Matt Chandler Returns to the Pulpit, Receives Standing Ovation + His Critics Go Nuts
Chandler explained that he’d spent the last few months undergoing “intensives,”
Three months ago, it was announced that Lead Pastor Matt Chandler would be taking an indefinite leave of absence from preaching and teaching at The Village Church after it was revealed he was engaged in an inappropriate texting conversation with a woman not his wife, (the conversation, while not romantic or sexual, was described as “overly familiar” and involved “coarse and foolish jesting.”
Yesterday Chandler, who was earlier restored by the elder team, took to the stage and received an extended standing ovation, taking a few minutes to apologize to his congregants, telling them, “I’m sorry, I failed you…” while lamenting that his “foolishness” might have caused his congregants hardship and pain.
Chandler also explained that he’d spent the last few months undergoing “intensives,” which are extended counseling sessions delving into his personality, thoughts and motivations, and even had a neurological exam on account of not being able to recognize his error and wondering whether or not his brain cancer a decade ago where he had his frontal lobe removed might have something to do with it (This is a stretch). He told them:
“Of course I’m sick like I’m just- a couple of things. I very much know that the Christian life is a marathon and there are times in that run where you’re uphill in the snow and not sure if you’re gonna make it, and then there are other times you’re running downhill in the sun and it feels like nothing could ever hinder your love for Jesus and your bold witness.
And if in my foolishness I created any more weight on you, or made this any more difficult on you, please forgive me.
I said on the 28th that really the situation disoriented me, it scared me. I’m a man who’s very serious about his life and doctrine and that I didn’t see what I didn’t see really was disorienting to me. And I said I needed to understand that, it revealed some unhealth in me. And so the elders care plan involved a couple of intensives and I actually went even got a neurological exam. I don’t know if you were around for that, but I actually don’t have a right frontal lobe. I had a tumour taken out 13 years ago and radiation and all that, so we needed like, ‘hey, is there something wrong with my brain?’
And that’s the work I’ve been doing over the last three months. Some intensives with some experts and then is my brain okay. And I don’t I don’t have like here the eight takeaways…
Matt did not offer more details on what caused him to be suspended, but we covered that previously here:
In response to his restoration, social media is alight with criticism, with comments from survivor bloggers being emblematic of the greater whole.
We also got ridiculous videos , which are loaded with assumptions, conclusion jumping and gossipy innuendo.
We’ve had our share of issues with Chandler in the past. We’ve been on the record sayin that the leaky charismatic has been drifting for years, such as when he compared BLM leaders to prophets- saying that not participating in BLM Marches is ‘giving up our inheritance’, then denounced America as ‘demonic’, while saying that racism is theologically woven into our foundation and finally declared after January 6th that ‘everyone is complicit in the unrest and destruction of our nation’. These are all troubling and worthy of rebuke.
But this restoration? Nothing about the situation would indicate that it is not appropriate.