Disgraced Pastor Johnny Hunt Claims His Extramarital Encounter ‘Nobody Else’s Business’
Thirteen years ago, disgraced pastor and former SBC president Johnny Hunt engaged in what he describes as a “brief, consensual extramarital encounter,” and what the woman involved maintains was non-consensual sexual assault. His church was never told about the incident and it remained a secret for a decade until it outed in the recent Guidepost investigation.
During our investigation, an SBC pastor and his wife came forward to report that SBC President Johnny Hunt (2008-2010) had sexually assaulted the wife on July 25, 2010. We include this sexual assault allegation in the report because our investigators found the pastor and his wife to be credible; their report was corroborated in part by a counseling minister and three other credible witnesses; and our investigators did not find Dr. Hunt’s statements related to the sexual assault allegation to be credible.
These allegations of sexual assault and revelation of (at the minimum) a “brief, consensual extramarital encounter” caused Hunt’s life and ministry to implode. He lost his job as VP at NAMB, was formally suspended from his position as Pastor Emeritus at First Baptist Church of Woodstock congregation, and was subject to great personal embarrassment.
Though he was quickly ‘restored’ by some friends and now is traveling and preaching on the conference circuit, he nonetheless filed a lawsuit against the SBC and Guidepost, claiming that they defamed and libeled him. Though his primary contention seems to be with the Guidepost resport, that fact that the current SBC president Barb Barber called the woman in question an “abuse survivor” didn’t help matters much, and Hunt is alleging substantial reputation and economic harm, as well as “personal harm and anguish.”
A new report by RNS about the lawsuit explains that Hunt is fired up about having his affair exposed, arguing that he never should have been included.
The heart of Hunt’s claim of invasion of privacy and defamation was summed up in a recent court ruling filed by his attorneys. Hunt’s sins, they wrote, were a private moral failing that should have been kept confidential.
“Pastor Johnny was not the president of the SBC or a member of the Executive Committee at the time of the incident,” they wrote in a memorandum, opposing the denomination’s attempts to have the case dismissed. “He was merely a private citizen whose marital fidelity was nobody else’s business.”
While the Guidepost report is indeed pure trash– an embarrassment that should never exist in its current form, Hunt claims that he’s always taught that “confession should only be as broad as the offense.” He believes that since he “sought forgiveness from those I had offended” and “did my part,” none of this should ever have been made public.
Hunt’s view that his sins as a pastor should be private and not publicly disqualifying is as idiotic as it is unbiblical and makes no sense in light of the scriptural imperatives regarding church discipline and qualifications for an elder.
If that’s what he truly believes, then perhaps he should have been disqualified way before that encounter thirteen years ago.
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Thankfully, he was “quickly restored” – all better : )
Yeah, it’s nobody’s business if pastors want to have extra marital affairs, sheesh.
The nerve!