What the recent Christian author’s acknowledgment of wrongdoing helped me to remember.
January 18, 2026 | Silver Spring, Maryland, United States | Marcos Paseggi, Adventist Review
On January 8 the Christian world in North America and beyond was shocked when Christianity Today posted a confession by renowned Christian author and preacher Philip Yancey. In it Yancey, 76, acknowledged an eight-year affair with a married woman, and announced he was withdrawing from preaching and teaching.
Amid thousands of comments, reflections, and multiple opinions on the disclosed and assumed details of the whole situation, I took some notes. Here are eight things that Yancey’s self-inflicted ordeal helped me to remember.
The “guard your heart” command is as relevant as ever. There is important contextual information that is missing from Yancey’s account, and we would do well to avoid needless speculation. One thing we can ascertain, however, is that his fall might have begun well before he embarked on (and then hid) his affair by giving free rein to Christless thoughts. From then on, it is always a slippery slope, no matter how devoted or committed to Christ you seem to be to those around you. It is the reason King Solomon, advising his son, said to “guard your heart” (Prov. 4:23). Or as the Living Bible puts it: “Above all else, guard your affections. For they influence everything else in your life.”[1]
Sin has consequences in real life, but ultimate judgment is the Lord’s. Some online forums have spent many lines pondering whether Yancey’s confession and about-face is sincere or just a marketing ploy. The truth is, there are details about his state of mind that are known only to God and Yancey’s conscience. It is not our role to weigh in on how forthright or not he has been, or to ascertain his post-confession thoughts, feelings, or attitudes. The same applies to the poignant statement shared by Janet, his wife of 55 years.
It is often healthy to assess and challenge our blind spots. Unlike reactions to previous Christian scandals (Ravi Zacharias comes to mind), not many overtly ran to defend Yancey. Still, online comments showed some differences between, for instance, men and women. While many women decried the deceit and the deep sense of betrayal regarding the whole situation, some men seemed to minimize or almost justify Yancey’s conduct. This probably says more about those men than about Yancey himself. What if the public perpetrator had been a woman? Would those men have extended the sinner the same grace? Ultimately, biased comments display the imperfect and subjective nature of human judgments.
Sin is always sin, but some sins seem to have graver consequences. Some sins are more private, but others seem to have further reach and greater visibility. In a sense, we can say the private sin of an inglorious church member it is not the same as the eight-year mistake of a public speaker, teacher, and author read and followed by millions. Leadership makes a person more responsible for his words and actions, as the story of Moses hitting the rock reminds us (see Num. 20:1-13).
Sin affects not only the sinner but also those around them. In the case of such a public Christian figure as Yancey, it is perhaps difficult to establish how many have been negatively affected by his behavior. His immediate and extended family, his readers, his followers, and even people who did not know about him before he decided to confess come to mind. For a public figure and a leader, open sin has a ripple effect with expansions, tearing down confidence, beliefs, and assumptions in its wake. From Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden, it is the very nature of sin.
As believers we are responsible for the image of God’s character we show to unbelievers. After King David sinned in courting Bathsheba and killing her husband, Uriah, prophet Nathan called him out. But when David confessed, Nathan told him, “The Lord also has put away your sin; you shall not die” (2 Sam. 12:13). But then the prophet added that the king would be punished, “because by this deed you have given great occasion to the enemies of the Lord to blaspheme” (verse 14). Our blunders not only hurt those who are part of the family of faith; they drive unbelievers to distrust God’s character and move away from Him. And that is something that, at least in David’s case, was worthy of heart-wrenching consequences.
To prevent slips, proactive behavior is usually the best way to go. Christian life is not so much about avoiding what is wrong as about focusing on what is right. For those who are married, every day is an opportunity to renew the commitment they made before God and seek for ways to grow together and keep the flame alive. In the school of marriage, from which, to use Ellen White’s words, you are “never in this life to be graduated,”[2] “little attentions and courtesies . . . make up the sum of life’s happiness.”[3] Loyalty is certainly a key component of this conjugal dynamic.
Connection is the key. Connected to God, every one of us can become a source of infinite blessing to those around us and beyond. On the contrary, far from God every one of us can do incalculable harm. Our natural propensity to do what we do not want to do (see Rom. 7:19) can cause deep pain and have long-lasting negative consequences for us and many around us. The key, then, is to keep a relentless connection with the Source of all good. It is as simple and as profound as that.
Yancey certainly needs the grace he so often wrote about. Every one of us needs it too. The good news is that the divine grace offered to all of us is abundant and sufficient. Today is a new opportunity to start again with the help of a power that transcends us. That is what is so amazing about grace!
[1] From The Living Bible, copyright © 1971 by Tyndale House Foundation. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers Inc., Carol Stream, Illinois 60188. All rights reserved.
[2] Ellen G. White, Counsels for the Church (Nampa, Idaho: Pacific Press Pub. Assn., 1991), p. 126.
[3] Ellen G. White, In Heavenly Places (Washington D.C.: Review and Herald Pub. Assn., 1967), p. 206.