“A Young Lady,” An Old Story of Ongoing Sin

Posted on June 27, 2024 by RC

Like so many others I find myself taken aback by the recent resignation of Robert Morris, senior pastor of the massive Gateway Church in Texas. Morris resigned his position after it was made public that when he was a young, married pastor he had sexually abused a girl under his care over the space of four years. It’s bad enough that it was sexual sin. Worse still that it was sexual abuse of a child.

What is truly shocking, however, is that none of this is news. The sin came out right after it happened. Morris repented. Those in authority at the church affirmed their forgiveness. They removed Morris from the pulpit for two years, put him through a program of rehabilitation and restored him.

Over the years two things happened. Morris planted Gateway in 2000, starting with a flock of 180. It grew exponentially. Second, Morris occasionally made reference in his preaching and teaching to his moral failure. His references were admittedly vague. He acknowledged having engaged in sinful sexual behavior as a young, married pastor. He referred to the girl as “a young lady.” His confession wasn’t merely vague- it was a lie. She was no more a young lady than a drag queen is a young lady.

The leadership at the original church knew that the girl was 12 when this started. The leadership at Gateway says they did not know. The police knew nothing because they were never told. Not by Morris. Not by the girl. Not by her family. Not by the leadership of the church. No one told the ones who had proper jurisdiction over the crimes. Morris went on his way, now equipped with a nice story about his humility and God’s grace. The girl grew up, became a young lady, and languished, hung out to dry.

Pundits tend to say that the cover-up is always worse than the sin. That is not the case here. The cover-up, however, a deep and grievous sin, lasted not 4 years but 40 years. This secret sin endured the whole of his public ministry. This is the shame that rests on Morris and the elders of his first church.

It is true enough that things were handled differently back then. Sweeping these things under the rug was quite common. It just wasn’t talked about. All of which is likewise deep and grievous sin. One can no more excuse this cover-up on the grounds of it being a different era than one can excuse any other sin, like racism, that shamefully got a pass in another era.

No, the solution was never blaming the culture of the time, pretending a 12 year old girl is a young lady, hoping the whole thing would just go away. The solution then and now is repentance. From Morris, to the Lord who reigns, to the now woman, her family and the elders at Gateway. From the elders of the previous church to the Lord who reigns, the now woman, her family and the elders at Gateway.

We find, whether we are utterly unknown or pastor of one of the largest churches in the nation, forgiveness when we confess, judgment when we deny. May God be pleased to expose all our deepest failures, and may we all cry out for His mercy.

Posted in "race", 10 Commandments, Big Eva, church, ethics, grace, kingdom, Kingdom Notes, RC Sproul JR, repentance, scandal, sexual confusion | Tagged , , , , , , , , | 4 Comments

Grace Reformed; Pride Religion; First Fleece; Me & My Needs

Posted on June 26, 2024 by RC

This week’s Jesus Changes Everything Podcast

Posted in Biblical Doctrines, church, Devil's Arsenal, ethics, hermeneutics, Jesus Changes Everything, Lisa Sproul, Month of Sundays, persecution, politics, post-modernism, RC Sproul JR, Sacred Marriage, sexual confusion | Tagged , , , , , , , , | Comments Off on Grace Reformed; Pride Religion; First Fleece; Me & My Needs

Evil Employees and Saintly Corporations

Posted on June 25, 2024 by RC

It is a common but dangerous business, our propensity to make ourselves the heroes of our own stories, and to see all who stand in our way as wearing the black hats. As a person with an interest in all things economic I see it in the realm of our buying and trading all the time. We all want to sell high and buy low. And we are all sellers and buyers. We all sell our labor in the marketplace. And we buy what we buy. The ones in the black hats, we think, are the ones keeping us from selling high, and from buying low.

First, when we sell our labor we all want to sell high. We might insist that the government make it illegal for anyone to hire anyone for less than what we think we ought to earn. We might simply grumble that we are being taken advantage of. We might cheat our employer on the ground that we are not being paid as we think we ought to be. In any of these cases the employer is wicked and must be punished.

Second, when buy goods and services we all want to buy low. We might insist that the government make it illegal for anyone to charge more than what we think we ought to be charged for the good or service. We might insist that the state give us money so that we can more easily buy what we want. We might simply grumble that we are being taken advantage of. We might steal from the business we are buying from on the ground that we believe they are charging more than they ought. In any of these cases the business is wicked and must be punished.

Trouble is, of course, that because we are all sellers and buyers we are all also buyers and sellers. Why should our employers not insist that the government make it illegal for anyone to work for more than they want to pay? Why should they not insist that the government give them money so they can more easily afford to pay us? Why should they not simply grumble that they are being taken advantage of? Why should they not steal from us, on the ground that we are charging them more for our labor than we ought? We may be, in selling our labor, a corporation of one, but we are a corporation.

Or, why should the business we buy from not insist that the government make it illegal for anyone to pay less than they are willing to sell for? Why should the businesses not insist that the government give them money so they can charge less? Why should they not grumble that they are being taken advantage of? Why should they not steal from us, on the ground that we are paying less for their goods and services than they believe we ought?

There is an economic lesson here, but as is so often the case with economic lessons, there is also a life lesson- we are adept at justifying ourselves and castigating others. Our moral compasses are out of whack because we think we’re the center of the galaxy, because we believe in our own innate goodness and the innate badness of all who oppose us, even if what it means to oppose us is charging more, or paying less, than we would like. The truth is that prices, for both labor and goods and services ought always to be determined solely by the free interaction of those making the deals, by agreement of both parties.

When I pull up to the gas pump that reads $4.00 a gallon I am reaching an agreement. When the Kansas City Chiefs write Patrick Mahomes a check for $40 million, they are reaching an agreement. When I pick up my spatula at the local Burgers Cooked By People Making $5 An Hour joint, I have reached an agreement. When those deals don’t get made, we’ve just agreed to disagree. No one needs to be vilified. No need to call the feds.

What we all need to do is own our own sins. We’re the hero of the story when we keep our agreement. And those who use the force of theft or the state to get their way, those are the ones in the black hats.

Posted in 10 Commandments, Economics in This Lesson, ethics, Kingdom Notes, logic, politics, RC Sproul JR | Tagged , , , , , | 2 Comments

What’s the ideal size for a local church?

Posted on June 24, 2024 by RC

The Bible doesn’t say. So neither will I. I will concede that different sizes have differing advantages and disadvantages. We live in the era of the mega-church. Churches that measure their membership in the thousands are positioned to support many missionaries, to serve their unbelieving neighbors, to create helps to the broader church.

Where they tend to be weaker is in strong relationships between leadership and laity and among the laity. Accountability is lost in the sea of faces, which sadly is part of what draws so many of those faces. Finally, such churches tend to let slip, remain silent, or seek safe spaces on the issues of the day, so as not to offend.

Churches that measure their membership in the tens, not surprisingly, tend to have the opposite strengths and weaknesses. They tend to be cash poor, unable to pay their pastor, often without a building to meet in, and often invisible to the broader world. They tend to be stronger in pastoral care and the blessings of community. Accountability can, however, slide over into a church body full of busy-bodies.

It may be that what works best is shaped largely by the state of the church as a whole, and the state of the broader culture. When the Christian faith is strong and the broader culture is less hostile, big churches may be more effective. When, however, the church is both given to worldliness and being overrun by the world smaller might be better. The church in our day is less effective and more worldly which in turn makes the world more worldly. Compromise with the world doesn’t bring peace but greater aggression from the world.

Smaller churches do not have to face mass departures and budget deficits when they confront the sexual insanity of the world, or sexual shenanigans inside the church. Smaller churches have smaller targets on their backs when the state encroaches on our call to gather for worship.

As the world becomes more hostile to the Christian faith, as it descends deeper into its madness large churches will either stand firm and become small churches or flee from the battle and remain large and largely insignificant. Thus far, it seems, we’re seeing far more of the latter than we are of the former.

I suspect smaller churches will become increasingly common in the coming years, and that such is a good thing. That doesn’t mean large churches are sinful and small ones pious. I haven’t forgotten where I began- the Bible doesn’t say how big churches should be. I do believe, however, we would be wise not to assume that which is normal right now is how things always ought to be.

Remember this- ear tickling preachers have large flocks precisely because both sheep and goats like having their ears tickled. Even the pew-sitters long to be on the winning team. The winning team, however, just may be the twenty faithful folks who just got kicked out of the local YMCA for not being inclusive enough. Give some thought to how you think about your church.


This is the first of an ongoing series of pieces here on the nature and calling of the church. Stay tuned for more.

Posted in Ask RC, Big Eva, church, kingdom, RC Sproul JR, wisdom | Tagged , , , , , | 4 Comments

Got to Get Back to the Garden

Posted on June 21, 2024 by RC

Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, shame on me. I’ll admit I got taken in the first time. As a grade school child my conception of cool included too tight silk shirts and blue jeans with more flair than Liberace. I even had my own polyester jumpsuit. I looked like a cross between Howdy Doody and Elvis, in his latter years. The fashion craze of recreating the nightmare of the seventies hasn’t filled my heart with a warm dose of nostalgia. Instead it makes me embarrassed for what I used to wear. I’ve learned my lesson well. I won’t get fooled again.

It reminds me of the power of nostalgia. Postmodernism, because it is parasitic and destructive, cannot build a culture. It can only reconstitute old ones. Because it is cynical and knowing, it goes out of its way to reconstitute that which is garish, immature, and kitschy. We dress like goofballs to demonstrate our knowing superiority over the narrative that is clothing. Because it denies that anything lasts, it demands that everything be new. The danger is the speed at which our cultural spin-masters are spinning the old cultures. Soon we’ll practice a faux nostalgia for last week.

Real nostalgia, true longing for days gone by is fed by a different kind of folly. It seems that hindsight can only be had through rose-colored glasses. And they never go out of style. We want things not as they used to be, but as we remember that they used to be. Which is why the author of Hebrews went to such trouble, argued with such passion, warned with such fervor in his epistle. Nostalgia can do worse things than make you dress funny.

Living in a comparatively free country, one where pluralism rules the day, it is difficult to understand what it would have taken for a first-century Jew to embrace the claims of Jesus Christ. More than likely, such would destroy a whole host of family relationships. Friendships would be sundered as well. Those, like Nicodemus and Joseph of Arimathea, indeed, like the apostle Paul, who once were honored and respected men of the community, would now become social pariahs, unable to get a place at the table. And a swift and painful death by martyrdom, with each passing day, became more and more likely.

Like their forefathers before them, we can have sympathy when some begin to talk about how they once had leeks and garlic back in Egypt, that though they were slaves, their pots were filled. Present suffering deepens the rosy hue as we look back at past suffering. And so many believing Hebrews struggled mightily with fits of nostalgia. Many were sorely tempted to throw off the dead-weight of this Jesus, that happy days might be here again. Cast off that cross, they reasoned, and they could stand upright in the halls of men again. Many, in short, were tempted to neglect so great a salvation.

Ironically, one could argue that their problem wasn’t that they were looking backward. The old saying, “you can’t go back again,” wouldn’t help. One might say their failure was that they weren’t looking far enough back. A love of the past may be a good thing, as long as what we love is a good thing. They were called not to look back to their recent Judaism. Neither were they to look longingly at the apex of their nation, to the days of David and Solomon. They should not look back to Egypt, nor even to the days of the great patriarchs. Rather, they should have longed to get back to the garden.

The right thing too long for is a world without sin. Our hearts should ache to be once again at peace with God, to walk with Him in the cool of the evening, to see the lion lay down with the lamb. This is godly nostalgia, as long as it moves us to godly obedience. While we ought to long for such things, we ought not to do so forlornly, knowing that you can’t go back again. Rather we do so joyfully, knowing that we, with every forward step, move back to the garden. The path to the garden is through the consummation of the kingdom of Jesus Christ. To go home again, we must seek first the kingdom of God.

These things, however, are written for us as well. While our status as outcasts and victims in our own culture cannot compare with the Hebrews in the first century, we have entered that territory. Like Augustine before us, we are called to witness the destruction of the culture around us. And, like the Hebrews, we are tempted toward nostalgia. We long for those halcyon days of the 1950’s, when the Hayes Office kept our movies clean, and the daily news wasn’t filled with liberal prelates gayly shouting the “love” that once didn’t dare speak it’s name. And like the Hebrews, we are looking in the wrong place.

As Christians, our longing is not that we might have a cleaner pop culture. The church does not place its hope in military/industrial/cultural American hegemony across the globe. Rather, we long for the day when every knee will bow and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord. The church longs for the day when we will be dressed not in the gaudiness and flash of a decadent culture, but will be dressed in the radiant robe provided by our Husband and Lord.

Posted in beauty, Biblical Doctrines, Biblical theology, church, creation, eschatology, grace, kingdom, Kingdom Notes, Nostalgia, RC Sproul JR, wonder, worship | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , | 1 Comment

Ten Things I Miss About Childhood Summers

Posted on June 20, 2024 by RC

I am not a fan of summer. Not at all. I don’t like hot. I don’t like bugs. I don’t like night being overrun by daylight. Every year I count down the days until summer ends. The best thing I can say about today, the first day of summer, 2024 is that tomorrow we’ll be as far away as possible from the first day of summer, 2025.

It hasn’t always been this way. Part of my distaste, I’m sure, flows out of the too many years I lived in Florida and summer nearly year round. Another part is the adult chores that come with summer. When, however, I was young, those burdens weren’t a part of summer. The more I think about it, the more I miss those summers. Here are ten reasons why.

1. Baseball. When I was a kid I played in two different leagues, spent hours playing with friends, and either watched or listened to my Pittsburgh Pirates who had a great run during my childhood, winning two World Series and winning their division several more times. I have too much respect for the game to try to communicate its glories in prose.

2. Camping out. We had roughly twenty acres of woods behind my house. One or two nights a week my friends and I would hike a few hundred yards to our camping spot, light up a fire, make smores and watch the stars. It was like Stand By Me, but without the bullies and the dead body.

3. Fishing. I’ve never been a deep aficionado of fishing. But that doesn’t mean I never found joy in it. Mr. Campbell owned the neighboring property and had a lake. My friends and I would lug our tackle boxes and Zebco 202s to the banks of that lake and spend an hour or so seeking bass. If we succeeded we feasted. If not, we moved our hooks closer to shore and found our fun catching and releasing blue gill. Do kids still do this? Do they know how to put a bobber on a line, to bite a sinker closed? Have they removed fish scales with a fishing knife, or washed the pungent smell of fish offal from their hands?

4. No school. Goes without saying.

5. Watermelon, and spitting seeds.

6. Rainless thunderstorms. Oh mercy these were something else, a safe yet dazzling fireworks display from the living God. And, on a smaller scale, the whimsical dance of fire flies. And in between, fireworks on the 4th of July, or after a ballgame at 3 Rivers Stadium in Pittsburgh.

7. The Fireman’s Fairs. Each summer several of the local volunteer fire companies raised money with fairs. Part small-scale county fair, part Monte Carlo Night, part country style rave, these kaleidoscopes of music, games, rides and cotton candy were mesmerizing.

8. Thursday nights at the Ligonier Valley Study Center. These community gatherings began with grilled hot dogs, covered dishes, Texas sheet cake, moved on to softball or volleyball and often ended with s’mores around the fire. This experience of koinonia shaped my soul.

9. Pool days. A few days each week I was sent off with my peers, and the bigger kids, equipped with two dollars. Such got me into the public pool at Idelwild Park and a lunch of a hot dog and a root beer.

10. Cool evenings in late August- the sure sign that even better days were coming.

Do you miss anything from your childhood summers? Camp? Strawberry shortcake? Let us know in the comments. Happy first day of Summer.

Posted in beauty, creation, kingdom, Kingdom Notes, Nostalgia, RC Sproul JR, seasons, wonder | Tagged , , , , , , | 5 Comments

Sorry Friends, No JCE Podcast This Week

Posted on June 19, 2024 by RC

But here, for your viewing/listening pleasure, is our final study on the book of Romans. We hope you’ll find it edifying.

Posted in announcements, Bible Study, church, friendship, grace, Jesus Changes Everything, RC Sproul JR | Tagged , , , , , | 1 Comment

Love One Another, Because He is In Us and Them

Posted on June 18, 2024 by RC

Do we not glide happily past this command? It should, though it doesn’t, go without saying. There’s no question that the Bible teaches this. There’s no question that the Bible emphasizes this. There’s no question that we’re not very good at it. Why, when the command is obvious, are we so bad at obeying it? Because we’re no good.

Even a cursory reading of the gospels will reveal the connection between God’s love for and grace toward us and our call to love and be gracious toward one another. When we’ve been forgiven much we’re to find it easier to forgive much. When we’ve received grace we’re to find it easier to give grace. We fail here, however, because we judge unjustly. We minimize our sins while maximizing others’ sins. We minimize the importance of others, while maximizing our own importance. Whether it is a marriage, a family, a friendship, or a church body, believing ourselves morally above others is a sure recipe for disaster.

When I find myself hated by others, including those who name the name of Christ, I try to find comfort in the knowledge that my heavenly Father loves me. He knows how truly awful I am. Those who despise and accuse me are blind to my real flaws. My Father knows them all, and still loves me. When I find myself hating others, including those who name the name of Christ, it should be enough for me to remember that I am not due the love I receive. It’s not a bad first step. But I will do so much better if I remember not just that Jesus loves me, despite my sin, but that Jesus loves the one I’m despising, despite his sin.

When we fail to love our brothers and sisters we put ourselves in direct opposition against the One who loves and redeemed us and who loves and redeemed our brothers and sisters. “Jesus loves me” doesn’t blow me away like it ought to. “Jesus loves them” barely registers with me. Because I am a fool.

Our love for each other makes manifest three things the world needs to know. First, that love is possible. How easy it is to grow jaded and cynical when living in a world untouched by God’s redeeming grace. Those fragments of the image of God that yet remain in the unbeliever long for love and acceptance. What a testimony when they see it among believers.

Second, it shows that change in us is possible. My growing capacity to love the brethren is evidence that I am part of the family, that the Spirit is at work in me. When the unbeliever is discouraged in his own sin, it is light to blind eyes to see believers growing in grace, evidenced by increasing love one for another.

Third, it shows that acknowledging our sin is not a doorway to despair but the entrance into liberty. When the love others have for me is grounded not in me being good but in Christ being in me, when I have no need to pretend to be better than I am then I can know that the love I receive is for me, and not the image I project.

More important than all this, however, when we love one another we delight our heavenly Father.

Posted in "race", 10 Commandments, Biblical Doctrines, church, grace, kingdom, Kingdom Notes, RC Sproul JR, wisdom | Tagged , , , , , , , , , | Comments Off on Love One Another, Because He is In Us and Them

Live Study Tonight, Finishing Romans

Posted on June 17, 2024 by RC

Tonight we conclude our look at the monumental, towering book of Romans. All are welcome to our home at 7 est, or you may join us for dinner at 6:15. We will also stream the study at Facebook, RC-Lisa Sproul. We hope you’ll join us.

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Are believers justified by their election?

Posted on June 17, 2024 by RC

Of course not. The way some of my fellow Reformed folk talk at times it might seem some think so. The way some non-Reformed folk talk at times, it might seem that they think we think this. But we don’t. And it all comes down to simple logic.

Our first premise is- All the elect have been or will be justified.
Our second premise is- None of the non-elect have been or will be justified.
Our conclusion is- Election justifies us.

Each of our premises are correct, at least according to Reformed doctrine. The conclusion, however not only does not follow from the premises, but is in fact false. Election describes and delineates for us who are the saved and who are not. It says nothing whatsoever about how they are saved. The following syllogism follows the exact same form and yields a clearly false conclusion:

Our first premise- All the first class passengers were given parachutes when the engines failed.
Our second premise- None of the non-first class passengers were given parachutes when the engines failed.
Our conclusion is- Sitting in first class puts us safely on the ground.

It is the parachute, not the seat assignment that brings people safely to the ground. In like manner, if I were to die and God were to ask me why He should let me into heaven, and if I were to respond, “I’m elect. My name is in the Lamb’s book of life” that would demonstrate that I’m not elect, and my name is not in the Lamb’s book. Those whose names are in the Lamb’s book do not rest in the book of the Lamb but the blood of the Lamb.

There is only one way into heaven- the work of Christ for us, which becomes ours through resting in it alone, which is itself a gift from God, which gift is given only to the elect, for no other reason than God’s good pleasure. Both election and even faith are not the ground of our justification, not the means of our justification. Election determined who would receive it. Faith is how it becomes theirs. But it is Jesus’ perfect life of obedience imputed to us, and His sacrificial atoning death that covers our sins that earns the blessings of God for us.

These are not esoteric and meaningless distinctions. For one thing, we don’t know who the elect are. I’ve been asked countless times, “How can you know you are elect?” Knowing we are elect is not how we know we have the work of Christ. Rather, having the work of Christ is how we know we are elect. The tax collector went home justified because he cried out for God’s mercy. The same is true of all of us. We must stop trying to peek into the Lamb’s book, and instead run to the foot of His cross.

Election is true, biblical, God honoring, comforting. But it does not move us from dark to light. Jesus does that.

Posted in Ask RC, assurance, Biblical Doctrines, Doctrines of Grace, grace, justification, logic, RC Sproul JR, theology | Tagged , , , , , , | Comments Off on Are believers justified by their election?