and have seen a few) situations where the best thing is for the couple to split up. While reconciliation is a good thing, you must admit that your husband telling you he is attracted to pre-pubescent girls is a horrible thing. In my head I cannot imagine a person being willing to reconcile a marriage in that situation. It is incredibly tough and a very long road to win back trust… if that is at all possible. By the way, Josh Duggar reportedly told his girlfriend before they were engaged about his past issues. That is a very different thing.
Now in the secular media:
http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2015/05/31/megachurch-stay-with-y…
Having had some experience with marriage counseling over a number of years, I’ve concluded that some sins render marriages virtually irreconcilable. I’ve seen marriages that I didn’t think would survive, flourish even after adultery.
A close relative, a Christian woman, endeavored to save her marriage in the face of her husband’s serial unfaithfulness. After a period that marriage failed and I supported her in her decision to divorce. She later remarried to a Christian.
Karen followed a direction that many evangelical / fundamental pastors would support. I think she did the right thing in seeking an annulment for fraud.
The Village church is right to apologize to Karen for their treatment of her; she should want to try and mend the relationship with her husband, but this is a pretty massive series of problems and I have no issue with recommending at least a temporary separation so that they can work through their own issues. I’m tentatively more inclined to agree with Karen than I am the church, but what would that say about Christ and the Church (Eph. 5)?
Karen’s claim of ‘fraud’ as a grounds for annullment is interesting, and I don’t know how I would handle that case. If an unbelieving spouse desires to depart, then we are to let them depart, as Paul says. But if you were married to someone who was addicted to child porn for decades (!) and had no idea about it…I’d have a really hard time counseling them to stay and fix the marriage. Does anyone know if there are children in the marriage?
Christ can and does forgive any sin, but that’s a pretty massive and ongoing misrepresentation of him and his pseudo-spirituality.
"Our task today is to tell people — who no longer know what sin is...no longer see themselves as sinners, and no longer have room for these categories — that Christ died for sins of which they do not think they’re guilty." - David Wells
In my view, very good. I could sign it
http://thevillagechurch.net/sermon/membership-covenant/
Her sticking point was:
I will seek to preserve the gift of marriage and agree to walk through the steps of marriage reconciliation at The Village Church before pursuing divorce from my spouse
Per her response to them:
- Had she “walk[ed] through the steps of marriage reconciliation “, she could not have obtained a legal annulment.
- And in her view, and I agree, his long time involvement with child pornography was hidden from her AND
- That constituted fraud
[Jonathan Charles]Now in the secular media:
http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2015/05/31/megachurch-stay-with-yo…
Sadly, situations like Jordan and Karen happen in churches regularly. No two marriage breakups are alike and no one is claiming this was handled perfectly. However, the reason this is national news is because it is another chance to elicit 1000+ comments condemning Bible believing churches.
So the church has the right to continue the process of “church discipline,” even when a member resigns, to determine whether they could legitimately give a letter of recommendation to another church that the member left as a member in good standing. So TVC did nothing wrong in that respect.
HSAT, from what I’ve read they made several missteps that make me think the apology was a good idea.
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Greg Long, Ed.D. (SBTS)
Pastor of Adult Ministries
Grace Church, Des Moines, IA
Adjunct Instructor
School of Divinity
Liberty University
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