Office of the Keys

Kongsvinger Lutheran Church

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All right, let's pray. Lord Jesus, as we open up your word, we ask again that you would send your spirit, open our hearts and minds so that we may understand it properly, so that we may have true faith in you for the forgiveness of our sins, true hope of eternal life, and understand how to love our neighbors as ourselves in good works.

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We ask in Jesus' name, amen. All right, we're gonna open up for questions regarding the sermon.

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Before we get into it, there was one that was asked of me in the interim, and it has to do with the binding and loosing aspect of what's mentioned in Matthew 18.

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You'll note that in the context of church discipline, it says, whatever you bind on earth will be bound in heaven, whatever you loose on earth will be loosed in heaven.

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Binding and loosing. First appearance in the gospels of that language is found in Matthew 16.

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And let's take a look at it real quick. In Matthew 16, we have Peter's great confession of faith in Christ and who he is.

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This is where we'll see it for the first time. In Matthew 16, 13, for context, when

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Jesus came to the district of Caesarea Philippi, notice Jesus is out of Israel. He's taken his disciples to pagan territory.

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He asks his disciples, who do people say that the Son of Man is? And they said, some say John the

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Baptist, others Elijah, other Jeremiah, or one of the prophets. It's weird, because Jews don't believe in reincarnation.

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And he said to them, but who do you say that I am? Simon Peter replied, you are the

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Christ, or the Messiah, the Son of the living God. Jesus answered him, blessed are you, Simon bar Jonah, for flesh and blood has not revealed this to you, but my

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Father who is in heaven, and I tell you, you are Peter, and on this rock I will build my church, and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it.

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I will give you the keys of the kingdom of heaven. Whatever you bind on earth shall be bound in heaven, whatever you loose on earth shall be loosed in heaven.

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First appearance of the doctrine known as the office of the keys. Rome claims that Christ gave the keys specifically to Peter, which is why the papal crest today, if you were to look at the logo of the

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Pope, the logo of the Pope is what? Two keys, superimposed over each other.

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That's the logo of the Pope. Now, they would have a point if Jesus didn't go on to kind of give us more citations so that we can better understand this binding and loosing thing.

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So bound on earth, bound in heaven. Next appearance then is in our text today from Matthew 18, let me pull it up so you can see it in its proper context, the office of the keys.

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So we got the 99, here we go. If he refuses to listen to you, I'll start verse 15. If he refuses to listen to them, tell it to the church.

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If he refuses even to listen to the church, let him be to you as a Gentile and a tax collector. Truly I say to you, and watch, whatever you, and here, this is going to be, this is a fascinating thing here that this is a plural you now.

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This is a y 'all. So whatever y 'all bind on earth shall be bound in heaven.

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Whatever y 'all loose on earth shall be loosed in heaven. Same, same terms, same terminology.

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Binding, loosing. What is this referring to? Well, in this context, you're gonna note the context is church discipline.

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Context is of calling a sinner to repent. If they repent, do you bind or do you loose?

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You loose, right, you loose, you give them an absolution. If they refuse to repent, do you bind or do you loose?

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You bind, you bind. And here's the funny thing. In the real sense of the word, when the church binds someone's sins, this is why church discipline is so important.

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It's really not the church doing it, it's Christ, number one, but the person wants their sins bound.

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Otherwise, they would have repented and been forgiven. Now, the third time the language that then appears then in Scripture is in the

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Gospel of John, starting at verse 20, verse 19. On the evening of that day, the first day of the week, the doors being locked where the disciples were for fear of the

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Jews, Jesus came and stood among them and said to them, peace be with you. And when he said this, he showed them his hands and his side and the disciples were glad when they saw the

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Lord. Jesus said to them, peace be with you. As the Father has sent me, even so I am sending you. And when he had said this, he breathed on them and said to them, receive the

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Holy Spirit. If you forgive the sins of any, they are forgiven. Now, this is kind of fun.

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The Greek verb for forgive here is aphiomi and it means to loose. Whatever you loose, whenever you loose the sins of any, forgive the sins of any, they are forgiven.

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If you withhold forgiveness from any, it is withheld. Now, this is not the best translation.

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And let me give you, the NASB does a far better job. The New American Standard from 1977 does a little bit of a better job picking up what's going on in the verb tenses.

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So here's what it says in the NASB. If you forgive the sins of any, their sins have been forgiven.

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Put it on a timeline then. So if you forgive the sins of any, their sins have been forgiven.

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So you've got two events. You have somebody who's a Christian saying, I forgive you all of your sins and you have their sins already being forgiven.

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Which comes first, technically? The already, which is where?

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Christ. So the idea then is that this is why we point this out.

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So that when you hear a pastor like me using an old formula for an absolution,

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I forgive you all of your sins, I, listen, there ain't nothing special about me.

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And unfortunately, there are those who would accuse Lutheran pastors who speak this way of being cult leaders or something because only

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God can forgive sins. But the text is clear. The sins you forgive will have already been forgiven.

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So when you hear me say, I forgive you all of your sins, since you can't hear the voice of Christ in heaven, he's made it so that he's chosen somebody foolish and stupid and sinful like me to actually be his voice so that you can hear that your sins are forgiven.

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Does that make sense? What I'm doing is giving an echo to what Jesus already said. Now, David, you had a question.

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Rather than loose, I've used lost or lost. If I lose or lost my sin on earth, it has been lost in heaven.

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It has been taken, it has been, if you've been forgiven on earth, you have been forgiven in heaven.

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You have shed that sin until you reappear again, of course. And I'm glad we had this interpretation here.

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Not that I was totally wrong in my interpretation. It's just that I read it differently than others.

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Yeah, you're actually talking about the ultimate effect of the loosing.

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So if you've been loosed from your sins, they're truly lost to you and they're lost to God. I mean, a good way to talk about it, what does

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Scripture say about our sins? God casts them as far as the east is from the west. Notice it doesn't say north and south.

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We know where the north pole is, the south pole is. Where's the east pole? There is no east pole.

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I like to describe it as God takes your sins and throws them into the sea of His forgetfulness and then posts a sign that says no fishing allowed.

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A good way to put it. So the idea then is this, is that this unique authority that Christ has given to the church to bind and to loose, to forgive and to retain, this is a very important thing because I'll tell you when

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I was a layman, going to church and hearing and confessing my sins and hearing that absolution every Sunday, man, that was the thing

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I clung to. There were times in my life that were so dark, it's like, oh man, I just need to hear that I'm forgiven.

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And if that wasn't enough, going to the Lord's Supper and hearing the pastor say, take heed, this is the body of Christ, broken for you for the forgiveness of your sins.

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That also was very helpful. Something objective outside of me. And believing what Christ has said here. The sins you forgive are forgiven.

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The sins you retain are retained. Very important stuff. And if you remember the vows

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I made at my installation here, the vows I made at my installation here is that I would forgive the sins of the penitent.

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That's part of my vow as a pastor. And you're gonna note that in the context that we saw in Matthew 18.

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In Matthew 18, can a pastor act unilaterally, all on his own, to bind somebody's sins?

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No. You're gonna notice that to bind sins, it takes a congregation. Very interesting.

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Yes. And will not. Yeah. It's like Pharaoh. Fine, have it your way. It's the

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Burger King result. Yeah. Isn't the binding of sins almost the default mechanism?

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Because anybody who repents is gonna be forgiven. Yeah, yeah, yeah. If they don't repent, they ain't gonna be forgiven.

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Right. The binding is not necessarily an active function, it's a passive default. It's actually recognizing what that person has already determined in their heart.

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They refuse to be forgiven, fine. You don't wanna be forgiven? You don't have to be forgiven.

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Remember on the last day, okay, in Matthew, Jesus talks about the last day, describes it as the sheep and the goats being separated.

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Where do the goats end up? In that lake of fire. And what does it say?

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You know, Jesus says to them, depart from me into the fire, prepared for the devil and all of his angels.

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Was hell ever prepared for humans? No. If any human ends up there, it is just utter foolishness.

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Totally foolish, it's on them. They are totally to blame. Hey, I know.

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Hell is empty. Yeah. Is what? Hell is empty. The presiding bishop of the

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ELCA, a woman, this week said that there probably is a hell, but if there is, she says, she wasn't sure, but if there is, it's probably empty, she said.

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And to which I would say, since when do you know better than Jesus? I don't understand how she's still there.

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Yeah, yeah, so. So all believers have the keys to the kingdom.

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Okay, notice the keys are given to the church. Now, this is the fun part. I'm thinking, what about the one that do, don't interpret this passage as we do?

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Do they have the keys, but they don't realize it? Yes, okay, let me kind of put it to you this way.

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In every church, there is hanging on one of the walls these keys, a binding key and a loosing key.

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And if the church doesn't recognize that Scripture says this, will they ever use these keys? No, but are they still there?

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Yes, and here's the thing. These keys are not given to pastors. These keys are given to the church.

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Now, in public ministry within an individual local congregation, the exercising and the use of the keys normatively is given to the pastor, but not exclusively, not exclusively.

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You have authority to use these keys as well. As a member of that church.

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No, as a Christian. As a Christian, okay. So I've used this, I've talked about this before.

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It's worth reminding. Back when I was a layman, a very well -known apologist and a friend of mine who lived in the

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Minneapolis area, he had a very terrible fall into sin. And he had been nursing a sin for decades that nobody knew about, and finally it became a health issue for him.

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As a result of that, he had to go into the hospital. And because he had to go in the hospital, the sin that he had been keeping secret for decades now got out.

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And I mean, the guy was just, oh, it was a terrible situation, but he's a friend of mine.

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All right, now I was a layman at the time. Now he's not a Lutheran. I was a layman at the time and I knew exactly what he needed because I could see how he was just being beat up on the internet and I suspected that members of his congregation would do the same thing.

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Because one of the things I've noticed about evangelical Christianity is it has a really bad habit of shooting its wounded.

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I'm sorry, but that's the truth. How do we deal with sin? Repentance and absolution.

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Repentance and being forgiven. So literally, as soon as I found out about it, I called his wife, because he was in the hospital.

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He was not able to talk. Called his wife, asked if he would see me. And she says, let me talk to him. Because he hadn't seen, he was so ashamed.

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He wouldn't see anybody. And so she went in and talked to him and said, Chris Roseville wants to come up here.

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Would you see him? He says, I will see Chris. And I said, great. So literally,

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I was living in Indiana at the time and I drove to my church, bought an extra hymnal for him, drove up to Minneapolis, arrived really late in the evening that day and went to see him.

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And I was the first person he allowed to see him. And basically, when I walked in, his wife walked out and I said,

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I'm here to talk about your repentance. And I gave him the hymnal, opened up the hymnal to the section on individual confession and absolution.

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And as soon as we started walking through this together, where he began to confess his sins,

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I mean, he just came unglued. And I mean, it was one of the most frightening and amazing things

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I've ever seen in my life. And then when he was done confessing his sin, he didn't blame anybody else.

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He blamed only himself. When he was done confessing his sin, we got to that part in the individual confession and absolution liturgy where I said, now,

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I want you to see these words. I'm going to say, I forgive you all your sins. And he says, I don't know if I believe that.

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I said, here's what the Bible says. And I read them out, John 20. He said, yeah, you're right. That's what the text says.

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I said, go ahead. And so I said to him, I forgive you all of your sins in the name of the

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Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit. I mean, and it was like the clouds parted.

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It was just an amazing moment, an amazing moment. And afterwards, when

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I was driving home, I stayed for a couple of days after that. But when I was finally driving home,

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I was sitting there going, oh my goodness, what have I done? I literally stole the keys and used them.

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So I called a LCMS pastor, a friend of mine, Brian Wolfmuller, and I said, Pastor Wolfmuller, I said, I got to talk to you about something.

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And so I kind of relayed the whole story to him. And I said, I stole the keys and I used them. I actually forgave this guy and absolved him.

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And he said to me, Chris, and this is how Brian talked, Chris, he said, you didn't steal nothing.

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Those keys belong to the church. And if you hadn't have absolved him, you would have been sinning. Well, okay.

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So that kind of cleared things up. He's a closet Lutheran now, but that's a different story. So he talks all about the means of grace now and the objective gospel coming to you from outside of you.

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But you're gonna notice something here. And I wanna talk about this issue, although it's gonna be a little bit thorny. Which key gets used here every

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Sunday? Loosing key, loosing key. And how many keys are there?

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Two. The reality of the situation is that many churches today, they use one key, not both.

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Church discipline requires that should somebody be impenitent, and clearly when confronted with their sin and gone through the steps of Matthew 18, that the binding key must be used so that they will repent.

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And it's not politically correct. And I can't, I mean, I recently,

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I don't know of any churches that have recently used it. You don't even hear of it anymore. I've seen it used once, and it was horrifying.

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It was absolutely horrifying. When we were very new to the Lutheran church, I was attending Bill Swirla's congregation, the

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Holy Trinity Lutheran Church, Hacienda Heights, California. And there was a gal in the congregation, she was in her late 20s, and she was having an affair.

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She was totally committing adultery and cheating on her husband. The Matthew 18 steps were actually walked through.

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With each step, first with her husband, then with others, and finally with the pastor and the whole church, she literally just dug in and said,

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I won't repent. I've never, you know, and when I saw that,

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I mean, it's like, whoa, who does that? She thought she was justified in her adultery. At that point, they did something very scary, and the next church service began with the right of excommunication.

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And she knew she was gonna be excommunicated from the church, and she showed up. She was there, and it was awkward.

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It was terrible. The worst experience in church I've ever had in that sense.

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I mean, you could've heard a pin drop. And, you know, do we have that right?

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She stayed until she was excommunicated, and then she walked out. Well, the story continues a little bit.

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Now, in the pulpit, down in the pulpit, there's a book, a burgundy book, and if you can grab that,

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I wanna read out this right because it's frightening, but at the same time, if you understand the right of excommunication properly, the ultimate goal is the person's repentance.

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And this is where a lot of churches get this wrong. They think, oh, we finally, you know, we used church discipline, and we got rid of that person.

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Done with that. No, that's not the point of excommunication because remember, you're to treat them as a

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Gentile or tax collector. How did Jesus treat Gentiles and tax collectors? With love as the mission field.

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Would this be like considered the lost sheep? Yeah, yeah. So, and you go out and you grab that person, bring them back.

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Yeah, right, that's exactly what you do. Now you start, now you treat them as an unbeliever, which means we're to treat them as somebody that you should tell them to repent and be forgiven.

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And reel them back in. And reel them back in, right. So, in the agenda, the

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Lutheran service book agenda, let's see, the right of excommunication.

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It's a little less used than the right of holy matrimony, which I'm pretty happy about. That wasn't nice.

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Hang on, hang on. Let's see here. Baptism, enrollment, confirmation.

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Excommunication from the church, 35. I want you to hear this. Okay, yeah.

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And you'll notice that the artwork has the keys on it. So here's how it goes.

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In fact, listen to the notes before it begins. Excommunication is a solemn declaration spoken by the pastor and best announced in the divine service, in the actual church service.

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Like the spoken word of absolution, excommunication is the voice of God himself that we hear through his called and ordained servant of the word.

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The right normally takes place during the divine service, immediately before the service of confession and absolution. So it begins at the beginning of the service.

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Pastor stands at the place where he normally pronounces absolution. And here's what the pastor says. Beloved in the Lord, Christ our

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Lord says in the gospel, according to St. John, if you forgive the sins of any, they are forgiven them. If you retain the sins of any, they are retained.

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As a called and ordained servant of the word, I must make known to you that our fellow member, and you say their name, has by continued impenitence despised his or her baptism.

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He or she was under church discipline, and although repeatedly admonished from the word of God, has refused to repent.

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Following the direction of our Lord in the gospel, according to St. Matthew, I and other members of this congregation have pleaded repeatedly with him or her to receive

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Christ's forgiveness, one for him or her on the cross, but to no avail. Finally, this person refuses also to hear the church.

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In order to show the seriousness of his or her impenitence, and as a last effort to win him or her back to our

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Lord, I announce that this person is now excommunicated. Terrible words.

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I now announce that this person is now excommunicated from the Holy Christian Church. Until he or she repents, this person may not come to this or any other

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Christian altar for the Lord's Supper. He or she is also not permitted to serve as a sponsor at holy baptism, nor to engage in any other rights or privileges of the church, except for to hear the preaching of God's word.

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May Almighty God mercifully grant him or her grace to confess his or her sin, so that he or she might receive the

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Lord's forgiveness and be restored to communion with God and his church.

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In the name of the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Spirit. Yeah. Yeah, so here's the issue.

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Because their sins are bound, if they die in that state, there is no hope.

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They're off. Right. No, they have the option to come and hear the word.

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Yeah, if they can't take communion, they can't be a... Yeah, right. Now, let me tell you the rest of the story.

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So this woman, she stayed up to this part, and after she was excommunicated, she walked right out the door.

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And we heard the door bang. And again, awkward moment. Okay. Months later though, months later, in less than a year, she repented.

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And she was restored. And it was, that was amazing. But oh my goodness, terrible, terrible thing.

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So how did they come back? The marriage didn't survive. The marriage did not survive the adultery. But she was restored to Christian fellowship because of her penitence.

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Yeah. Correct me if I'm wrong, I think in the Book of Concord, they outline

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Luther's excommunication, the language in there is much more... Yeah, Luther's a little stronger.

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Yeah. Well, as a papal excommunicator. Yeah, yeah. Yes. This happens all the time.

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People get divorced and remarried. Where, you know, where does this, you know, after they're divorced, do they just say, oh, sorry about that, and then they're forgiven, and then they...

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So it's gonna, you're gonna have to take it on a case -by -case basis. In that particular case, in that marriage, she had committed adultery.

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And her husband had biblical grounds for a divorce. And he was not obligated to stay in the marriage.

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Had he stayed in the marriage, that would have been his option. So he had an option to either stay or to go. And he exercised his biblical right, as given by Christ, to say, no,

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I'm done with this marriage. Which, you know, so that exonerates him in the divorce.

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The blame now for the divorce is on her. And in this particular case, she persisted in her adultery and refused to repent of it.

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Ultimately, though, the gospel prevailed, and she repented, and she stopped committing adultery with the fellow that she was committing adultery with, and confessed her sin, and was absolved, and was restored to fellowship.

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Now, the consequences, temporal consequences of that was that her first marriage was absolutely destroyed, and it was her fault.

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But that's not the unforgivable sin. That is a sin that is forgivable. And there are many

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Christians today who have been through divorces. And it's not that divorce itself puts them outside the faith, it's that the impenitence that goes along with the circumstances that lead to the divorce that could potentially put somebody in danger of needing to be disciplined by the church.

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Does that make sense? So as long as the church doesn't, she's still receiving to you again?

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Now you're getting into an issue of bad practice. Bad practice doesn't change something.

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And that is that somebody who takes the gospel and turns it into a license to sin, which

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Scripture explicitly forbids, and uses the gospel as a cover for their impenitence, that person, whether the church recognizes it or not, is an impenitent and doesn't desire to be forgiven.

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And ultimately Christ is the one who has to make the call on that. Now the church should be involved when there are these types of things going on.

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The church should be saying, yeah, no, this is what Scripture calls us to. But you're gonna also notice that when it comes to church discipline, that the process, it doesn't give you a time frame.

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It doesn't say make sure that you work through all three of these steps and you have to have it done within 30 days. In fact, when it comes to discipline like this, it is best to have a very, very long period of time and to repeatedly go and plead and beg the person to repent and be forgiven.

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Patience and long suffering in church discipline are a very vital part of it so that emotions settle down.

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I don't know if you've noticed that sometimes when there's turmoil or ranks in in a church, emotion levels and drama seem to go through the roof.

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You're not in a good frame of mind to address an issue of this kind when that is going on. And it is best to be patient and long suffering in the pleading.

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And ultimately if they won't repent, then this last step is an actual step when the hope of their repentance to show them the seriousness of their sin.

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Because now, I mean, the person leaving the church having been excommunicated and hearing that their sins are bound and they're not even welcome at the

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Lord's table at any church. What does that do inside of that person? Oh my goodness, if I die,

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I'm going to hell. Yeah. Right.

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Now, the husband in this case has the freedom to remarry.

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Upon her repentance though, does she then have the... Yeah, I guess since the marriage no longer exists, you know, the answer would be yeah.

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And one of the more difficult things to do, one of the more difficult things that happens that sometimes marriages dissolve, there's no biblical grounds for it.

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In a situation like that, the Christian spouse must continue to remain loyal until the other partner fails morally.

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It's a terrible situation. It really is awful. So in churches that don't even whisper the word church discipline.

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Right. I mean, those who church. Yeah, yeah.

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Well, see, the thing is is that in the megachurches and evangelicalism, I mean, number one, they don't even recognize the office of the keys.

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I mean, they think it's a papal thing and it's not. It's a biblical thing. Number two, in the megachurches, it's all about growth and being big.

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And the reason why size, they like the size is it creates anonymity. The Babylon Bee did a recent story where they featured, you know, it's that satirically that a megachurch pastor, you know, meets people who attended his church for nine years, you know.

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It finally meets them in person, you know. Like, wow. Yeah, I'm sorry, but this now gets to a bad, this gets to bad ecclesiology.

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And bad ecclesiology is gonna make it that a pastor is not actually doing his job.

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I mean, the reality is this. If somebody visits Kongsvinger, unless I'm out of town,

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I'm talking to him. You're talking to him. Nobody's gonna come in here and remain anonymous.

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It just doesn't happen. And if you're a member of the congregation, then believe it or not,

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I kind of keep a mental dossier on all of you as far as where I think you might need help or what are your strengths and your weaknesses, your gifts and things like that.

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Okay, you gotta bear with me now. Oh, this is tough to do. Oh, that's a tough cross. Big cross to bear.

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Trust me. Okay. Okay, I'm just learning about them.

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In today's sermon, we talked about homosexual immortality.

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Homosexual immortality is the same degree as gossiping. Yeah, gossip and homosexuality are both abominations to God.

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Okay, but all sin is an abomination to God. Not exactly.

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So you're gonna note this. All sin has consequences. All sin is rebellion against God.

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But within the spectrum of sins, for instance, the kid who steals a

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Snickers bar while his mom isn't looking when he's at Walmart, that's not of the same magnitude as gossip or homosexuality.

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Neither of them are listed as abominations. And now you repent to those you are...

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No. Okay, you did that. So now if you don't repent... Now you're getting into another issue.

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Let me... I'm confused. I know. Let me give you a category that's a bad category that will actually help clean this up. In Roman Catholicism, they talk about mortal and venial sins.

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Now, it's a bad category. But in mortal and venial sins, a mortal sin, if you commit it and you die, you immediately go to hell.

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A mortal sin, if you commit a mortal sin and you are not absolved before you die, you go to hell immediately. A venial sin, and this is how the

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Roman Catholics talk about it, oh, they're just little sins. Now, here's the thing. When we talk about sin in a broad sense...

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Now, notice how I'm talking about it. Sin in a broad sense. Any sin can be a mortal sin.

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So if you don't repent, the church can excommunicate you? Yeah. Yes. So if I stole the candy bar, and I came to the church and said,

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I stole the candy bar, and repented and said, I'm not going to, the church can excommunicate me?

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Absolutely. Okay, I'm not... We'll see. I'm having a tough time with this.

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Okay, well, Janet, here's the thing, okay? So you've stolen the candy bar, right? Okay. What are we talking?

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A buck at Walmart? Is that... It doesn't make any difference. If I feel I'm in the right, the church can excommunicate me?

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So the conversation is going to go like this, first of all. So let's make it a little bit more personal.

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Let's say you stole the candy bar, not from Walmart, from one of the local stores here where we know the owner. And the owner comes to you and says, you know,

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I went through the surveillance camera footage, and I saw you steal that candy bar. So you say to that person...

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Whatever. What are you going to do about it? Person goes...

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Well, I'm a Christian, so the person's a Christian. So they decide to go the

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Matthew 18 route. Am I involved at this point? No. I'm not involved, okay? So they go the

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Matthew 18 route. So they get some other Christians, show them the surveillance footage, say, look, it's clear as a bell.

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She stole this candy bar. I went and confronted her about it, and she just told me to go pound sand. So all three of them come to you, and they say,

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Janet, listen. Scripture says, you shall not steal. Here's the footage.

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This is the evidence. We have proof that you stole this candy bar. And you say, yeah.

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So what? What are you going to do about it? So they beg and plead with you, and you drive them off.

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So they think maybe you're just having a bad day. And they come and approach you again. And you say, no, I'm not going to bend on this.

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There's nothing wrong with what I did. I don't care what the Bible says. I don't care if it says you shall not steal. So finally, now they're exasperated, they give me a call.

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Pastor Rosebrook. We got footage. This is what happened. Here's what we've done.

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So now the footage gets played at the church council meeting. Oh, yeah. And the people who came and talked with you explain how they lovingly wanted you to repent, that they haven't gone and broadcast this on Facebook or anything like that.

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But they want you to repent and to be forgiven for this sin and to acknowledge and just say you're sorry and ask to be forgiven.

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And you refuse to do it. So we play the footage in the church council meeting. We listen to all of them.

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And all of the Norwegians put their head down and refused to make eye contact. This is how this goes.

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And then Pastor Rosebrook sheepishly speaks up and says, brothers and sisters, we have a biblical obligation and our church constitution actually acknowledges that scripture teaches that we have no choice but to exercise church discipline with Janet.

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So a vote's finally taken. Everyone agrees begrudgingly. Now the church comes to you.

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Not just a couple people but me, the church council members, representatives of the church, and we sit you down and say, listen, here's the evidence.

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Here's what the owner said. He walked us through the fact that he brought other people. He stole this.

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You need to repent. And you say, how dare you get involved in my life?

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You are just a bunch of busybodies. Get out of my house. If you come back here,

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I'll have Gary gun you down with his AR -15. And I'll stick all over on you.

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Yeah, there you go. That's right, he'll drool on you and you'll be dead. Okay. So at this point, we've taken a small sin and you refuse to be forgiven.

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Amazing. Yeah, who's the one who's actually magnified this? The church or you?

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You. Like I said, just bear with me, you guys. So here, this is a sin because of the video.

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Okay. Each and every single one of us is sinning at least once a day.

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Listen, yeah, how are you getting away with only sinning once a day?

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I want to know your secret. Holy guacamole.

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Janet. Janet. We ask for forgiveness. Janet. And we accept it.

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But you don't know if I do or not. Janet, why do you come to church?

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What do you confess when you first come into church? My sins. Yes, you do. But I'm... But see, listen, repentance is not a flu shot.

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Repentance is not a flu shot. We live in daily repentance. Yes. Oh, I know.

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I'm going through my head, you guys. We're Amish. Let's communicate, somebody.

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Yeah, I'm sorry, you're not wearing the right dress to be Amish. You better change up your clothes here. You know,

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I'm just learning about this and it's just blowing my mind. Uh -huh. But here's the question I have for you.

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Just kind of keep this in perspective. I don't know if Presbyterians do this. Yeah, just throw this out here. Are you learning this from our church constitution, policy papers, or are you learning this from what scripture says?

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Scripture? Yeah. That's the... Sorry, I don't know if Presbyterians do this. Presbyterians practice church discipline.

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They do, absolutely. And when they excommunicate somebody, they bar them from the Lord's Supper. They do as well. Never heard of it.

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Here's... It's just not that common. Yeah. There's things under the rug. Mm -hmm. Yeah.

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But if I know, anyway, this was like wide open. I mean, everybody, and that's why it came up.

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Am I correct? Yeah. You see what I'm saying? So, I mean, if it was kept secret, well, good move, though. Yeah.

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But the person who sinned, better go ahead and repent or...

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Yeah. You see what I'm saying? Yeah. So we live in daily repentance. Daily repentance.

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And excommunication is only for the person who says, nope, I don't need to repent.

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I don't need to be forgiven. I am special, and what I did is justified.

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Oh, that's haughty as it gets. Yeah. That's the person who...

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Huh? Yeah, that's haughtiness. I mean, that's demonic in and of itself. And that person justifies their sin and things like that.

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Yes, that's not me. Haughty. Yeah, yeah. Not talking about a good -looking woman.

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She's a haughty. No, haughty, H -A -U -G -H -T -Y. Yeah. Yeah. Right? No. Is this why in baseball you get three strikes before you're out?

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Because it's basically three strikes against you before you're out. I just wonder. It is a three -strike system.

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Yes, it is. And it's one, two. 15 minutes.

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What are we gonna do with 15 minutes? Well, I have another question. Oh, let's ask. Ask the other question.

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Yeah, what? Give me an envelope and I'll put it to my forehead.

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The answer is. We are having a tough time.

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Okay. About the gossip thing. Yes. Okay, so. When is it gossip to go to someone and ask about what you heard is true?

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And when is it concern and wanting to help that person? All right, so this is where motivation is gonna come into play.

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It's very important motivation comes into play. Because you're gonna notice, in Matthew 18, confronting a person with their sin requires, if they persist in impenitence, for you to broaden the circle.

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And so when you broaden the circle, I mean, you gotta think about how this is done. The way it is done is not by getting on the phone saying you're not gonna believe this.

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Instead, the way it's done is going something like this. You know, let's talk about the candy bar thing.

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All right, and then so, somebody will go back to that analogy. In that particular case, the story has to broaden the circle a little bit.

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And so for the sake of argument, he's gonna broaden the circle, he's gonna bring in Don, and he's gonna bring in David Fagerlund.

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Just to broaden the circle. So the person's gonna go to them and say, listen, I've got a matter of church discipline that I need help with and I need your assistance.

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I'm to the second point in Matthew 18 regarding somebody who sinned.

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And notice I'm not saying who it is yet. Would you be willing to help me with this?

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I need to bring you into the confidence and I need to share with you information that will require me to tell you what this person's sin is and share the evidence of it.

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And so you'll notice at this point, I haven't said who it is or what they've done. And I'm giving them the option of opting out.

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And I've purposely made it clear, the reason I'm talking to you is because we're following the steps in Matthew 18.

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It's the reason why I'm speaking with you. And so Don says yes, David says yes.

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And then, okay, the person I'm talking about is Janet. She stole a candy bar, here's the footage.

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Here's what I've done so far, here's what she said. So it does require you to tell more people.

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But again, it's in the context now of following what Christ has said to do. This is not gossip, this is not gossip.

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Now, if you really wanna get an idea of what gossip really is like, have you ever read Luther's Large Catechism?

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Of course, everyone's like, yeah, I read it every day. Okay. I was gonna be honest, like, let's do it.

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Okay, in Luther's Large Catechism, which was a series of sermons that he delivered on the 10

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Commandments. Let me see if I can do this. Well, so here's the thing, is if somebody's coming to you with the purpose of just information sharing, that's gossip.

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But okay, there's somebody that's in our prayers. You know, it's in our prayers, we're supposed to think if it was one of our neighbors.

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Now, can I go in and ask, is this the neighbor right there?

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Or, you know, is that gossiping? Is that trying to find out something? Or is that out of concern?

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Okay, well, you could cross the line into being a busybody. And again, the context is going to be one of those things.

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You know, so you gotta be very careful. So the idea here is that gossip is the type of thing that will necessarily cause somebody's character to be maligned.

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Yeah, assassinated. And that's really the purpose of gossip. That's really the purpose. Whereas the purpose of church discipline is repentance.

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What'd you give her? The large catechism. Oh, large catechism. Now, I want to read a part of this.

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I want to read a part of this from the large catechism. We have like 10 minutes, but I won't read the whole thing.

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But I want you to listen to what Luther writes about the Eighth Commandment. The Eighth Commandment is, you shall not bear false witness against your neighbor.

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Besides our own body, our wife or husband, and our temporal property, we have one more treasure which is indispensable to us, namely our honor and good name.

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For it is intolerable to live among men in public disgrace and contempt. Therefore, God will not have our neighbor deprived of his reputation, honor, and character any more than of his money and possessions.

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He would have every man maintain his self -respect before his wife, children, servants, and neighbors.

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In the first and simplest meaning, as the words stand, you shall not bear false witness, this commandment pertains to public courts of justice where a poor, innocent man is accused and maligned by false witnesses and consequently punished in his body, property, or honor.

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This problem appears to concern us only as little at present, but among the

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Jews, it was extremely common. That nation had an excellent orderly government, and even now, where there is such a government, instances of this sin still occur.

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The reason is this, where judges, mayors, princes, or others in authority sit in judgment, we always find that true to the usual course of the world, men are loathe to offend anyone.

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Instead, they speak dishonestly with an eye to gaining favor, money, prospects, or friendship.

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Consequently, a poor man is inevitably oppressed, loses his case, and suffers punishment.

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It is the universal misfortune of the world that men of integrity seldom preside in courts of justice.

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A judge ought, above all, to be a man of integrity and not only upright, but also a wise, sagacious, brave, and fearless man.

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Likewise, a witness should be fearless. More than that, he should be an upright man.

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He who is to administer justice equitably in all cases will often offend good friends, relatives, neighbors, and the rich and the powerful who are in a position to help or to harm him.

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He must therefore be quite blind, shutting his eyes and ears to everything but the evidence presented, and make his decision accordingly.

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The first application of this commandment, then, is that everyone should help his neighbor maintain his rights. He must not allow these rights to be thwarted or distorted, but should promote and resolutely guard them.

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Whether he be judge or witness, let the consequences be what they may. Remember, something has to be established by the testimony of two or three witnesses.

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So here we have a goal set for our jurists, perfect justice and equity in every case.

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They should let right remain right, nor perverting or concealing or suppressing anything on account of anyone's money, property, honor, or power.

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This is one aspect of the commandment and its plainest meaning, applying to all that takes place in court.

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Next, it extends much further when it is applied to spiritual jurisdiction or administration.

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Here too, everyone bears false witness against his neighbor. Whether there are godly preachers and Christians, they must endure having the world call them heretics or apostates, even seditious and accursed scoundrels.

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Moreover, the word of God must undergo the most shameful and spiteful persecution and blasphemy. It is contradicted, perverted, misused, and misinterpreted, but let this pass.

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It is the blind world's nature to condemn and persecute the truth and the children of God, and yet consider this no sin.

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The third aspect of this commandment concerns us all. It forbids all sins of the tongue by which we may injure or offend our neighbor.

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False witness is clearly a work of the tongue. Whatever is done with the tongue against the neighbor then is forbidden by God.

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This applies to false preachers with their corrupt teaching and blasphemy, to false judges and witnesses with their corrupt behavior in court and their lying and malicious talk outside of court.

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It applies particularly to the detestable, shameful vice of backbiting or slander by which the devil rides us.

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Of this, much could be said. It is a common vice of human nature that everyone would rather hear evil than good about his neighbor.

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Evil, though we are, we cannot tolerate having evil spoken of us. We want the golden compliments of the whole world, yet we cannot bear to hear the best spoken of others.

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To avoid this vice, therefore, we should note that nobody has the right to judge and reprove his neighbor publicly even when he has seen a sin committed unless he has been authorized to judge and to reprove.

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So notice, when it comes to sins, that nobody has a right to take a person to task publicly regarding these sins.

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Now, I will make this clear. Scripture's very clear that false teachers are to be rebuked publicly and warned against publicly.

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So this doesn't apply to the warning about heresies and false teachers, but we're talking about when somebody sins, even if you see it, if you see a sin,

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Scripture in Matthew 18 makes it clear you do not have the ability to prosecute this publicly on your own recognizance.

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There's a great difference between judging sin and having knowledge of sin. Knowledge of sin does not entail the right to judge it.

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I may see and hear that my neighbor sins, but to make him the talk of the town is not my business.

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If I interfere and pass sentence on him, I fall into a greater sin than his.

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When you become aware of a sin, simply make your ears a tomb and bury it until you are appointed a judge and you are authorized to administer punishment by virtue of your office.

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Those are called backbiters who are not content just to know, but rush ahead and judge, learning a bit of gossip about someone else.

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They spread it into every corner, relishing, delighting in it like pigs that roll in the mud and root around in it with their snouts.

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This is nothing else than usurping the judgment and the office of God, pronouncing the severest kind of verdict and sentence for the harshest verdict a judge can pronounce is to declare somebody a thief, a murderer, a traitor, et cetera.

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Notice, in order for somebody to be declared a thief, it takes a judge.

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Does that make sense? If the person has committed the crime here in the United States, they're innocent until proven guilty and there's due process.

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Does everybody who is accused of a crime actually commit it? No. There are those who are wrongfully accused and so there is a process for it, but the gossip says that person is a thief.

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Isn't that interesting? So this is nothing more than usurping. Whoever therefore ventures to accuse his neighbor of such guilt assumes as much authority as the emperor and all magistrates.

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For though you do not wield the sword, you use your venomous tongue to the disgrace and harm of your neighbor.

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Therefore, God forbids you to speak evil about another, even though to your certain knowledge he is guilty.

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All the more urgent is the prohibition if you are not sure, but have it only from hearsay.

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But you say, why shouldn't I speak if it is the truth? How many times have I heard that?

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I reply, why don't you bring it before the regular judge? Oh, I cannot prove it publicly.

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I might be called a liar and sent away in disgrace. Ah, now do you smell the roast?

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If you do not trust yourself to make your charges before the proper authorities, then hold your tongue.

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Keep your knowledge to yourself and do not give it out to others. For when you repeat a story that you cannot prove, even if it is true, you appear as a liar.

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Besides, you act like a knave, for no man should be deprived of his honor and good name unless these have first been taken away from him publicly.

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Every report then that cannot be adequately proved is false witness.

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No one should publicly assert as truth what is not publicly sustained. In short, what is secret should be allowed to remain secret or at any rate reproved and secret as we shall hear.

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Therefore, if you encounter somebody with a worthless tongue who gossips and slanders someone, rebuke him straight to his face and make him blush for shame.

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Then you will silence many, a one who otherwise would bring some poor man into disgrace from which he could scarcely clear himself for honor and good name are easily taken away but not easily restored.

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So you see that we are absolutely forbidden to speak evil of our neighbor. Exception is made, however, of civil magistrates, preachers, and parents, for we must interpret this commandment in such a way that evil shall not go unpunished.

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We have seen that the fifth commandment forbids us to injure anyone physically, and yet an exception is made of the hangman.

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By virtue of his office, he does not do his neighbor good, but only harm and evil, yet he does not sin against God's commandment because God of his own accord instituted that office.

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As he warns in the fifth commandment, he has reserved to himself the right of punishment. Likewise, although no one has in his own person the right to judge and condemn anyone, yet if they whose duty it is to fail to do so, they sin as much as those who take the law into their own hands without such a commission.

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Necessity requires one to report evil, to prefer charges, to attest, examine, and witness.

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It is no different from the situation of the physician who, to cure a patient, is sometimes compelled to examine and handle his private parts.

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Just so, magistrates, parents, even brothers and sisters and other good friends are under mutual obligation to reprove evil where it is necessary and beneficial, but the right way to deal with this matter would be to observe the order laid down by the gospel where Christ says, if your brother sins against you, go and tell him his fault between you and him alone.

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Here you have a fine, precious precept for governing the tongue which ought to be carefully noted.

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If we are to avoid this detestable abuse, let this be your rule then that you should not be quick to spread slander and gossip about your neighbor, but to admonish him privately so that he may amend.

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Likewise, if someone should whisper to you what this or that person has done, teach him, if he saw the wrongdoing, to go and reprove the man personally, otherwise hold his tongue.

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This lesson you can learn from the daily management of the household. When the master of the house sees a servant failing to do his duty and takes him to task personally, if he were so foolish as to leave the servant at home while he went out on the streets to complain to his neighbors, he would no doubt be told, you fool, that is none of our business.

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Why don't you tell him yourself? And that would be the brotherly thing to say, for the evil would be corrected and the neighbor's honor maintained.

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As Christ himself says in the same passage, if he listens to you, you have gained your brother, then you have done a great and excellent work.

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Do you think it is an insignificant thing to gain a brother? Let all the monks in the holy order step forth with all their works heaped up together and see if they can make the boast that they have gained one brother.

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I think you get the gist of it. But I think Luther's sermon here on the

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Eighth Commandment and bringing in our gospel text today is quite relevant. Does that help clear up the question as to what is and isn't gossip?

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And now along to Sunday school. No, now it's time to wrap up and to head over to the