A MESSAGE TO THE CHURCH FROM STEWART MENELAWS

-Statement-

I have been asked to make a statement regarding the recent shameful witness that began well and truly at the feet of Jacob Prasch and his uncontrolled temper.

Despite my wife having been threatened and slandered by email some time before my interview with David Nathan, (which was an astonishing shock), I wrote to Jacob Prasch (someone I have respectfully advised, prayed for and supported for many years) to meet with me in private. He refused (despite his bold rant saying he would debate me to his followers) and sent various emails that were disparaging, disrespectful and filled with falsehoods. It was clear there was no reasoning with this abusive figure (which I attested to David Lister) and The Lord tells us not to converse with divisive individuals.

My only recourse was to submit myself to God fearing Saints who along with myself set apart weeks of prayer before addressing Prasch/Moriel in accordance with Matthew 18.15-17. I was deeply troubled in spirit as many can testify and desired to see repentance and reconciliation. My beautiful wife who is well known for her charity and commitment to the Saviour was being slandered in a nature that was utterly vile and I had to keep my heart right and allow The Father to tie my hands and trust in Him.

Everything done to try and get Prasch to face this situation (in private) has been met with bullishness and arrogance of a type that is utterly disgraceful even in the eyes of non-believers. In all my 30+ years of service I have never witnessed anything like it even from cult groups.

For more than 30 years, my wife and I have served our Lord Jesus Christ and His Body at great cost (and He alone knows this) and it has grieved us greatly to have witnessed many believer’s lives destroyed by other’s sin and covered up by leadership and fearful congregations.

As called by The Lord - we have a great deal of experience in this area of gently helping spiritually abused people find their way back to the safe arms of The Father. Under no circumstance will we be a party to covering up the sin Prasch / Moriel have avoided to face up to, which has left a trail of victims.

The LORD has made it clear and there is no other way…
If a malicious witness takes the stand to accuse someone of a crime, 17 the two people involved in the dispute must stand in the presence of the LORD before the priests and the judges who are in office at the time. 18 The judges must make a thorough investigation, and if the witness proves to be a liar, giving false testimony against a fellow Israelite, 19 then do to the false witness as that witness intended to do to the other party. You must purge the evil from among you. 20 The rest of the people will hear of this and be afraid, and never again will such an evil thing be done among you. (Deuteronomy 19:16-20)

Jacob Prasch must own up and put right the damage he alone is responsible for, as misguided zeal cannot justify his deplorable actions. Many people have written privately to him to that effect, hoping he would seek The Lord and do what is right. To date he has continued and also sanctions the slander of God fearing ministries and what is worst of all - he bullies and dishonours women because he is a coward.

Since the call to be accountable for his actions was rejected, the letter went out to a wider group of the church in-line with scripture asking all leaders to contact me for further information and discussion. I heard from a number of leaders who agreed but wanted to remain nameless for fear of having their names blasted all over social media as is Prasch’ s way.

Deborah has had to put public posts on Facebook in reply to numerous messages. Of course it is improper to bring such situations into the public domain but it was Moriel who took it into that realm themselves leaving no way of recourse since direct responses are never shared by Moriel. We have numerous records and accounts from around the world and we have not made any of them public, despite continuous false allegations that we are paying people to make nasty films about Jacob / Moriel. So we have indeed been restrained in the hope that given time, Godly sorrow would lead to repentance.

Please be assured, that if my secular production company were to make a film, there will be no doubt about who made it. At present I am involved in far more important and far reaching works for The Lord.

To date – every twisted piece of rhetoric regarding myself and my God fearing wife has been completely false and slanderous. I have offered leadership to come and visit us at our studio so that they may prayerfully see the facts, ask any questions and be encouraged by the breadth of work our hard working team are involved in.

Not only has no supporter of Moriel taken me up on this, they don’t even have the decency or courage to contact me directly. I am a very busy person but I am easy to contact and more than willing to take time with those who genuinely desire to walk upright with the Saviour.

For those immature in the faith who think that everything can be swept under the carpet because you think the name of Christ is being brought into disrepute, do not be fooled by such sentiment. It is The Lord who demands wickedness to be uncovered / exposed in accordance with His Holy Word.

The danger of leaving cancerous rot to continue its course is fatal. And while cancer can go into remission and make it look as though it has disappeared – it’s only a matter of time before it continues its march of death on the body.

For every leader who believes they have been called of The Lord – we will all be held accountable for covering sin. Correction is one thing, but spiritual abuse and false testimony are completely different.

I repeat, I certainly welcome any examination of our service before The Lord as we have nothing to hide and everything to share.

And in regard to the challenges David Nathan faced, we asked him to travel from South Africa to Scotland where we and other pastors examined the accusations for 4 days in which he gave a good account. David knew he needed to amend those areas of concern where required and to explain himself to others, which he was more than willing to do – and did do.
The way he was treated was disgraceful.

Let me ask you a question. If you wanted to repent and put right anything you may have done wrong, and you wrote many letters explaining these things, asking to meet and to be given a fair hearing, but you received no response… you are denied the right to repent and put things right. In fact, you are vilified time and time again without recourse. How would you feel? That is what was done to David Nathan and the dated email trail bears witness to this.

But that is what bullies and cult groups do. They control communication, they want to debate, but only if there is a camera there to film it all so they can show off.

I will not be a party to a cover-up of these many disgraces and repeat the words of our brother the apostle Paul –
Therefore I want men everywhere to pray, lifting up Holy Hands, without anger or dissension. (1 Timothy 2:8)

Please share freely with believers.