According to some reports, Shiflet’s sentence does not meet minimum sentencing requirements for the offenses of which he had been convicted, the result of a miscalculation.
Shiflet will be required to register as a sex offender and will remain under supervision for the remainder of his life.
One of Shiflet’s victims spoke with FOX 4, describing how Shiflet groomed and later abused her.
“He slowly treated me more like a girlfriend. As a young teenager, I knew something didn’t feel right. I knew that I felt uncomfortable,” she recalled. “And when he would do different things and touch me in ways that were inappropriate, he would ask me if it was okay. And if I said yes, he would keep doing them. And if I said no, he would ice me out emotionally.”
Expressing frustration with Denton Bible Church’s years-long mishandling of abuse allegations, the survivor further said, “You know what frustrates me the most about this story? Is the number of times we’ve been told, ‘We did not know what to do.’ I don’t have words for that. I don’t think you need a seminary degree to know what to do. You need to do the right thing. Take care of the victims and report to police and CPS.”
Notably, while Shiflet was being sentenced in June of 2021, Denton Bible Church was hosting a conference that very same month to warn Christians about the dangers of “wokeness.” Called “Wokeness & the Gospel,” the conference featured author Owen Strachan, SBC pastor Tom Buck, and Grace to You social media dean Darrell Harrison.
“I have been in the ministry almost 50 years, and [wokeness] is the most insidious and dangerous and pervasive ideology that I have ever seen in all of my life, in all of my ministry,” Nelson said while promoting the conference. “And it is dangerous to the Christian church as well as to our culture.”
A number of Christian leaders and civil rights activists sternly criticized the conference at the time, including Bernice King, daughter of civil rights leader Martin Luther King Jr., who tweeted, “Very telling that instead of a conference on ending racism and white supremacy, there’s this. Christians collectively could do so much to evict racism from society, beginning with churches, fellowships and conventions. Read my father’s ‘Letter from Birmingham Jail.’”
RELATED: ‘Wokeness & the Gospel’ Conference Draws Accusations of ‘Harmful Rhetoric’
ChurchLeaders has reached out to Denton Bible Church for comment and will update this article in the event of their response.
