Doug Phillips and the Other Woman

Some friends of ours came over for dinner last week, as I was throwing the last bits of our meal together and we were chatting about the week’s events, the husband said, “Oh, did you hear about Doug Phillips?” I had not. He then informed me that Mr. Phillips had revealed that he had been involved in an affair, which had apparently gone on for years. I have been reading the news and blogs ever since.

My heart is broken, both for Mr. Phillips and for this woman.

You see, if this woman worked with Mr. Phillips or was shepherded by Mr. Phillips then there is just no way you can classify this as any kind of affair. I hope you will take a few moments to read about clergy sexual abuse here. 

As I read Mr. Phillips “repentance” and his “clarification” of his repentance” I was struck with how similar he sounded to the man who abused me. Let’s call him SS. I found it quite ironic when I began to write this that this man’s actual initials are SS and that those letters together are synonymous with the Gestapo, Hitler and death, but I digress…

I noted that Mr. Phillips was thankful for the love and support he received for his own family and asked for continued prayers, yet no mention for prayers for this woman and her family, whoever they might be. I also noted that no apology was made to this woman or her family. Now before you say I am being mean, let me just say that Mr. Phillips took this into the public arena by posting his letter of resignation on the Vision forum website. In part, here is what he said: 

“There has been serious sin in my life for which God has graciously brought me to repentance. I have confessed my sin to my wife and family, my local church and the board of Vision Forum Ministries…. Where I have directly wronged others, I have confessed and repented. I am still in the process of trying to seek reconciliation privately with people I have injured and to be aware of ways in which my own selfishness has hurt family and friends. ”

And here is his clarification of his repentance in full: 

“I would like to express my gratitude for the great kindness so many have shown to my family in the wake of my stepping down as president of Vision Forum Ministries. My family has been greatly encouraged by many loving notes we have received. With that in mind, I want to be so very clear abot the rightness of this transition, and I want to clear up some matters which have been brought to my attention. My sin has resulted in great pain within the Body of Christ, some confusion, and has given the enemies of God reason to rejoice. This is heartbreaking to me. Some have suggested that my sin was not sufficiently serious to step down. Let me be clear: it absolutely does merit my resignation. My resignation is sincere and necessary given the weightiness of my sin. Some reading the words of my resignation have questioned if there was an inappropriate physical component with an unmarried woman. There was, and it was intermittent over a period of years. The local church, not the Internet, is the proper forum for overseeing the details of a man’s repentance, but I just want to be clear for the sake of peace within the Body of Christ, that the tragic events we are all experiencing, including the closing of Vision Forum Ministries are my fault, and that I am sincere that I should not be in leadership, but must spend this season of my life quietly walking a path of proven repentance. Please pray for the Phillips family, the Board and the men who have made up the staff of Vision Forum Ministries.”

Reading through his statements, and then through the blogs of people who previously attended his church (hereis a good one) increased my “ick” factor for the man, but my heart remains broken that THIS happens in the Body of Christ, with the men we trust to shepherd our souls.

My heart was naïve when I joined Cornerstone Bible Church in 1998. I believed ALL Christians were like me, as my daughters say, I did “all of the things” I thought I was supposed to DO as a believer. I walked through those doors, shiny and new and full of hope; I left tarnished angry and yes bitter.

That was then, that is NOT who I am today, but it has been a l-o-n-g road from there to here. And My God allowed ALL of it. To reveal MY sin, to reveal his.

There was sin on both parts. There IS culpability on both sides. That being said you cannot in good conscience call what happens between a Pastor and a congregant an affair, because there is an imbalance of power. Even if the woman were to throw herself at Mr. Phillips, he, as a man of God (though not ordained, something else he shares with SS) he is STILL more accountable than SHE; because of his position.

I remember the FIRST time I got that nagging feeling about SS. He invited me over to work on bible study questions for a ladies bible study group I was leading and his wife was in NOLA visiting her parents. As my husband pulled into their driveway to drop me off, I asked him to stay, or to let me reschedule, I voiced my concerns, and he told me I was being silly, this was after all our PASTOR. This was the FIRST time SS said things to me that were inappropriate and I never said a word to anyone because he couched it in such a way that I felt sorry for him and special that ~I~ could help.

I pray this woman gets the help she needs quickly and that Mr. Phillips is brought to his knees in true humble repentance.

I’m still waiting for that day of true humility from SS. The last thing we received from him was a carefully crafted letter where his apology was once again vague and he once again tried to shift the blame towards me. He stated in his letter that he was grateful that we had never crossed the line and had sex, like that was ACTUALLY ever gonna happen. My husband and I laughed it off but just for a moment I wondered if my husband could actually believe that was ever a real possibility as I remembered  SS’s very real threat that he would destroy my marriage. I wasn’t the only person damaged by SS, and until he makes things right with ALL of the people he damaged, this will never really be over.

What I do know is this:

God is merciful and gracious and He renews and restores.

This woman, whoever she is, WILL recover and she WILL heal. She may not realize it now, but some day she will look back and she will be THANKFUL for where she is, for where she has been because God Almighty brought her through it.

Isaiah 43:2-3 says, “When you pass through the waters, I will be with you, and through the rivers and they will not overwhelm you. When you walk through the fire, you will not be burned or scorched, nor will the flame kindle upon you, For I am the Lord your God, the Holy One of Israel, YOUR SAVIOR.”

XOXO