This passage talks about how to do church discipline on a sinning brother or sister—a very important passage on church discipline. I see it as providential for us. We have been wanting to do a study on Reformed church constitution; one of the important articles is about church discipline. For a few months, I wanted to teach you that chapter, so now I thought I will use Matthew’s passage today as an introduction, talk broadly about church discipline, and next week we can look in detail at the passage before us.
So this will be like a doctrinal teaching on CD. We will cover that under four headings:
- Necessity: Why do we need church discipline?
- Goal: What is the goal of church discipline?
- Process: How should we do the church discipline?
- Authority: With what authority should we do the church discipline?
Four points: Need, Goal, Manner, Authority. Today, two and next week, two.
So today, we will cover the need and purpose/goal. Why this is important: nowadays, generally most churches don’t practice CD. Places like India find it very rare. Many think church discipline is considered ancient, outmoded in our day. We may also think, “Oh, we are all sinners, why do we need to point someone out?” Especially when someone does wrong, we cannot be involved in confronting people for their personal sins, let alone tell the whole church the evil they have done publicly. “Oh no, that is difficult. We have to be loving.” Then the next step, remove them from the church, don’t give them communion, looks cruel. This all seems very difficult to handle in our current mindset.
Church discipline is a controversial topic. Most places people don’t practice, and when they practice, they abuse it with selfish motives. The abuse of church/pastoral authority—Roman Catholic (RC) and traditional and even Pentecostal churches remove anyone who questions them, challenges them in the name of CD. Even most Baptist and Brethren churches, if the whole church may be Arminian, believing heresy, and someone comes to biblical Reformed truth by self-study and talks to them, they use church discipline to remove them. That has happened to some who have come and joined our church.
All this comes from two reasons. Firstly, people don’t understand the great need of CD, and many see it as cruel. On the other side, they don’t understand the aim of the church discipline; it is not to shut people’s mouth, or throw someone out. Two problems: people don’t realize the need and purpose of CD. That is why today we will look at the need and aim of the church discipline. Next week, we can look at the manner and with what authority we should practice church discipline.
I. Necessity of Church Discipline
In the midst of all wrong understanding, and while we also secretly want to avoid it, we all need to thoroughly understand the absolute need for church discipline. I am going to give you two reasons as to why we need church discipline:
- Christ solemnly commands it.
- The Church very much needs it.
1. Christ Solemnly Commands It
Notice these verses. The imperatives in the words of Christ to His church (Verses 15-17): “If your brother sins, go and show him his fault in private… but if he does not listen to you, take one or two more with you… if he refuses to listen to them, tell it to the church; and if he refuses to listen even to the church, let him be to you as a Gentile and a tax collector.”
In a series of five imperatives or commands, Jesus directs the church to engage one another in discipline. These are active terms: “go, show, take, tell,” and finally, “let him be.” And you will notice that He does not limit this to the elders, pastors, or deacons of the church. He begins with the singular, “you,” and moves to the plural body of believers, “the church,” so that ultimately, the church as a whole has the responsibility to be involved in disciplining its members.
First, Christ commands it. Christ, who said earlier “if your hand or leg causes you to sin, cut it, and [if] your eye causes you to sin, pluck it out,” He desires that his church be pure and holy, and when we see sin, he wants us to act. If we don’t obey Christ’s command, we as a church sin, and terrible consequences come from disobedience to this command. How will Christ bless a sinning church?
If this were the only occasion that church discipline was mentioned, it would be enough. But we see Christ, through the Spirit and his word, repeated this command in the entire NT in Acts and the epistles. In Acts 5, he killed Ananias with Sapphira on the spot for lying in the church. We see Paul addressing a number of New Testament churches, giving instructions on discipline. He told the Roman Christians to watch out for those causing dissensions in the church, and to “turn away from them” (16:17). He rebuked the Corinthians for tolerating immorality among their members, and to immediately take action in disciplining the particular member, realizing that “a little leaven leavens the whole lump of dough” (1 Corinthians 5:6). The Thessalonians were warned to deal with those that did not obey the apostolic instruction in Paul’s epistle—lazy, not working, disorderly—and not to even associate with such a one (2 Thessalonians 3:14). Paul instructed Timothy in his pastoral charge in Ephesus to publicly rebuke spiritual leaders that refused to repent of sin (1 Timothy 5:19-20). On the island of Crete, Titus received instruction to “reject a factious man after a first and second warning” (Titus 3:10-11).
Revelation 1 reveals Christ in a glorified state now, and what do we see? Where is he? He is in the midst of seven lampstands, which are symbolic for his churches in the world. What is He doing in the midst of the church? He performs his ministry as Prophet, Priest, [and] King, ministering to the church and sanctifying the church and keeping the church pure. He has “feet of bronze,” ready to trample out sin and speak a word of judgment when he sees sin in the church. His “eyes [are] like a flame of fire”—like a laser light. His omniscient eyes are penetrating, piercing, looking for sin in the heart and lives of his church, and when he sees sin, he wants his church to deal with it. He is Lord of the church, ruling the church. He works through his word and Spirit and keeps his church pure. In addition to that, the Lord has ordained church discipline as a means to keep his church pure. He commands it.
Five of the letters to the churches of Asia Minor in Revelation 2-3 contain rebukes and upbraiding of the churches. Some of the churches had tolerated false teaching and immoral behavior—having failed in church discipline—so they received the terrible rebukes of Jesus Christ (Rev 2-3). The Revelation 2 and 3 warning should teach us, “When discipline leaves a church, Christ goes with it.” The horrible danger of neglecting CD: He leaves the church where he doesn’t see church discipline. What happens if he leaves? Then we are just a dead church that will soon be scattered or become a synagogue of Satan. That is one danger that we must avoid at all costs.
Why do we need church discipline? Firstly, Christ solemnly commands it. Disobeying him has terrible consequences.
2. The Church Very Much Needs CD
What is one main reason why churches are so dead today? Why is there no life, no power, and weak or no influence in the churches to the world? Why have, like our confession says, many churches which were once Christ’s church become synagogues of Satan today? Why there is not much difference between the church and the world today? What is the reason why churches have become a mockery among heathens today? Churches are sick, weak, and many are dead. Do you realize it is because of the lack of church discipline? Do we realize if we also don’t take CD seriously, we will become like that? The Church very much needs CD for two reasons:
a. To Avoid God’s Direct Punishment on the Church
The very meaning of “church” is “called out, separated ones from the sinful world.” We are saved to be sanctified. The entire Bible is filled with God’s will and desire that we, his people, his church, be holy and pure: “Be ye holy for I am holy.” He has called the church to represent Him in the world as his body. It can do that only when the church is holy. God is very concerned about it, and he expects we should be concerned about it.
Do we as a church realize how much we need church discipline for us to be holy? I was serious thinking: the problem with us is we preach about sin, preach about holiness, preach the Bible, but where is the church discipline or framework for us to practice that? There is no point in preaching against sin so much in our sermons, and not do anything about sin when we face sin in the church or any believer’s life. We say “Bible authority, sufficiency, finality, [and] infallible,” and just give lip service to the Bible. And in our lives when people disobey that Bible and not practice it in life, we don’t do anything about it.
Are we concerned about our church’s holiness? How do you get a people to be holy? You can’t just preach sermons and then be indifferent to what they’re doing in response to that. There’s got to be more than just saying it. There’s got to be a framework in which there is godly pressure on the people to obey God’s word and conform to it in a good, wholesome kind of godly pressure. That is what CD will do.
Our church needs it. I have preached so much sermons—15 years, 1,500 over sermons—Genesis to Samuel, Matthew, John, Peter, Revelation, many series. How much of that have we been practicing in our life, and grown and become holy by those truths? And there is less discipline and pressure to be conform to be holy. I think this year we started putting some basic discipline of reading the Bible personally and a partner to overseeing that. We need to do a lot more like this CD if we have to grow.
Just read our constitution. You all agreed to obey that when you joined the church. It clearly outlines discipline when you join our church. Generally, what we see in each of our lives is: no discipline in personal life, personal devotions, no discipline in family life, no discipline in church life—one meeting you attend, not attend another, church responsibilities, tithing, Sabbath observance—so many problems. Friday prayer meeting is optional. We don’t do anything for all that. This is all lack of church discipline.
Will the Lord continue to bear with us while we continue with dishonoring him and his church by our disorderliness and sin? If the Lord sends a letter like he sent to seven churches, what will be his rebuke to us? How many names he will use and tell how disorderly you are in church? “You have heard so much, but not grown. I know so much sin in your life, wasting all the time, and not using any means to grow.”
How much we need church discipline if we need to avoid the Lord’s direct punishment! The Lord warns in Revelation if we don’t implement, he will act like he did in Acts 5: Ananias with Sapphira die on the spot for lying in the church. Peter tells him, “Ananias, why has Satan filled your heart to lie to the Holy Spirit?” “And the young men came in and found her dead and carrying her forth buried her by her husband. A great fear came upon all the church and upon as many as heard these things.” Well, you can imagine that, can’t you? That would correct our indisciplines and shape up our church. We lack that kind of godly fear in the church.
We see God was dealing very firmly with sin. Very firmly in that early primitive time of the church, God was conveying His attitude toward sin in church. And they dropped dead in front of the church. God was serious about sin. This is still His church, right? He is still the head of His church. He hasn’t changed His attitude toward sin, and He hasn’t changed the desire to see the church pure.
But, He has taken the authority and He has put it in the hands of the church and those who lead the church, that authority. He says you each of you must carry this burden to see the church pure and holy and confront sin when it appears and do church discipline. When we don’t take church discipline seriously, he acts directly in providential discipline. Like it says 1 Corinthians chapter 11, some [are] weak, sick, and even some die. And so, God is concerned about the holiness of His church. And He may still take some lives now and then. Heaven may still act in a very supernatural way to purge the church.
b. Due to the Very Nature of the Church
So church needs CD to avoid God’s direct punishment. Secondly, the Church needs discipline because of its nature.
Let us think of the two natures of the church. The Bible identifies the church as the Body of Christ.
The Bible uses the metaphor of the body for the church. Just like a physical body, the church is a body constituted of many parts. It has a “head“—that is, Jesus Christ, who gives leadership and identity to the body (Ephesians 4:16). It also has many members—which would be you and me; each one of us gifted in a unique way to serve the needs of the others (1 Corinthians 12). We have what we might call a ‘life-principle’ that runs through the body—the Holy Spirit, who joins the body together into one and gives it power for living (Ephesians 4:4). Our daily food is the Word of God, and our breathing oxygen is prayer.
Nowadays, after COVID, everyone talks about immunity. Green tea, honey, soap, cream. The buzz word is immunity. How much does our body need immunization—maximum, right? Some virus comes; we immediately fight that and remove it. Without that, we will become weak, diseased, and even die. Just like the body needs immunization, for the church, which is the living body of Christ, church discipline is like an immunization. One of the most vital aspects of any physical body is its “immune system.” An immune system immediately identifies and effectively deals with things that will cause it harm. Without it, all sorts of harmful things would invade and infect a body, bringing about weakness, or sickness, or even death.
Two deadly viruses that can weaken, sicken, and destroy any good church are sin and false teaching. Church discipline acts as an immune system. As much as we need immunity in the body, so much the church needs CD; otherwise, we will perish.
The second nature of the church is again that this whole chapter talks about believers as children. How much do our children need discipline? What happens to children without discipline? They will never progress and finally perish. We always want our children to be disciplined, right? We look for a school where there is good discipline. You and I both know very well that children must be conformed to obedience by some kind of discipline, some kind of enforced rule, some kind of consequences for their misbehavior. There must be some pain for disobedience. The wise man says, “he who spares the rod hates his son.“
The same is true spiritually. As children, we will never grow if there is no CD. The neglect of dealing with sin not only allows the person sinning to drift away further and further, but it sets a standard that allows others to walk in the same path of sin, feeling no consequence will be forthcoming.
As parents must discipline children, we as children of God, inevitably need discipline. We need to be taught to obey. And basically, the way we learn to obey is to find out the consequences to disobedience, right? If there is no consequence manifest to disobedience, there’s no change/progress. We need to be taught to obey, and made to realize there are consequences for disobedience. That is why CD is a must.
I think we lived in an illusion, believing we can just preach against sin and preach against sin and teach holiness and never do anything about it in the lives of the people, and expect them to conform to the pattern of holiness. Children don’t do that. And like children, who have a bent to disobedience in life, we have a bent to disobedience in spiritual life because sin is still in us, isn’t it? So, we have that problem, and we have the tendency to drift that way unless there is a sense in which we are pressured into the line of obedience. We must create a framework/situation for them to obey. And that is why there must be an enforcement/compelling pressure. And that sounds like a very strong word, but that in fact, is a good word to use. We have to move ourselves in to implement the message.
But where you act against sin, discipline the sinning person, you not only pull the person sinning back, but you reestablish the right kind of model of virtue. In the Old Testament when God set out to punish the people of Israel for their disobedience to His word, He said in Deuteronomy 13:11, “And all Israel shall hear, and fear, and shall do no more such wickedness as this among you.” In other words, you punish a few and the others get the message. And so there is then to be discipline. The church must be pure.
So we have seen the absolute need for CD: Christ solemnly commands it, and the Church very much needs it.
II. Goal of Church Discipline
Secondly, what is the goal of church discipline? Two goals: Firstly, gain a brother, and secondly, keep the church pure.
We have to understand the goal of church discipline. As soon as we hear discipline, I don’t want you to get scared. Discipline is not a negative word. It is a positive word. It is a word about training. It is closely related to discipling. To discipline is to conform someone to a standard. And when we talk about discipline in the church, we are talking about bringing people into line with God’s standard. Take any great men who have achieved anything in life—a basic aspect of that is they were disciplined. We don’t progress in life for lack of discipline.
Just like truly loving parents discipline their children for their good, if we are really a loving and caring church, we will practice CD. Just look at the context of this passage of CD. What did we see before? We saw Christ’s warning not to despise any of the little ones, and then he gave the parable of pursuing one lost sheep, and then after this comes the CD passage. There is the beautiful parable of forgiving magnanimously one another in Christ. That itself should tell you CD is not a negative but a wonderful thing.
We already saw we shouldn’t despise the brother even when he is sinful like a lost sheep. Does that mean we keep quiet and don’t do anything? “Why [is this a] problem for me? Because the Father and angels are seeing him, Christ’s lost sheep. Let Christ do it. Whatever sinful state he may be, the Father’s eternal will is none of these little ones will perish. So I will not do anything.” No, that is how you despise him.
When you see a sinning brother, you despise him if you don’t do anything, or just in your mind have low thoughts of him: “See what kind of sins he is doing, calling himself Christian,” or going around gossiping about him to others. All these are ways you despise him. But if you really realize the Father’s care, Christ’s Shepherd-like love, the Father’s will that not one of them should perish, you will act in the way Christ says and go directly and talk to him about his sin. For what purpose?
Verse 15: “Now if your brother sins, go and show him his fault in private; if he listens to you, you have gained your brother.”
The primary purpose of CD is to gain your brother. It conveys the idea that you have gained back one that appeared to be slipping into a path of sin. You were about to face a big loss, but by going and doing what Christ said, you have made a great gain. Is that cruel or harsh or uncalled for? By all means, that is an act of love for another brother in Christ!
You don’t despise him by back talking. You truly love him and are concerned about him, so you directly go and show him where he is wrong, so that you gain/restore him. It is not like, “I have to discipline this brother… before I gossip to two or three people or announce it to the whole church, according to procedure Matthew 18, I will first talk to him.” No, no. When you go and talk to your brother of ongoing open sin, you have no thought of talking about this to anyone; it is between you both. You have no intention to announce to the church or take it to the next level, but you go with genuine concern.
You are a partner helping your brother because you understand you also need the same kind of help from him. When he sees any sin in your life, he can come and tell you. That is the accountability we have for one another. So what is the goal of church discipline? Not like priests/pastors who use it to remove members who confront them, but the first primary goal it is always to gain, restore/redeem a brother who is falling in sin.
Now, notice in Verse 15, there’s an interesting word, “gained.” It’s a word from the commercial world. It’s a word of the marketplace. It is a word used, for example, to talk about accumulating big wealth. “Gain” in the sense of treasure. “Gain” in the sense of money or goods, commodities. And used in this connection, it sees a sinning brother then as a loss of treasure, as a loss of something valuable.
Isn’t this what we are seeing in Matthew 18, a view into the heart of God as to how much he values one of these little ones? God cannot let one soul go because each is to Him a treasure. And the church has to have that same sense as well, that we can’t allow a careless attitude: “What to do? He is sinning; it is a personal problem. I just really can’t get involved. If he falls, what for me, what loss for me?”
No, no, it is a big, big loss for me. I cannot allow that to happen. There’s a treasure that’s gone from us. And when restored, we regain that wealth. So, there’s something lost to us of value. No son of God, no daughter of God is valueless, worthless. And so, when a brother or a sister sins, we’ve lost them as a treasure that’s lost to us. And we need to bring them back, and we need to work diligently to bring them back to restore them, because they are of value to us. How?
Firstly, they are valuable because God sees them like that. We saw how Christ left ninety-nine and went after one, go into the mountains and use maximum effort to seek it. When he finds it, what joy! “Even so, it is not the will of your Father who’s in heaven that one of these little ones should perish and become useless.” Should not be rendered of no value to you, because they are a treasure lost and need to be regained. What gain we make by gaining a soul, an elect soul? Oh, men go to tremendous lengths to regain the wealth they’ve lost, monetarily, and to regain the loss of an eternal soul, which is of infinite value. What is the value of a soul? A world is not equal. The whole heaven rejoices when one soul repents. What efforts we should put in!
In Galatians 6, Paul says, “Brethren, if a man is overtaken in any trespass, you who are spiritual restore such a one in a spirit of gentleness.” Restore him.
In James chapter 5:19-20: “Brethren, if anyone among you wanders from the truth, and someone turns him back, let him know that he who turns a sinner from the error of his way will save a soul from death and cover a multitude of sins.” You save a soul from death when you restore.
And that word “restore,” (katartizō), is a very interesting word. It has the idea, basically, of repairing something to bring it back to its original condition. It talks about mending fractured bones, replacing dislocated bones. It is used of mending fishing nets. It is to restore to the former condition. First, the concerned Christian gains the brother, for God sees such value in his children, and the believer seeks to restore the fallen brother to the joy and fellowship of Christ.
Secondly, personally also we have gained as a church. God has brought them into this church and given them unique gifts to serve in this church, and when they are living holy, obeying God, the Holy Spirit works through them and does a wonderful ministry in my own life and in the church life. God can bless me and the church through their Spirit-given gifts. Who can imagine how He can use them in the church for all our growth? But now they are fallen in sin, and that is a great loss for us, because no one else can make up for that service in the church.
Now, gaining the brother is always the goal of discipline. The goal of discipline in the church is not to throw people out. It’s not to embarrass them. It’s not to be self-righteous as over against their unrighteousness. It’s not to play God. It’s not to exercise authority or power in some unbiblical manner. The purpose of discipline isn’t to throw people out; it’s to bring them in. It’s to bring them back.
That’s the goal of discipline. It’s to see a person as a treasure. To see the people the way God, the good shepherd, sees them, who leaves the ones that are there in the fold and goes out and finds that one and brings it back, because one, just one of a hundred, is a loss.
We have to understand that motive and goal. It is not easy to do. When we do that, people will sometimes misunderstand us: “Who does he think he is? Does he not have better work? Does he understand what is my situation?” So if we have to overcome all that, we need to understand this great goal and blessing of restoring and gaining a treasure when we make him see his sin.
This should be done with great love, gentleness, and care. The problem is we live in some kind of self-righteous circle. And there’s almost a certain kind of relishing in our spirit that they fell because it makes us feel better. That’s really a sickness. It’s called pride. If you feel yourself more spiritual than your sinning brother and you can smugly remain in indifference to his sin with the idea that you’re better than he is, isn’t that good? Then, you really are far afield from the heart of the shepherd. And you’re in sin as much as he is.
We don’t show genuine concern and have a deep and loving relationship to openly share our sins and discuss our weakness. We live with outwardly self-righteous relationship. No close, open-heart relationship. One Christian said this: “I have often thought that if I ever fall into a sin, O God, don’t let me fall into the hands of those censorious, critical judges in the church. Let me fall into the hands of the worldly men, drunkards, drug addicts, [and] sinners. Why? Because so often the church people would tear me apart with their long, wagging, gossipy tongues, cutting me to shreds.” This is so bad; it needs to change.
So the first goal of CD is to restore a believer who is about to perish in sin.
2. To Keep the Church Pure
This is the great desire and will of Christ. Paul pictures the church in Ephesians as a bride “in all her glory, having no spot or wrinkle or any such thing; but that she would be holy and blameless.” He says in 2 Corinthians 11:2: “For I am jealous for you with a godly jealousy; for I betrothed you to one husband, that to Christ I might present you as a pure virgin.” That must be our desire and burden for the church that moves us to humble action on behalf of the body when we see sin. The purity of the church, which Christ purchased with his own blood, must be our great care.
That has been a hallmark of our Baptist forefathers in the face of the state churches in Europe. Without the new birth, one has no admission to baptism or the Lord’s Supper. How many lost families, lives as fugitives, and many died for this truth, because they saw the church must be kept pure, and otherwise it is useless to call it a church. We must share the concern. And that is why we don’t allow everyone into membership, and then once they are members and we believe they are regenerated by the Spirit of God, we should enforce them to live like members who have been made alive by the Spirit of the living God. We should demand them to live holy lives. If you cannot live holy lives, then there is a question whether you are truly born again and should not be part of the church.
The church of God must be kept pure, and you cannot call yourself a believer and live unholy life and stain the church of God. Christ has called us to be salt and light in the world. If we lose our saltiness, Christ warned, how can we be made salty again? (Matthew 5:13) Careless sinful church members have done more harm to the testimony of the gospel through the local church than anything.
An erring, unrepentant, continuing sinning brother affects the whole church badly. He affects the unity, purity, prayers, progress, holiness, growth, and success of the church. Just like Achan made entire Israel be defeated by enemies. One member, a sinning brother, can spoil the church. The church, though loving every member, recognizes the leavening effects of sin (1 Corinthians 5:6). Singling out one member is done only as a last resort, but it is done because of the damaging effects of unrepentant sin in the body.
The last thing that any church wants to do is to ostracize and remove a member due to unrepentant sin. Nothing is more painful for a congregation to walk through. And yet the greater concern for the whole church compels us to love the purity of the church more than even our own feelings. And it compels us to follow the instructions of Christ toward erring members in the hope that repentance and restoration will take place.
Albert Mohler has written, “A lack of attention to moral purity is a sure sign of congregational rebellion before the Lord.” “The greatest moral danger to the church is the toleration of sin, public or private.”
Francis Schaeffer said, “One cannot explain the explosive dynamite, the dunamis, of the early church apart from the fact that they practiced two things simultaneously: orthodoxy of doctrine and orthodoxy of community life, a holy community which the world can see.” By the grace of God, therefore, the church must be known simultaneously for its purity of doctrine and the reality of its holy community life.
After all, why did the Father elect a people in eternity (Ephesians 1) to be holy and blameless? Why did Christ shed his blood to make us holy and blameless? Calling ourselves the church and bride of Christ, if we are not concerned about the purity of the church, it is foolish. We show our lack of concern by not practicing CD. It’s His redeemed people that He wants to see holy, and pure, and spotless, and without blemish.
III. Applications for Personal Responsibility
So what we have seen today: The need of CD—Christ solemnly commands it, and the Church very much needs it—and the goal of CD—Gaining a brother and maintaining the purity of the church.
Next week, we will see from Matthew 18—how to do CD and with what authority to do it.
What Lessons Do We Learn?
Do we take CD seriously? How much do we practice that in our church?
We all want our church to grow. We all are burdened about the state of our country. We want God to mightily use us for his truth. We all pray for revival.
When does revival come to a church? It all starts with our realization of how holy God is, like Isaiah, and our recognition of how sinful we are, to seriously start dealing with sin in our personal lives and church lives. God’s promise in 2 Chronicles 7:14: “If my people, which are called by my name, shall humble themselves, pray and seek my face and turn from their wicked ways, then I will hear from heaven, and will heal their land.“
People fear the church will reduce and people may not join the church if we practice this too strictly. But when it is done in biblical balance, it always results in church growth.
Jonathan Edwards says, “If you tolerate visible wickedness in your members, you will greatly dishonor God, our Lord Jesus Christ, the religion which you profess, the church in general, and yourselves in particular. As those members of the church who practice wickedness bring dishonor upon the whole body, so do those who tolerate them in it.” “If strict discipline and thereby strict moral laws were maintained in the church, it would be one of the most powerful means of sin conviction and conversion towards those who are without.” And then he asked this ultimate question, “How can you be the true disciples of Christ if you live in the neglect of these plain, positive commands?“
Whose responsibility is this? The Pastor? “Oh yeah, the Pastor, and we have leaders who have to do [it]…”
Notice the verse: “Moreover if your brother shall trespass against you, you go and tell him his fault between you and him. If he shall hear you, you have gained your brother.” Who is the hero of that verse? So many times, “You, You, You.” That thing that is so highlighted in the verse is “you.”
Do you feel that is your responsibility? You say, “Me? Why, you? I just can’t do that. I’m not a confrontational-type person. I’m too loving, gentle.” This is all about you folks, not about me, not about some committee. It starts with you. You’re the key. This is all about you. How many of you have gone to a brother/sister like this? How many of you have come to me and told “Pastor, I see this problem in brother’s life. I have spoken to him, but [he] doesn’t seem to change.” None.
We have to be concerned about sinning brothers and church purity. If we are not, then you’re not concerned with the things that God’s concerned about. If you allow yourself false pity, indifference, smug, contented, self-righteousness, contempt for someone, or pride, or sentimentality, or cowardice, or busyness, or whatever it is that you allow to prevent you from being faithful in the work of Christ to confront a sinning brother, you have failed and disobeyed Christ and sinned. If I ignore the restoration of the wandering sheep, I’ve become, in a sense, a wanderer too, don’t I? Disobedient.
We need to be burdened. Watch one another. “Am I my brother’s keeper?” Yes, we all are. That is why we have an accountability group as a good starting point. We want to watch one another. I know people will misunderstand, “Is this church GRBC or CBI, spying on everybody all of this?” And that isn’t the idea. The idea is that we have great concern for the high value and worth of each soul that belongs to God and is one sheep, and we have the heart of the Shepherd and care for them always, like parents always checking on kids. And we have great concern for the purity of the entire church.
We talk a lot about holiness, and I’ve preached a lot on this in our church, but I don’t think it’s ever really going to happen until we get personally concerned with the people who fall into sin. Instead of saying what our culture wants us to say—“don’t get involved, don’t invade his life. He’s his own thing. He’s got his private deal. Don’t tell him what to do”—instead of doing that, we really pursue that kind of person to pull them back into the fold. We’re never going to know the holiness that we keep preaching about.
The purity of the church is our concern. And I know it’s your concern, and it’s mine, and it’s on our hearts. But it never is going to happen until we become committed to the confrontation of that which makes it impure, in love and meekness. I mean it’s not just, “well, we’re praying for them that they’ll see the light.” Listen, you’ve got the light, take it and shine it in their eyes. Now, in order to do this, one preacher beautifully says you need three things. Very practical:
Three things. Number one: determination to do this with burden. You’ve got to be determined to do it. Look at Verse 15, the main verb there: “go.” “Go and tell it.” You’ve got to go and tell it. You say, “well, if I see a brother in sin, what am I supposed to do?” Go and tell him. “You mean, just go and tell him?” That’s what it says, “go and tell him.” “Go and tell him what?” Just go and tell him he’s in sin. Look at Verse 16. “If he doesn’t hear you, then forget it…” No, you are determined to save him with a burden. You take the next step: take two or three. First, you go and tell, then you take. If he still doesn’t hear you, Verse 17, you tell again to the whole church. Go, tell, take, tell. I know it’s difficult. That is why you need a determination with burden. Now, every one of those commands implies a response, action. And they each imply that you could respond, right? Because God doesn’t give commands to people who haven’t a capacity to respond to them. So, they indicate that there must be a determination to do it on our part.
How does this kind of determination come, Pastor? That willingness comes from zeal for God’s house. Determination to confront sin comes when you have zeal for God’s house. Example: John 2. When Christ saw sin in the temple—selling and buying—he confronted them, right? See him, he confronted them. They didn’t leave easily. He made a whip. “He drove them out with the sheep and the oxen, poured out all the money all over the place and flipped over the tables. And said to them that sold doves, ‘Take these things from here. Make not my Father’s house a house of merchandise. My house is house of prayer and you have made it a den of thieves.’” Now, what in the world made Him do this? Why did He have such a reaction to sin? Why did He have such a tremendous desire for the holiness of the house of God? Verse 17: “His disciples remember that it was written,” (Psalm 69:9), “the zeal of thine house hath eaten me up.” “God, when you’re dishonored, I have such a zeal in my heart, such a longing for your glory, that when you are dishonored, I feel the pain.” Now, the willingness to confront sin is born out of the zeal for God’s name, and God’s reputation, and God’s glory, and his house.
“I can’t tolerate sin in His house. I must drive it out.” That temple is not the house anymore. You are the house of God, right? The assembly of the believers is a holy habitation in which God dwells. And we should have the heart of Christ who can no more tolerate unholiness in this His temple than He could tolerate it in His Father’s temple in Jerusalem. Zeal for God’s house. You can’t have determination or willingness to confront sin in a vacuum. It is born out of zeal for God.
Finally, that zeal for God’s house holiness comes when you live a personally pure life. That comes from personal holiness and walking with the Spirit. Godly zeal is given by the HS. “A believer who is not concerned about his own purity will have no obedient willingness or righteous zeal to help protect the purity of the church.” You’re not going to be consumed with the desire for the holiness of His name unless you are walking in that holiness. Isn’t it because we are not personally holy, we don’t have the desire to exercise CD? The lack of church discipline practiced in our day can be traced back to a root of neglecting one’s own spiritual disciplines in holiness.
Finally, this calls all of us to seek holiness in our own lives. Let’s face it, most Christians would resist following a course of discipline because they are doing very little to personally walk in holiness. But Christ’s command is a wake-up call to realize that as part of the Body of Christ we have an ongoing responsibility for zealously guarding our own spiritual lives and helping one another to reflect the image of Christ. We are called a holy people throughout the New Testament. We are indwelled by the Spirit—personally and corporately. So we must not brush Christ’s command off as though it applies to other Christians but not to me. Most of the time, the need is not to bring an issue all the way to the church, but it is the concern of one Christian for another—exhorting, admonishing, explaining from the Scriptures, and calling another brother into account.
Grace Reformed Baptist Church, Bangalore 