Tom Chantry, Molestation, Child Abuse, and Assault Charges, ARBCA
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Back in his heyday, Pastor Tom Chantry was a highly respected commenter at Pyromaniacs blog hosted by various Calvinist dude-bros such as Phil Johnson, Dan Phillips, Frank Turk, et al. We know he has been on trial for child abuse, molestation, and assault charges.
Today, I looked to see if I could find some old comments of Tom Chantry’s on the Pyromaniacs blog. On Google’s first page after searching: Tom Chantry and Pyromaniacs, I came across one of Pyro’s blog posts entitled, Pornographic Divination. Sure enough, Tom responded in the second comment.
Let me tell you a bit about the brief Pyromaniacs post. In the post from August of 2011, Phil Johnson was writing about “preposterous claims, unhinged behavior, and spiritual quackery that are so prominent at the charismatic movement’s lunatic fringe.” He highlighted a creeper (my adjective) pastor, Mark Driscoll, and explained why Driscoll’s “unhinged behavior” is inappropriate, and then posted video of Driscoll. That is the extent of the blog post. Reader comments ensued.
Note how Phil Johnson warns his readers about the content of the video:
The video below features Mark Driscoll, claiming the Holy Spirit regularly gives him graphic visions showing acts of rape, fornicators in flagrante delicto, and sexual child molesters in the very act.
You can watch the video below. Key parts of the video are transcribed below (H/T Pyromaniacs blog post).
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Mark Driscoll: Some people actually see things. This may be gift of discernment. On occasion, I see things. I see things. Uh, like I was meeting with one person and they—they didn’t know this, but they were abused when they were a child. And I said, “When you were a child you were abused. This person did this to you, physically touched you this way.”
Driscoll later claimed he could see detailed sexual scenes in his head:
. . . Some of you when you’re counseling you will see things. I mean you will, you will literally gift of discernment see things. I can’t explain it. It doesn’t happen all the time.
. . . Sometimes your counselee, they will see things. Ye—eh—there’s pa— I found this with people—ok, now let me—I’m gonna ask the demon questions. You tell me what they say.”
“They don’t say anything.”
I say, “What do you hear?”
And they say, “Nothing.” They say, “But I’m seeing stuff.”
“Oh, oh, well tell me. What’s that?”
“I’m seeing—you know when I was little my grandpa molested me. I didn’t know that.”
I said, “Well, let’s not assume it’s true. Go ask your grandfather.”
Grandpa says, “Yyyeah, when you were little I molested you.” Grandpa was assuming they’d be too young to remember. So he’d only molest grand kids up to a certain age. But they saw it.
It’s the supernatural. It’s, it’s, it’s the whole other realm. It’s like the Matrix. You can take the blue pill, you take the red pill. You go into this whole other world. And, and, and that’s the way it works.
So I say—tell me everything you hear, tell me everything you see. And sometimes I see things too. I see things too. I’ve seen women raped. I’ve seen children molested. I’ve seen people abused. I’ve seen people beaten. I’ve seen horrible things done. Horrible things done. I’ve seen children dedicated in occultic groups and demons come upon them as an infant by invitation. And I wasn’t present for any of it, but I’ve seen it visibly.
. . . And there are some people that have real gift of discernment, and I’m not saying I’m a hundred percent always right with it, but some of you are going to have gift of discernment, and you need to—you need to learn to grow in the use of that gift. And sometimes people will hear things. Sometimes people will see things.
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Ok, that is the end of the Pyromaniacs post. Before we get to Tom Chantry’s comment, let me break quickly and catch you up to speed with Chantry’s most recent assault, molestation, and child abuse charges:
- Thomas Chantry was arrested and jailed in December of 2016.
- Tom Chantry recently went to trial and was convicted of aggravated assault.
- While awaiting sentencing on September 28th, 2018 for his crimes against children, Chantry was arrested again on multiple counts stemming from his time as an ARBCA Pastor at Miller Valley Baptist Church.
- Chantry was arrested on a total of nine (9) charges. The counts break down as follows: four (4) counts of aggravated assault, four (4) counts of child molestation and one (1) count of child abuse.
- Tom Chantry is currently being held on a One Million Dollar Cash Bond. (Source: ARBCA.org)
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Here is the beginning of the comment section from Pyromaniacs’ blog post:
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Matt F said…
- Hi Phil,
I’m curious then what you would think of Nathan’s conduct in 2 Samuel 12?
Thanks, Matt
Tom Chantry said…
Matt F,
Please specify the verses in 2 Samuel 12 in which the Holy Spirit played a porno flick in Nathan’s mind in order to enable him to call out David.
When you’re through with that you can take us through the verses in which Nathan preached publicly on the details of David’s tryst with Bathsheba – including details of sexual positions – for the cough spiritual enlightenment of the people of Jerusalem.
When you’re through with that exegetical task, you can perhaps direct us to the public and written confessions of the alleged adulterers, rapists, molesters, and other brutes whom Driscoll’s prophetic gift has led to repentance. Look for something along the lines of Psalm 51.
See, anyone can claim to have a great prophetic story. I could, for instance, go into church next Sunday, relate a lustful dream I had when I was a teenager, and claim that people no one ever heard of had later confessed to doing everything in my dream. I’m sure the teenage boys in my congregation would get a kick out of it, but it wouldn’t prove a thing.
Further down, is Pam’s comment:
Pam said…
God bless Phil for warning us and helping us to be on guard of such “teaching.” Thanks be to God for people like Tom Chantry who use their writing skills to help us. One would think there would be enough things in the Bible for a minister to teach than to tell others about their dreams and fantasies and have the nerve to tell us they came from God. How very tragic. Do not our hearts grieve for our churches today? How do these teachings from this Mark fellow honor Christ and help the sheep who do not have a Shepherd? Thanks, Phil.
Maybe it’s just me, but seeing Tom nonchalantly responding to the commenter after he saw/heard Driscoll talk about physical abuse and child sex abuse (now knowing he has been convicted of similar crimes), makes me sick. I hate abuse. Thank God he has now been exposed and can no longer hurt children. Ugh!
Related links from Todd Wilhelm who has done a stellar job following this case:
Spiritual Sounding Board 
It is very unsettling, creepy, and disturbing when one smarmy pervert (e.g., Chantry) is found to have commented on and condemned another smarmy pervert (e.g., Driscoll) and (cherry on top!) for being a smarmy pervert.
It’s a bit like the very virulent anti-LGBT preachers whose every other sermon contain searing condemnations of homosexuality, who are also later reported in the news having been mugged by a gay dude they met after agreeing to meet for a romp on “Grindr”(gay dating app). (This has actually happened.)
Or it’s like…
The young-ish (usually age 30s / 40s) pastor or worship leader who heads his church’s “sexual purity” classes for youth (or for adult men) who is later to be arrested for having sexually assaulted a teen when in his 20s, or for molesting kids (both have actually happened).
In one of those cases, the perv had even written some booklets that were for sale on his site talking about sexual purity in dating, and how to behave in a car on a date (he assaulted one of his victims while in a car).
It’s like that complementarian Christian guy whose written work complementarian group CBMW used to love to quote, who condemned Christian gender egalitarianism in part because it could (supposedly) lead to homosexuality, who was later found out to have paid a young man to go with him on some trip for some man- on- man hubba-hubba, if you know what I mean (and I don’t mean for games of chess. Unless you mean the chess involved nudity and sexual touching).
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I think there used to be a whole bunch of Chantry comments and articles, one of which I remember somebody (was it that Turk guy?) scrubbing and putting up some sort of ‘shame on you for looking for this article’ comment in its place. These people are wild.
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Oh yea, I remember that!
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It is a mystery to me how these men in ministry makes claims of having a gift if discernment, They describe seeing sexual acts/abuse in parishioners.
So how is it that they never claim to see sexual perversion or acts of domestic violence in lives of other ministers, teachers, who claim to be doing the work if God.
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Julie Anne,
please check your e-mail. I just sent you two e-mails I’d appreciate you taking a look at.
Thank you.
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Regarding Driscoll, I’d personally have expected someone to sue if he got it wrong. I guess that’s what the deliberate ambiguity is for, eh?
Regarding Chantry and his views, apart from the obvious issue of whether we ought to be cessationist or continuationist/pentacostal, it does strike me that the Prophets did indeed give some fairly earthy descriptions of the idolatry engaged in by Israel. The question is whether many of those actually involve physical fornication of the kind “revealed” by Driscoll. Given that many of the false gods were fertility gods, I think it’s almost assured that some of those descriptions describe idolatry and fornication simultaneously.
But regarding both of them, for me it’s a lot like watching Notre Dame play USC. It’s all I can do not to cheer for injuries, as both parties have stunk up the place. would ya please just shut up for a while, Mark & Tom? Thanks!
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A man like Tom Chantry is living two lives. The private one, where he indulges his heinous urges, and the public one, where he plays the persona of a good person. I bet that sometimes a person like this gets carried away with their false good persona. It’s not enough to just pretend to be a normal man, they have to take it further- become a religious leader, an example of piety, speak out and take a stand against the very person they are in private, become extreme in their religiosity. I wonder how many of his colleagues, his supporters and friends are also hiding a private self?
How do people get like this? Do they grow up in families where this is practiced?
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PS Driscoll really is unhinged, IMO. He has a one track mind. He makes a great foil, though, doesn’t he? A person can point at Driscoll and make himself look pretty normal in comparison.
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@Celeste:
If you’re talking “Deep Throat” Driscoll and his Pornovisions From God, it’s obvious to everyone outside the bubble that these were his own sexual fantasies and paraphiliae being given Respectable form.
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@BikeBubba:
And actually get out of the 24/7 spotlight?
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