In a scene reminiscent of a Serena Waterford speech from Margaret Atwood’s dystopian depiction of totalitarian patriarchy in The Handmaid’s Tale, Dallas megachurch pastor Josh Howerton and his fellow elders allowed a woman to preach on Mother’s Day.
If you’re a complementarian, that’s likely where the scandal begins and ends since women are supposedly required to remain silent in church and are not to usurp authority over a man. Unfortunately for the women of Lakepointe Church, it appears to be part of a strategy to dismiss concerns about abuse and consolidate the elders’ power.
Howerton hailed her “The Hispanic Hammer” on a follow-up podcast conversation about her sermon, while bursting into laughter. Pamela Baltazar opened her message by saying, “It is such an honor to come under the fathers of this house — our pastors, our elders — to bring a message especially for the ladies of Lakepointe on this special day.”
Under the fathers of this house?
As Waterford and the women of Atwood’s Gilead would say, “Under his eye.”
It sounds similar to language Howerton himself used recently to describe Carlos Erazo, his podcast co-host, as a “son of the house.”
If this sounds like the language of a cult, perhaps it would help to learn more about who these leaders are.
Unfortunately, the identity of the Lakepointe Church elders is unclear because the leadership page on their website is password protected. What kind of church puts a password protection on their leadership page?
A Google search for Baltazar’s name produces a promising link to a page on Lakepointe’s website, but when you click through you get a 404 error saying that page doesn’t exist. It clearly did exist at one point.
However, Right Now Media gives us a hint on its website that is not password protected: “Born and raised in Mexico, Pamela Baltazar moved to the United States with her husband to work with the Hispanic community in the DFW area. Working full time in ministry since she was 17 years old, she has served in many different areas but has always had a passion to teach and encourage others. As part of the teaching team of Lakepointe Church en Español, she’s had the opportunity to preach in different platforms. She’s a pastor’s wife and a mom of two boys.”
However much Lakepoint tries to obfuscate the identity of its staff, what’s clear is whoever these leaders are, they’re the ones with the authority who are wielding a woman they call “the Hispanic Hammer” on Mother’s Day to get a message about abuse and authority across to the women of Lakepointe.
The timing is worth wondering about.
Church hurt and social media
One might imagine a sermon designed for the women on Mother’s Day in a conservative evangelical church could have something to do with being a “biblical woman,” a Proverbs 31 woman or about motherhood. But instead, this message was about “church hurt.”
“The church has never been perfect,” Baltazar said. “The idea that the church is now worse than ever is a lie. We have always had the same issues. There’s nothing new under the sun. We just didn’t have social media to hear all about it.”
During a follow-up podcast discussion about her sermon with Josh and Jana Howerton, Carlos Erazo and Baltazar, Erazo said, “It seems to me that church hurt — is it more of a thing in the past 10, 15 years? Or has it always been and it’s because of social media that more people are talking about it?”
Josh Howerton
“I think it has a lot to do with social media,” Baltazar replied.
Earlier, in her sermon, she advised Lakepointe women: “Don’t bash the church. Don’t go on social media saying everything that is wrong with the church. We’re supposed to rule the world with Christ someday. And what we do is to go out to the world to vent our problems within the church. We’re fighting each other in front of the world to see.” Then she added, “When you go publicly trashing the church, you’re hurting the whole church.”
So the basis of her being allowed to talk is the authority of Lakepointe’s fathers, while the goal of her talk seems to be to deal with these social media distractions related to church hurt among Lakepointe women so they can “rule the world” with Jesus someday. It feels like damage control over their own online image in the service of power.
In the two hours of content between Baltazar’s sermon and the podcast conversation, no examples are offered of legitimately criticizing the church on social media. Instead, comparing someone criticizing the church to someone criticizing his wife, Howerton said, “Man, if you love me but cuss her, I punch you. That’s how that triangle works.”
While he likely would claim he was speaking metaphorically and making a joke to a general audience, that’s quite a choice of words when discussing a sermon that was “especially for the ladies of Lakepointe.”
Church hurt and the mental health movement
Another topic in their crosshairs is mental health.
On the podcast, Baltazar claimed the “mental health movement … has infiltrated the church. I think we’re too aware of our feelings all the time.”
“It’s pretty new, like it hasn’t been forever and we have used these big terms like ‘spiritual abuse’ and ‘narcissism,’” she continued. “We’re just focusing on ourselves. We have become weaker instead of stronger because of the mental health movement.”
“We have become weaker instead of stronger because of the mental health movement.”
During her sermon, she brought up the “famous mental health movement,” mentioned terms like clinical depression, OCD and anxiety and warned, “We play with big words just based in temporary feelings.” Then she lamented “Unfortunately, this trend has infiltrated the church.”
In contrast to “the famous mental health movement” that uses “big terms,” Lakepointe offers a counseling service, where they recommend books by the likes of James Dobson, Francis Chan, Josh McDowell, Dave Ramsey, John Eldredge, Kevin Leman and Dave Harvey.
Blaming women through selective appeals to unity
For the Lakepointe women who choose to criticize the church or appeal to their own mental health on social media, Baltazar said, “You realize that you are the church, right? It’s not, ‘The church should do this’ or ‘Why don’t the church do that?’ The real question is, ‘Why don’t you do it?’”
“You cannot separate yourself from the church,” she claimed. “You cannot point your finger and say, ‘The church is.’” Instead, “It should be, ‘We are.’ When you criticize the church, you’re actually criticizing yourself. It means that you are part of what is wrong with it.”
Ironically, later in her sermon when she gives three practical words of instruction, she contradicts herself by suggesting that people “separate the person from the church and the church from God.”
Howerton echoes this point in the podcast conversation by saying: “The church didn’t hurt you. Six people in your church hurt you.”
So when anyone criticizes the church, they can’t be separated from the church and thus the blame falls on them. But if the church does happen to be guilty of what Lakepointe’s pastors would admit to be real abuse, then they can be separated from the church and thus the church doesn’t have to be held accountable.
The result of this logic is essentially: “It’s your fault. We’re the judges of abuse. And we can’t be held accountable.”
Church with a ‘dad bod’
But what about people leaving the church over something the Lakepointe fathers would evaluate as real abuse? Howerton said during the podcast, “If you walked into a YMCA and there was a guy with a dad bod wearing … a pair of Jordans and it like literally says ‘Jordan’ on the shoes and the dude, he can’t make a jumper, he can’t make a layup, he’s dribbling off his ankles. Are you gonna all of a sudden reject Michael Jordan because the guy that was bearing his name played bad?”
He surmised, “It’s the same thing when a person that’s a Christian represents Christ very poorly.”
In case its not clear to Lakepointe’s password-protected pastors, the concerns being brought forward about abuse in the church today aren’t about men with dad bods wearing Jordans at the gym and not knowing how to dribble.
“To compare abusers in the church today to men with dad bods is ignorant and offensive.”
To compare abusers in the church today to men with dad bods is ignorant and offensive. Setting aside concerns related to body shaming, men with dad bods are not analogous to abusers. And abusers are not simply like men with dad bods. Abusers are perpetrators of violence.
Treating abuse as a disclaimer, while protecting authority
Of course, if Lakepointe’s password-protected pastors were to read this article, I can imagine them arguing that Baltazar’s sermon and Howerton’s follow-up podcast both said they weren’t talking about cases of actual abuse, but of perceived abuse. And that’s true.
But there’s a difference between a disclaimer and a central focus in a sermon. Any mention of real abuse in these two conversations is relegated to a disclaimer that quickly gets passed over in order to emphasize the main point about submitting to church authority without talking negatively on social media.
So many of the examples they give are about church leaders confronting their members over sin, and then the members getting upset and falsely labeling it as abuse.
By framing abuse in these dismissive ways, they set themselves up as both the authorities on what constitutes abuse and as the victims of abuse.
They talk about how pastors feel like they never can win, how church members need to apologize to their pastors, how saying negative things about the leadership is persecuting Jesus, how members should honor the pastors, and how the sheep bite.
I’m sure it’s difficult to be a pastor. But remember who we’re dealing with here. These are the men who told the women in their congregation last year to give their dishonorable husbands crowns in hopes that they’ll become kings. These are the pastors who told the men to be the military heads of their families. And we’re supposed to feel sorry for the men?
Howerton said, “One of the more common forms of abuse is abuse of the word abuse.” And he added, “Sometimes what that is, is again an emotionally manipulative person trying to make you feel guilty for having correct judgment about incorrect actions.”
The men of Lakepointe Church will not be judged for having incorrect judgment.
“The men of Lakepointe Church will not be judged for having incorrect judgment.”
Women’s priority is the home
It takes Baltazar’s entire sermon and then 56 minutes into the follow-up podcast before they begin addressing something that sounds like Mother’s Day. To this point, the Lakepointe women have mainly just been corrected for talking about church hurt and undermining the authority of the pastors.
So what role do women have?
“Let me be really clear,” Howerton said. “The Bible does not teach that a woman, wife, mother’s place is the home. It teaches her priority is the home.”
If that’s not really clear, Howerton attempts to clarify by saying it’s not a sin for women to work outside the home. But then he adds, “Everything in our culture is trying to sell women on the lie that actually what would make you most happy is prioritizing everything except your home, prioritizing career and travel and girl boss.”
If that’s still not clear, Lakepointe shared a “glam bot” Mother’s Day reel with the slogan, “Godly moms don’t just pray, we slay!” The video depicts Lakepointe women doing laundry, caring for a baby, using a broom and dustpan, and doing dishes while tossing their hair in slow motion. It also depicts one woman sitting at a desk, who happens to work for Howerton. The purpose was “to show how glamorous they always look doing everything!!”
A church’s online image
Why would the Lakepointe elders want to discourage negative talk about the church and references to mental health on Mother’s Day?
Lakepointe is no stranger to controversy online. So it could be a number of things. In addition to Howerton’s controversies last year about his sexually coercive jokes from the pulpit and his promotion of the Stronger Men’s Conference, Howerton also drew fire and became defensive when he was worshiping at the White House and taking pictures with Trump’s Tesla at the end of April. And Lakepointe church members allegedly upset their pastors over the last couple of weeks because they were talking online about Lakepointe firing an employee with Down Syndrome who was much beloved by the congregation.
But another controversy has been brewing online due to a former Lakepointe Church youth volunteer named Natalie Sorrells who was sentenced to five years in prison on two charges of indecency with child sexual conduct.
According to Fox 4 News, “Sorrells previously served as a volunteer at Lakepointe Church in Rockwall.”
Sorrells originally was charged after the 13-year-old victim’s mother discovered text messages from Sorrells in which Sorrells called the boy “babe.” According to Law & Crime, “Weeks later the boy told his mom that Sorrells had molested him.” The child told the police it happened on multiple occasions.
Law & Crime reports, “The victim also reportedly told investigators that Sorrells’ husband called during one of the encounters asking if she was cheating on him. The victim also alleged Sorrells often bought tobacco and alcohol for him and his friends.”
Although she was a youth volunteer at Lakepointe while committing these sexual crimes multiple times against a 13-year-old, Lakepointe leadership said in a statement after her arrest: “We were informed last week that one of our volunteer youth workers was arrested for illegal sexual contact with a minor. While it is our current understanding that no inappropriate activity occurred on church premises, at any church event, and that the minor involved was not under the direct leadership of the volunteer, out of an abundance of caution we immediately informed Lakepointe parents, restricted the volunteer from any access to minors at the church and removed her from her volunteer position.”
Her sentencing was on Thursday, May 8 — three days before Mother’s Day.
If there’s one thing Lakepointe’s pastors seem to be primarily concerned about in all this, it’s their image online. So password-protected pastors used Mother’s Day to do damage control for their brand by unleashing who they call, “the Hispanic Hammer.”
What’s equally interesting is whether Lakepointe — one of the nation’s largest churches — will now come under scrutiny by the Southern Baptist Convention for allowing a woman to preach. Other churches have been expelled for less. Even while echoing the SBC’s belief in the power of male hierarchy.
Rick Pidcock is a 2004 graduate of Bob Jones University, with a bachelor of arts degree in Bible. He’s a freelance writer based in South Carolina and a former Clemons Fellow with BNG. He completed a master of arts degree in worship from Northern Seminary. He is a stay-at-home father of five children and produces music under the artist name Provoke Wonder. Follow his blog at www.rickpidcock.com.
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