The wreckage of the Sexual Revolution, laid bare in one website hack
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| Ed Stetzer (Photo credit: Wikipedia) |
A group calling itself the “Impact Team” announced it would
release the names of people who used the Ashley Madison website if its owners
didn’t shut the website down.
If you hadn’t heard of Ashely Madison back then, chances are you
now know more than you care to about the site, which brings together people who
seek to have extramarital affairs. Its motto tells you all you need to know:
“Life is short. Have an affair.”
The site’s ownership didn’t comply with the demand, and in
mid-August, the “Impact Team” released more than 25 gigabytes of data. As soon
as the data was released, people combed through it looking for potential
targets for humiliation, or even worse, extortion.
But this isn’t just a problem that’s “out there” in the world.
Ed Stetzer of Lifeway Research estimates that “at least 400 church leaders
(pastors, elders, staff, deacons, etc.)” would be exposed in the Ashely Madison
affair. (Pun intended.)
In one post, Stetzer wrote that just as people reap what they
sow, cultures do as well. Citing the story about the Old Dominion University
fraternity’s signs that read “freshman daughter drop-off” alongside the Ashely
Madison story, Stetzer wrote, “at some point, we must ask, ‘Is this what we
really wanted when culture turned against traditional sexual mores?’”
He continues, “The sexual revolution is, by definition, a war
against something—in this case against previous sexual mores. And wars, whether
we admit it or not, always have victims . . . So it is in the sexual
revolution.”
And as it turns out, in some instances, the victims of that
revolution include churches and other ministries. As Ed says, “When the
shepherd has violated a sacred trust, it harms the whole flock. This is not the
time to act as if everything is fine, rush together a pastor search team, while
ignoring the hurt and bleeding flock.”
After all, he continues, “Even when members of a church don’t
idolize their pastor, there’s still a great deal of implicit trust in the
relationship. The members believe the one teaching them week after week is the
same in the park as in the pulpit, the same in public as in private. When a
revelation like the Ashley Madison hack occurs, the breach of trust is severe,
and often lasting far beyond his moment.”
For these victims, Ed urges them to “focus on God who does not
fail.” Instead of focusing on your pastor’s guilt, focus on God who does great
things despite the flaws and failings of his servants.
People should also take care of the pastors’ families. They are
principal victims and yet, perversely, they’re often unintentionally punished
along with their betrayers.
And most of all, we should remember that “God’s grace is
sufficient for the shepherd who falls, and the flock that’s left vulnerable.
“We have a Great Shepherd, a Chief Shepherd, who is for us what earthly
shepherds can never be,” Ed writes—“perfect, absolutely trustworthy, and never
failing. It is He who leads us beside still waters in and into green pastures.
Let us place our faith in Him, and we will find rest for our weary souls.”
Reprinted with permission from Break
Point.
