Melissa Scott: A ministry conundrum

I got thrown for a loop the first time I heard a pastor's reaction to Melissa Scott’s ministry. 

I had mentioned her name to him because early one morning I happened to turn on the television and watched her teaching without bias. How could I be biased? I knew nothing about her! But I think all of us who are Christians have that same initial tinge of electricity rustle our nerves in shock when we first hear the news about Gene and Melissa Scott's ministry.

Well not all of us … here’s a comment from a good friend and pastor about some of his recollections of Dr. Gene Scott:

I have fond memories of Gene Scott.  I remember watching him chomp his cigar and talk about how the Hebrew slaves hid the truth of Torah in the pyramids and if you add up lengths of corridors divided by heights of this multiplied by widths of that . . . well that led you to Deuteronomy 6 and the great Shema.  AND if you line up the peaks of the pyramids they point true north. . . proof that the Bible is accurate.  WOW.  Pure entertainment. Philippians 1:15 -19. Paul is speaking to motives for teaching and not advocating anything goes as long as Jesus is mentioned, so we’ll have to continue to teach and beg and plead and hope that people with whom we are associated will allow us to introduce them to the Bible and common sense. I hope Mrs. Scott has received Jesus and I hope she blesses many with her teaching.  I’ll be rooting for her. 

What an opportunity for hyper criticism the Church resurrected when she and her husband started doing ministry! Melissa was the third wife to the “shock jock of televangelism” Dr. Gene Scott (Ph. D. Stanford University in Philosophy of Education, 1957).

As one blogger put it “what he preached FOR was a staunch belief in the Resurrection, and the power of believing in Jesus Christ of Nazareth; that, and the therapeutic power of screwing with bureaucrats.” His videos are posted all over the Internet, and folks, he’s still raising a commotion posthumously apparently!

There were very few who didn’t get on the band wagon about that ministry.  Many, along with CRI, felt strongly that Scott has no business preaching in a church. The Christian Research Institute (CRI), an international religious center based in Irvine [hosted by Hank Hannegraaf] that monitors controversial religious movements, goes so far as to advise Christians not to attend Scott's services. 

During the last few years, Scott has become more and more outrageous and offensive," a CRI analysis concludes. "His language is crude, abusive and profane, clearly violating God's standards for Christians."  Scott protested to loud applause. "These judgmental asses!"  

But it gets worse (depending on your perspective of course).  Supposedly Melissa had a pretty bad reputation and background (OK, I'm being gracious). It’s rumored that she was a porn star named Barbie ‘something or other’ prior to becoming a wife and subsequent Bible scholar. There is more than a little slander on the Internet about that which may not yet be proven to be all fact. But let’s just suppose that all of that stuff is true. Let’s say she was a porn star.  

She marries Gene Scott [20 years her elder], after they both divorced their spouses. Gene was no doubt leaning strongly toward being a cult leader by this time (OK ...so I'm really trying to be gracious now). He now has this established ‘over the top weird TV ministry’ that pays for great looking porn star women to sit up front on Sundays which might cause some men and even the women themselves to become more curious about his messages than they normally would have ever been. I mean – people are coming in to check out the ‘show’ and wind up hearing a message that some of them really believe and enjoy. Suppose all that's true. 

I read that Glenn Campbell is one of those who winds up being one of those curious guys and eventually becomes a genuine born-again believer through Gene Scott's ministry. [Glenn may not be the best example to use because he, like many of us, has had some pretty strong struggles to overcome in his Christian walk. But who hasn’t?].  

Anyway, Glenn gets invited to speak on The Blasphemy Network (TBN) about his life and Christian experience. He’s on the air explaining his conversion experience to Paul Crouch that after attending some of the infamous messages by Gene Scott he becomes a believer. Paul Crouch gets very obviously uncomfortable on live TV when Glenn mentions the Gene Scott show, and Paul changes the subject before anyone tries to explain the impossible.... someone actually comes to faith in Christ through that really weird set up with the girls and the swearing and the cigar –chewing, and the money and all the cult-like hype. 

Paul Crouch is thinking ... "sorry, that's just too weird!" Imagine Paul saying that about someone else ....

Now I'm not advocating that our church make some changes in the front rows at the early service. But you have to agree that this looks pretty unusual, and yet by God's grace it gets used in a strange way in spite of the way it looks! And the whole story ruffles Christian feathers all over the place.

So I’m asking – do you really know what God is doing in every situation? I mean well enough to make a judgment call on it?

But then I started thinking some more…..

Is Gene Scott’s show really any weirder than the open, blatant obvious heresy (I guess I'm not being gracious anymore) that we hear promulgated by TBN and other "Christian networks?" I mean, let's face it, Kenneth Copeland, Kenneth Hagin, and the like are about as far in left field as it gets theologically. In some respects TBN may LOOK better than the Gene Scott show; and TBN undoubtedly has a “Christian platform” that has some surface appeal, but when you put it all together theologically, there’s nothing short of heresy flowing from the TBN studios regularly!  

But then I’m wondering to myself …. Might God choose to use that ministry in spite of itself as well? Are you sure enough about what God is doing in all situations to make a certain judgment call about that ministry? Who knows?  

Maybe Melissa Scott did receive Christ and was rescued from her previous pathetic lifestyle. Isn’t that what the gospel is supposed to do? Aren't we all on 'death row' before we receive Christ? Do any of us have a merit-worthy lifestyle prior to becoming Christians? I certainly didn’t. Is being a porn star any worse than being … any other kind of sinner, or an atheist? Maybe she genuinely was rescued and teaches the truth of the gospel as well as she can. 

For a sampling, there’s a collection of Melissa Scott’s sermons on video; check out this brief message on her web page here. Then tell me it's not orthodox.

Here’s a final delicacy for thought and later discussion: 

How often does our pride manifest itself in thinking that our fellow Christians are inferior to us? That they don’t deserve to be used of God in ministry? How quickly we run to plunge in the dagger to those we find fault with or disagree with. Here’s an interesting testimony from a congregant in Melissa Scott’s church. You decide for yourself.  

The ridiculous thing is, even if this … allegation was true [about her being a porn star], where is the scandal? Pastor Scott has never put herself on a pedestal and condemned others from a self-righteous pulpit ala Swaggart, Falwell, Bakker, etc. If Voss [who wrote a nasty on line hit piece about Melissa Scott’s ministry that the congregant is responding to] had listened to even a few hours of Pastor Scott's teaching, she would know that Pastor [Scott] describes herself as being worse than Paul, who was "the chiefest [sic] of sinners," "the lowest of the low," "a sinner saved by grace..." Pastor [Scott] regularly goes on like this with self-deprecatory comments. She preaches Christ, His forgiveness, His righteousness... never her own. Pastor [Scott] is all about teaching the message of grace and that no matter what condition we find ourselves in, or how badly we've screwed things up, it's never too late to turn our lives around.”  

You can check out her teaching here. You be the judge …. Or maybe you shouldn't be. Maybe you should just believe God can do the impossible, and perhaps, take Plato's advice: You are young, my son, and, as the years go by, time will change and even reverse many of your present opinions. Refrain therefore awhile from setting yourself up as a judge of the highest matters. 

Melissa Scott photo credit: http://irishfaithcentre.ie/home.html  
Dr. Gene Scott photo credit: http://www.pirate7.com/7.html

Not just another blog on God's love ...

It's not often that you find a balanced, thoughtful and deep thinking blog on the Internet that accurately speaks to the difficult topic of the love of God. Recently I came across one such blog that I have appreciated here. 

Theological Meditations is deep, well researched, and does indeed cause one to meditate on the depth of Scriptural topics. It is a difficult topic though because 

Here is an example from that blog discussing the love of God:

"You cannot faithfully preach the gospel message to a lost soul without at least conveying to the sinner that God stands ready, willing and prepared to receive them through repentance and faith in the gospel call. That, among other things, inevitably conveys God's goodwill to that sinner, and thus God's unconditional love of benevolence to that sinner. It is most certainly not the "wrong message." Sure, to merely say that, or to merely convey that idea, is not sufficient. One must say more than that, but not less than that. The unregenerate sinner does need to be terrified about his condition, but he also needs to know that there is hope for him while he lives in this world, and that there is hope because God, in his unconditional benevolent love to that person, has made a way for him to be saved."

Here is another:

We are hence taught to acknowledge no love to be in God, which is not effectual in doing good to the creature; there is no lip-love, no raw well-wishing to the creature which God doth not make good: we know but three sorts of love, that God has to the creature, all the three are like the fruitful womb; there is no miscarrying, no barrenness in the womb of divine love; 

1. He loves all that he has made; so far as to give them a being, to conserve them in being so long as he pleaseth: he had a desire to have Sun, Moon, Stars, Earth, Heaven, Sea, Cloud, Air; he created them out of the womb of love, and out of goodness, and keeps them in being… 

2. There is a second love and mercy, in God, by which he loves all Men and Angels; yea, even his enemies, makes the Sun to shine on the unjust man, as well as the just, and causes dew and rain to fall on the orchard and fields of the bloody and deceitful man, whom the Lord abhors; as Christ teacheth us, (Matt. 5:43-48). Nor doth God miscarry in this love, he desires the eternal being of damned angels and men; he sends the Gospel to many reprobates, and invites them to repentance and with longanimity and forbearance suffereth pieces of froward dust to fill the measure of their iniquity, yet does not the Lord’s general love fall short of what he willeth to them. 

3. There is a love of special election to glory; far less can God come short in the end of this love…

[Christ Dying and Drawing, op. cit. p. 476f. (some copies, p. 440f., due to faulty numbering) Or see Samuel Rutherford, Christ Dying, and Drawing Sinners to Himself (Glasgow: Printed by Niven, Napier & Krull; for Samuel and Archibald Gardner, 1803), 549–50. Also cited in David Silversides, The Free Offer: Biblical & Reformed (Glasgow, Scotland: Marpet Press, 2005), 46–47.]

Personally, it's difficult to talk in terms of God's 'willingness to save all men.' In that blog post, the author stated, "... carefully observe how historic Calvinists and Puritans have common love, common grace and free gracious offers interconnected with God's willingness to save all men."

Troubling to me is the fact that God's willingness to save all men doesn't come to fruition in saving men until He saves them. There is no willingness to save outside of saving them.

God's saving love for men is demonstrated in His ultimate willingness to bring His love for them to fruition.

According to Moses, "The secret things (the things that God decrees) belong to the Lord our God; but the things that are revealed belong to us and to our children for ever, that we may do all the words of this law" (Deut. 29:29).

We need to differentiate between the complicated notion of, on the one hand, the will of God that is hidden from us and the will of God that is revealed to us.

The will of God that is hidden from us is his secret will, that will by which he decrees and determines events that do come to pass.

It’s by this secret will that he governs the universe and determines everything that will happen. He does not ordinarily reveal these decrees to us (except in prophecies of the future), so these decrees really are God's "secret" will.

We find out what God has decreed in his secret will only when events actually happen. Because this secret will of God has to do with his decreeing of events in the world, this aspect of God's will is sometimes also called God's will of decree.

God’s revealed will is revealed in the Scriptures, and usually contains his commands or "precepts" for our moral conduct.

God's revealed will is sometimes also called God's will of precept or will of command. This revealed will of God is God's declared will in His word concerning what **we should do** or what God commands us to do.

We perceive God’s revealed will because it is known to us in His commands and precepts. But his revealed will is not necessarily his (ultimate) will.

His revealed will is only the commands and precepts he issues as the
rule for **our** conduct.

God’s revealed will we know from Scripture. In his revealed will he
does not say what he will do; it is not the rule for his conduct; it does not prescribe what God must do, but tells us what he desires that we must do.

His revealed will is the rule for our conduct. It is only in a metaphorical sense, therefore, that it is called the will of God.”

God desires all men to be saved and to come to the knowledge of the truth in the sense that this is what he has revealed that he desires that we do.

Troubling to me is the fact that God's willingness doesn't come to fruition in saving men until He saves them. 

According to Moses, "The secret things (the things that God decrees) belong to the Lord our God; but the things that are revealed belong to us and to our children for ever, that we may do all the words of this law" (Deut. 29:29).

We need to differentiate between the complicated notion of, on the one hand, the will of God that is hidden from us and the will of God that is revealed to us. The will of God that is hidden from us is his secret will, that will by which he decrees and determines events that do come to pass.

It’s by this secret will that he governs the universe and determines everything that will happen. He does not ordinarily reveal these decrees to us (except in prophecies of the future), so these decrees really are God's "secret" will.

We find out what God has decreed in his secret will only when events actually happen. Because this secret will of God has to do with his decreeing of events in the world, this aspect of God's will is sometimes also called God's will of decree.

God’s revealed will is revealed in the Scriptures, and usually contains his commands or "precepts" for our moral conduct. God's revealed will is sometimes also called God's will of precept or will of command. This revealed will of God is God's declared will in His word concerning what **we should do** or what God commands us to do.

We perceive God’s revealed will because it is known to us in His commands and precepts. But his revealed will is not necessarily his (ultimate) will. His revealed will is only the commands and precepts he issues as the rule for **our** conduct.

God’s revealed will we know from Scripture. In his revealed will he does not say what He will do; it is not the rule for his conduct; it does not prescribe what God must do, but tells us what he desires that we must do.

His revealed will is the rule for our conduct. It is only in a metaphorical sense, therefore, that it is called the will of God.” God desires all men to be saved and to come to the knowledge of the truth in the sense that this is what he has revealed that he desires that we do.