Max Lucado, Joakim Lundqvist will continue to serve as interim Gateway Church pastors

By Leonardo Blair, Senior Reporter Wednesday, January 15, 2025

Gateway Church interim teaching pastor, Joakim Lundqvist. | YouTube/Gateway Church

Gateway Church in Southlake, Texas, is expected to keep Max Lucado and Joakim Lundqvist as interim teaching pastors as the search for a permanent executive pastor continues after founder Robert Morris' hurried exit from the church last June amid allegations of child sex abuse.

"Gateway Church is actively searching for a new pastor. Joakim Lundqvist and Max Lucado will continue to serve in their roles as teaching pastors while Gateway searches for the right candidate to lead us as executive pastor," Gateway Church officials said in a statement to WFAA Tuesday.

Lundqvist served as senior pastor of Word of Life Church in Sweden for several years before moving to serve at Bethany Church in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, where he is currently based.

Lucado, a bestselling Christian author, serves as teaching pastor at Oak Hills Church in San Antonio, Texas, in addition to his work with Gateway Church.

It remains unclear how long Gateway Church's search for a permanent executive pastor will continue.

Although he was initially asked to help at Gateway until December 2024, Lundqvist said in a message to congregants earlier this month that elders asked him to keep working with the church until June.

"You know, initially, I committed to staying behind here and being with you all for this year and to the end of the year (2024), which is pretty much now, but I was asked to extend," Lundqvist said on Jan. 6.

"So Maria and I are actually going to be spending the whole spring with you all until the end of June, and I and I just want to let you know Gateway family that when the elders asked, it was one of the easiest decisions I've ever made because we love this house and we sense the presence of God upon this church," he added.

Max Lucado is an interim teaching pastor at Gateway Church in Texas. | YouTube/Gateway Church

Elders brought in Lundqvist and Lucado to serve as interim teaching pastors after Robert Morris' son, James Morris, who stepped in to fill his father's role of leader of the megachurch, stepped down just over a month later with his wife Bridgette, as elders worked the address the child sex abuse scandal.

Last June, Cindy Clemishire, 54, reported that Robert Morris began sexually abusing her on Christmas Day in 1982 when she was just 12 years old, several years before the launching of Gateway Church in 2000. She says the abuse continued for four-and-a-half years before others found out. But Morris was later allowed to return to ministry.

When questioned about the allegations by The Christian Post, Morris only confessed to being involved in "inappropriate sexual behavior with a young lady" more than 35 years ago. He said he repented and was restored to ministry.

Clemishire insisted to CP, however, that she was no young lady when Morris abused her.

"I was 12 years old. I was a little girl. A very innocent little girl. And he was brought into our home. He and his wife, Debbie, and their little boy, Josh, trusted and preached at the church that my dad helped start and then began grooming all of us to do this, which took me decades to wrap my brain around as an adult," she said.

The scandal led Pastor Robert Morris Ministries to cancel "all future radio and television broadcasts." The church also commissioned an independent investigation that saw the removal of multiple elders. James Morris has since started his own ministry.

Church leaders also pledged to join the Evangelical Council for Financial Accountability and undergo a forensic audit of their financials following the filing of a class action lawsuit alleging leaders misappropriated millions of dollars in tithes meant for global missions.