“Come out of her, my people, so that you will not share in her sins, so that you will not receive any of her plagues.”

 If being in a worldly organization requires one to share in its sins, then one needs to get out—or expect to partake of the plagues. Daniel spent his adult life in Babylon, but did not partake of its sins—even when it meant that he might be fed to the lions (Daniel 6). Daniel’s three companions had similar trials (Daniel 1, 3). It takes a lot of faith to trust God for deliverance in these situations. In our experience, Boy Scouts was about outdoor skills, crafts, knots and following God. We did not contribute any money to the central organization, and we agree there is probably corruption there. But one time, we had the whole local troop of scouts visit our church as part of a “ten commandment hike.”

I took on the fourth commandment and taught them about the Sabbath. We never encountered any of the evil things that you described. On the other hand, people in other areas may have had a very different experience with a scout group—and they never should have joined or left once they were asked to participate in sin.

Jesus taught us that there would always be tares among the wheat—people put into the church by “the enemy”—Satan. (Matthew 13:24-30). This is true of all “Christian” organizations. Following God is not about joining the one true church with the least sin and staying out of everything else. It is about living a righteous life where we are, departing if we have to do so to avoid sin, but not departing simply because somebody else associated with us is sinning. Many other parables mention this intermixing of righteous and unrighteous people: the mustard seed, the woman and leaven, the net, the debtors, the good Samaritan, the fig tree, the supper, the Pharisee and the publican, the pounds, the two sons, two men and two women, the ten virgins, the talents and, the sheep and the goats. Revelation 2 and 3 describe sins in those churches. Christ’s commandment is not to leave, but for the ones who are sinning to repent, and for those who are doing right to keep on doing it.

There are times when God told His people to “serve the king of Babylon” (2 Kings 25:24; Jeremiah 27:12-17; 28:14; 40:9. It was a punishment for unrighteousness, but our nation is full of similar unrighteousness today. Today, evil people have infiltrated our governments, businesses, legal systems, medical practices, religious groups, entertainment media and social organizations. If a person is tempted to sin by their presence in one of those things, then they should do what they can to get out. But that does not mean all believers have to get out of the same groups. I have known Christians who, when they came across evil done in one of these entities, announced that they would not participate in it—even if that meant their departure; when they stood up for good, the whole group departed from the evil. For example, some organization came to our Boy Scout group to recruit young men—but it appeared to have a “spiritual” component that was not biblical. Our family expressed no interest and I do not think anyone else from the group joined. Jesus and the apostles spoke at many synagogues, even though these synagogues were a den for the false teachings of Pharisees. The new Testament has no less than 12 mentions of people of faith who had government jobs or synagogue affiliations—and none of them are told they need to “come out” of those groups (Luke 3:12-14; Matthew 9:18-25; Luke 8;1-3; acts 8:27, 36-37; 10:1-4, 44-47; 13:6-12; 16:33-38; 17:1, 4; 17:11-12; 28:8; Romans 16:21, 23, NIV; Philippians 1:12-13; 4:22). Finally, there was a sect at the time of Christ, known as the Essenes, which believed the leaders at Jerusalem were so corrupt that they should “come out of them”. But God chose not to mention them in the Bible.