My wife and I love children.
She has the privilege of teaching them. I have the privilege of being their counselor...sometimes. I work as a clinical psychologist, and have rendered a broad range of services over the past several years. This blog is about our Christian life, mostly, so I want to stay focused on how we function as Christians through life circumstances. One of the hardest circumstances I deal with at work is when I counsel a victim of sexual abuse. I wish that was the end of this paragraph, but it can't be. As hard as that is, the most difficult part of my job is counseling sex offenders.
Out of respect for everyone, I will not share here about specifics of those experiences. I only mention it in order to provide some context to why I am addressing the scandal at Penn State regarding numerous allegations of abuse by a former assistant football coach. My emotions have been stirred by this scandal because I love children, and don't want anything to hinder them from coming to Jesus (Matthew 19:14). But I also experience a certain amount of numbness, simply because I've read so many court reports revealing terrible details of abuses. However, the Holy Spirit is rarely more present and active in me than in moments when I have to make sense of such horrible events. Thus, I believe He is empowering me to write this post.
God is everywhere. Wherever you go, God is there. No matter where I go, God is there (Psalm 139:8). Before he ascended into Heaven, Jesus promised his disciples that the Holy Spirit would come and enable them to spread the Gospel (Acts 1:8). So even though He left, He was there. So when I have to read about these events, God is with me. When I spend time with either victims or perpetrators, God is present. This truth used to bring me anger because it evoked questions like, 'Why didn't God stop them?' or 'Why didn't God do something?' Those are great questions, and ones the Bible is not afraid to answer. God hates what happens when kids are abused, and God did something about it. He poured out his wrath on his own son, Jesus, who then rose again so that we all could be safe, secure, and even healed from sin and death. Even sin as heinous as sexual abuse.
So as I have moved through life, the Holy Spirit has turned those questions back to me. 'Hey Josh, how can you stop them?' or 'Hey Josh, why don't you do something?' These questions do not come out of an attitude of machismo, or a savior complex. No, they come out of trusting that the Holy Spirit is in me and is active. He uses me to accomplish His purposes in the lives of others, spread the good news of Jesus, and bring glory to God. God loves children, wants them to come to Him unhindered, and sees fit to use us to protect and care for them. God also loves the offenders, and uses us in the process of their discipline, forgiveness, and transformation.
If you are a Christian and see a child endangered, act. Don't act only out of anger, fear, civic duty, or (if applicable) professional responsibility. Those are all appropriate at some level, but I implore you to act out of obedience, reverence, and humility. As one pastor close to the Penn State situation wrote, act out of love. If you are in that situation, please understand that God has given you a responsibility to be his ambassador in a broken and sick world. Don't assume someone else will take care of it. God is everywhere. God is active. God often sees fit to use us to act.
So as I have moved through life, the Holy Spirit has turned those questions back to me. 'Hey Josh, how can you stop them?' or 'Hey Josh, why don't you do something?' These questions do not come out of an attitude of machismo, or a savior complex. No, they come out of trusting that the Holy Spirit is in me and is active. He uses me to accomplish His purposes in the lives of others, spread the good news of Jesus, and bring glory to God. God loves children, wants them to come to Him unhindered, and sees fit to use us to protect and care for them. God also loves the offenders, and uses us in the process of their discipline, forgiveness, and transformation.
If you are a Christian and see a child endangered, act. Don't act only out of anger, fear, civic duty, or (if applicable) professional responsibility. Those are all appropriate at some level, but I implore you to act out of obedience, reverence, and humility. As one pastor close to the Penn State situation wrote, act out of love. If you are in that situation, please understand that God has given you a responsibility to be his ambassador in a broken and sick world. Don't assume someone else will take care of it. God is everywhere. God is active. God often sees fit to use us to act.
Usually it's really hard to Do the Right Thing and protect a child. I chose to testify in court at what I saw happen to a disabled person who could not speak for himself and it cost me my job as a caregiver. I never saw myself as any kind of hero although the family of this person tells me I am on the top of their list. It never occured to me NOT to report what I saw. A co-worker and I were the only 'brave' ones to tell our supervisor, who did nothing except tell us to keep it to ourselves. We documented, documented, documented. We kept copies of our documentation because we noticed some of our notes disappeared from the book. We believe the perp destroyed them so we kept duplicate notes. When we felt we had seen more than enough and had reported enough incidents, we finally Did the Hard Thing and notified someone who had the ability to get through to the CPS people and eventually this person was removed from that environment and is now thriving under the care and supervision of family and caregivers who care. It was a hard and long process and it was scary for my co-worker and me. We both lost our jobs because our employer lost a huge source of income. They blames US for our loss of hours. But neither of us cared. We found other jobs and we both stayed incontact with our friends. God used us to help this young person and neither one of us regrets our decision. We were simply doing the Right Thing.
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