Some original commentary on today’s breaking news about Newsboys/DC Talk singer Michael Tait being busted for multiple homosexual sexual assaults on young men in their 20’s while they got drunk with him. (I’ll leave the shocker “Rock Star abused drugs” revelation for others.)
1] The allegations against Tait, who allegedly felt the genitals of inibriated/passed out young men who partied with him, date back to 2004 or 2005. I’m encouraged by the fact that there WERE allegations, because that means the young men this happened to
a] know that what happened to them was wrong
b] that means they have the psychological framework to get help
c] I’m grateful that we live in a time when psychological and religious help is openly available for male victims of sexual assault.
2] Tait is admitting that the assault is ‘largely true’ per Fox News today. After a generation around sex offenders, a general truth is that disclosure (admitting what someone did) tends to be a process. So, good first step, but I won’t be surprised or shocked if more details come out in the future. That’s what the process looks like, and that won’t tell me that God is not working on Tait to bring him to repentance and help him bear fruit keeping with the same.
3] I’m guardedly hopeful that Tait’s fame will not allow him to sweep this under the bus and avoid the consequences of his actions. For starters, most (but by no means all) treatment and education options for those who have/can commit sexual assault is only available on the far side of a coutroom. That’s a shitty realty for abuse prevention, but the stats for re-offending among those who receive treatment following their sentencing are encouraging. In my state of Minnesota, re-conviction rates drop by roughly half for perps who complete sex abuse treatment programs.
I want to be very clear: It would be A Bad Thing for our society and public Christianity if Tait faced no legal consequences for at least two sexual assaults. Society needs justice. God will handle the grace.
Speaking of which:
4] “The saying is trustworthy and deserving of full acceptance, that Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners, of whom I am the foremost.” St. Paul in 1 Timothy 1:15
I’m not shocked or rocked that one of the Newsboys had a homosexual sexual assault issue, “for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, and are justified by his grace as a gift, through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus,” In my faith, it is not a question of whether or not anyone I meet is a sinner. (We all are.) The question is more like, “I wonder what shape their sinful nature takes?” We all have one, and we all stand equal at the foot of the cross in need of God’s mercy.
The sins of some people are conspicuous, going before them to judgment, but the sins of others appear later. So also good works are conspicuous, and even those that are not cannot remain hidden. – 1 Timothy 5:24-25 ESV
The God of all Truth has revelealed to us that homosexual activity is a sin, even without sexually assaulting vulnerable young men who trusted you. Michael Tait’s alleged crimes are all the more grievous for the betrayal of that trust. God is equally forthright that Jesus Christ has died for the sins of all humanity, and that includes Tait’s admitted homosexual activites and these alleged crimes. God has also established authorities to punish evildoers, and that is the just and right goal of government.
No temptation has overtaken you that is not common to man. God is faithful, and he will not let you be tempted beyond your ability, but with the temptation he will also provide the way of escape, that you may be able to endure it. – 1 Corinthians 10:13
No, I won’t be deleting my Newsboys music or DC Talk concert memories because there were a bunch of sinners up on stage and now I know what one of their sins was. The reason? I know that both King Solomon’s sexual idolatry led him to legalize polytheism, and King David’s rape and murder are famous even among non-Christians, but God in his wisdom has kept their writings in His Holy Word.
That said, I’m pretty sure that Tait’s Christian Music career is and should be over for a significant time. I heard Rev. Mark Peske once say, and I have quoted him ever since: “Forgiveness is free. Trust has to be re-earned.”
God can and sometimes does restore fallen people to the lives they had before. Other times, he leads the blind out by paths that they do not know. If Tait does not reject Christ’s mercy, there will be an interesting path ahead for him. That may or may not involve public performance.
5] Hebrews 12 (the whole chapter) teaches us that God loves us too much – because of what Jesus Christ accomplished on our behalf on the cross – for God to skip disciplining us like a loving father disciplines his beloved children. It is my fervent hope that God will use the upcoming difficult times to discipline, correct, and lead Tait to a penitent and more righteous life relying on the grace of Christ.
This is all just Day One of this story, and I doubt I’ll be asked about it in a public forum after this. But that covers the bases.
Finally
6] In Romans 2, God warns that we Christians who rely on God’s grace to cover our ongoing sins while we point fingers at the sins of others are storing up wrath for ourselves, as well as giving the unbelievers reason to despise and blaspheme God’s Holy Name.
Tait seemed to ‘get away with it’ for 21 years till the walls came crashing down. If you are living with secret sins, or you’re afraid to repent, or even worse, if you think that you love to sin and God loves to forgive, let Tait’s example remind you that God is patient, but he is not fooled. It is better to repent and bear the consequences while you are young, because God is more faithful than you are wicked, and even if the consequences of your repentance last your whole life here on earth, what Christ’s love and forgiveness, won for you at the foot of the cross, has in store AFTER is totally worth it.
He drove into my kidneys
the arrows of his quiver;
14 I have become the laughingstock of all peoples,
the object of their taunts all day long.
15 He has filled me with bitterness;
he has sated me with wormwood.16 He has made my teeth grind on gravel,
and made me cower in ashes;
17 my soul is bereft of peace;
I have forgotten what happiness[a] is;
18 so I say, “My endurance has perished;
so has my hope from the Lord.”19 Remember my affliction and my wanderings,
the wormwood and the gall!
20 My soul continually remembers it
and is bowed down within me.
21 But this I call to mind,
and therefore I have hope:22 The steadfast love of the Lord never ceases;
his mercies never come to an end;
23 they are new every morning;
great is your faithfulness.
24 “The Lord is my portion,” says my soul,
“therefore I will hope in him.”25 The Lord is good to those who wait for him,
to the soul who seeks him.
26 It is good that one should wait quietly
for the salvation of the Lord.
27 It is good for a man that he bear
the yoke in his youth.28 Let him sit alone in silence
when it is laid on him;
29 let him put his mouth in the dust—
there may yet be hope;
30 let him give his cheek to the one who strikes,
and let him be filled with insults.31 For the Lord will not
cast off forever,
32 but, though he cause grief, he will have compassion
according to the abundance of his steadfast love;
33 for he does not afflict from his heart
or grieve the children of men.– Lamentations 3 ESV
But if you think that you have gotten away with your quiet sins so far, or that you have been able to remind you of the fate of Pharoah Amenhotep II, who faced Moses. Many times, Moses called for Amenhotep to repent and set Israel free from slavery. Many times, Amenhotep hardened his heart. But Amenhotep’s ultimate doom was sealed long before he died, because one day, the Lord stopped calling Pharoah to repentance, and started to set him up for destruction.
16 Then Pharaoh hastily called Moses and Aaron and said, “I have sinned against the Lord your God, and against you. 17 Now therefore, forgive my sin, please, only this once, and plead with the Lord your God only to remove this death from me.” 18 So he went out from Pharaoh and pleaded with the Lord. 19 And the Lord turned the wind into a very strong west wind, which lifted the locusts and drove them into the Red Sea. Not a single locust was left in all the country of Egypt. 20 But the Lord hardened Pharaoh’s heart, and he did not let the people of Israel go. –Exodus 10, ESV
Once YHWH himself decided to harden Amenhotep II’s heart, it was all over for the King of Egypt. Romans 8 teaches us that our sinful natures are incapable of understanding or desiring God, and without God’s help, we would all be self-condemned for all eternity. So be warned that God is not mocked.
Instead, God calls us to repent, and that life of repentance is a daily baptism of putting to death our sinful selves and trusting in Jesus Christ for forgiveness, life, and salvation won for us at the foot of the cross.
21 So I find it to be a law that when I want to do right, evil lies close at hand. 22 For I delight in the law of God, in my inner being, 23 but I see in my members another law waging war against the law of my mind and making me captive to the law of sin that dwells in my members. 24 Wretched man that I am! Who will deliver me from this body of death? 25 Thanks be to God through Jesus Christ our Lord! So then, I myself serve the law of God with my mind, but with my flesh I serve the law of sin.
8 There is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus.[d] 2 For the law of the Spirit of life has set you free in Christ Jesus from the law of sin and death. 3 For God has done what the law, weakened by the flesh, could not do. By sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh and for sin, he condemned sin in the flesh, 4 in order that the righteous requirement of the law might be fulfilled in us, who walk not according to the flesh but according to the Spirit. 5 For those who live according to the flesh set their minds on the things of the flesh, but those who live according to the Spirit set their minds on the things of the Spirit. 6 For to set the mind on the flesh is death, but to set the mind on the Spirit is life and peace. 7 For the mind that is set on the flesh is hostile to God, for it does not submit to God’s law; indeed, it cannot. 8 Those who are in the flesh cannot please God. – Romans 7:21 – 8:8 ESV
Hebrews 12 calls the Christian life a ‘struggle against sin.’ St. Paul talks about his ongoing struggles with sin, and his ongoing dependence on Christ. Praise God that, no matter what our sinful nature takes, or what crimes we have to face here on earth, Jesus Christ’s victory at the cross and the empty tomb is complete, and his plan of us is glorious.
So let us pray for Andrew Tait, for our justice system, and for Tait’s alleged victims. Let us all the more pray for God’s mercy and grace to repent of our sins, trust in our own lives that the living God has done everything necessary for our salvation, and embrace his call to repent and believe, knowing that in the end it will be well worth the struggle.
18 For I consider that the sufferings of this present time are not worth comparing with the glory that is to be revealed to us. 19 For the creation waits with eager longing for the revealing of the sons of God. – Romans 8 ESV
Monument Ministries 