I figured it out! There is a plugin called ‘Members’ that allows you to make the forum private, then allow certain users to access it and see all the topics.
Here is the link I found on this BBPress Forum with the information.
https://bbpress.org/forums/topic/how-do-you-make-a-private-forum-visible-to-some-wordpress-classes
Hey jaredatch, I see that johnjamesjacoby replied to ticket #1805 that this would be possibly added to a future release? I can’t figure out how to contact him. How can I get an approximate time frame in which this may happen? I have to tell my client something. I am so frustrated as I had to launch their site without the forum and about to have to tell them they can either have it only public or not at all
So does anyone have a resolution to this issue?