The Terrible Takes on Philip Yancey's 8-Year Affair

Can we please stop with the sin levelling?

This week we learned that best-selling and beloved author Philip Yancey confessed to an 8-year affair.

He announced in a statement he was stepping back from ministry, as he was now disqualified. His wife Janet issued a statement too saying that she was devastated, but that she would stay with him after 55 years of marriage because of their vows. (You can read both statements here).

This news obviously rocked the evangelical world. Many have read Yancey’s books and have been affected by them; I personally loved The Jesus I Never Knew.

And quite frankly, evangelical women are so, so sick and tired of evangelical men betraying them. So sick of it.

Rather than talk about Yancey specifically today, since we don’t know all the details, and I don’t think it’s fruitful or kind to Janet to talk about them specifically, I’d like to talk about the commentary that I’ve heard about how we should respond to news like this.

So much of that commentary has been atrocious, and we need to inject some sanity and some Jesus back in this discussion.

“This could have been any of us…”

One of the most common responses I’ve seen from pastors especially to the news goes something like what I saw one pastor say on Facebook:

“If Philip Yancey is capable of this, you and I are capable as well.”

It’s interesting that we don’t do this with other sins (although I remember Owen Strachan reacting to the discovery of Ravi Zacharias’ sex trafficking with “there but for the grace of God go I…”). If we hear someone murdered, we don’t say, “it could have been me.” If we hear someone robbed a bank, we don’t hear pastors say, “it could have been me.” But when it comes to cheating on your wife? Oh, yeah, that could have been me.

I’m going to share a piece by Tullian Tchividjian, the disgraced grandson of Billy Graham, who has been credibly accused of clergy sex abuse, destroyed several families, and forced to leave his PCA denomination before starting his own ministry:

Somewhere along the way, we’ve come to believe there is a fundamental difference between certain people and the rest of us—that some are less broken, less fragile, less capable of failure. But while there are functional differences between roles, statuses, and responsibilities, there is no fundamental difference at the level of human nature. The idea that some people don’t struggle with the same fears, temptations, and contradictions as everyone else is a myth. Human beings are human beings, carrying the same flaws, anxieties, and sinful tendencies across the board. No one lives outside the bounds of reality or human nature.

I have a friend who once said that all of us are three bad days away from becoming a tabloid headline and most of us are already on day two. All have fallen short, across every culture, vocation, ideology, and persuasion under the sun. Sin is a shared, ever-present reality, something that clings to all of us. All of us.

So if our theology leaves us stunned by human failure, it may be worth asking whether we’ve quietly believed in ourselves more than we realized.

What’s so amazing about grace? It covers both the sin of adultery and the sin of the one who looks down on the adulterer.

Tullian Tchividjian, Facebook

Let’s start with the idea that all of us are equally vulnerable; that all of us are “three days away from becoming a tabloid headline”, or that all of us carry the “same..sinful tendencies across the board.”

Actually, no.

When it comes to infidelity, we are all not equally at risk. Infidelity is not like a virus that can hit just anybody; specific types of people are far more likely to have affairs.

In terms of men vs. women, in our study for our book The Marriage You Want, we found that men were about three times as likely to cheat as women were, consistent with other numbers I have seen in other studies. Also, the rate of infidelity among churchgoing faithful evangelicals is relatively low—my best guess, after analyzing several studies, is around 15% for men and 5% for women, but it’s hard to know for sure because people often don’t define churchgoing evangelical well.

Keith and I covered the reasons for affairs at length last year in episode 282 of the Bare Marriage podcast on “Why Do Men Cheat”. We looked at a number of new studies about the predictors of affairs, and here are a few things to know:

• Frequency of sex in marriage is not a good predictor of having an affair. In other words, men don’t cheat because they’re not getting sex.

• Power differentials and a sense of entitlement is highly linked to affairs. Men who exhibit signs of entitlement, and who have power differentials in their marriage, are more likely to cheat.

• Hostile and benevolent sexism are linked to affairs. Men who think women are beneath them in some way are more likely to cheat.

(all studies are linked at the podcast).

I want to highlight one of the sentences from one study:

The decision to be unfaithful is solely an individualistic quality in which zero culpability should be directed toward one’s partner, as having more sex and developing a deeper bond with one’s partner did not serve as a deterrent for infidelity.

Jefferson et. al., Revenge Sex: Weaponizing Infidelity

Affairs are due to an individual person’s choice, and certain individuals are more likely to have affairs—it is not the same propensity.

Evangelical teaching, unfortunately, stokes men’s feelings of entitlement towards their wife’s body (she’s not to deprive him), and stokes sexism (that he needs unconditional respect and can’t be corrected or critiqued). Men like Tullian have lived right in the middle of these types of beliefs.

“We shouldn’t judge because we are all equally guilty…”

Tchvidjian really drove this one home. In response to one woman questioning his stance in the comments, he responded:

“ask God to help you see that your own heart is as adulterous as Yancey’s, mine, and every other human heart that has ever lived.”

So we can’t judge Yancey, or anyone who has had an affair, because we are all equally guilty.

Except that Paul did say that we are to judge those within the church, and that church leaders must be above reproach? I guess Tchvidjian ignores that part!

In the comments, Tullian also brings up Jesus’ take on the Sermon on the Mount, claiming that when Jesus said that lust in your heart was as bad as adultery, or hate was as bad as murder, that he was saying that we aren’t to judge.

Quite frankly, this is an infantile and deceptive interpretation of Scripture, because elsewhere Jesus gives us plenty of places where He says that some will be judged more harshly.

Tullian also ignores the reasons for Jesus’ comments in the Sermon on the Mount. Jesus was defending the vulnerable. He was defending the vulnerable in the case of lust, putting the blame at men’s feet, not at women’s. And he was defending the vulnerable in other places in the gospel when he said that those who sin against children will be judged more harshly.

Pastors who are so quick to say that we are all equally guilty are not defending the vulnerable but giving succor to the oppressors.

Would a woman who was the victim of sexual abuse be safe in a church that believed we are all equally sinners? Sin levelling always benefits those in power, and never the vulnerable.

Of course those who commit infidelity can be redeemed (though never restored to ministry, as I’m glad Yancey acknowledged), but to say that we are equally guilty is a sloppy reading of Scripture.

“The only reason we can stay faithful is God’s grace…”

I saw another pastor on Facebook complaining about how the secular world was reacting to the Yancey news. He wrote:

I am grieved at the differences between the comments of New York Times readers and readers of Christian publications.

Grace, sadness, disappointment, and hopeful for reconciliation in his 55 year marriage, yet understanding if his wife leaves him, in the Christian publications.

Snarkiness, giddiness, celebration, mocking and triumphant hatred in the Times.

What a stark difference in fellow humans.

This difference is caused by unbelievers lack of understanding of what a Christian is, and isn’t. We are a people who, from the earliest of Christian writings, admit who we are:

I do not understand what I do. For what I want to do I do not do, but what I hate I do. 16…(Romans 7:16-20)

We are as weak in temptation as anyone, and only made strong in Him. But for the grace of God go we, and making it through this life unscathed and untainted is a miracle we can only attribute to God, not to ourselves.”

Look at that last sentence again: not having an affair is a “miracle we can only attribute to God.”

Would you want to be this man’s wife?

I don’t want to be married to someone whose only reason for not falling into bed with another woman is that Jesus performed a miracle. I often wonder, too, do these pastors know any nonChristians? Most in the secular world aren’t having affairs either. Most people are faithful to their spouses.

Honestly, this man’s excuses remind me of what Paul wrote in 1 Corinthians 5:1, that such things aren’t done even among unbelievers! When Christians seem to have fewer morals than the secular world, we’re doing something very wrong.

“Satan attacks men in power, and aims for their marriages..”

Whenever someone with a large platform falls, we always hear some variation of this. We even hear it before they fall— “pray for your pastor/marriage ministry person, because Satan wants to target their marriage.”

Is this true? Perhaps.

But what is the effect of this teaching? If a leader falls, it’s because “Satan targeted him.” But if you, a mere plebe, fall, it’s all on you.

Anything that takes agency or responsibility away from those in power is not of God. Scripture is so clear that those in power will be judged more harshly, and yet so much of our teaching is designed to excuse those in power while condemning those without.

Who does all of this benefit?

That’s the question that I kept coming back to, over and over again, in the last few days. When pastors give all of these excuses, who does it benefit?

Does it benefit women? Of course not. It hurts women, because we’re told that no matter how secure we are in our marriages, how much we love our husbands and they love us, how long we’ve been married, our husbands are only a few bad days away from throwing it all away. We can never be secure in our husband’s love or faithfulness.

In our survey of 20,000 women for our book The Great Sex Rescue, we examined the result of the teaching that “all men struggle with lust, it’s every man’s battle.” That’s not exactly the same thing, but it’s close. And when women believe that this is a universal struggle men have, so they can never fully trust their husband, their libido drops; their orgasm rates drop; and marital satisfaction drops. Telling women they must be hyper vigilant and can never trust their husbands hurts women. Full stop.

Does this teaching help your average man in the pew? No, because when men are taught that they will inevitably struggle with sexual sin, their marriages do worse too, as we discovered in our survey of men for our book The Good Guy’s Guide to Great Sex. Telling men that they were made to sin sexually, and that this is a particular area of their lives they will never recover, makes porn use more likely, is associated with worse marital outcomes, and makes men far worse lovers.

So who does this message serve?

It serves those who want to cheat and get away with it. That’s it. It’s that simple.

And it serves pastors who want to groom their congregation to overlook the sin of the men in power in their church.

Let’s not overlook that.

Do pastors ever think, “what is the effect on the women in my congregation?”

One of the pernicious effects of having all male leadership in churches is that pastors can totally miss what women are thinking and experiencing, and discount women’s voices.

In my social media posts about this, overwhelmingly both men and women agree with me, but when someone does disagree, it’s almost always a man.

And I wonder, do these pastors understand how the women feel when they hear, over and over again, you shouldn’t expect that your pastors, elders, or husbands will be able to stay faithful?

So let me end with this:

It’s okay to expect your husband won’t have an affair.

Scripture tells us that when we are in Christ we should put sexual sin to death (Colossians 3:5), not that we should normalize it. So if you’re sick and tired of these messages excusing infidelity, I hope this is a comfort!

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You may also enjoy:

• The Great Sex Rescue, with great data and charts about what makes a good sex life—and what ruins it

• The Good Guy’s Guide to Great Sex, with data and charts about what evangelical men’s sex lives actually are like

• Our podcast on why men cheat

• Our new “starter packs” of podcasts, so you can jump in and get to know me easily!