Op-Ed: You Can Have Confidence in Supporting Grace Community Church
You may not agree, but those of us who take this position aren’t arriving at it out of nowhere.
Here’s a thought on the recent scandal stirred up by recent reports. Based on the information Grace Community Church (GCC) elders had at the time, there was sufficient reason to believe David was repentant and the home was safe. Eileen disagreed, and justifiable church discipline ensued, on account of not submitting to their collective spirit-led wisdom.
Suppose later David emerged as a child predator who fooled everyone and necessitated a separation/ divorce, does that mean that GCC is guilty in light of their initial assessment, based on the information they had at the time? There’s a case to be made that they’re not.
Reasonable people can disagree and come to different conclusions. As far as why there’s been no response, one view could be that GCC sees the discipline of a member as a private church issue. And although Julie Roys made it public, there’s no step in Matthew 18 that says after you tell it to the church, which they did in a private manner, that you then release a public statement on social media giving every passerby the intimate details of the discipline, especially if Julie Roys writes about it.
That’s not a step contained in the bible.
The fact that David later went out and did this wicked thing (which it seems some people have questions about the extent of his guilt) does not mean that the initial assessment and ask by GCC elders was wrong prior to this event happening, particularly when we have basically no information of what went down in those sessions, or really what the counselor or counsellee said or did that resulted in the ex-communication.
Even if GCC completely dropped the ball in their interaction with her, and their efforts at church discipline were misguided on account of being far too eager in their attempts at reconciliation and not sensitive enough to obvious lies and predations from David, is that worthy of public comment, or does that still fall under the category of a private church discipline issue that the public does not need to know about? No. We are not owed an explanation.
You may not agree, but those of us who take this position aren’t arriving at it out of nowhere. It’s not like we have no biblical basis for putting a certain about of trust and confidence in John MacArthur and the elders at GCC and assuming good intentions and honest dealings with the couple.
At the very least the church has earned our consideration that there’s a way to reconcile these events that doesn’t result in the allegation that GCC covered sexual abuse, or gaslighted a victim, or callously did her dirty on account of their deep-seated misogyny and patriarchalism.
For more in-depth assessment, check out our new article: Roys vs MacArthur: Anatomy of a Smear