When asked by a reporter why the public service was held, Sims noted that because Lohn was publicly disciplined by the church, he needed to be restored publicly. ‘Because this was a highly publicized and reported sin, we felt the church as a whole needed to come publicly and declare we had forgiven him,” Sims said. “We wanted to be completely transparent.”

The church discovered in July 2009 that Lohn had embezzled more than $75,000 over a three-year period. When the investigation was completed, the amount proved to be more than $100,000.

The past three years haven’t been easy for Shelbyville Mills Baptist Church.

But the congregation found some closure in a restoration service for its former minister of youth and church administrator, Charles Lohn, on Sunday, Jan. 22.

For pastor Jonathan Sims, what made the situation even more stressful was that he had been “like a father” to Lohn since high school. Lohn served on Sims’ staff for six years in Alabama before moving to Shelbyville, Tenn., shortly after Sims became pastor about 12 years ago.

“It was difficult, very heart-wrenching,” Sims said, recalling the day when he received a phone call from David Brown, then minister of education and now associate pastor, that Shelbyville Mills literally had no money in the bank.

Sims, who was on vacation, had thought the church was in excellent financial condition, having paid off its mortgage.

Church leaders, in reviewing the financial records, discovered that Lohn had embezzled funds by taking cash and writing additional payroll checks to himself over the course of about three years.

Sims and his wife Kala met with Lohn and his wife Misty, who had no knowledge of what her husband had done.

Lohn did not disclose everything he had done after several meetings, which forced Sims and the church to turn the matter over to civil authorities.

“If he had been transparent with the church, this might could have been avoided,” Sims said. “I couldn’t protect him from this. A crime had been committed.” Sims also knew that he “could not stop what was about to happen. It grieved my heart.”

CHURCH DISCIPLINE

During the Jan. 22 service, Sims reminded the congregation that there are two “swords” the Lord uses to enact discipline — church discipline and civil authority.

On Aug. 2, 2009, the church had voted unanimously to remove Lohn from its fellowship. “Our only goal was to bring Charles back to Christ,” the pastor said.

Sims observed that church discipline is “all but lost in our churches today,” yet he is a firm believer that it is mandated by Scripture in such passages as Matthew 18:15-20, 1 Corinthians 5:1-7 and 1 Timothy 5:19-20, with the latter specifically dealing with pastors.

Discipline is painful and distasteful, Sims said, but that doesn’t give a church the right to leave it out.

“It is a part of divine Scripture and we tried to obey it,” he said.

Sims also is convinced that Lohn would not have truly repented and ultimately realized he had never been saved had the church not forced the issue by removing him from membership.

Lohn concurred during the restoration service Jan. 22.

“Church discipline isolated me out of my world that I had conformed to and forced me to face God one-on-one. God did use it in my life to help convict me. Thank you for not departing from the Word,” Lohn told the Shelbyville Mills congregation.

After serving nine months in jail, Lohn began attending the church as soon as he was released, but he was still considered a non-member.

It would take another 16 months of working with Lohn before church leaders felt he was ready to be restored to membership, Sims said.

LOHN’S STORY

Addressing the congregation for the first time since he was charged with embezzlement, Lohn read from a prepared statement. “I would like for you to know that I am truly sorry for what I have done,” he said. “I have been convicted and I have repented to God. I know that I have been forgiven by God. I stand before you today to ask you for your forgiveness.”

Lohn said he would try to answer questions he knew the church would have about what he did.

“I cannot tell you the exact date that everything started. I can tell you that I had not been the leader in my house or the man that I should have been,” Lohn said. “I had gotten into a tough situation with debt and many things coming at once. I thought it would be all right to ‘borrow’ some money and pay it back at a later date.”

[Editor’s note: This article is incomplete. The source for this document was originally published on bpnews.net—however, the original URL is no longer available.]