I heard someone say that assumption is the lowest form of knowledge. Take any person, find the darkest secret in their life, blow it up out of all proportion, assume the worst, publicize it to the world on every news outlet, define their name by that act and you have successfully eliminated them from meaningful participation in public life.  Take the same person, discover their greatest sin, surround them with mercy and compassion, assume the best, protect them from exploitation, walk them through pain to hope to renewal to restoration and you have successfully preserved and enhanced their influence and public impact. In the latter case the failure frames their life message, in the former case they become a by-word and a mockery.  The latter is redemptive, the former demonic.
 
Perhaps it is time that people begin to ask serious questions.  Why would you banish and silence a man whose presence and words had helped so many for so long?  Why would you want him exiled from friends when he had stood by so many in their time of shame and pain? Why would you assume the worst about your pastor and the best about a male prostitute who failed a lie detector?  Why would you refuse a broken man the opportunity to apologize in person to the people he loved and those who loved him? Why would you allow everyone to assume a restoration process is underway when no restoration was envisioned?   Why would you assume a man to be a fraud and a hypocrite rather than a good man with a dark pain and problem? There are a great many unanswered questions in the Ted Haggard case.  Foremost among them, where is the redemption of our brother?
 
When a pastor’s sins are exposed it hurts.  People feel as if they have been betrayed and as if the pastor did it to them personally.  People put hope in pastors.  They want to believe there are leaders with extraordinary character.  And there are, in fact I believe Ted Haggard was and is such a man.  But when a man’s worst is exposed, people lose hope.  Then they react more often than respond. The man who visited NLC was humbled, but not destroyed. He is on the way back. His strength is returning, largely due to two things; God’s grace working in his wife and in the secular media.  Both are significant. When your wife stands by you in your darkest hour it is a good indication.  She is the one with intimate knowledge and she is the one most devastated by the action.  And when the secular media offers you a reprieve, an opportunity to apologize and to clarify, it is a strange reflection on the church. Getting dirty is the business of salvation. Jesus did it and his church should follow him into the quagmire. 
 
His NLC Visit
 
The man we encountered is too valuable to banish.  The man who spoke in our pulpit is too beautiful to silence. We need his story, we need his music, we need the dirge and the dance  of Ted Haggard. There is now a long history of publicly shamed Christian leaders.  Ted was guilty; sex, drugs and lies were all included and exposed.  He did not hide from that reality. He has no delusions about his humanity.  But his message is still anointed, still blessed by God.  Every person who heard him teach the Word experienced the warm embrace of our Father’s love.  We experienced the seasoned wisdom of a veteran warrior.  We experienced the humbled but slightly defiant processing of a brother still in pain, still in shock. We also experienced the compassion of one walking with a limp.  We all hoped that we will find such compassion when our deepest shame is shouted from the rooftops.
 
Gayle Haggard was a late comer to our meetings.  She stood in our midst head lifted, eyes clear, voice winsome and spoke of her love for her fallen husband.  She spoke of the grace and longsuffering of our LORD.  She spoke of forgiveness and love; those two impregnable towers of truth. She was regal as she befriended her prince. She stabbed us into breathless clarity.  Ted Haggard married well.  So did Gayle. If you don’t believe it then you need to listen to her and watch her. In a short time you will wonder why we can’t forgive if she can.  I marvel at the wives who endure undeserved suffering for the sins of their husbands. I certainly marveled at Gayle Haggard.
 
We Are Exposed
 
Let the pretense fall away.  Ted’s ordeal makes us all a little leery.  We all know that we too are susceptible, and that alone is paralyzing at times.  But then there is the reality that we all have also judged too quickly and too harshly. We assumed things we did not know.  We enjoyed the exposure and congratulated those who daggered the cornered prey.  We filled our mouths with coarse accusations and crude jokes.  We have dismissed rather than restored. We have bound over to the devil those who are desperate for forgiveness.  No redemption of this fiasco is possible until we deal with our own hearts.  What if we were as desperate to save our fallen comrades as to preserve a broken limb? What if we were as determined to restore a brother as we are to restore a diseased and endangered eye? What if our first assumption and decision toward a fallen brother was to surround him with the finest care rather than the most extensive exposure?  I suspect we would have more victories and a great deal more respect from those outside.
 
We are so intimidated by the world’s accusation of hypocrisy in the church that we are victimizing our most deeply wounded brothers and sisters.  The closer I have gotten to the case of Ted Haggard the more ashamed I have become of my own failure to handle scandal with loving-kindness. I am exposed by Ted’s exposure and I am ashamed.  Not of him of us. Jesus endured the cross despising the shame.  Yes his cross had both pain and shame.  The pain he could endure.  The shame was inflicted upon him to ruin his name and make it a scandal to associate with him.  But millions of us follow him. Why?  Because he is so pure?  No,  we had no way to measure his purity  we follow him because he is willing to bear our shame and grant us his forgiveness.  I intend to start making more mistakes of grace than shame.  Father, help me to do it, I pray.

Alan