For the Charismatic Prodigals

The Return of the Prodigal Son (Rembrandt)

As I have said many times now on this blog, I am profoundly indebted to the charismatic movement and the many leaders within it who have worked so hard to make space in the church for the working of the Spirit, who often received much unwarranted and hurtful criticism for doing so. In one social media post a while ago, I went so far as to say that I owe my life to this movement and its leaders, because prior to my encountering the love of God within the charismatic movement I was in a very dark place and things were only going to get darker. At the very same time, as I look back on my now 16 years of life within this movement there have been many times and places where I was treated so badly that my therapist a while ago said that she was amazed I am still a Christian. The credit for this goes to God and his grace, not to me. As I look back on the many friends and colleagues I have known and as I look at the wider charismatic landscape in North America, one doesn't need to be prophetic to see that there is now a kind of groundswell of people who were either raised or deeply involved in the charismatic movement who are now completely deconstructed or on the brink of walking away, usually because of the ways in which they have been hurt and mistreated. They are the charismatic prodigals. This phenomenon is of course not in the slightest bit unique to the charismatic movement. This is happening now across huge swathes of the global Church. How are we to respond to this?

Let's start with how not to respond. A while ago I saw a leader post something to the effect of 'If you have left Jesus because of the failures of the church, you have been putting your faith in the wrong place all along'. This is A. a remarkably tone-deaf and pastorally insensitive thing to speak into this context and B. a convenient way for leaders to exonerate themselves for the harm they have done to people. When I was still in secondary school, I was at home practising for an upcoming interview to be the head of one of the school houses (think Harry Potter, they just weren't Gryffindor, Slytherin etc.). As I was practising, I accidentally said something to the effect of 'If I were to receive this position of leadership, I would always remember that the privileges of leadership are more important than the responsibilities.' My Dad obviously burst out laughing, because I had got the two the wrong way around by accident! As humorous as this was for me and my family, on a more serious note this to me sounds like a good diagnosis of what has gone wrong with some leaders in the charismatic movement: all of the privileges of leadership with none of the responsibilities. If one accepts a call from God and from a church community/movement to be a spiritual leader, one really has to think carefully about saying yes or no. On the one hand, Jesus was very clear that those leaders who do well by treating the sheep well will be hugely rewarded in the next life. But Jesus was equally clear, that those who do badly by treating the sheep badly have some serious confrontation with him on the horizon. I think that the last 1.5 years of God pulling the rug out from under so many charismatic leaders who were one thing in public and something else in private is God calling time on some of the abuse and calling the false shepherds to account. We are all responsible, leaders especially, for our theology, our politics, our way of life, our way of interacting with other people and the effect that all of these things have on others, especially people who are more vulnerable.

When my wife Claire and I were first dating, it took me some years to lean that sincerity is not always enough. What do I mean by this? I mean that just because I had good intentions in a given situation, that did not mean that I was not responsible for how I may have hurt her in the same situation. This was a difficult lesson to learn for me because I placed such a premium on having good intentions/motivations. And God certainly takes our motivations and intentions into account in terms of how he evaluates our lives. But I think it is important for leaders in the charismatic movement to remember that, especially as a leader, sincerity is not always enough. Many people throughout history have sincerely done great harm to vulnerable people. And if this is not eventually followed by repentance and work to right the wrongs done to vulnerable people, God rises up to vindicate and fight for the vulnerable. This obviously requires humility, as all of us are capable of deceiving ourselves and not realizing that we are doing harm. This is where we need to pray as the psalmist in Psalm 139:23-24 (NIV) "Search me, God, and know my heart; test me and know my anxious thoughts. See if there is any offensive way in me, and lead me in the way everlasting."

What is the ultimate purpose of this rambling blog post? I think God wants to say to the thousands, tens of thousands, hundreds of thousands (I don't know the number, but it is not small) of charismatic prodigals what he said to Moses so long ago: Exodus 3:7-10 (NIV) "The Lord said, “I have indeed seen the misery of my people in Egypt. I have heard them crying out because of their slave drivers, and I am concerned about their suffering. So I have come down to rescue them from the hand of the Egyptians and to bring them up out of that land into a good and spacious land, a land flowing with milk and honey—the home of the Canaanites, Hittites, Amorites, Perizzites, Hivites and Jebusites. And now the cry of the Israelites has reached me, and I have seen the way the Egyptians are oppressing them. So now, go. I am sending you to Pharaoh to bring my people the Israelites out of Egypt.” I think he is calling the charismatic prodigals back to himself by assuring them that he has seen, he has heard, and if we will choose to trust him (much easier said than done), he will restore us and protect us under the shadow of his wings. What got me through my darkest times was a God-given determination not to quit on Jesus. I pray that God continues to give this to me and to all of us who can relate to the topic of this blog post. 

Having said all of this, for those leaders who have done harm there is of course abundant mercy and grace in Christ. I am not trying to be the one to cast the first stone, as it were. But the fact that Jesus preached mercy and that all of us have sinned and fallen short simply does not equal no calling out of the wrongs and no need for repentance. And repentance looks like something. In this case, honesty, transparency and concrete work to help those who have been wronged. Any kind of church discipline that does not prioritize the needs of the victims has missed the point and missed Jesus' heart.