UnOriginal Sin: A Church Leadership Lesson From The Biden Debacle

No new sin under the sun

There’s nothing new under the sin. No sin since Adam and Eve’s “origin sin” has been new material so to speak.

And that’s what you will find when you read the bestselling book – Original Sin: President Biden’s Decline, It’s Cover-Up and His Disastrous Choice to Run Again, by Jake Tapper and Alex Thompson.

The title says it all. I devoured this book on a long domestic flight – Sydney – Brisbane – Darwin, a week or so ago, having listened to Bari Weiss’s excellent interview of both men on her Honestly podcast over at The Free Press.

Tapper and Thompson come from politically liberal perspectives. In fact Weiss play clips to Thompson of his own CNN show, in which he forcefully refutes Lara Trump’s assertions about Biden’s decline and the alleged (then) media cover-up.

Thompson now says he was wrong and that Lara Trump was  right. But that’s the problem. Wrong about what?  Wrong about Biden’s decline? Or wrong about the fact that he – like so much of the media – turned away at the convenient time from what so many of us could plainly see was happening.

So Tapper and Thompson have some sins of their own to atone for. To their credit they do a pretty good mea culpa. Well, I was convinced at least, and if you can fake sincerity you have got it made!  Oh, wait, that was the problem with the Biden scandal in the first place.

But there’s no conspiracy theory stuff going on here. In fact, the opposite. Just good investigative reporting by both men who prove to have an incredible range of sources. Though, tellingly, and we will get into this, many of those sources are unnamed Democrats. Why unnamed? Because of what it might do for their careers of course.

Thompson’s and Tapper’s reporting is of the kind that – damningly –  did not get done by those in the mainstream media. Those who feared a second Trump presidency cos, well, cos democracy was at stake, so you can’t be too picky with the truth!  The end justifies the means.

So even if they thought Biden’s decline merited at least a raised eyebrow, they not only did not do that, they scorned, scorched and gaslit anyone who pointed it out.

Which was a lot of people. If the mainstream media wants to know why trust is an issue, they might like to reflect on their Jedi-knight style declaration: “This is not the decline you are seeking”. Even though it clearly was.

It’s base propaganda to deny what is obvious. It’s baser still to go after those who declare the obvious. But that is what the Biden Politburo (The  White House gang’s own word for their group) did.

And still, sadly, do. There’s a level of self-deceit that goes beyond the deceit of others.

Loyalty is for lapdogs and henchmen

The most damning assessment of the whole debacle around the Biden presidency is also a damning assessment of what can happen in churches and church systems when it comes to difficult truths about bad leadership issues being covered up. There’s a common feature and it’s this: loyalty is prized above everything else. Even the truth.

When asked by Bari Weiss on her podcast, why no one in the Biden White House was actually talking about this matter at the time, Tapper made this telling statement:

The origin to why no one was dissenting is because the defining virtue in Biden-world is loyalty. Dissent is not taken as “Let’s have a conversation”. Dissent is seen as disloyal.

Astonishing isn’t it? Here are people who are the most powerful in the world, who have access to information and people and finances and influence. And what is their presiding problem? They are loyal lapdogs to a man/woman. One would think that, having worked their way into their roles by virtue of making hard decisions, they would continue to be able to make hard decisions.

But no one dissents. No one.  Why? Because access to the President would have been barred for them if they had. Invitations would have dried up. People would start to cross over to the other side of the street if they saw them coming (I have literally seen this happen in a church setting).

Access and Approval

The desire to be close to Joe Biden and his entourage was so strong in them, that they became craven and loyal lapdogs.  Truth was not their goal. Access to power, and approval by that power, was their goal. Why? For self-declared noble reasons – to keep Trump from the White House. In the end it proved to have the opposite effect.

If there is one thing I have lamented in the church over the years it is this: misdirected loyalty among church leaders to another leader in order to gain access and receive approval. That’s never the stated issue of course. The lack of dissent is always couched in “But he gets stuff done!”, or worse, “We don’t want to bring the gospel into disrepute by airing our dirty laundry to the world”. That sort of thing.

Most bad, but often gifted, leaders in churches that I meet are insecure people, but they have a level of power that protects them. And those who want access to that power and who often crave the approval of that leader, have to stroke the leaders’ insecurities in order to stay part of the team or the inner sanctum.

And that means loyalty. Loyalty above all else. No one cuts and runs. No one dissents. They could not countenance losing that access to the centre, or they could not countenance the loss of approval from someone whose approval of them carries a lot of weight. And this often means that a lot of bad occurs, a lot of blind eyes are turned, a lot of gaslighting occurs, and a lot of other people. including leaders who speak out, are burned in the process.

And when the bad leader over-reaches (In Joe Biden’s case, it was that debate), there’s a sudden rush to say exactly what they could not say just one day before! And I’m saying this just in case you are going through a situation such as this. If you’re the loyal lapdog, then time is never your friend. And if you are the dissenting leader who is under the cosh, time is always your friend.

The Solution

If you are scared that your dissent in a troubling situation in church would have you branded disloyal, or that you could lose your job or your influence or your future career, let me offer you the following, in both negative and positive formats.

Negative

First, understand just how grossed out King Jesus is by misdirected loyalty that hides the truth. Loyalty is not part of the fruit of the Spirit. When it says in John’s Gospel that people secretly trusted Jesus but not publicly, lest they were put out of the synagogue (John 12), the conclusion is not that they were acting with wisdom.  John makes this damning assessment:

Nevertheless, many even of the authorities believed in him, but for fear of the Pharisees they did not confess it, so that they would not be put out of the synagogue;  for they loved the glory that comes from man more than the glory that comes from God.

No doubt such people among even the authorities were convincing themselves that they could be silent for righteous reasons. But God sees the heart. Their problem is that they loved glory – but not the glory that was invisible, off-site and long-term. Instead they settled for visible, up-close and now glory.

Which, according to the Bible is no glory at all.  Don’t settle for short-term glory, even if it gives you access to, and the approval of, a leader in the church. It never works out well.

Positive

But there’s something positive here too. If you are struggling with this very issue, and you see something bad in a leader that is destructive of the team or even of themselves or the gospel witness,  and you know you need to say something, then say something!

But you will never have the power to do so in your own strength. You will only be able to do so if you have locked away these astonishing twin truths of the gospel that will empower you:

First, you have full access to the Father through the Son by the Spirit, and therefore access to any human being pales into insignificance compared with that. And second, you have the full approval of God because He approves of the finished work of Christ on your behalf. 100 per cent.  You are the beloved child of God, and no earthly father or earthly leader can give you the level of approval that comes close. Nor the level of access.

The great irony of many a bad leader is just how insecure they actually are! Much of their bluster is smoke and mirrors. I’ve unpicked a lot of these issues over the past ten years and it’s interesting how many desperately insecure leaders, who demand loyalty from others, have historically lacked the approval of their own earthly father  (often due to abuse or abandonment or works-based approval).

If you can sort out truly where your approval comes from, and the quality of access you have to the one who approves of you, you will never end up being a loyal follower of an earthly leader.

And, if you should get into senior leadership yourself, you will never end up being an insecure leader who reads dissent as disloyalty. That means, as you look at your life history and your propensities, you may need to do some remedial work. Let the problem stop with you. Don’t be the leader we have to warn others about.

(If that is you, and if you do need some advice, then feel free to contact me on my website page to chat. I’m happy to direct you to places that can help.)

There is no such thing as a grandiose narcissist. They are all insecure. That’s why I feel 80 per cent angry for such bad leaders, and 20 per cent sorry for them. They need help. They can preach a gospel of acceptance and approval that they hardly feel themselves.

They need to create systems around them that buffer them from dissent, that offer loyalty, and that keep them in an echo chamber. Much like Joe Biden and the Politburo did. And they did so to the point that even the polling numbers that came to their doors, they rejected. Until the one poll that mattered.

Churches need to learn from the Biden debacle. Why? Because a bigger and more important poll is at stake. The Last Day, in which wood, hay and stubble will be burned up. It’s that important. Fortunately in the gospel, churches have far more resources, a greater vision of access and approval, and the power of the Risen Jesus. And that’s far more than anything Biden’s craven lapdogs had.

Joe’s sin was, in the end, unoriginal. Our only question is, do we want to repeat his unoriginal sin?