Ep 669 ｜ My Thoughts on Matt Chandler & Baptist Theology
Episode Stats
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Summary
Popular Southern Baptist pastor Matt Chandler announced over the weekend that he is temporarily stepping down from his role as lead pastor of his church because of an inappropriate online relationship. Also, the DOJ is investigating the Southern Baptist Convention. And another blow to Baptist Presbyterian podcasters who say that Baptist theology caused transgenderism.
Transcript
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What in the world is going on in the church, specifically the Baptist church?
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Popular Southern Baptist pastor Matt Chandler announced over the weekend
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that he is temporarily stepping down from his role as lead pastor of his church
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because of an inappropriate online relationship.
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Also, the DOJ is investigating the Southern Baptist Convention.
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Baptist Presbyterian podcasters say that Baptist theology caused transgenderism.
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I will give you my analysis on all of this today.
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This episode, as always, is brought to you by our friends at Good Ranchers.
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Go to GoodRanchers.com slash Allie for American meat delivered to your front door.
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So as you could tell from the introduction, we are taking a break from news and politics,
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and we are talking about things that are happening in the church,
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specifically things that are happening in the Baptist denomination.
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As we've talked about before, the Southern Baptist Convention is the largest and the most
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influential denomination in Protestantism in America.
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And so even though this might seem like a niche subject, it actually is relevant for all Christians,
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I would say all conservatives, and really kind of all Americans,
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because it's such an influential and politically active denomination.
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It's important for everyone to kind of understand the direction it's going, what's happening with its leaders.
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So I first want to talk about this Matt Chandler story.
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I will just summarize what happened and then I'll kind of give my personal reaction to it.
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Matt Chandler, if you don't know, he's the lead pastor of teaching at the Village Church in Flower Mound, Texas.
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He is the president of the Acts 29 Network, which is a global church planning ministry.
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He really, he burst on the stage, I would say, for most people.
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Most people started knowing who he is and listening to his sermons online, I would say, probably around like 2008.
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Now, he had been around before that, of course, as a pastor, as a teacher.
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I'm sure locally a lot of people knew who he was before that.
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But nationally, it seems, at least in my consciousness and in my memory,
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it seems like he really became popular around 2008, 2009.
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Now, that is also, that also happens to be when I started listening to him.
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But in my mind, it seemed like that's when he really started rising to national prominence and popularity.
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So a lot of you have probably heard his sermons.
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You've either watched some of the videos that he's put out or watched some of his sermons.
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One of his most famous clips online is Jesus Wants the Rose.
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Like, I remember showing my friends that in college.
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And as I'll talk about in a few minutes, he has been very, very influential on my theology,
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my understanding of the gospel, especially when I was a junior, senior in high school.
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So even though I've had plenty of disagreements with him and his takes on social and so-called
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racial justice over the past few years, I would still say he has been extremely impactful
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on my faith and on my love for theology and understanding of Scripture.
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So the story that I'm about to summarize, it makes me very personally sad for the reasons
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And I will expound upon that in just a minute after I tell you what happened.
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Matt Chandler steps aside after inappropriate online relationships.
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So Christianity Today, just FYI, I would categorize it now as a progressive publication.
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It hasn't always been as overtly progressive as it is today.
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But when it comes to this story, they do give us a pretty detailed summary of what happened
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over the weekend with Matt Chandler and his church.
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So the article says on Sunday, August 28th, Chandler announced to his church that he had
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an inappropriate online relationship with a woman.
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He is taking an indefinite leave of absence from preaching and teaching.
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I know that maybe if you've already looked at the story online, then you're seeing a lot
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of people make assumptions or saying things that we just don't actually know are true.
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The church says that the relationship or the conversations, the interactions that he was
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having with this woman online were not sexual or romantic in any way.
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But the elders of the church believe that the frequent and familiar direct messages that
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were exchanged over Instagram were, quote, unguarded and unwise and revealed something unhealthy
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So how this all started, and this is according to Matt Chandler himself and his announcement
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He says that the red flag came several months ago when a woman approached him in the foyer of
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the village church after a church service and confronted him with concerns about how he
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was communicating with a friend of hers, a female friend of hers, and that she didn't
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think that these online exchanges that they were having were appropriate.
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Now, Chandler says that he pushed back on this initially, saying, you know, look, my wife
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I'm sure that he defended himself by saying this is not romantic, you know, this is totally
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But he says that he was disoriented by this confrontation and conversation.
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And so he says that he immediately went to the elders in his church and he said, hey, here's
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He says that he called for a third party investigation.
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And so church leadership and this investigation reviewed his DMs and decided that they were
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But he says that there was coarse joking, that there was crude joking, that, again, it was
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just very frequent and familiar and that they found this to be very inappropriate.
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So the law firm that they hired as the third party investigator decided that Chandler had
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Chandler said this, quote, it was that our conversations were unguarded and unwise.
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And because I don't ever want there to be any secrets between us, the concerns were really
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We believe in brother-sister relationships here.
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And yet there was a frequency that moved past that.
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And there was a familiarity that moved past that.
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And there was a familiarity that played itself out in coarse and foolish joking.
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If I'm honest, he says, I'm just really embarrassed, feel stupid, feel dumb, feel like I'm embarrassing
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my wife and kids, putting a ton of pressure on our staff.
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And Acts 29, which he is the head of, has also asked Matt Chandler to step down from his
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responsibilities and day-to-day operations are going to be moved to someone else.
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And so this was a shock for a lot of people, including me, including someone who has really
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And I'm not even saying that he's not in general, but he really does seem like someone
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He talks a lot about being above reproach and being a good man, a good husband, someone that
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is accountable, someone who is transparent and honest.
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And so I think a lot of people who really respect and admire him are disappointed by this.
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Obviously, so thankful that it's not romantic and that it is not sexual.
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But still, a lot of people are, of course, saddened, even while there is a ton of grace and there's
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a ton of understanding and there's a ton of gratitude for the confession and for the
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actions of the church in trying to hold him accountable.
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We'll talk in a minute about church discipline, how I think that this is a good example of
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And I also think that Matt Chandler's attitude and his disposition and what appears to be
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genuine humility in confessing this sin and submitting to his elders is a really good
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example of how the local church is supposed to operate.
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Now, not all reactions were like that, as you can imagine on Twitter.
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As I mentioned a few minutes ago, there are people who are making assumptions.
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There are people who are jeering, who are cheering over this because they don't like
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Now, I've already said that I've had disagreements with Matt Chandler over the past few years
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when it comes to social justice and so-called racial justice comments that he's made about
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things like white privilege and systemic racism and Black Lives Matter.
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And I just have not agreed with a lot of his opinions when it comes to those things and
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And I say that as someone who doesn't have it all figured out myself, but I have really
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The disagreements that I've had with him on these kind of what I think are major issues
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And yet the people who are jeering and cheering on social media over this or making assumptions
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or gossiping about this are not the people who, like me, have disagreed with him on those
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kinds of issues, but really the people who would probably identify as progressive Christians.
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So here is one tweet by Mike, the therapist, who says,
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I've counseled well over 100 pastors who were disciplined or fired for sexual reasons.
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Whatever they admit to is the bare minimum of what has happened.
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They only admit to exactly what they were caught doing.
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That is because we have no idea if that's true.
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That's basically saying that this person knows that this pastor, Mike, the therapist,
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knows that there was actually sexual impropriety here,
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that there was actually some kind of romantic relationship going on here,
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and that really he is just being dishonest because he knows that's what he can get away with.
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I mean, that is, I mean, as far as we know, that is bearing false witness.
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after listening to a statement to the congregation,
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my educated guess is that there is much more to the story, not in a good way.
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This has a way of bringing forth the whole truth.
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And then someone with a trans flag in this person's bio says,
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just saw the news and read the story about Matt Chandler online.
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I've got to say, if it was simply that what Mr. Chandler says it is,
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that it shouldn't rise to the level that this has taken.
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There's more or else the church's legalism is more toxic than I thought.
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And that's what's a little bit confusing about these reactions from people who
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call themselves progressive Christians, which, of course, as I've said before,
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But that they will simultaneously say that someone like Mike Pence saying,
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hey, I'm not going to be alone with a woman that's not my wife.
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I'm not going to be communicating with them in any kind of private way.
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They will say that that's sexist, that that's misogynist, that that's, you know,
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patriarchal and paternalistic and that that hurts women and that that is the wrong attitude.
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And then those same kind of people will turn around and say that someone like Matt Chandler,
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oh, well, if they're having a conversation online, then there's got to be more here.
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It can't just be that they were friendly and familiar with each other.
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Really, what the so-called progressive Christians can't understand is that the standard of purity
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and the standard of righteous action and healthy relationships when it comes to Christian teachers
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is quite a bit higher than what they think it should be or what they think it is.
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That it is, at least to me, it is not obvious or likely at all that there is some other secret,
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scary part to this story that the church is not admitting.
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I think that this is wishful thinking on behalf of a lot of people who really hate Matt Chandler's
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negative words about things like deconstruction.
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And the fact that he is conservative, even though I think he has some wrong progressive
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He believes in conservative, what I would simply call biblical gender roles, the biblical
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definition of marriage, the biblical definition of male and female.
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He has been a consistent anti-abortion voice for years.
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And so this, to me, the celebration, I would say like underhanded celebration, the celebration
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that is that they are trying to like cloak with fake concern coming from these professing
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And I think probably speaks to something in their heart more than it does to some kind of hidden
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Now, if there is more to this story, well, you know, maybe it will come to light.
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But I think that it probably speaks to just a gossipy, slanderous motivation in us for us
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to be trying to make different kinds of assumptions, especially publicly.
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I have more in-depth and like personal commentary about it.
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And I do want to talk a little bit about what the Bible says about church discipline and why
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I think this is a good example of that in a second.
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So let me tell you a little bit more about why personally this story makes me really sad.
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Sadder than if it was another prominent evangelical pastor.
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So my brother introduced me to his sermons, I think, in 2009.
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So I would have been junior, senior in high school.
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I visited the church with my brother and his wife around that time.
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And this was about the time in my life when my faith was becoming real, for lack of a better
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It was going from something that my parents taught me to something that I wanted for myself.
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I was listening to and reading everything, like a very wide range, like Joel Osteen and
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C.S. Lewis and Stephen Furtick and David Platt and Donald Miller and John Piper and Rob Bell
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And honestly, I didn't have a whole lot of discernment back then.
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This book that I had really been reading and memorizing my whole life, I really felt like
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when I was about 16, 17 years old is when the gospel became real to me, when it became
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Now, thank God for his Holy Spirit and his discernment and pulling me towards solid teachers
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But the person that the Holy Spirit used during that time to help give me that discernment,
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to help me distinguish between the true gospel and the false gospel, between superficial teaching
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I had never heard someone preach the Bible like him with such earnestness and enthusiasm
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And here's what revolutionized my theology at the time and still affects how I read and
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approach everything to this day, is that he brought everything back to the gospel.
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It didn't matter whether he was preaching out of Leviticus or John.
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If there was one teacher that I can credit for initially making me excited about theology,
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enthusiastic about the gospel, it was Matt Chandler.
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Now, God has used a lot of people, a lot of books, a lot of churches, a lot of sermons
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in my life that have helped shape my worldview.
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But Matt Chandler's teaching and preaching changed the game for me about 13 years ago.
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I made all my friends in college listen to him.
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Truly, his gift of teaching has been so formative in my life in so many ways.
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I don't think I've even ever met him in person.
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And yet, this situation, like I feel it personally.
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It makes me personally sad simply because of how long I've been listening to him, even
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though I've listened to him less over the past few years because of the concerns that I have
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when it comes to, as I've said, the issues of race and justice.
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But this still so deeply disappoints and saddens me.
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And of course, I too, just like a lot of people, I do have those curiosities about like what really
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Of course, I'm wondering like who initiated the conversation, what they talked about.
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And I'm also I'm thinking about his family, as he mentioned.
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I'm thinking about his wife and his kids and how difficult this must be.
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How is she feeling about how this went down, how it's being represented by the media, by
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And I don't want to do the same thing that a lot of professing Christians on Twitter are
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doing, particularly those who just don't like him because he is conservative theologically
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by assuming that there must be so much more to the story or or even I've seen this a lot
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There are people saying that Chandler slid into her DMs and are accusing him of abusing his
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And like, I would hate for someone to make those kinds of assumptions about me, especially
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after I have done what I think is the right thing and being transparent about something.
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I would hate for someone to try to make further assumptions.
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It's hateful because it seems to be hoping for someone that you disagree with to fail.
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And from what we know, at least from what we can see, this was a proper use of church
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The Bible speaks to different forms of discipline or also how the different ways in which Christians
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can disagree or not even just disagree, confront each other about sin in a way that is godly.
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If your brother sins against you, go and tell him his fault between you and him alone.
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If he listens to you, you have gained your brother.
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But if he does not listen, take one or two others along with you that every charge may
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be established by the evidence of two or three witnesses.
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If he refuses to listen to them, tell it to the church.
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And if he refuses to listen even to the church, then let him be to you as a Gentile and a
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So it seems to me like Matt Chandler has believed in, has agreed with his brothers in Christ,
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the leadership of the church, that the conversation, the interactions that he was having with this
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woman were inappropriate and is submitting to them.
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Now if anyone has caused pain, he has caused it not to me, but in some measure, not to put
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For such one, this punishment by the majority is enough.
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So you should rather turn to forgive and comfort him, or he may be overwhelmed by excessive
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For this is why I wrote that I might test you and know whether you are obedient in everything.
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Indeed, what I have forgiven, if I have forgiven anything, has been for your sake in the presence
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of Christ so that he would not be outwitted by Satan, for we are not ignorant of his design.
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So for the Christian who repents in a church, there is a command to comfort them, to forgive
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That is indeed a testimony of the forgiveness that God has shown us through Christ.
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If anyone aspires to the office of overseer, he desires a noble task.
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And so the office of overseer or the leader of the church is a noble task, and it's a task
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that comes with a lot of responsibility, bigger responsibilities, more accountability, and even
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a higher standard of behavior than other positions within the church or even lay people in the
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James 3.1, not many of you should become teachers, my brothers, for you know that we who teach
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Now, I am not reading that verse because I don't think that Matt Chandler should be a teacher.
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Obviously, I think that he has a wonderful gift of teaching and expositing the word of God.
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I am reading this verse as an example, a biblical example of the bar that is raised for those
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who are in positions of teaching and authority and influence within the church, that they
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So for the people who are saying, oh, it's just DMs, it's who cares?
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It's just interactions back and forth with a woman.
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Well, look, scripture says that they are going to be judged, that these teachers will be judged
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So from everything that I can see, and of course, like I'm not a member of this church.
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I'm probably not even privy to all of the information that the members of the village
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church are, but it seems, at least from the outside, that this was a good and healthy exercise
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of church discipline and that this was handled in a way that is godly.
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And I hope that it was handled in a way that considered all parties involved.
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Now, outlets like the New York Times have already picked this up and they will sense, I mean,
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the secular media that hates the church and especially hates the Southern Baptist Convention
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simply because the majority of Southern Baptists vote Republican and are conservative on their
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on their issues that they hold up as idols like gender and marriage or, you know, homosexual
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And so they are going to try to attack him, of course.
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That's why you are seeing some glee on Twitter from these people who want to see yet another
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conservative Christian leader step down or be attacked or be destroyed in some way.
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It also affirms the perspective of a lot of these people that, oh, all church leaders
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are just giant hypocrites, see Christianity, is it true?
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So this is happening at the same time that, as NPR reports, the Department of Justice is
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So even though Matt Chandler's interaction was not romantic or sexual, this situation is going
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to be seen in light of the bigger investigation that is going on.
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And I just want to talk about that briefly before getting to our last story about my disagreements
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On Friday, August 12th, the leader to the SBC said that several of their major entities
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are under investigation by the United States DOJ after the release of the Guidepost Sex
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Now, I will link the previous episode where we have talked about these investigations.
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Basically, in May, Guidepost Solutions released a report on sexual abuse and cover-ups in the
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They also released a list of pastors and other church-affiliated personnel accused of sexual
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There is a lot of drama, a lot of back and forth, a lot of disagreement about how that
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investigation went down, about the inclusion or the conclusion of that investigation.
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And so go back, listen to that episode for a more detailed kind of analysis of everything
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I mean, it does seem now this is not at all to minimize any real instance of sexual abuse,
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sexual harassment or cover-up, especially when it involves child victims.
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I don't want you to hear me minimizing that at all or trying to push back against real
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accountability for those things, legal accountability for those things, because I think that there
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is a place for civil authorities when it comes to abuse, even and especially within the church.
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It is even worse when it is Christians perpetrating those kinds of crimes and that kind of
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perversion because we are supposed to be light in the darkness.
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We are supposed to be a beacon of goodness and compassion.
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We are supposed to be a refuge for the most vulnerable, not people who are a refuge for
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So I do think it is OK for people to hold the church to a higher standard than they hold
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But I don't think that there should be different standards legally for the church versus secular
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And it does seem when it comes to a DOJ investigation of the SBC that this is a different standard
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than, say, the DOJ would apply to, I don't know, the public education system, a public school,
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any kind of entity that happens to align with the politics of the DOJ.
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It would be hard for me to believe that there isn't at least some kind of political motivation
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in Biden's DOJ and going after the SBC because, again, the SBC is so majorly conservative and
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is such a big supporter of Republican political candidates.
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It's hard for me to believe, based on the previous actions of this DOJ and how they have
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gone after people based on their political ideology, like the parents, the concerned parents going
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to school boards and complaining about pornography in their kids' schools.
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The DOJ said that they were going to be investigating those parents who were just being responsible
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So really hard for me to believe that this is completely above board, that this is just
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impartial application of the law against the SBC.
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There's not a whole lot of detail about what is going on within that investigation.
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Of course, I'll talk about it more as the investigation goes on.
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But every time there is an indiscretion or every time there is a true scandal, every time there
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is an SBC pastor, a Baptist pastor, any evangelical, any Protestant pastor that confesses to any kind
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of sin publicly, it is going to be weighed against the backdrop of the findings in the SBC and also
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I don't think that's necessarily fair because that casts it in a maybe a more serious and a harsher light
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than it needs to be, particularly when it comes to Matt Chandler's case.
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But I do, I mean, it is important context, of course, for us to understand that there's
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a lot that's going on in the SBC right now and that it will be subject to a lot of public
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commentary and a lot of public scrutiny, especially by people who want to see this denomination
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As Christians, as a member of the SBC, of course, I pray for true justice.
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I pray for true transparency and true honesty and true help for those who are victims of
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But of course, I also pray against any kind of partial injustice that may be being enacted
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So in keeping with our Baptist theme, I do want to talk about my disagreements with the
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CrossPolitik is a podcast that talks about culture and politics and theology from a Reformed
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perspective, but they are Presbyterian and I am Baptist.
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And as Presbyterians, they made some comments about Baptist theology causing transgenderism
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And so we are, I will explain my disagreement after playing this short clip.
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You came out and said that my view of waiting till my child is ready to confess faith in
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our Lord and then baptize him is related to the identity crisis found in transgenderism.
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And I didn't say related to, I said is the cause of.
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So, um, man, connect that, you know, someone who has got good, like David said, got good
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intentions, raising his family, loving Jesus, you know, all that stuff.
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And, and then you, you throw that bomb in their lap and, and, and you're, you're like,
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So he goes on to explain, and this is my paraphrasing and what I hope to be an accurate,
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what I want to be an accurate interpretation of the argument, uh, that the idea of allowing
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our children to choose whether they are following Christ when they're say 13 years old, which
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he would say, that's what Baptists preach and then be considered a child of God and a
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part of God's family has provided a foundation for identity crisis in young people.
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Um, this Baptist idea that baptism is an outward symbol of an inward reality.
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I think they would say is very similar to the basis of gender ideology, uh, which says
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that we get to declare who we are and try to change the external to, uh, match what we
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Whereas I believe they as Presbyterians would say that we baptize our children into the family
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of God as babies, telling them who they are as partakers in God's new covenant.
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So I think I do understand what he's saying and I'm not offended by it.
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Baptists do believe, and I'll explain why biblically in a minute, that baptism is an
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That when by grace through faith, God makes you a new creation in Christ, that the next step
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in obedience is baptism, which serves as an important, though not salvific in itself, representation
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I would argue that transgenderism, just like every worldly attempt at giving people identity
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and purpose outside of their creator, is not a consequence of that theology, but a perversion
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of it at best and a total denial of it at worst.
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Whereas the Bible says, and what Baptists like me believe, God made you, he created you
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And you are either dead in your sin, following the devil, the print of the power of the air,
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or by grace through faith, you are made alive in Christ, as Ephesians 2 tells us, turned
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into a new creation who loves God and hates sin.
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Your salvation and satisfaction is found in yourself.
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The only sin, the world says, is not being true to yourself, failing to make yourself
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The old self is who you were before you truly found yourself.
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And the new self is who you are after you've unleashed the real you and you started worshiping
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That is the exchange of the God of scripture, which Christians, including Baptists, believe
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That is not a manifestation of any form of true Christian theology, but is actually a cheap,
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damaging replacement of it like all false teaching.
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Transgenderism comes from a denial of the very first verse of the first chapter of the
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first book of the Bible that God created the heavens and the earth.
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And therefore, he is the authority over all of it.
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Genesis 127 says that God, that that authority, that creator, that identity giver, that value
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ascriber, that purpose provider, that he made us in his image, male and female, it is first
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the denial of that that has led to transgender ideology and all of the identity and purpose
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I assure you, Christians who are Baptists hold fast to the truth of God's word in matters
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The debate, really, that we are having is about believer's baptism or infant baptism as it comes
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to how we should raise our kids and what actually is healthy identity giving.
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And so let me just tell you briefly, I'll summarize kind of the disagreements between
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Presbyterians, what they say about baptism and what I, as a Reformed Baptist, would say
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So here is how I would explain the difference in what we think about baptizing and baptizing
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children, whereas Presbyterians would say, and I think this is the most accurate way
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to say this without getting too much into the weeds and the complexities, that baptizing
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babies is a signifier of a Christian family's covenant with God in the same way that circumcision
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Baptists would say that that's not in the Bible, that there is no biblical basis for
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infant baptism, that there are no examples of babies being baptized in Scripture.
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The command to baptize others is followed by the command to make disciples of Christ, and
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the command to be baptized is followed by the command to repent.
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So, for example, go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name
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of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, Matthew 28, 19.
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And he said to them, go into all the world and proclaim the gospel to the whole creation.
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Whoever believes and is baptized will be saved, but whoever does not believe will be condemned,
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And Peter said to them, repent and be baptized every one of you in the name of Jesus Christ
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for the forgiveness of your sins, and you will receive the gift of the Holy Spirit.
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So, those who received the word were baptized, Acts 2, 38 and 41.
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But when they believed Philip as he preached good news about the kingdom of God in the name
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of Jesus Christ, they were baptized, both men and women, Acts 8, 12.
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Now, in Acts 16, 15 and 1 Corinthians 1, 16, we see references to baptizing whole households.
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But in these, there is no indication here that non-believers or that children who hadn't
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So, I just find no biblical support for infant baptism.
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Now, of course, there are theologians much wiser than me on both sides of this issue.
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Like, I certainly would not have wanted to go up against someone like R.C.
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I think he just knows a little bit more than me about the Bible, about theology, and about
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But there are many other theologians at his same level of wisdom and understanding whom
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I also see no explicit support for infant baptism being a sign of the new covenant.
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Like, when we see reference to the new covenant in the New Testament, it is referencing the
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2 Corinthians 3, 5 through 6, not that we are sufficient in ourselves to claim anything is
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coming from us, but our sufficiency is from God, who has made us sufficient to be ministers
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Great chapter talking about our inability to keep the law perfectly to save ourselves.
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Um, now, as I've mentioned, I am a reformed Baptist, which means in part that I believe
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that Christians are chosen by God, not that we are in charge of our salvation, but that
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God is Luke 18, 7, Romans 8, 33, Romans 9, 11, Ephesians 1, 5, Ephesians 2, 8 through
00:39:41.940
10, 2 Timothy 2, 10, Titus 1, 1, 1, 1 Peter 2, 4, the elect, God's chosen ones.
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And so, I have significant crossover with the guys at CrossPolitik.
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I seriously disagree with this idea that Baptist theology is not just similar to, but is actually
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the cause of, is actually the basis of, uh, transgender ideology.
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I think that transgender ideology, just, again, like all identity and, um, purpose-centered
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secular ideologies are a perversion of and a denial of any form of Christian theology.
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Now, I, you know, they are my, I, I view them and view Presbyterians who, by grace through
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faith, believe in the gospel as brothers and sisters in Christ.
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It is not a, um, you know, salvation denying, uh, issue.
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And I know there are a lot of people who are saying, oh, you know, don't listen to CrossPolitik
00:40:57.000
and we shouldn't be linking arms with them in any way because of what they said about Baptist.
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They didn't say, oh, well, you know, maybe we could have said that differently or maybe
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I would love to see them kind of more thoroughly, um, debate this issue and hash this out.
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But I still think that they bring a lot of value to the table, uh, that I am thankful
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But a lot of you kind of were asking about what I thought about this.
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And you've been asking me for a long time to explain infant baptism versus believer's
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So I kind of just scratched the surface of that.
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Anyway, that's everything that's happening in the, uh, in the, in the Baptist world.
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I know that I said that I was going to play mom moments at the end of this episode, but
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And so I'm going to play your voicemail sometime in the next couple of days.
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I promise, but we've run out of time on this one.
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I hope you forgive me, but we will be back here tomorrow.