These men need to walk in the light, not dwell in the darkness.
I have been following the suicide of Ergun Caner's 15 y/o son. Really heartbreaking.
“One of the problems here is the secrecy. If a member of the congregation cannot determine church finances, pastor’s salary, identify deacons, the organization is not healthy.”
So much of what we call “Church” simply cannot be found in the Scripture, not the least of which is a perverted, man-pleasing view of authority. The Star Chamber leadership is false. Blind allegiance to any authority is not Truth. (Lol, just remembered the man born blind who was healed by Jesus and unwittingly found himself confronting the unbelief of the religious authorities: “Do YOU want to become His disciples, too?” Ha!)
In Galatians, Paul details an interesting exchange between himself and Peter:
“But when Cephas came to Antioch, I opposed him to his face, because he stood condemned. For before certain men came from James, he was eating with the Gentiles; but when they came he drew back and separated himself, fearing the circumcision party. And the rest of the Jews acted hypocritically along with him, so that even Barnabas was led astray by their hypocrisy. But when I saw that their conduct was not in step with the truth of the gospel, I said to Cephas before them all, “If you, though a Jew, live like a Gentile and not like a Jew, how can you force the Gentiles to live like Jews?”
Peter—God love him!—was confrontable. If Paul had tried to walk up and confront any number of modern pastors he would have been stopped by security or by a cabal of elders/sycophants. “Touch not God’s anointed!”