Beware of Wolves in Sheep's Clothes

Yesterday was a wonderful day at church. We celebrated the Lord's Supper that morning and proclaimed the Lord's death for sins and enjoyed a wonderful fellowship with Him and with one another. Later that afternoon, I invited our insurance rep to visit with us to help us better understand our insurance coverages and to gain his insight concerning any potential liabilities our church may be exposed to.
He met with our transportation committee (which has been charged with the task of studying our transportation needs and then making a recommendation to the church based on what they learn) and then he spoke with any church members interested in safeguarding our children's / youth ministry. We had an abbreviated service that evening and spent several minutes discussing a proposed policy manual for use in our church. In short, we spent most of our day discussing the reality of living and ministering in a fallen world.
We had to talk about some difficult things. Our rep talked to us about potential liabilities in transporting children, teens and adults in both church owned transportation and privately owned automobiles. We learned more than we ever wanted to know about that and we'll probably be having a hard time getting anyone else to drive for us..... He talked to us about the numbers of children who are abused and how to watch for the signs of abuse. He talked about our coverages should their ever be an accusation against our church or church workers. He talked to us about very practical safeguards to protect against anything bad happening. Things like never allowing an adult to be alone with a child, placing windows in the doors and instituting a screening process for children's workers that includes an interview, background check and waiting period before service all goes a long way in protecting the church and the children and, in some cases, increases your levels of coverage.
Let me just tell you how difficult it was to talk about these issues. For whatever reason, churches seem to treat as taboo these kinds of things and by not talking about them open themselves to all sorts of bad things. Let me also tell you this: As uncomfortable and difficult as it is to talk about these things, it is infinitely more uncomfortable and difficult to experience some kind of accusation or incident. When I was pastor in Louisiana, our church experienced two separate occasions that were potentially dangerous to individuals and to the church. In one, there was suspected abuse by an older man, but before it could be verified he left the church. In the second, one of the members who worked with the teens was involved in a very public and very sinful scandal. That situation cost our church two or three families who left over the scandal. In addition to that, our church's reputation was more than tarnished and we lost a great deal of influence in our community. As one who has now stood before a church to address an issue that happened and one who has stood before a church to address issues that could happen, I would much rather stand before a group and talk about uncomfortable things that could happen instead of standing before a group that is trying to figure out why a bad thing happened.
If you attend church or have children in church, you owe it to yourselves, your children, your church and our Lord to address these issues before they become issues. Beware of wolves in sheep's clothing.