Considering the seriousness of the COVID-19 pandemic, I found none of the precautionary measures that the county is requiring the Grace Community Church to take are unreasonable or impossible. They are measures that many churches have adopted not only in the United States but also in other countries. Grace Community Church has so far been fortunate that it has not become a COVID-19 hot spot. It would take only one super-spreading event at one service.
Grace Community Church is a non-denominational megachurch with an affluent congregation. It may have the resources to survive the public relations disaster that would follow such an event. Smaller churches that are following Grace Community Church’s lead in defying their state and county public health measures may not be able to tap the kind of resources that Grace Community Church can tap. They would be far more vulnerable to a public relations disaster than Grace Community Church if they became the epicenter of one or more clusters of new COVID-19 cases.
While President Trump may claim that the United States has “turned the corner” on the pandemic and a number of posts on the internet may claim that we are at the end stage of the pandemic or a return to normalcy is imminent, the truth is that we are still in the midst of a full-blown pandemic. It will be with us well into 2021 if not longer. We are also learning a great deal more about how COVID-19 spreads and the extent of the damage that it does to the human body. What we are learning should make us highly suspicious of such claims. They are wishful thinking at best.
To my way of thinking John MacArthur is engaging in grandstanding. He is seeking to attract applause and favorable attention from like-minded people. He is acting in a way that makes people pay more attention to him rather than giving thought to more important matters. His actions are reminiscent of those of the Pharisees and teachers of the law who opposed Jesus. They went to great lengths to be seen as godlier than their fellow Jews and to win their fellow Jews’ approbation for their godliness.
I have heard the argument that MacArthur is acting upon his God-given convictions. The problem with this argument is that fails to take into consideration what the Scriptures teach us about the deceitfulness of the human heart. We are quite capable of deceiving ourselves as well as others. It also assumes that the convictions that others may have and which differ from MacArthur’s do not come from God. It treats MacArthur as if he is a kind of Protestant Pope.
Anglicanism, which MacArthur rejects as insufficiently reformed, itself rejects the notion of one person such as the Pope evidencing a special gift of the Holy Spirit than no one else has. MacArthur is claiming that God has appointed him as “the champion of the Church.” While he may not be making the claim, he is assuming that he has a special anointing, one from a historical perspective is similar to that which the Popes have claimed. This is ironic since MacArthur is highly critical of Roman Catholicism, referring to the Roman Catholic Church as the kingdom of Satan and the Pope as an anti-Christ. MacArthur’s personal theology is a mixture of Calvinism and dispensationalism.
MacArthur does not shy away from controversy and he has been involved in a number of controversies during his career. As he has in the recent past described the charismatic movement and Pentecostalism as a work of Satan, he is now accusing those who do not agree with him as being in league with the devil. He is not one for mincing words when it comes to demonizing those who do not hold his views.
Most recently MacArthur has damaged his credibility by repeating inaccurate and false information about the COVID-19 pandemic, which has been circulating on the internet and is popular with conspiracy theorists. One is prompted to ask why someone who believes that God has appointed him the champion of the Church would be passing on untruths that damage the Church. As a pastor for 56 years he should be well-acquainted with what the Scriptures teach about lying.
If anything can be learned from this stage of John MacArthur’s career is the danger of a pastor living in an echo chamber and not being teachable. MacArthur appears to be one of those individuals who insist that he is always right and cannot tolerates views that differ from his own. He is therefore apt to surround himself with those who echo his opinions and do not contradict them. The controversialism that has marked his career points to a lack of teachability.
Let us pray that these qualities do not result in more suffering and deaths from the COVID-19 coronavirus, not only at Grace Community Church but also other churches that are following its lead.
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