Episode 2

This podcast discusses abuse and false teaching in the Independent Fundamental Baptist movement. The host, Jen Robertson, aims to provide support and guidance for those who have been harmed by these practices. She shares her own story and encounters with abuse within the movement. The podcast also highlights the issue of churches protecting abusers and the lack of accountability within these institutions. Jen emphasizes the importance of standing up against abuse and calls for church leaders to prioritize the safety of victims over their own image and liability. Warning, this podcast may contain sensitive content involving abuse and may not be suitable for all listeners. Listener discretion is advised. Welcome to the Together for Truth podcast, hosted by me, Jen Robertson. I'm committed to uncovering abuse and confronting false teaching with an independent Fundamental Baptist movement, while providing support and guidance for those who have been harmed by these practices. Join me as I seek to bring healing and truth to those who have been impacted and to point them to Jesus Christ, the kind and good Savior. Welcome to the show. I'm glad you're here. Hello, and welcome to the studio. I'm your host, Jen Robertson. This is my second podcast, and I'm glad you're listening. In March of this year, my family and I moved from southern Minnesota to Ankeny, which is a suburb of Des Moines, Iowa. One thing we are enjoying is eating out in new places. This morning, we had some errands to run, so we decided to try out a bubble tea place. My 17-year-old daughter, Abby, and I had tried it out for the first time when we were vacationing in Myrtle Beach this past February. If you aren't familiar with it, I'm really not qualified to educate you, but basically it's a drink with small balls a little bigger than a pencil eraser at the end of a pencil. They're called pearls. They're filled with juice, or more often, something very chewy that tastes like flour. You get a wide straw to drink through, so the pearls can fit through the straw. We were excited for the fun new drink until we tasted it. Our conclusion was, it's not tasty, but at least it's expensive. But our memory isn't so good, so this morning, we decided my 18-year-old son, Troy, should get to enjoy the experience of bubble tea, which I think is also called boba. Our new downtown is a place not far from us, so Abby and I took him. We got our drinks, and then I remembered why I wasn't a fan of it the first time. I just can't get used to chewing my drink. We were doing it wrong. Maybe we were supposed to strain out the pearls and throw them away. When my kids were little, we used to make rock soup. We threw away the rocks, though. The thing is, there's a lot of people at this cafe, and they're purposely ordering that drink, so I think this is maybe an us thing. If you're listening and you enjoy it, leave a comment with what you order. My daughter really wants to like it. Enough about boba tea. I have a podcast with heavy content, so I really wanted to start light. About two weeks ago, my webpage Together for Truth went live, and this past Sunday, I dropped my first podcast, which is available through the Together for Truth website or on Spotify or iTunes. Check the notes for the link. I used that first podcast to tell my story and my encounters with abuse in the Independent Fundamental Baptist movement. Independent Fundamental Baptist is a mouthful. So I'll refer to it by its common acronym, the IFB, through the rest of the podcast. That first episode was so emotionally difficult to share. In addition, it was a shortened version of a long story, and it was hard to decide what to include or what to delete, so it could be produced in an hour segment. I wanted to edit out the spots where I cried and fix the places where I got so emotional and I talked too fast or lost my words, but I also want to be real. I want to be genuine more than I want to be polished. People who have reached out to me in this process and shared their story are being very vulnerable and trusting me with very personal parts of their life. I feel like I owe it to them to leave my own story raw and unedited. I want to say a sincere and heartfelt thank you to the many of you that have reached out. I've been so encouraged and challenged by you. It is so hard to hear how many have been affected by abuse in the church, but it has also fueled my fervor to bring awareness. I felt cared for and understood by the people whose stories have so many similarities to my own. People all over the United States have reached out, and it is such a privilege to listen. I'm looking forward to introducing you to some of them as they join me as guests on the podcast. On today's podcast, I want to talk about why churches protect abusers and what it says about the church. I think it's natural for humans to want to conduct a forensic analysis after something tragic happens. We want to ask questions, find faults, see what could have been done differently. We want to ask the why questions. I keep asking that question after my own story and after hearing other people's stories. I'm reading about the scandal in the Southern Baptist Convention and asking that same question. If you haven't been following what's happening in the Southern Baptist Convention, I'll catch you up. After a seven-month investigation, it was revealed by Guidepost Solutions that 380 leaders and volunteers in the Southern Baptist Conference have faced public accusations of sexual abuse between 2000 and 2019. A Brace to Mind report done in 2018 by the Fort Worth Star-Telegram, about 412 IFB pastors and volunteers accused of sexual abuse and similar cover-ups. The men who control the daily operations of the Southern Baptist Convention are called the Executive Committee. It's been revealed that they knew the scope of the problem, but they didn't act because of advice from their lawyers. It would seem the primary concern was avoiding a lawsuit, protecting their image and their money. So these church leaders slandered the people who wanted to do something about abuse and repeatedly rejected their pleas for help. One investigator said, and I quote, behind the curtain, the lawyers were advising to say nothing and do nothing, even when the callers were identifying predators still in the Southern Baptist pulpits. Auggie Bodo, head of the committee, advised that taking any action on abuse would pose a liability to the Southern Baptist Conference. Bodo went so far as to refer to advocacy for abuse survivors as, and I'm quoting, a satanic scheme to completely distract us from evangelism. Wow. I have no doubt there is a satanic scheme, but I am certain it is not the fault of the children who were victims. First John 3.8 says the one who practices sin is of the devil, for the devil has sinned from the beginning. The son of God appeared for this purpose to destroy the works of the devil. I hate sexual abuse. He has clear directions for dealing with those in the church who claim to be Christ followers, but engage in sexual sin. First Corinthians 5.11-13 says, but now I am writing to you that you must not associate with anyone who claims to be a brother or sister, but is sexually immoral, or greedy, an idolater, or slanderer, a drunkard, or swindler. Do not even eat with such people. What business is it of mine to judge those outside the church? Are you not to judge those inside? God will judge those outside. If you were able to listen to my first podcast, you may recall that was exactly my experience. While I can't retell the whole story, I'm going to share a portion related to that topic. I married a man named Caleb who was part of the IFB. I had no clue what I was walking into. He was Baptist. I was Baptist. How different could we really be? I was so naive. We started going to my church, so I didn't learn until later how much different we were. He decided to start attending an IFB church called Midwest Baptist Bible Church in Rochester, Minnesota, which is where I met Pastor Hanson. Although I didn't attend the church long, I did decide to meet with Pastor Hanson and his wife out of desperation. My new husband had become controlling and abusive, and I had to reach out to law enforcement for protection. We had been married only a little over a year, and it was rapidly escalating. I met with Pastor Hanson and his wife in his office because I thought Caleb would listen to him. IFB pastors have a lot of authority over the lives of church members, something I had learned in the few IFB churches I had visited. I told him and his wife about Caleb's escalating behavior and my fear of him and of what he might do to the children if I wasn't there to intervene. Caleb's children had already reported horror stories from before they had moved to my home in Minnesota, before Caleb and I were married, some of which they later chose to share with Child Protective Services. Pastor Hanson seemed very concerned initially. He even admitted that he had also heard of the Roloff Boys' Home, where Caleb had lived through high school, and he knew that they were accused of being abusive and damaging. His agreement that some IFB organizations were dangerous made me trust him. I thought he would be different, but ultimately he decided it would not be best to address this situation with Caleb. Instead, he recommended we come for counseling, where he never once addressed abuse. Of course, a few months later, when the situation had escalated to a point where he could no longer look away anymore, he had to change his approach. His decision was to move Caleb and his children to a church property where they were protected from my intervention and calls for police protection. But that decision backfired when he came to learn Caleb's history as a pedophile. That wasn't enough for him to alert his church members, though. Even when Caleb sexually harassed a woman in the church, he saw no cause for reporting. He simply moved Caleb to another church, First Baptist Church in Rosemount, Minnesota. That pastor was informed, but he wasn't concerned for his congregation, which also included a Christian school. Caleb additionally attended a church in Rochester, Minnesota called Rochester Baptist Church, whose pastor also decided to ignore the warning. Why? My question is again and again, why? Recently two women have shared stories with me about violent physical abuse and sexually perverse behavior by their husbands in their homes. One young woman's attack almost took her life. When these two women chose to go straight to their pastors for protection and intervention, their pastors sent them right back home. They didn't say, let's call the police. They didn't help them find a place that is safe to stay with their children. They just looked away. One young woman's story became public in the Southern Baptist Convention's investigation. Her name is Debbie Vasquez, and she was repeatedly sexually assaulted by a pastor in the Southern Baptist Church starting at the age of 14. When one assault led to pregnancy, she was forced to apologize in front of the church and forbidden from revealing the father. The pastor was moved to another Southern Baptist Church where he continued to pastor. Similar stories were released in the ISB report. One of a youth pastor and another with a music pastor from two different churches. Both men were sexually assaulting girls. Both pastors were caught, moved to another church where they were free to re-offend without accountability. Another pastor had sexually assaulted eight little girls in multiple churches. So many people, not just a pastor, had to look away for that to occur. When I found out my husband's history of sexually abusing young children, I was destroyed. I felt numb. In fact, so much so that Caleb thought I was, in his words, okay with it. I was not okay with it. I was just in shock because Caleb had hid this when he married me. I am a mother of eight, and because he had continued to pursue and engage in sexual sin. Because of this, I couldn't believe that he no longer posed a danger. I wanted to hide in my grief and shame, but I couldn't. I needed to warn people who trusted him, especially those who had children. Caleb is drawn to children. He engages with them at every opportunity. He wants to hold them, tickle them, and play with them. A fact that suddenly looked very sinister through the eyes of this new revelation. Only one woman thanked me for warning her. Only one. Almost every other person, even good friends, simply didn't want to know. A few asked Caleb directly if what I had accused him of was true, and even after he confirmed it was, they chose to believe he would not do it again. I was astonished by that response, but I have come to think that must be the most common response. We are programmed to think that child abusers look unkempt, and they drive around in white vans. Unfortunately, they are frequently well-liked and respected. Child abusers groom the adults every bit as much as they groom the child. Almost every one of the people that I notified claimed to be a Christian, and many have expressed how much they hate child abuse. Some support organizations that prosecute abusers. They would express a strong desire to keep their kids from predators. And I believe that they do hate child abuse, and they do want to protect their children. So why did they respond the way they did? I read an article in Life Science, I'll attach a link, about the Jerry Sandusky story. You may recall he was a Pennsylvania State University assistant coach. Two moments from his trial stand out. One, an incident in the year 2000 when a janitor allegedly witnessed Sandusky performing oral sex on a middle school age boy. And the other, a 2002 incident in which a graduate student, now a coach at the school, saw Sandusky raping a boy about the age of 10 in the university locker room. Both men reported what they had seen to their supervisors, and according to grand jury testimony, both were distraught. The janitor so much so that his co-workers thought he might have a heart attack. But neither man stepped in to stop the abuse in the moment. Both men walked back out. Those decisions earned them criticism. That might seem like a very unlikely reaction, but psychologists say it's not. Researchers call it the bystander effect. The surprising fact that many people will stand by while terrible things happen. It suggests that when something horrible occurs, people often go into a kind of denial, thinking that if it were really this bad, somebody else would be stopping it. That was exactly what I heard. If it was bad, the police will do something. I assure you, I did notify the police. Yet how many people do you know who were abused as children, and their abusers never served a day behind bars? Statistics show that an estimated 20 to 30% of sexual abuse is all that's actually reported. The church should look different. Christ followers should hate what God hates, and we should react as we are instructed to do. Whether it feels comfortable or not, it is simple obedience. First Corinthians 5 says, hand this man over to Satan for the destruction of the flesh so that his spirit may be saved on the day of the Lord. Doesn't say hand him over to another church, but note the desire of Christ for the offender at the end of the verse, so he may be saved. Those in sexual sin are not beyond the redemption of the cross, but it is so important to remember that their Savior is Jesus, not any of us, and he has established church discipline to both protect those in the church and to bring about repentance from the wrongdoer. We can't change the hearts of people, only the Holy Spirit can do that, but we can trust his plan even if we don't understand it. For those in leadership positions in both IFB and Southern Baptist churches, it's beyond looking away to deliberately diminishing abuse and advocating for themselves. Like the SPC, Pastor Hanson called an attorney, not on the behalf of any victim, but to protect his own liability. I am not an attorney, but I am learning that if you follow biblical church discipline and you remove a member from the church, not just to another church, that is essentially an admission of guilt. If a pastor does what 1 Timothy 5, 22-21 says, then he would have to tell the church members what had happened. That's a public presentation of guilt, leaving an opening for someone to ask if there was negligence on the part of the church staff. By simply ignoring the biblical command and moving the predator to another congregation, the church doesn't take this risk. In the reports, both IFB and Southern Baptist leaders admitted to knowingly moving pastors who were guilty of crimes against children to new churches. So I'm wondering, does sexually abusing a child mean something different to me than it does to those pastors and church leaders? It is an unimaginable, insidious evil to me, with a lifetime of damage to the victim. But it must have an entirely different meaning to someone if their first priority is not the protection of the victim and future victims. I wonder if it would be different if it was their own children. Are they so cold and uncaring because they are not directly affected? Are they so selfish that they care more about their own liability than the security of children? Where are men who stand up and protect women and children? Shouldn't church leaders be those men? Are their church members willing to accept cowards and hypocrites behind the pulpit? That's a lot of questions. The one answer I know for certain is these are not godly men. These men are governed by their own pride and self-preservation. They value their own image and their position more than humble submission to God's authority. The Bible leaves no question about how it should be handled. I cannot read my Bible and conclude that the righteous thing to do is to call attorneys and make decisions based on liability. What if the church is found liable? What if the pastor is removed? What if the congregation leaves to find other churches and the whole ministry ends? Isn't that worth it to be obedient to God? We are not being burned at the stake. We are not being tortured, starved, or thrown into prison. Around the world, our brothers and sisters in Christ are paying a very high price for the privilege of being sons and daughters of the King. But here, innocent children will pay a price, a high price, so arrogant men can set up their own kingdoms in their churches. It is total spiritual blindness to stand and preach the Bible on Sundays and then abuse the most vulnerable in the audience during the week, or to pound the pulpit and preach at the audience to stand against compromise and wickedness in our culture, and then make compromise after compromise to protect wickedness when you step down from the pulpit. Proverbs 21.15 says, When justice is done, it is a joy to the righteous, but terror to evildoers. Church leaders aren't left with hard decisions. It's simple. Obey God or disobey God. There will be consequences either way. That decision, obedience or disobedience, reveals the true heart of the pastor. Will they have the courage to stand on God's word, or will they love the approval of man more? Our churches need leaders who can't be bought, intimidated, manipulated, or compromised. Men who believe the words of the Bible they preach. The men whose love for God is so great, they would sooner face public humiliation, lawsuits, rejection, loss of job and friends, before they would diminish his authority and take glory for themselves. It's hard to watch the moral decline in our country, but it isn't a surprise when spiritually blind people lack biblical wisdom and discipline. However, when men who claim to have spiritual sight behave in the same way, it's appalling. But we have been warned. Acts 20.28-31 says this, Keep watch over yourselves and all the flock of which the Holy Spirit has made you overseers. Be shepherds of the church of God, which he brought with his own blood. I know that after I leave, savage wolves will come in among you and will not spare the flock. Even from your own number, men will arise and distort the truth in order to draw away disciples after them. So be on guard. Friends, I encourage you not to look away. Be the change. I can promise you it will not make you popular. It will have consequences, but so does sin. James 4.4 says, Know ye not that the friendship of the world is enmity with God? Whosoever therefore would be a friend of the world maketh himself an enemy of God. C.S. Lewis said, There is no neutral ground in the universe. Every square inch, every split second is claimed by God and counterclaimed by Satan. We're in a spiritual battle. There is no neutral ground. The war wages on both sides, and those on both sides will take injuries. I urge you to fight for the side that you would be willing to lose your life for. Fellow believers who are listening, be encouraged by Matthew 16.25. For whoever wants to save their life will lose it, but whoever loses their life for me will find it. I'm going to include the Bible references and the names of the pastors and churches mentioned as well as links for the two reports in the article that I referenced. Both of the full reports require a subscription, but if you prefer, you can read the reports from secondary news sources for free. If you are listening and you have some comments to share, I would love to hear from you. You can reach me through the website at TogetherForTruth.blog or connect through the comment section below the podcast. You can also find me on Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter. Thank you for listening. I'll see you next time.