Last Saturday, Evangelical Dark Web reported on the accusations of Hohn Cho against John MacArthur’s Grace Community Church. The Christianity Today article added nothing new to the story that was reported last year except that former GCC elder Hohn Cho was coming out as a whistleblower on the practices of biblical counseling at GCC.
The Long Wait
According to Christianity Today, Hohn Cho performed an investigation into GCC’s handling of Eileen and David Gray and wrote a 20 page memo about how GCC mishandled this case and others. The memo was not well received by the other GCC elders and Cho claims that they pressured him to resign.
Hohn Cho resigned from being an elder at Grace Community Church on April 4, 2022 and his public statement gave no indication that his reasons for eventually whistleblowing were the reasons for resigning.
Ten months later, Christianity Today publishing his accusation; however they also would not publish the 20 page memo that Hohn Cho wrote. The memo is still private, which undermines Hohn Cho’s commitment to whistleblowing, unless he is trying to leverage its release to get GCC to take what he deems is appropriate action.
But in any case, this action need not have waited ten months, conveniently around the upcoming Shepherds Conference, which was utilized by liberal blogger, Julie Roys, for maximum damage. If Hohn Cho’s accusations are true, then this issue was not worth waiting ten months to go public.
It must also be stated that Hohn Cho’s choice to go to the apostate Christianity Today shows a lack of discernment and judgement. Furthermore his defense of Kate Shellnutt, the author of the Christianity Today, is a red flag given how liberal she is.
Grace Community Church Cover Up?
It’s important to note that Hohn Cho investigated based on his own interest and not on an official capacity. It’s also unclear who was interviewed during his investigation.
GCC responded to the story as follows.
Grace Church’s elders do not publicly discuss details arising from counseling and discipline cases—especially on social media. Nor do we litigate disputes about such matters in online forums. Grace Church deals with accusations personally and privately in accordance with biblical principles. We do not respond to attacks, lies, misrepresentations, and anonymous accusations. Our church’s history and congregation are the testimony. Myriads of Grace Church members who have sought counsel at our church will testify that the counsel they receive is biblical, charitable, supportive, and liberating.
The statement by GCC leaves much to be desired. The fact that a former elder made charges against GCC merited more of a response than what Julie Roys has done.
Compounding the lack of meaningful response was GCC scrubbing Hohn Cho from their website. Perhaps GCC feels betrayed by Cho, but scrubbing otherwise biblical content from their ministry is not a good look. Their reticence to give a ready defense for the charges smells like a coverup to many.
Conclusions
The Christianity Today article introduces Hohn Cho as an authority figure to appeal to in the ongoing accusations against GCC. However, appeal to authorities have their limitations as the rest of the elders at GCC are on the opposite side of Cho, until we find out otherwise.
We still have no reasons to conclude that GCC acted wrongly in their counseling and church discipline based on the information GCC knew at the time.
We can also suspect that GCC disagrees with David Gray’s conviction of child molestation, which the finite details of the case warrant some level of suspicion. If GCC is right that he was wrongly convicted than the case against them would fall apart. If they are misguided in their insistence of Gray’s innocence, something Gray has maintained, it still difficult to compel a church to adhere to the findings of a secular court.
Ultimately Hohn Cho has charged GCC to “do justice” with Eileen Gray who was excommunicated using Matthew 18 on the basis of unsubstantiated refusal to reconcile her marriage. If Eileen Gray never confided anything that David Gray would eventually be charged with and refused to cooperate with the church, what exactly is the path to reconciliation? She still bares the responsibility of her sin, and it was her sin that she was excommunicated.
Ultimately it is naïve to think that this issue is not a proxy for a larger attack on biblical counseling and church discipline in general. We would be wise to avoid these conclusions regardless of what transpires with GCC.
The whole situation has a lot of smoke and little fire to be found. Maybe its there, but for now, we must continue to reserve judgement.
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One Response
Looks to me like this article is extremely deceptive and truly supports GCC’s position. Hohn Cho was an elder in this church and asked to look into it I’m gathering because he’s an experienced attorney and a member of the church. Clearly he saw something wasn’t right and needed to see for himself. Turns out he was right! Withholding his assessment doesn’t mean anything. Did you ask him personally why he didn’t release the information sooner? I believe giving him an opportunity to answer that question is fair! Instead you made your own conclusions. I don’t see you putting your neck on the line to look into GCC except to make assessments where you have no knowledge to make those assessments they are just assumptions!