Texas Megachurch Pastor Quits After Sliding into the Instagram DMs of a Woman Who Wasn’t His Wife

The lead pastor at the Village Church a Texas-based megachurch which operates under the auspices of the Southern Baptist Church announced his resignation earlier this week after having an Instagram relationship, Raw Story reports.

When he announced his resignation, lead pastor Matt Chandler, who is married and has three children, told the congregation, “I fell short.”

Church elders were alerted to Chandler’s online messages, so they decided to take a look at what he was doing, Christianity Today reports. They found the direct messages he’d made on Instagram and reviewed some of the comments he’d also made. The church elders found that the direct messages Chandler exchanged “revealed something unhealthy.”

Chandler is vehemently against abortion and on one occasion he compared rape victims to Hitler. His church also received a storm of backlash after it “disciplined” a woman for wanting to divorce her after she found out her husband was watching explicit adult videos that exploited children. Her husband was later prosecuted by the FBI and after receiving heavy criticism, the church issued an apology.

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Chandler called his actions “unguarded and unwise,” and said he agreed with the church elders’ assessment and that he was grateful for their spiritual guidance.

“We cannot be a church where anyone is above the Scriptures and above the high heavenly call into Jesus Christ,” he said. “The Word of God holds me to a certain standard. And I fell short.”

Light began to be shed on this when a woman approached Chandler and said she was disturbed by the way he was talking to her friend on Instagram. He decided to discuss it with the congregation and that’s when the church elders got busy.

“He told the congregation he didn’t think he’d done anything wrong, and the DMing was not a secret. His wife knew. The woman’s husband knew. And yet the woman who approached Chandler did not think the online exchanges were appropriate,” the elders wrote in their report.

Chandler himself said he was left feeling “disoriented” by the confrontation, so he informed another senior pastor and an elder at the church. They subsequently reviewed the posts and found them concerning.

The Village Church has since issued a statement telling members it has now hired a law firm to review all of Chandler’s social media.

Chandler has worked as a pastor at the church for 20 years. He’s also served as the president of Acts 29, a church-planting network for the past decade. That gig, according to Christianity Today, was previously held by Mark Driscoll, who was later disqualified due to his “personal character.” Driscoll was also one of the founders of March Hill Church in Washington State, where he became embroiled in misconduct.

Less than a year ago, according to Christianity Today, Chandler told the site that “pastors need to be in the kind of community [where] they might be encouraged or challenged if you start getting red flags.”

And that looks like that’s what’s going on here. The red flags have been duly noted. That’s totally appropriate, especially since this man sees similarities between rape victims and Hitler.

What a guy.