Forbidden fruit

There is, sadly, an on-going problem of the failure of ministry marriages.

EN was able to contact a small number of Christians who were at one time involved in the ministry but whose marriages went wrong through adultery. We asked them, 'If you could tell others what you have learned through your experience what would you say?' Their remarks form the basis of this analysis of the common dangers for Christian workers.

This summary addresses Christian leaders on this subject under the four headings: overlooking your weaknesses, over-stretching your resources, under-estimating your enemy and under-funding your defences.

Overlooking your weaknesses

The devil will go for your weaknesses. He may leave them alone for some years to get you established in ministry so that, if he can make you fall, the impact will be all the greater when it does come. Pride gives us a natural tendency to disregard our weaknesses. The devil will not.

Your flesh

One ex-pastor wrote: 'Never under-estimate the power of sin in your heart. You might think that if you are called to the pastorate you are sufficiently spiritual to avoid such gross sins as adultery. But never think that. In fact you are more vulnerable because you can come into contact with members of the opposite sex on a very personal and intimate level.'

* There is the proneness (Mark 7.21) to lust: 'Be honest about your own weaknesses and areas in which you are likely to be tempted. We all know what those are and we need to face up to them and seek the Lord's help to resist them. Specific prayer for specific help is vital and certainly something I neglected.' Another ex-pastor said: 'I can honestly say that when I began to be involved with a particular young couple, my motives were pure. I was desperate to see them saved and spent time meeting with them'. But the sin of lust was lurking. How were defences breached?

* There is proneness to pride and flattery: 'I was flattered when the young woman confided in me and I enjoyed the attention. I did not realise that the woman in question was becoming obsessive, and in any case I could handle it couldn't I?'

Of course, it follows that ministers should be extremely careful when visiting women. Never do so alone.

Your background

There are two points here.

* Make sure that both you and your wife are absolutely committed to the pastorate. One pastor wrote, 'My wife came with me (when I took up the pastorate) out of love and duty, but didn't really want to leave our old town. She did not like the new town and found the new church officers difficult. However, she was a superb pastor's wife.' On the surface they were together, but actually the wife wished they had not taken on this work. This throws up the whole question of the call of God. Did this man mistake his call in the first place? With hindsight he would say he did. If God truly calls a married man, God will confirm that to his wife. Being out of step with one another over the ministry itself can bring a first fracture in the intimacy and oneness which should exist between pastor and wife. The devil will make sure he plays the 'your wife doesn't really understand you' card in that situation. This can lead selfish men to look elsewhere for someone 'who does understand'. On the other side of the same coin are the misgivings which many a pastor's wife has about her role and what is expected of her. She may feel squeezed into a mould for which she is not suited. This too can lead to marital tension.

* Understand weaknesses in your own make-up. One ex-pastor's wife wrote: 'The weak spot for my husband concerned the fact that he had a very painful relationship (or rather non-relationship) with his father that was never resolved. I now believe that it is crucial for those who are in ministry to be willing to face up to things like this and receive help. My husband had buried the pain very deeply and it was a 'no go' area with him.' There seems to be a link between a man being at ease with himself and his relationship with his father. If that is bad he is always looking to 'prove himself' as a man. This turns some into workaholics, (to prove success to Dad?), to the neglect of wife and family. For others it may lead directly to adultery, seen unconsciously as 'making a conquest' and so affirming their manhood.

Your thinking

There are many examples we could choose. We will just highlight two.

* Unbalanced thinking about husband and wife roles. Again, an ex-pastor's wife writes: 'Another element having a bearing on the tragedy concerned the views that my husband and I once held about the role of women in the church and family. I, in particular, held very traditional views, believing that it was the role of the man to lead and of the woman to be quietly submissive. This made it difficult for me to challenge my husband about the inappropriate nature of his working relationship with his secretary. I did talk to him about it, and made my objections clear. However, I felt obliged to put up with the situation when he did not think it necessary to change it. If I had my time over again, I would take a much more assertive position and insist that something had to be done.' The Bible does teach male headship in the home, but a servant headship, and certainly not something which says a wife must be silent and submissive in the face of her husband laying himself wide open to sin.

* Too much influenced by the therapy culture of modern world. The secular 'me-centred' world tells us constantly now to be 'good to yourself'. It is forever going on about how to 'survive' at work, or as a parent. It casts all challenges in terms of 'pressure'. And that can insidiously poison our whole outlook on ministry. It will turn us into complainers, rather than thankful people. Think of pastoral difficulties in the church. Do we see them all the time as 'pressure'? In fact they are no more 'pressure' than it is 'pressure' for a GP to keep seeing sick people. Again, the challenge to set a good example in family life is seen by many pastors and wives as 'pressure'. Why? Why not say, 'what a privilege to be entrusted by God with this'. False thinking subtly turns us into complainers and undermines ministry. When we feel continually 'under pressure', we are open to the devil's suggestion that we need to escape, perhaps to internet pornography, or even to another woman.

Over-stretching your resources

Here are three ways in which 'over-stretching' often occurs.

Your early days in ministry

We can be so thrilled to be called to the work that we have always desired that we throw ourselves into it with little regard for the family. Listen to another ex-pastor: 'My early days in the ministry were very full. Perhaps it is at this point that care had to be taken in relationship to building the marriage and working through any "hairline cracks" that started to emerge. My wife had become the mother of three children with all the demands that produced. There was the pressure of money, the pressure of time, the pressure of having an open home for church members. Added to this, there was the work that I was involved with in schools, door-to-door, preparation of sermons, visiting members and spending time preaching away.' Enthusiasm without wisdom, in the early days, leads to trouble.

Your planning

With the overload through over-eagerness of that ex-pastor's early days, we are led to consider planning the pastor's life situation generally.

* Do we over-stretch ourselves through sheer thoughtlessness? Children? Open home for church members? Involvement in schools? Perhaps we cannot do it all. Sometimes pastors and wives have to make tough decisions in order to cope. 'Perhaps we can't run the youth work as well as my wife holding down a job, we just have not got the energy to do both.' Indeed Jesus spoke of those who decide not to have children, for the gospel's sake (Matthew 19.12).

* Do we over-stretch the patience and resources of our wives and families? How do you organise your preaching preparation? Are you regularly missing from the house on Saturday - the day your children are not at school and there is time to spend with Dad? Are you often fiddling around writing a sermon on Sunday afternoon, leaving your wife to cope alone with the family, the visiting missionary and the two old ladies you invited to lunch after the morning service?

Your psychology

Do you remember Lady Diana's remark in that famous interview with Martin Bashir? Referring to Camilla Parker-Bowles, she said: 'There were three of us in this marriage'. Some pastor's wives have spoken of 'church mistress' syndrome. The church is like an interloper in the husband-wife relationship. Church concerns take over to 'seduce' a man away from spending time with his wife. This situation of the church dominating his life to the over-stretching and detriment of marriage is a great threat for well-meaning, zealous men. But it is especially a threat to three types of men.

* It is a great temptation to men with a deficit in their personality. They are in the ministry to serve the Lord, but they are also very much in the ministry because they thrive on the attention they get through being the minister, the centre of things. 'Thank you for coming to see me so often, pastor, you're a real saint.' They feel driven to do more and more.

* Excessively conscientious men are vulnerable. Listen to another ex-pastor speaking: 'One of my mistakes was to think that because the church members were paying my salary I should work all the hours of the day and night to ensure they got "value for money". That meant that little time was spent at home and our relationship certainly suffered as a result'. Often this springs from a pastor having no definite job description worked out with the church. He has a job with no boundaries.

* Pastors who may even consciously undermine their own marriage. There may be many reasons, but one is out of a kind of bitterness towards the church. We are strange people, psychologically. A pastor may feel so over-burdened by what is expected of him that he deliberately runs himself and his marriage into the ground.

It may be that he sees that route as an 'honourable' way of escape from the crushing pressures. 'No one can say I didn't do my best, but they just pushed me too hard.' It may be that this deliberate running into trouble is a cry for help. It may be that this conscious over-stretching of himself and his family life is out of bitter retaliation towards the church, so that when the crash comes he hopes all the church will feel guilty.

Underestimating your enemy

The great enemy of marriage and of ministerial marriages in particular is Satan. We live in a secular age, which plays down the invisible and the super-natural. It is easy for us to fall into this way of thinking. But our struggle is not against flesh and blood.

The devil's lies

Scripture tells us that to harbour anger against one another is to give the devil a foothold, to give him an advantage over us (Ephesians 4.26, 27). This is relevant not just to other people's marriages, but to ministerial marriages. It is interesting to realise how Satan seems to be able to infiltrate misconceptions and lies into our thinking when we are angry. The writer John Eldredge in his book Wild At Heart relates an incident driving with his wife to get to their child's school football match. The traffic wasn't easy. She says something like, 'If you take a right here, you can go up over First Street and that will cut five minutes off our journey'. In his pride he gets riled. He doesn't say anything, but inside he's thinking angrily, 'Doesn't she think I know how to get there? I hate it when she does that!' Then, it's almost as if another voice comes in saying, 'She always does that.' Then again, 'Yes, she does ... she's always saying stuff like that. I hate that about her.' A feeling of self-righteousness and accusation sweeps through him. Then the thought enters, 'John, she's never going to change.' And he finds himself agreeing. Then another idea is infiltrated, 'You know, John. There are a lot of women out there who would be deeply grateful to have you as their man...' And in his pride he thinks, 'Yeah - there are a lot of women out there...' And a rift with your wife is opening up through anger and half-truths. Most times we overcome it. But the devil will keep on trying for the time we let it fester.

The devil's targets

When we are effective spiritually, the devil will be more interested in attacking us. We need to be aware of that. I think these are wise words from an ex-pastor's wife. 'Satan's attack was particularly fierce because my husband was engaged in activities which put him in the front line of the spiritual battle. As well as his church work, he was the founder of (and she then lists a number of very helpful spiritual ventures)... All these things made him a target for the enemy, who successfully found a weak spot and exploited it.' If you are effective for Christ, Satan will target you and your marriage. If the church grows under your ministry, there will not only be extra calls upon your time for which you need to plan but the devil will be more concerned to target you.

The devil's agents

There are those who deliberately serve Satan. There are those who do the devil's work without realising it. We must be aware of both. I know of men to whose churches it seems that Satan has sent particular young women (perhaps with alcohol / drug / occult background), looking needy and vulnerable but actually seeking to deliberately trap the pastor sexually. One ex-pastor's wife spoke of being in an area with a reputation for witchcraft, and finding out that a local coven had sought to 'put a curse on the leaders of our church for the destruction of their marriages'. She went on: 'People glibly say that Christians cannot be touched by such curses. I can only reply that that is not my experience and I am now more careful to pray regularly as the Lord's prayer tells us to - for deliverance from the evil one'. It is a mistake to under-estimate the enemy.

Under-funding your defences

We dare not leave our defences in disrepair.

Your prayers

Listen to an ex-pastor: 'Ensure that your own personal devotions remain a priority. It is very easy for this to slip under the pressures of ministry, when you feel a bit like a sermon factory and you are rushing from one thing to another. The pastor's own spiritual state is crucial. If your relationship with the Lord declines, then, of course, you are more vulnerable to sexual sins, and there is no one to blame but yourself.'

I would go further. Not only is it crucial to maintain your personal devotions, I would say it is crucial to maintain and promote close spiritual fellowship with your wife. If you and your wife do not pray together you are wide open to the devil and living parallel lives instead of a united life.

The converse is that a bad marriage relationship makes your prayers ineffectual (1 Peter 3.7). This again is telling us that the idea that you can be an good pastor (working at the word of God and prayer), while presiding over a bad marriage is utter nonsense (Matthew 5.23,24).

Your marriage

You must ensure that your relationship with your wife is not only maintained, but flourishes. This means investing time, thoughtfulness, effort, money and your very self. A strong marriage depends on depth of intimacy. That means, in the context of truth and love, knowing your wife and allowing yourself to be known.

Too many pastors and their wives live lives like parallel railway lines, going in the same direction, but never touching. Under the burden of getting the job done, they suppress their true emotions. Feelings are very powerful. If a pastor's marriage is emotionally dead, then when either he or his wife run into someone with whom they find they do communicate on an emotional level, you can be almost certain the ministerial marriage will be blown apart. Pastors above everyone else need to have marriages which sing! That takes investment.

Your church leadership

I have spoken before about knowing our weaknesses. We ought to say that ideally, within an eldership or leadership team, there should be a depth of fellowship and mutual accountability, such that weaknesses can be identified, shared and supported in prayer. (This is a practical reason not to have a mixed gender leadership situation). Again, that will not come about easily. Time and effort must be expended to produce a true band of brothers.

Here is perhaps the most poignant statement from a good ex-pastor who fell: 'If you find yourself being drawn towards an illicit relationship, then talk to someone and seek help. I almost did. I started to open up to the man who had been my old pastor, but I stopped myself from telling him more than the fact that I was fed-up with my wife. There is no doubt that my pride and fear of what he may have thought of me overcame my desire to seek help. That illustrates how wicked the heart is.'

That final caveat shows us that good fellowship is not a foolproof defence - a wicked heart will always keep quiet. But, if that man had opened up to his friend perhaps there would have been one less casualty.

These are defences. Do not under-fund them. Invest in them.

God's goodness

A number of the ex-pastors I contacted stressed the grace and forgiveness of God which they have experienced as they have repented of their fall. One wrote: 'I am amazed at God's loving kindness to us. We received so many wonderful encouragements from the Bible. I felt God's presence return and knew I had been forgiven.' Another wrote: 'Remember that no sin is beyond forgiveness. True repentance does bring a restoration of your fellowship with God and, for the most part, a restoration of fellowship with the believers you have hurt and let down. However, it is something that will affect you for the remainder of your life, even though you are forgiven.'

But though we can rejoice in the forgiveness of God, I need to stress that last point. To fall in this way leaves you marked for life, and, personally, I believe it debars a person from future church leadership. The New Testament is quite clear that, as to his public life, an elder must be 'blameless' (Titus 2.6; 1 Timothy 3.2), and the context seems primarily to have marital relationship in mind. So the stakes are very high in this matter.

The problem can be beaten if we take the right course. God has said: 'No temptation has seized you except what is common to man. And God is faithful; he will not let you be tempted beyond what you can bear. But when you are tempted, he will also provide a way out so that you can stand up under it' (1 Corinthians 10.13).

JEB

This article is edited from a talk at the Carey Conference 2004. Tapes from 1 The Saddlery, The Chase, Newton Aycliffe, Durham DL5 7LX.

Why some ministry marriages end in adultery