Southern Baptist Convention is being investigated by the Department of Justice

An Oklahoma preacher said a U.S. Department of Justice investigation of the nation's largest Protestant denomination is "not something to fear."

The Rev. Mike Keahbone, a member of the Southern Baptist Convention's Executive Committee, voiced his thoughts on social media Friday as news reports about the DOJ's investigation began circulating. Keahbone, senior pastor of First Baptist Church of Lawton, was recently named to the Southern Baptist Convention's new Abuse Reform Implementation Task Force by the denomination's president the Rev. Bart Barber.

"The DOJ investigation of the SBC is not something to fear," Keahbone said Friday evening in a tweet.

"If there are crimes, there needs to be justice. The heart of the messengers in 2021 was repentance, restoration, and reform. If there is more work to do, we will do it."

The Southern Baptist Convention's Executive Committee was informed that the Department of Justice had begun an investigation into the denomination that will encompass "multiple SBC entities," according to a joint statement released Friday by Barber and leaders of Southern Baptist Convention entities. The leaders said they would cooperate with the investigation, according to their statement published in a news report by Baptist Press, the Southern Baptist Convention's official news outlet.

“Our commitment to cooperate with the Department of Justice is born from our demonstrated commitment to transparently address the scourge of sexual abuse,” the denomination's leaders said in their statement.

More:Southern Baptists call for transparency at first annual gathering after of abuse report release

“While we continue to grieve and lament past mistakes related to sexual abuse, current leaders across the SBC have demonstrated a firm conviction to address those issues of the past and are implementing measures to ensure they are never repeated in the future. The fact that the SBC Executive Committee recently completed a fully transparent investigation is evidence of this commitment.”

The statement referred to a revealing independent report released in May that gave details about several executive committee leaders downplaying and covering up sexual abuse allegations made against ministers and other individuals associated with Southern Baptist churches across the country. The report also noted that a "secret" database of predator preachers was kept even as some Executive Committee members said such an archive could not be created and shared between Baptist churches because of the autonomy of the denomination's affiliated houses of worship.

Keahbone, who has served on the denomination's executive committee for one year, emerged last fall as one of the more outspoken members of the group, calling for transparency among the faith group's leaders. He also has been a champion for sexual abuse survivors who came forward over the years, only to be maligned and discredited by some in denominational leadership positions.

The Southern Baptist Convention has been grappling with scandal stemming from leaders' mishandling of sexual abuse cases since the Houston Chronicle and San Antonio Express News released a bombshell investigative series called "Abuse of Faith" in 2019.

With a reckoning at hand, delegates called "messengers" from Southern Baptist churches and affiliates around the country gathered in 2021 for the denomination's annual meeting and voted to hire an outside group to conduct a report on how the Southern Baptist Convention's Executive Committee had handled sexual abuse allegations over a period roughly from 2000 to 2020.

This past June, just a month after the release of the independent sexual abuse report, messengers gathered for the denomination's annual meeting in Anaheim, California, and voted to implement reform measures. Most notably, the group gave its approval for the creation of a denomination-wide "Ministry Check" website that will include information about accused and convicted sexual predators. The denomination's messengers also voted to create the Abuse Reform Implementation Task Force that will oversee reforms like the Ministry Check database, among other things.

“While so many things in the world are uncertain, we can be certain that we serve a mighty God," the denomination's leaders said Friday in their joint statement regarding the Department of Justice investigation.

"Nothing, including this investigation, takes Him by surprise. We take comfort in that and humbly ask you be in prayer in the days and weeks ahead. Specifically, we ask God to grant wisdom and discernment to each person dealing with the investigation,” they said in the statement.

This article originally appeared on Oklahoman: Department of Justice investigating Southern Baptist Convention