Judging Creflo Dollar

Judging Creflo Dollar

June 8, 2012 in Church with 10 Comments

What did you think when you saw this headline, “Pastor Creflo Dollar charged with attacking his daughter”? Maybe you agree with this comment from Twitter when I suggested we pray for Rev. Dollar’s family:

“Why would anyone pray for Creflo Dollar? You pray for the girl, not the money-grubbing scam artist that abused her.”

Maybe your reaction was more along the lines of my friend from Facebook:

“Pray for him sure, but if [it] turns out he’s guilty [I] hope they throw the book at him. No excuse whatsoever for a man to ever strike a female under any circumstances! We’ve all lost our patience with our kids at one time or another, but hitting is never an answer/option.”

Or you may have a completely different take:

“In a world where Black children are shot every day by one another and by the police, the tough hand of a loving parent might be the only thing that keeps that child out of the morgue.  I encourage others to refrain from judging Pastor Dollar’s parenting techniques until the evidence is fully revealed.  Also, I wouldn’t be surprised if one day, his daughter thanks him for his sacrifice.” (You can read the full article here)

Is Creflo Dollar an angry, ego-maniacal prosperity preacher who has finally been revealed for the fraud we knew him to be? Or is he a desperate dad willing to do whatever it takes to protect his daughter from evil?
What would I do if my 15 year old daughter demanded to go to a party I had forbidden her to go to? What if I caught her sneaking out of the house at midnight, and she refused to stop when I told her to? What if there were older boys waiting for her in a car in the driveway? What if I could see that the boy who was driving was obviously drunk? What would I do to keep my 15 year old daughter from climbing in that car, to keep her from going to that party, to protect her from making a decision she could never recover from? Is it possible that I would physically restrain her? Is it possible in the course of a horrible, horrible encounter that she might get a scratch on her neck? And what if she was so angry at me, so enraged that she couldn’t go that party, that she called the police and told them that I had beat her?
I don’t know what happened at Creflo Dollar’s house last night. But I do know that when I choose to judge him, regardless of how I feel about his theology, I am walking into dangerous territory. In John 8 Jesus seems to indicate that the prerequisite for judgement is perfection, and I’m nowhere near that standard.
The reality is that, while they don’t make headlines, I come into contact with stories like this every day. People make decisions I don’t understand, people espouse views I can’t agree with, people fall into the trap of sin that chips away at their soul. I can have one of two attitudes when I encounter the messiness of life in a fallen world:

Two men went to the Temple to pray. One was a Pharisee, and the other was a despised tax collector. The Pharisee stood by himself and prayed this prayer: ‘I thank you, God, that I am not a sinner like everyone else. For I don’t cheat, I don’t sin, and I don’t commit adultery. I’m certainly not like that tax collector! I fast twice a week, and I give you a tenth of my income.’
But the tax collector stood at a distance and dared not even lift his eyes to heaven as he prayed. Instead, he beat his chest in sorrow, saying, ‘O God, be merciful to me, for I am a sinner.’

Oh, and one more thing, I’m thankful my kids didn’t have cell phones when they were 15.