This is out of place in my normal book blogging. But over the past several months I have been thinking about the John Yoder problem (or to a lesser extent the AW Tozer problem that I discussed on my review of Tozer’s biography.) What prompted me to write this post was a very good article in The Other Journal about Yoder and the problems of his legacy. (Although I started writing this about a week before Mark Driscoll was removed from Act29, so there are some parallels there as well that I did not intend when I started the post.) The actual issues, while I think grounding them in some real cases makes them more concrete are not particularly about Yoder, or Tozer or anyone else.
In simple terms, the John Yoder problem is what do we do with Christian leaders, authors and pastors that sin. Of course all Christians sin. But there is sin that would seem to disqualify a person for public ministry based on some of the implications of I Timothy 3:2 and the surrounding passage, but also examples from the Old Testament with Eli’s sons and others.
This is not a topic I take at all lightly. But I believe it is a rejection of the teaching of scripture to allow pastors and other Christian leaders to remain in office while flagrantly sinning. The issue, of course, is what the line from normal sin that is part of the human condition and the sin that is such that should remove a person from office within the church. Different parts of the church would highlight different sins as disqualifying, which is again part (and benefit) of the problem of a diverse church.
As an example, I think that AW Tozer was probably a bad father and husband, but not someone that I think should have been removed from ministry. It would have been appropriate for a community of people around Tozer to attempt to help him become a better father and husband, but that is not the same thing as removing someone from office.
The example of Yoder is clearly different. Yoder, from evidence that has been gathered over a long period of time, was sinning in a way that deserved some type of censure and real rebuke. The accusation is that he sexually harassed women, exposed himself, and abused his power with female students. It is likely that he also coerced women into having sex (which may have crossed the line to rape, although no charges were ever filed with police).