Unless you live in a duplex under a rock you've heard about, thought about and talked about the so-called Epstein Files. In a rare act of near unanimity congress voted to direct the Department of Justice to release in thirty days the information it had on the case regarding the dead child sex offender and financier Jeffery Epstein and his accomplice. Only one of the 535 members of congress voted against this bill and the president signed it into law.
There is, and has been for years, much talked about regarding this. The alleged, heinous actions are gross and scandalous. It is no joy of mine to think about rich and powerful people flying to a private island to engage in criminal sexual activity with minors who were scouted and trafficked there.
As a Christian how should we think and talk about this? How should a biblical faith engage with this?
I won't go so far as to say I will offer up the principles to guide us but I would like to propose a way to Christianly respond. I would like to propose three principles that can guide a Christian.
1) This is not political. Don't make it.
I'm saddened to see how this Epstein garbage has been made political. Politicians are likely involved in the darkness of Epstein's crimes, but that doesn't make it political. It will undoubtedly have massive political implications, but that doesn't make it political.
If your heart reacts to this news with a hopefulness that more blues than reds are involved, I think your moral compass is out of whack. If one of the politicians on the side you pull for is involved and you want to ignore it, I think your moral compass is broken. If you are okay with more cover up and strategic delaying of the truth, i fear your moral compass needs repair. Recall the story of the prophet Nathan. Nathan had to call out King David's heinous sexual sin and the deadly coverup that followed it. Nathan didn't reason that David was too good of a king to rock the boat. Nathan didn't consider the military power and economic success of Israel as something worth more than calling his king to repentance for rape, murder and a gross political coverup. Neither should you.
We must think about right and wrong not right and left.
2) God hates this!
You cannot read your Bible and think that God doesn't hate when the rich and powerful abuse and plunder the weak and lowly. You can't read your Bible honestly and think God doesn't burn with wrath over the crimes reported to have been done by this syndicate of sin.
According to Matthew 18:6 Jesus says it would be better for a large millstone to be tied around the neck of these creeps that would sexually violate these girls and then toss the creepos off the so-called "Pedophile Island" and into the sea. It's undeniable that God hates this.
Hell is evidence of God's hatred of sin and Hell itself is a comfort in situations like this. Christopher W. Morgan and Robert A Peterson say that, "... the biblical writers underscore the justice of hell in order to comfort persecuted believers. Indeed, we could speak of the 'comfort of hell.'... hell reassured God's people that ultimately evil and evildoers would be defeated."
If God hates this, you should hate this. Don't become calloused to the disgusting sinfulness of this Epstein crap.
3) Even pedophiles can be saved.
I think in the United States of America in 2025 sex crimes against children is considered more deeply unthinkable than even murder. There's something righteous and burning hot about the rage that bubbles up when we hear about sexual abuse against children. I think this is right and good.
There is probably no class more ostracized and vilified than that of sex offenders.
Don't hear me wrongly. I'm not saying it is Christian to ignore sexual abuse. I'm not by any means saying that the Christian response to this is to preclude firm justice. I'm not saying it's Christian to be foolish and let your children stay overnight at someone on the sex offender registry.
What I am saying is that the Gospel is good news even for the pedophile if he will repent and believe. Jesus' saving work is applicable, even to those that heinously violate children.
"The saying is trustworthy and deserving of full acceptance, that Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners, of whom I am the foremost." 1 Timothy 1:15
Christians, this good news isn't a get out of jail free card. This gospel certainly does not and should not pervert earthly justice. Sex crimes deserve justice. What this good news does is cause us to awe and wonder at how good Jesus is. What this gospel does is provoke us to tell it to all, even those we have a hard time imagining it is for. What the good news of Jesus' propitiatory death on the cross for sins does is demand that we pray for the salvation of sinners, even sinners that we also pray that fair justice lands on.
Don't engage with this Epstein stuff as the non-Christians do. We must be Bible-informed and Gospel-shaped people. So, don't make this excrement political, hate this sin like your Heavenly Father hates it and remember and proclaim that the Gospel extends even to those who sin monstrously today.
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