Robert Morris demands money, appears in court: How should Christians interpret pastoral scandals?

Robert Morris, the shameful pastor of Texas, first appeared in court for the first time since his turbulent exit from Gateway Church, the church that he founded in 2000.

“It is really sad and tragic when these things take place,” said Jeff Schreve, an author and pastor based in Texarkana, in a recently carried out episode of CBN's “Faith vs. Culture”, which related to cases like the Morris scandal.

Morris' dramatic fall from Grace rocked not only the massive community of the church, but also the Christian culture, which was tied up as a 63-year-old former pastor of Cindy Clemishire to have repeatedly attacked her in the 1980s when she was only 12 years old.

After Clemishire had made her accusations against Morris, he resigned from his post as the main pastor of the Multisite Gateway Church in Southlake, Texas. He was then charged with indecent and indecent actions with a child by a Grand jury in Oklahoma in mid -March for five crimes.

On May 9, he appeared publicly for the first time since his fall and checked in at a court hearing in Oklahoma. The judge of Osage County, Cindy Pickerill, set a preliminary hearing for the ex-minister for September 4.

“As this type thought that it would not be disqualified by the public pastoral ministry, I was a mystery,” said Schreve. “[I]It looks like he could go to prison; He should for what he did. “

Morris has not guilty about sexual attacks. And in the recent development in connection with his interactions with the Gateway Church, CBS reports: “Morris calls for millions of dollars from the church for retirement payments.” According to reports, he submitted court documents this week to look for the money.

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According to the revelations over Morris, the Southlake Campus alone recorded a significant decline in participation and tithing contributions. In an internal video that was leaked on Facebook in November last year, one of the three remaining elders of Gateway, Kenneth Fambro, said that the tenth in the church had dropped by 35% -40% since Clemishire unveiled her allegations against the now inflamed Morris.

The processing of this type of stories can be overwhelming and even theological and spiritual questions have an impact and throw clouds of doubt about the belief of some creditors in God. Scandals of this size are certainly not something that most believers are confronted with. Nevertheless, everyone will be met at some point in their life of disappointments and discourages.

While the script makes it clear that those in the spiritual leadership should be “judged more” and should be held adequately for their actions (Jakobus 3: 1), Schreve Christen encouraged to remember, “We all have feet sound”, an indication of the Old Testament book by Daniel, and urged caution and knowledge when spiritual authorities occur.

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“We have those who are real Christians who fall, and those who are prepared, those who are not real believers who are there for the money, the false prophets who are there for the money,” he said. “[Christians] Must be recognized … with where you go to church, what you hear, who you hear. “

The believers, he said, would have to remember that Satan is a “master lying”, whose “lies best like the truth” and warns of unjustified cynicism, but encourages Christians to “train our senses to recognize well and evil”.

While scandals like Morris undoubtedly mourn the heart of God, Schreve said that it is important that Christians are not rooted in human leaders – although they are undoubtedly important – but in Jesus. In order to illustrate his point of view, the pastor based in Texas referred to 2 Timothy 4 when the apostle Paul Timothy wrote about his disappointment in Demas, who once worked with Paul, but ultimately “left” “because he loves things of this life”.

“We have to keep our eyes on Jesus,” said Schreve. “He never fails.”

The evil gift in this world, he later noticed, is the result of sin and freedom that God gives people for themselves, what – and who – they want to follow.

“To really love God, you have to have the choice not to love God,” he said. “If he only wants to make it where you have to serve him and have to obey him and there is no choice, then the free will goes out of the window and we just become robots.”

However, this does not mean that God is missing from his followers that take the pain. Schreve, author of the new book “The Devil's Newsroom: Satan's fake messages falsified and accompanied by God's truth,” said the Lord, “redeem” the exams, and noticed that he was “eradicat[ing] Evil ”from the earth.

“He just doesn't do what is a good thing, because that means that she and I would be away,” said Schreve. “There is also evil in us. We still have the sinful meat in us, which longs to do it evil and rebel against God. So he works all things to his perfect timing and we can trust him that we will end up saying all as believers:” You did everything well. “

You can follow our full conversation with Schreve in the video embedded.