THE DEVIL IS A LIE! PASTOR PHIL JOHNSON OF GRACE COMMUNITY CHURCH WHERE DR. JOHN MACARTHUR IS THE SENIOR PASTOR, FINALLY ADMITS FORMER PASTOR STEVE LAWSON WAS COMMITTING ADULTERY ON HIS WIFE WITH THIS YOUNG WOMAN WHILE SHE WAS A STUDENT AT THE MASTER’S UNIVERSITY
pictured: Steve Lawson appears in a picture posted by Grace Community Church’s college ministry with a woman purported to be the one with whom he engaged in sexual misconduct. (Source: GCC Crossroads Instagram account)
DANIEL WHYTE III, PRESIDENT OF GOSPEL LIGHT SOCIETY INTERNATIONAL, CALLS ON PASTOR PHIL JOHNSON TO RESIGN POST HASTE FOR LYING AND TELLS DR. JOHN MACARTHUR, A MAN WHOM HE HONORS, RESPECTS, AND LOVES AND HAS CALLED HIM A “PROPHET” AND A PASTOR FOR YEARS, TO TAKE FULL RESPONSIBILITY FOR THIS DEBACLE AND STRONGLY CONSIDER TURNING THE CHURCH OVER TO A SEASONED OUTSIDE PASTOR FOR ALL OF THE PASTORS AT GRACE COMMUNITY CHURCH, INCLUDING MACARTHUR, ARE TAINTED. MAY GOD HELP DR. JOHN MACARTHUR AND THE GRACE COMMUNITY CHURCH.
However, when recently accused of lying, Johnson admitted in an email that the woman was “a student at The Master’s College (University) during some of the time that (she and Lawson) were engaged in this adulterous affair.”
Lawson, a former dean at GCC’s The Master’s University and Seminary (TMUS) and a teaching pastor at Trinity Bible Church of Dallas, was removed from his church in September due to “an inappropriate relationship” with a woman.
Since then, there has been much speculation on social media regarding the identity of the woman and whether Lawson’s “affair” qualifies as clergy sexual abuse.
To date, Trinity Church, TMUS, and GCC have not identified the woman.
They also have not responded to questions by The Roys Report (TRR), concerning whether the woman, whom Phil confirmed was in her “late 20s,” was under the spiritual authority of Lawson, who’s 73.
According to abuse experts, “any sexualized behavior by a church leader/spiritual leader toward someone under their spiritual care, who by nature is in a position of less power and authority” is clergy sexual abuse.
Texas has a law criminalizing clergy sexual abuse; California does not.
On Oct. 20, Casey Staats, a longtime donor to Ligonier Ministries, where Lawson served as a teaching fellow and board member, confronted Johnson on X for his claim the woman didn’t live close to any of Lawson’s ministries.
In her post, Staats included a picture of Lawson with a woman purported to be the woman with whom he was involved, which had been posted on the Instagram account of GCC’s college ministry. That IG post has since been deleted.
“It seems maybe you weren’t telling the truth here?” Casey wrote to Johnson. “This picture was scrubbed from the Crossroads IG but word on the street is this is the girl who was nowhere close to Steve’s ministries. Care to confirm or deny?”
Discussion thread on X dated Oct. 22, 2024. (Screengrab)
Johnson responded that if Staats felt she needed more details, she should contact him “directly by email or phone.”
Two days later, Staats did just that.
“I am the woman who posted on X today wanting to know if you were being truthful about Steve’s young mistress not being ‘close’ to any of his ministries,” Staats wrote in an email she recently released to TRR. “If the young woman in the photo is, in fact, his mistress, she was apparently very close.”
Staats added, “People are desperate for transparency in a world that gets crazier by the day. Whether GCC knew about this or not, there is MUCH speculation that many there DID know about this and did nothing. Do you want this rumor floating around social media if it’s not true?? PLEASE help people understand what exactly went on with 100% honesty and transparency.”
The next day, Johnson responded and appeared to confirm that the woman in the picture was the one involved with Lawson. (TRR is not identifying the woman because it is not clear whether she is a victim of clergy sexual abuse or not.):
What I said is that she does not live close to any of Lawson’s ministries. Obviously, given that they were having an affair, they were adjacent to one another at SOME point, so a picture of her sitting next to him doesn’t actually nullify the facts of what I said. Grace Church is in Los Angeles. Lawson was preaching at a church in Dallas. The woman Lawson was romancing lives in Washington State. What I said was absolutely true. (You publicly accused me of dishonesty before you even asked for that clarification.)
The point is that this was not a case of pastoral abuse as defined by Texas law. She was not a parishioner of his. Her family (who live in Orange County, CA and are members of a church down there) were donors to Lawson’s ministry and personal friends with him, and that is how the connection was made. On more than occasion he even stayed in their home while he was in California. She was a consenting adult in her mid-twenties when the relationship began. She was also a student at The Master’s College during some of the time that they were engaged in the adulterous affair. But her connection with him originally came through her family’s relationship with Lawson and had nothing to do with her student status.
Though Johnson denied Lawson was in a position of spiritual authority over the woman while she was at TMUS, other documentation suggests otherwise.
Until recently, the woman was also featured on TMUS’s website “Alumni Focus“.
According to the webpage, which was deleted after Sept. 28, the woman attended Grace Community Church as a child and returned to the area to attend The Master’s University, where Lawson had a profound impact on her.
The website stated, “More than anything, though, (name redacted) says she was impacted spiritually by her time at TMU. ‘Getting to hear preachers like Steve Lawson or Dr. MacArthur on a weekly basis encouraged my faith and grounded my beliefs in truth,’ she says.”
Also, the post states that the woman graduated from TMU in 2018. This would mean that Lawson’s misconduct went on for at least six years, not five as Johnson stated in a now-deleted, Sept. 25 X post.
TRR reached out to Johnson via email to confirm the woman’s identity and to ask how he knew her relationship with Lawson “had nothing to do with her student status.”
Johnson did not reply to our email.
TRR has also confirmed that the woman worked at Grace Books, GCC’s bookstore, in 2021. We called and spoke with an employee at Grace Books today, who stated that only GCC members are eligible to work at Grace Books.
So, the woman involved with Lawson apparently was a GCC member while the misconduct was happening.
Johnson also claims in his email to Staats that none of the GCC elders knew of Lawson’s misconduct with the woman as some have claimed on social media.
Johnson adds that a Grace Church secretary told him after the scandal broke that she had “observed some overly-familiar behavior between Lawson and his mistress. (This girl had straightened his tie and combed his hair in a public setting.)”
However, Johnson said the woman took her concern to an employee of Lawson’s ministry, OnePassion, not to an elder at Grace Church.
“As far as I can determine, no one who says they witnessed inappropriate behavior between Lawson and the woman ever brought any concern to our elders,” Johnson writes.
TRR reached out to OnePassion Ministries and asked if any of its employees heard a concern about Lawson from a GCC secretary, and if so, when and what was done?
OnePassion did not respond to our inquiry.
The only employees listed on OnePassion’s 2021 990 tax form are Steve Lawson and his daughter, Grace Anne Bills, who serves as OnePassion’s ministry coordinator and vice president.
Steve Lawson’s wife, Anne Lawson, received $30,000 from OnePassion, according to the 990. But the only position mentioned for her is as a director of OnePassion, which is a non-staff position.
The money paid to Steve and Anne Lawson, as well as Grace Anne Bills, account for about 70% of the total $557,668 paid by OnePassion in salaries and other compensation in 2021.
IF YOU WERE TO DIE TODAY, WHERE WOULD YOU GO: HEAVEN OR HELL? IF YOU’RE NOT SURE, “BELIEVE ON THE LORD JESUS CHRIST AND THOU SHALT BE SAVED” FOR JESUS CHRIST SAID THE MOST IMPORTANT WORDS EVER SPOKEN IN THE HISTORY OF THE WORLD WHEN HE SAID, “FOR GOD SO LOVED THE WORLD, THAT HE GAVE HIS ONLY BEGOTTEN SON, THAT WHOSOEVER BELIEVETH IN HIM SHOULD NOT PERISH, BUT HAVE EVERLASTING LIFE.” READ FURTHER RIGHT HERE:
THE BIG QUESTION
GOSPEL LIGHT MINUTE X #447 WITH DANIEL WHYTE III
This is the “Chief of sinners,” Daniel Whyte III, president of Gospel Light Society International, with the Gospel Light Minute X Podcast #447 titled, “The Big Question” I’m here to remind you of what the Bible says, that “Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners” like you and me.
“HAVE YOU BEEN BORN AGAIN?”
The question is not “Have you joined a church?” or “Are you trying to do your best?” or “Do you have religion?” but “Are you twice-born?” Jesus Christ said in John 3:3, “Except a man be born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God”.
We enter the physical world by birth. Spiritual life likewise is entered with a birth. We become members of a human family by birth; we become members of the family of God by birth, by being “born again.” There is no other way to get into the human family except by birth, and there is no other way to get into God’s family except by the new birth. Neither education, nor cultivation, nor reformation, nor “turning over a new leaf,” will accomplish this. What is needed is not a new “leaf” but a new “life”! “Ye must be born again” (John 3:7).
A New Nature Needed
By physical birth we become partakers of human nature; by being born again we become “partakers of the divine nature”. A Christian is the product of a divine “begetting”. The second birth is not an improvement of the old nature; it is the imparting of an entirely new nature. The old nature is hopelessly corrupt and incapable of ever being made fit for His presence. The new birth requires a creative act of the Holy Spirit. “If any man be in Christ, he is a new creature”.
Not “Trying” But “Trusting”
“Trying to follow Christ” is not Christianity. Christianity is not imitation of Christ, it is the indwelling of Christ. Christianity is not trying to do anything. It is trusting Christ Who has done it all! He has “finished the work” and there is nothing left to do but simply to receive and trust Him. He shed His precious blood on the cross and the work is all done once and forever! Cease trying and begin trusting! Believers will progressively become more and more like Christ, but by His power, not their own.
What Must I Do To Be Saved?
Simply “Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ”. The Bible says in 1 John 5:1, “Whosoever believeth that Jesus is the Christ is born of God”. The Bible states in John 1:12,13, “As many as received him, to them gave he power to become the sons of God, even to them that believe on his name: Which were born, not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but of God”.
You are born again, you become a Christian by trusting a Person—receiving a Person. The very moment you do this, the Lord Jesus Christ comes in and life begins!
What Is Meant By “Believe”?
To “believe on the Lord Jesus Christ” means more than simply believing the historic facts concerning Him. Intellectual belief about Christ is not sufficient. The belief that brings salvation must be “with the heart,” that is, with the whole being. This belief also includes repentance: “Repentance toward God, and faith toward our Lord Jesus Christ”. The Bible states in Acts 17:30, “God … now commandeth all men every where to repent”.
The faith which saves, then, includes the necessity to repent, and to receive Christ as Saviour and Lord, to rest upon Him alone for salvation. It means to trust Him so utterly and completely that, if He should fail, there would be no hope at all!
May I Know That I Am Born Again?
This is an important question. We know that we are born again by the testimony of God’s Word. God says in John 5:24, “He that heareth my word, and believeth on him that sent me, hath everlasting life, and shall not come into condemnation; but is passed from death unto life”. Have you believed on the Lord Jesus Christ as explained by God’s Word? If so, then you are saved, you are “born again,” you have “passed from death unto life.” God says so! Take God at His Word, and go on your way rejoicing!
One Final Word
You may “belong to a church,” you may be “trying to do the best you can,” you may be “striving to live right.” Your outward life may be the model of moral correctness, and you may be looked up to, honored, revered, and respected. Yet, if you have not been “born again” you are just as lost as if you had never heard of Christ. Yes, you may teach in the Sunday school, read the Bible, sing, shout, “feel happy,” and all the rest—but if you have never been “born again” you are still in your sins and a stranger to the Lord Jesus Christ!.
If you want to be saved from the wrath to come and from an eternity in Hell, and if you believe that Jesus Christ suffered, bled, and died on the cross for your sins, was buried, and rose again from the dead and you are willing to trust Jesus Christ with all of your heart so you can go to Heaven, please pray with me what is called the sinner’s prayer: Holy Father God, I acknowledge that I am a sinner and I admit that I have sinned against You and that I have broken Your Ten Commandments. I have lied before. I have stolen things before. I have lusted after people and things before. I have dishonored and disobeyed my parents. I have taken Your holy Name in vain. For Jesus Christ’s sake, please have mercy and grace upon my soul and forgive me of all of my sins, my failures, and my faults. As I now believe in Your Holy Son the Lord Jesus Christ. I believe that He suffered, bled, and died on the cross for my sins, was buried and rose again. Lord Jesus, please come into my heart and save my soul and change my life. Fill me with Your Holy Spirit and help me to repent of my sins past. Help me to turn from my old, evil life and follow You in the new life. For it is in Your Name I pray. Amen.
SUPPORT THIS GREAT MINISTRY BY PURCHASING THE BOOK LETTERS TO YOUNG BLACK MEN BY DANIEL WHYTE III. ORDER IT FOR AS MANY YOUNG BLACK MEN IN YOUR LIFE AS POSSIBLE FOR THE GLORY OF GOD.
https://www.amazon.com/Letters-Young-Black-Men-Encouragement/dp/0976348799