Jerry Lee Clemishire

What He Did

In 1982, Jerry Lee Clemishire welcomed a young traveling evangelist named Robert Morris into his Oklahoma home for Christmas. Morris was a family friend. The Clemishires treated him “like another cousin.” They let him stay with them when he was leading youth revivals nearby.

He was abusing their twelve-year-old daughter the entire time. For four and a half years.

When Cindy finally told her father, in or around 1987, Jerry did exactly what a Christian father is supposed to do. He went to the man's pastor — the lead pastor at Shady Grove Church — and confronted him directly. According to public reporting, Jerry told the pastor that Morris had to get out of ministry, or he would call the sheriff.

Morris stepped down for two years.

Then he came back. He went on to found Gateway Church, which became one of the ten largest congregations in America. He counseled presidents. He wrote books. He built an empire.

Decades later, in 2024, when Cindy went public, Morris claimed that Jerry Clemishire had given his blessing for Morris to return to ministry. Cindy responded plainly: My father never ever gave his blessing on Robert returning to ministry. My father told him he's lucky he didn't kill him.

Today, Jerry Clemishire is named as a co-plaintiff with his daughter in a defamation lawsuit against Gateway Church and its elders. He is, by every available indicator, still in the gap with her. Forty years after the first conversation. Robert Morris pleaded guilty to five felony counts of child sexual abuse in October 2025.

Why It Belongs Here

This is the watchman's post in its hardest possible form.

The watchman in Ezekiel 33 is supposed to see the threat and warn the household. Jerry Clemishire did not see the threat in 1982. The threat was a charming young preacher his family loved. The threat was inside the house. The threat was sleeping in the guest room.

That is a thing every Christian father has to face. The wolf in the henhouse rarely looks like a wolf. He looks like a friend.

What Jerry did, when he finally saw it, is the part of the story most fathers fail at. He did not minimize. He did not protect the man's reputation. He did not bury it for the sake of the church or the family or the family friend. He went and confronted, and he made an immediate, concrete demand — get out of ministry, or I call the sheriff.

Then, in the decades since, when his daughter wanted to tell the truth in public, he stood with her. When the abuser's machine tried to recast the assault as a “relationship,” he put his name on the lawsuit. When the world tried to forget, he refused to let it.

“Son of man, I have made you a watchman for the house of Israel; therefore hear a word from My mouth, and give them warning from Me.” Ezekiel 33:7

Standing watchman is not a moment. It is a life. Jerry Clemishire stood watchman in 1987 when most fathers would have made it go away. He is still standing watchman in 2025. Forty years.

That is the testimony.

Forty years still standing in the gap.

This profile honors Jerry Lee Clemishire's public actions on behalf of his daughter and draws from public news reporting and court filings. He has not been contacted for or endorsed this article. If he or his family would prefer the profile amended or removed, please contact the site.