Tchividjian In More Trouble
Tullian Tchividjian has been removed from ministry…again.
He has been removed from his new job at Willow Creek Presbyterian Church and much of the Liberate Network board has resigned.
Both entities have received (or have been been forced to acknowledge) new information that could lead to new allegations about the defrocked pastor.
Tchividjian had recently had a couple of speaking engagements and it appeared that his parachurch ministry Liberate Network was taking on life again.
Now that Christianity Today has run the story, people will consider it legitimate news.
In reality, the heavy lifting on this story was done by bloggers again, particularly Julie Anne Smith of the Spiritual Sounding Board, along with the eminent Mr. Throckmorton.
Smith has paid for doing her work.
Tchividjian supporters, in particular Chris Rosebrough of Pirate Christian Radio, have questioned her motives, her sources, and her character.
Rosebrough basically condemned her as a “witch hunter” yesterday, exclaiming that he had “primary source material” that vindicated Tchividjian and refuted Smith.
I’ll be interested to hear his program today…
What often happens in these situations is that the more mainstream media have access to the celebrities, but bloggers have access to the victims.
For many bloggers, the story is about those who have no voice, not those whose voices have given them wealth and power.
Because of the imbalance of both, many victims cannot or will not come forward…but the stories they tell are true and worthy of attention.
It puts us in a very difficult position to tell those stories without creating further harm to those already wounded.
Credibility is earned over time…and Julie Anne Smith has once again proved to be a credible reporter.
The Tchividjian case opens up the whole issue of when, how, and if fallen pastors should be restored.
Those answers will still prove difficult to discern…but in this case, we now have much more information to work with.
Nice work Julie Ann! Jezzy-B!
Throckmorton is such a freaking stud as well.
I love this sort of thing. Goliath/Establishment/Celebrities vs. David/Regular Folks/Bloggers
The Tide is turning…..
You see this with the popularity of Sanders and Trump as well. Heck, even the #2 Repub, Cruz, is not really the Establishment pick.
There’s a very Populist flavor in the air….which if you read my stuff….I said would happen many years back now.
The Internet has a very Egalitarian Dynamic to it….as I mentioned the other day.
The Power that has been consolidate in the hands of a few Celebrities, Media and Politicians and Institutions is being diluted.
This SCARES the Establishment folks to death. You will see them continue to crack down on Free Speech and try to reign in a Free Internet (and guys like Snowden etc).
You see it beginning in Google and Facebook targeting dissenting conservative voices and closing down gun selling pages etc….while they allow ISIS to recruit on their platforms.
The Pick-and-Choose of Liberal Fascism will rear its ugly head….but I have faith in human nature’s rebellious streak to overcome it.
Rosebrough spun it…
http://www.piratechristian.com/captains-log/2016/3/a-statement-re
Lets move on…those were unfortunate and regrettable comments and I’ve removed them.
That was some quick deleting. Very well done sir!
Got ya.
Roseborough said it all when he said “My friend Tullian”.
He is a guy standing up for his friend. Unfortunately, his friend is a scumbag.
So this is about previously unheard charges of previously unreported offenses? These are not new charges since his previous failure? So it must be fair to say that he attempted to cover? I get confused in all the bombs going off.
Surely this is not just social media accusations.
These are previously unheard and new accusations.
I don’t know how you can say Rosebrough was spinning this.
He stated these were new charges and he was happy that God stepped in.
He explained that unlike Driscoll Tullian was under discipline and still is as evidenced by his removal today.
He also stated that people were free to voice their opinions about Tullian and the situation.
The only thing he objected to was accussing people of untrue things and demanding confession.
My opinion is it’s the skinny jeans – watch out for pastors in skinny jeans. (I think I heard that from our PP friend Jean)
Skinny jeans are definitely a sure sign
I am not trying to mitigate any blame or take a side here, but I will put forward that anyone with a keyboard and an agenda (whether for good or ill) has great power in the digital age. The internet has made it almost impossible to tell fact from fiction and I have recently begun trying to be extra mindful of where I get information. Because it is easy to perpetuate lies (like a fire online) we really must, as Christians, be wary of throwing people under the bus and being condemning when we are so far removed from the source. (The accusations against Gayle Erwin spring readily to mind)
It is not just with the church, but with politics, health/nutrition, anything really. It is becoming impossible to sort the spin from the facts….. Just be wary, please.
MLD,
The Lutherans have their own TT,
https://medium.com/@levinunnink/highway-to-the-lutheran-danger-zone-9a65bc591b8f#.3eb2npqgf
Michael – old news, but 2 points
He is Lutheran by doctrine alone (and I do applaud him for getting his theology right. – he was an evangelical who started his own evangelical church, got his doctrine right and took the whole church Lutheran. He is an independent – not aligned with any synod and has no seminary training.
In fact he is the living example of why we work in denominations and don’t have free lancers. He is under no one’s authority. AND HE WEARS SKINNY JEANS
“…..Christians, be wary of throwing people under the bus and being condemning when we are so far removed from the source.”
amen – as i read the post today, i thought to myself, “don’t bother to run this one down” … too much stuff to even attempt to figure it out way off up here in the mountains where i sit today … that said, Michael IS doing God’s work, but i just don’t know who all else is …
skinny jeans? i wore skinny jeans… when i was 15 🙂 which has me pondering the question: should we beware of anyone who is trying to look like they’re with it and cool? if so, does Donald Trump’s hair then make him more believable? lol
I keep coming back to the issue that we are just keeping these guys propped up on a pedestal, not of hero worship and adulation, but to keep whipping them until they show some level of repentance the the interwebs deem good enough. Oh, how I pray you all never see the depravity that is in me and are given a platform on which to flog me and my family in the public eye, stripping away any shred of hope I have in mercy and forgiveness. I dare not go to church and be too real, because what’s to keep “well meaning” folks from turning on me, telling me how I am not worthy of forgiveness until I have taken their class/read their book/gone on their retreat. I will take my chances in the wilderness and take what friendship I can garner there as opposed to self inflicted public shame. And all this just reinforces it to me. How can I share my sin and need for help when this is what is waiting for me in any given church?
gomergirl, take God’s grace with you as you go – praying someone else sees it and recognizes it and joins you or better yet invites you to join them
God keep
gomergirl,
I think you’re conflating two separate issues.
There are standards for Christian leadership.
When those are violated, I think the old saying is true…your repentance should match the depth of your influence.
For the vast majority of the church those standards would mean those closest to the sinner would be the only ones who know about the sin.
I would never disclose publicly that sort of thing on a member…it’s rarely ever even told to the church.
Chris Roseboroygh’s behavior in this situation has been disappointing, perhaps he is too emotionally close to the situation to see clearly.
None of this is particularly surprising.
“Your repentance should match the depth of your influence”
I like that.
Is that a MN original quote?
JTK,
No, that’s been around a long while.
I don’t know who coined it, but I tend to agree with it.
I think we all spend a lot of effort trying to determine and lay down what the rules are going to be, that must be followed when these situations happen.
Then we find out when any one of those situations happen, that the situation doesn’t fit neatly into the rules we thought we were going to apply.
Especially when our corrupt flesh surprises us… and it end up being someone we admire. Or even worse yet, when it’s someone close to us. Or maybe even… you or me.
Please read carefully. And listen carefully.
I ran into the material on Daniel Emery Price just yesterday. And when I saw Rosebrough’s title on witch hunters, my assumption was that the witch hunters were the people responsible for the other blog that Michael listed above at #13. Having read through a lot of their posts yesterday, it still makes sense that they are the ones Chris was calling witch hunters. He also refers to the person who was doing this as “he” and says it was about Dan Price around 22 minutes. If somewhere else he has gone after Julie Ann, that’s another thing. But I don’t see evidence of it in what I have run into.
Rick,
Most of the battles he was referring to yesterday took place on Twitter.
I had no knowledge of Price…but I had been following the skirmish between Chris and Julie Anne.
I believe it is all on her Twitter feed.
what is a reverse billy graham rule ? why do we want to reverse billy graham? only partly asked in jest…
Good to know. Even those who know some of these people are left trying to piece information together. And when much of it is Facebook posts and Twitter feeds, even a day later, it is hard to find the material you’ve seen, let alone the material you haven’t.
Rick,
I totally understand…the volume alone is more than I can handle most days.
I found Julie Ann’s twitter feed, and see little evidence Rosebrough was talking about her. (The timing has me not blaming her for imagining he was. I just don’t think she was his target.) She linked to his “Damned for Not Damning” article, which was light on specifics. Was there something specific on the feed that made you think Rosebrough was interacting with her?
I’ll see if she can post it up on her blog.
I don’t think Chris went after Julie Ann – I think she lit him up on twitter a couple of days ago.
When Trent Demarest did his blog over the weekend, that is what started what Chris labeled “the witch hunt”
Julie Ann was about Tullian and Trent was about Dan Price.
Chris was friends of both TT and DEP – he never defended their actions only that they could be restored to ministry when their discipline was up.
“Most of the battles he was referring to yesterday took place on Twitter.”
So, Michael, now we have Twitter pastors. WTF!
Lord have mercy on us all.
I’ve been an occasional reader of this blog for a long time. (Which is rare for me. I don’t read any blog regularly.)
For what it’s worth, I have always admired the way the blog tends to side with the victims of abuse. And I would hate to end up on the wrong side of Throckmorton.
Much of what I’ve seen lately is friends like Chris getting in trouble for having association with people in the early phases of a public scandal. We tend to trust the bodies responsible for finding the facts, and want to stay out of that process before the dust settles.
I read many discussions on the qualifications for an overseer, and while I’d say I’m in the middle right as far as how to handle the fallen (long restoration, but I think it’s often possible), I defer to the bodies who make the decisions here—at least when it comes to judging friends for their associations.
Otherwise we get into the type of situation Garrison Keillor lampooned in Lake Wobegone Days: ” if Believer A is associated with Believer B who has somehow associated himself with C who holds a False Doctrine, must D break off association with A, even though A does not hold the Doctrine, to avoid the taint?” (Known as the Bedford Question.)
A little off topic and definitely irrelevant considering who I am and people like me. I honestly don’t get the entire restoration thing, it does not happen for most folks who are not important. I mean you get the boot if you tick off the leadership, ask questions, make a complaint, express a concern, don’t tithe enough, ask for help, etc. I get certain people should be disciplined for these sins of fellowship. But when one repents of doing any of this you are still never welcomed back. I know this sounds like whining and maybe it is but it really is what happens to many of the common folks, I mean we share stories about it all the time.
Brian, what you say is true unfortunately. This is why I steer away from celebrity pastor driven churches and what you say is one of the main reasons.
“Oh, how I pray you all never see the depravity that is in me and are given a platform on which to flog me and my family in the public eye, stripping away any shred of hope I have in mercy and forgiveness. ”
Gomergirl, simple. Stop being evil/depraved. Didn’t anyone ever share with you what the resurrection is about? You also have an Advocate.
What I am sensing from you is we should hide the evil of “Christian” public figures who have spent their careers trying to get our attention and our money.
“I honestly don’t get the entire restoration thing, it does not happen for most folks who are not important.”
I don’t get it either. Would they restore the embezzler to count the money? I sincerely doubt it. :o)
I’ve just skimmed through your and other related articles on this topic, and some Wartburg Watch articles on our friends at 9 Marks. Talk about seeing how the bologna’s made. It makes you think church is a racket that you’re best staying far, far away from.
I wonder as the celebrity preachers and wanna-bes pimp themselves and kiss each others’ rear ends, if the late 21st/22nd century church will look back on this era as a theological and ethical trainwreck…
Expanding on my previous post: it’s a gigantic shame to think of church as a place to keep one’s distance from. But buyer beware has to be taken into consideration with any church nowadays; otherwise you get ‘gifts’ like tithe-or-be-cursed and shepherding thrown at you.
This morning I’m pessimistic: the 22nd century church will likely have forgotten that garbage went down a century before…and someone will be repeating it in their generation.
A – BrianD?!?! Good to see you around.
B – I think the church has been a mess from the time of the Apostles. It is not something to stay away from though. Certainly be aware. Keep your eyes open. But I do think we need to be in fellowship, growing, learning, and making a mess, just like the rest of God’s screw-ups.
I’m alive 🙂
Here is the requested exchange between Julie Anne Smith and Chris Rosebrough.
https://storify.com/DefendTheSheep/chris-rosebrough-piratechristian
Good to see Brian D!
It’s all over for Tullian…
http://www.patheos.com/blogs/warrenthrockmorton/2016/03/18/tullian-tchividjians-liberate-network-dissolves-and-cancels-2017-conference/
I don’t see Tullian as the kind of guy who will let it be “all over”. Maybe for a while.
Josh,
Based on what I know that has yet to be reported…it’s all over.
Good. I hope he goes away and heals.
It appears Liberate liberated Tullian.
I hope he goes away and repents…
Yes, repentance would be an early necessary step in healing.
Why do we say stuff like “Good. I hope he goes away and heals.”???
Why don’t we say “I hope he goes away and his body is festered with boils for the next 20 yrs.” ??
#s 41 & 42 … thinking… thinking… while i don’t think that God ever intended or ever has left the Church without leaders (the Holy Spirt is always looking for our attention IMHO), it does seem that an institutional church draws too many ambitious people… their dominance ebbs and flows… maybe we’ll see another Martin Luther?
trouble is there is no door to nail anything on anymore… or so it seems to me – dunno
MLD,
#53 is closer to how I feel…
#52 – we don’t do that because God might hear us 🙂
might try something to the effect of, “Lord, You know – it’s Your call – forgive me for what i want to see happen…”
Pope Pius the Em
Em,
The real leaders are local church pastors who no one has ever heard of or will outside the church they pastor.
MLD @ 53 – I say it because I mean it. Whatever is ailing this man is causing him to leave a wake of destruction. He needs to go away and get better. Sincerely.
I almost want to say I told you so. When Willow Creek hired him a few weeks after he was caught in one affair, I ranted about a lot of stuff and his hiring being bad for a lot of people. I consistently objected that the hiring was primarily bad for Tullian. I was right. He needed then to go away and learn to walk with the Lord. That would’ve healed him. He couldn’t stand the thought of an anonymous, quiet life even for a few weeks. That’s a sickness too.
I sincerely hope he can heal. He’s a scumbag, just like me, but I hope he can heal one day.
Michael,
In your opinion do his failures negate the grace message he’s preached?
BrianD,
As I said many years ago, I always felt he lifted his whole “message” from Steve Brown.
Brown is one of my fathers in the faith.
TT made it more mainstream…
BrianD, i know you’re addressing Michael, but i happened on those messages and i thought that he was preaching truth – they were a good listen, perhaps because i could amen most of what he presented… that said, my female antenna (still works 🙂 ) kept nagging at me that something wasn’t quite right about the man, himself…
Michael, Em,
Here’s the thing.
Brown’s message kept me from throwing my hands up and walking away from religion because with just about everyone else I’ve encountered, it boils down to how well you can maintain the perfect demands of a perfect God as outlined in His book, and how many hoops you can jump through to do that.
In our culture, people demand near-perfection from laity and absolute perfection from those in ministry. When someone falls their philosophy and theology — where it differs from one’s own viewpoint — becomes suspect.
BrianD,
From that stand point it’s a loss.
There will be others who God will raise up.
Michael, fair enough.
BrianD,
I think we’ll see the rise of confessional Lutheranism because of that message as well.
I’ve thought about becoming a confessional Lutheran. But reading the exchange from Julie Anne and Chris Rosebrough makes me think twice. I have to say, I am not sure where Chris is coming from especially when he makes statements like TT has been “absolved”. Its almost like Chris thinks Lutheran pastors have magical powers to forgive a sinner.
Pastors have the responsibility to declare forgiveness based on the sacrificial work of Christ.
At some point we all have to wrestle with the meaning of this passage…
“I will give you the keys of the kingdom of heaven, and whatever you bind on earth shall be bound in heaven, and whatever you loose on earth shall be loosed in heaven.””
(Matthew 16:19 ESV)
Michael I agree. But I have never heard it in “third” person where Chris Rosebrough is vouching for TT cause he heard a pastor say it. Its taken it to a new level for me. I’ll have to think this one through a bit. It would be one thing if TT said this but in this case Chris Rosebrough is speaking on behalf of TT. Can Chris be confident that TT actually heard the words the pastor said? After all Chris is excusing JA of being psychic.
Just a clarification. Absolution does not eliminate the temporal consequences of one’s sins.
TT’s theology was good. TT’s character was bad. That’s not unusual.
I too want to make clear that Jesus died on the cross for TT’s sins. He is )or can be) forgiven. He just needs to stop hurting people.
Why can’t we just say that he is a product of privilege – he comes from a pedigree of “big star, big money family preachers. Add it to today’s culture it’s all he knows.It’s all he knows
As far as absolution goes, it’s not that it is too RC – it’s that it is antithetical to evangelical theology – pure and simple.
#-66- IMV was addressed to the disciples present with Jesus when he spoke those words – they weren’t bestowed upon our leaders in perpetuity
another country heard from Em
the words of Matthew 28 – the great commission were given to the apostles also. Did that command die with them also?
The Apostles represent today’s church leaders and pastors
I was going to say in my #70 above – that absolution is antithetical to evangelical theology, because when you boil it down, an evangelical pastor doesn’t want any pastoral responsibilty – he just wants to study and teach.
But I was being nice, so I didn’t bring it up in my # 70 😉
IMX- without an ongoing mode of grace, confession and forgiveness no child of God could walk the walk in honesty – short story follows:
looong ago, i thought the Baptists that i knew were more holy than i ever could be, then over time i realized that they were infested with hypocrites or folk in denial…
that must be a hard row to hoe and it makes me sad when i think of how many who really loved Jesus must have suffered torment silently knowing that they weren’t really as good as they let on
life in Jesus is good and the joy of the Lord IS our strength – it’s supernatural
My turn to be heartbroken…Steve Brown may have been involved in the cover up.
http://www.christianpost.com/news/coral-ridge-elders-knew-of-tullian-tchividjians-affair-with-married-woman-advised-him-to-keep-secret-source-alleges-159519/
MLD – you seem to know an awful lot about church, but your conclusions are not all of them exactly spot on – strange how such a narrow way has so many conflicting views
“Grace, ’tis a charming sound,
Harmonious to mine ear;
Heaven with the echo shall resound,
And all the earth shall hear.
“Grace first contrived the way
To save rebellious man;
And all the steps that grace display
Which drew the wondrous plan.
“Grace first inscribed my name
In God’s eternal book;
’Twas grace that gave me to the Lamb,
Who all my sorrows took.
“Grace led my roving feet
To tread the heavenly road;
And new supplies each hour I meet,
While pressing on to God.
“Grace taught my soul to pray
And made mine eyes o’erflow;
’Twas grace which kept me to this day,
And will not let me go.
“Grace all the work shall crown,
Through everlasting days;
It lays in heaven the topmost stone,
And well deserves the praise.
“O let Thy grace inspire
My soul with strength divine
My all my powers to Thee aspire,
And all my days be Thine.”
presumptuously posting, Em
Em,
” then over time i realized that they were infested with hypocrites or folk in denial…”
If you are not in a church exactly like that then you need to join one. Come to my church – we are like that plus some.
I would love to hear how any church has attained any level above that.
Michael, I’m sorry to hear that if it’s true. 🙁
#76 – lovely point MLD – no argument from me
it’s evident that my ability to express myself isn’t up to the standards of some who post here
my point was? there are church fellowships out there whose congregants do put up a front, trying to meet a man contrived standard and in those cases: “that must be a hard row to hoe and it makes me sad when i think of how many who really loved Jesus must have suffered torment silently knowing that they weren’t really as good as they let on” of course, one can get too casual about one’s spiritual life, thinking it’s all just a ceremony also
@74 Straight up on this one Steve Brown gets the benefit of the doubt from me. If he did anything I will assume first that he had a clear path forward and no guile and no deceit. I will assert and assume that he acted with confidence of a resolution and not with any attempt to condone or protect sinful behavior.
BD,
I pray that you’re right.
It’s been a damn long night here…