Now, more than one in seven pastors calling the emergency hot line at Focus on the Family calls because he is in crisis as a result of his viewing of Internet pornography. More than 50 percent of the men attending one Promise Keeper meeting said they had viewed pornography in the seven days preceding the meeting. It seems clear. The church is shrinking and what is left is riddled with some tough, even frightening realities. There is little hope if we hide from the truth and try to go on denying clear but difficult reality.
Denial is always destructive.
It is not hopeful for us to arrogantly admonish the world to behave when we trail them on important issues like marriage and divorce. It is hopeless when we cover the dark pages of cybersex on our computers with Sunday smiles and moralizing. We must not tell the world they should be ashamed when we as Christian leaders are all but folding under the shameful weight of our secret sins. It does us no good to preach against divorce when married people in our congregations cannot look to the church for gracious quality help. Doing church the same way, with the same attitudes, the same arrogance and the same denial does not produce hope.