Ecclesiology: Church Discipline

Well, as you all know, we are continuing our study of Christian theology and doctrine. This is our Wednesday night. Brother Andy leads us in a time in the Psalms after we pray, which we did earlier. And then I give us a lesson in theology.

Theology matters because God's Word matters. Truth matters. And so, we're toward the end. We started this two years ago. We started with Theology Proper, Christology, Pneumatology, all of the different schools of Christian theology.

And honestly, I should just start over again because it was so long ago everybody's forgotten what I said two years ago. I could just start and just do the whole course again. But we're in section nine, which is Ecclesiology.

That's the doctrine of the church. Ekklesia is the Greek word for church. Therefore, Ecclesiology means the doctrine of the church. I'm hoping to finish part eight next Wednesday. You'll notice the eight parts that it is on your sheet.

What is the church? Church structure, leadership, membership, worship, ordinances. Tonight is church discipline. Next week is church support. Then we will have our Thanksgiving week off. We won't do midweek on Thanksgiving week because I'll be cooking for Set Free.

Many of you will be cooking for your families. We host Set Free here and do Thanksgiving here with them. And then the next week when we come back will be in Eschatology. Now Eschatology everybody's all excited about because that's the study of end times and all that stuff.

Not my favorite subject. As a theologian, I tend to prefer other schools of theological thought because there's so much debate in Eschatology. But I imagine this class will at least have a few extra folks.

You guys are the faithful few, right? You know the joke. Everybody who comes on Sunday morning loves Jesus. Everybody who comes on Wednesday.

Oh no.

People who come on Sunday morning love the church. People who come on Wednesday night love Jesus. That's the joke. There's very few people who come on Wednesday night. But I'm thankful for you guys who are here.

And so tonight we're going to look at Part 7 of Church. The Doctrine of the Church. We're going to look at Church Discipline. Now this subject is one that I've taught on before. So those of you who've been a member of our church for a while, you've heard me talk about.

This.

There are two major passages in regard to Church Discipline. Matthew Chapter 18 and 1 Corinthians Chapter 5. And we're going to look at those in a moment. But before we do, I want to look at this. It's in your notes.

You guys are familiar with John Calvin. John Calvin was a 16th century Geneva Reformer. And he was known for many things. One of the things that John Calvin gave us was what became known as the threefold standard of a true church.

How do you know if a church is a true church? Because not every church is a true church. Unfortunately, there are false churches. Unfortunately, there are heretical churches. Unfortunately, there are dangerous false teachings out there.

I mean, we know this. And so how do you know it's a true church? Calvin said the first thing is it preaches the gospel. If it doesn't preach the gospel, it's not a church. The gospel must be central. The gospel must be accurately proclaimed.

And so that's number one. Number two is that there must be participation in the sacraments. Now, we talked last week. We don't normally use the word sacrament. We use the word ordinance. But essentially, that is the participation in the Lord's Supper and baptism.

If a church does not practice the Lord's Supper and baptism, it's not following the commands of Christ. Therefore, it cannot rightly be called a church. But the third one is the one that is often the most controversial among Calvin's threefold, you know, if you think of a stool with three legs, the third leg tends to be the most debated.

And that is the doctrine of church discipline. He said a church, essentially, that does not practice discipline and allows sin to run rampant within without any rebuke or any correction is not a true church.

And I would say that that would not bode well for many churches today. Because many churches would never rebuke sin. Many churches would never address sin. I mean, there's a very famous pastor out in Houston who says, oh, I don't ever like to talk about sin because I like to talk about positive things.

You know, I mean, I don't mean to be ugly, but I'm just doing a nice impression there. You know who I'm talking about. That idea, well, we're never dealing with sin. And we're never dealing with the issues of sin.

Then it's not a church. And so church discipline. And it's just I don't know if I put the definition in your notes. Church discipline is the biblical process of removing a member.

Is that there?

OK, I just want to read that to you. Church discipline is the biblical process of removing a member publicly who has been found in habitual, unrepentant sin and has been given the opportunity to repent and has refused to do so.

That last part's important because nobody gets put out just because they're in sin. Really, the reason for being removed is they refuse to repent. They see the sin and they say, I'm not going to stop.

And I was looking for a passage earlier, and maybe some of you are smarter than I, and you just think of these things. But I was trying to turn there while Brother Andy was talking because he brought it to my mind.

And we co-teach on Wednesdays, and I enjoy that. And sometimes he says things, and it just sparks my mind. Where is the story of Achan? I couldn't think of where it is, and my mind's not on straight.

It's Joshua.

Yeah, I knew it was Joshua.

I couldn't find it.

That's six, maybe.

OK, well, you guys remember Achan? Achan was the man who when the people of Israel went to war, they were supposed to destroy and not take any of the spoils of war. They weren't supposed to take anything back.

But Achan stole some of the gold bowls, and he hid them in his tent, and he buried them in a hole in his tent. And then the people of Israel went to war, and they failed in battle. And Joshua went before the Lord.

What happened? And the Lord said, There's sin in the camp. So it was discovered that Achan had sinned against God. Not against Israel, not against Joshua, but that he had sinned against God. And the punishment was very severe.

He was executed along with his family for that sin. But the thing about that story, often the thing that people don't realize is when there is sin in the camp and it is not addressed, it, like a cancer, will metastasize and will keep the people of God from accomplishing what God has called them to do.

You guys are picking up what I'm putting down, right? That's the serious nature of sin in the camp. And so church discipline has a two-fold purpose. And it's in your notes. The first is the restoration of the sinner.

We want them to be restored. We're not looking to stone nobody. This side of the cross, we don't have that requirement anymore. Praise God, yes. We're not looking to bury anybody up to their neck and stone them with stones.

We love people, and we want to see them restored. So the restoration of the sinner is important, but also the protection of the flock. So if the restoration of the sinner cannot be accomplished, then the protection of the flock takes the primary role.

If a cancer can't be cured, it has to be cut out. If it can't be destroyed with radiation or whatever, it has to be removed. And so that is the two-fold purpose of discipline. I would say this. If I had to put one on top of the other, protection even would be paramount to restoration because the person is the one who is responsible for their sin.

We want them to restore and be restored, but ultimately the body must be protected. And so both are important, and I'm not necessarily saying one's more important, but the body is certainly the body of Christ that must be protected.

Throughout the history of the church, discipline has been the method used for ensuring that the church be kept from sin and false teaching. If a person was found teaching falsely or in habitual sin, they were called to repent.

If they refused, they were removed, and in doing so the church was protected. However, church discipline is a concept that is not practiced much anymore. As a result, many if not most churches have become very much like the world outside.

They harbor and allow all kinds of blatant sin in their midst while either turning a blind eye or outright accepting sinful behavior. In fact, for some, the very idea of a church that would call its membership to account regarding sin sounds awfully legalistic and terribly out of vogue with the new age of tolerance.

There's a book in our book rack. We don't exactly have a store, but we have a book rack out there. Brother Andy's book rack. And it's called The Intolerance of Tolerance by D .A. Carson, where Carson explains that there's something about tolerance.

What does it mean to be tolerant? It's like my children. I love my children, but I cannot tolerate them disrespecting my wife or myself because to do so would encourage more disrespect. And what have we seen?

We've seen a generation of people who have grown up without the expectation of respect. And what happens? We have a generation of people who have a great sense of entitlement and no discipline. And the same is within the church.

So my goal in this lesson, again, and I guess I've already explained it, is to show you why and how this practice is to be conducted and to show that it's not really optional. It's a command. So let's look first at Matthew 18.

On your sheet, I gave you an outline of basically the Matthew 18 passage, verse 15. So you're Matthew 18, verse 15. Can I have a handout? I thought I had that, but I don't have that.

Thank you.

Okay, so how do we practice church discipline? You'll notice I gave you a four-fold outline. There's a private rebuke, a private rebuke with witnesses, a public rebuke before the church, and excommunication from the church.

So let's read. This is Jesus' words in Matthew 18, verse 15. If your brother sins against you, go and tell him his fault between you and him alone. If he listens to you, you have gained your brother. But if he does not listen, take one or two others along with you that every charge may be established by the evidence of two or three witnesses.

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. Truly I say to you, whatever you bind on earth shall be bound in heaven.

Whatever you loose on earth shall be loosed in heaven. Again I say to you, if two of you agree on earth about anything they ask, it will be done for them by my Father in heaven, for where two or three are gathered in my name, there I am among them.

Okay, so that's the section of the passage Jesus is preaching. And this passage just sort of comes up, and he's addressing the issue of sin in the body. And he says, if your brother sins against you, go and tell him his sin between you and him alone.

So I call that private rebuke. The church is the worst at that. Because what we often do is, Daisy sins against me, and I go, what's your name brother? I go tell Louis, because I'm mad at Daisy. And Louis and I commiserate over our now mutual disdain for Daisy.

Because I'm upset, and rather than telling Daisy, I want Louis and I to go have a cup of coffee and talk about Daisy. And so that's how it often happens. Rather than going to Daisy and saying, Daisy, you hurt me, you've sinned against me, you cut me deep, whatever, I don't do that.

I go tell someone else. And Jesus says, don't do that. Because that's what? This is the very definition of gossip. I'm telling the story, I'm telling Daisy's story to somebody else. I'm telling my story to somebody else, somebody who's really none of their business.

Because if I go to Daisy and Daisy repents, oh, we'll turn it around, Daisy, I'll make me the bad guy. If you come to me and I repent, that should be the end of it. If I repent and Daisy recognizes that I've repented, that shouldn't go any further than that.

She doesn't need to tell anybody and neither do I. It's over. Oh, how the church would be different if it was practiced that way, if we could really deal with things that way. So often we don't. So right away we see that this is like more than just how to deal with the sinner, it's also you become the sinner when you don't want to deal with it the right way.

A lot of people come to me and say, Pastor, you'll never guess what so-and-so did to me. I'm like, have you told so-and-so?

No.

Well, then hush and go tell so-and-so. Because if you're going to tell me, just go.

Deal with them.

What do you want me to do?

Nothing yet.

Wait until you've talked to them. So that's, and I could get really stuck on this, and I know I'm limited on time, because a lot of people, well, I just needed to vent. That's what we say, right? We justify our misbehavior with those things.

So that's first. Private rebuke. But then you'll notice I say private rebuke with witnesses because Daisy, I've sinned against Daisy, Daisy comes to me and I say, you know what, Daisy, you're wrong.

I'm not wrong.

I was right. And she goes, but Keith, you sinned, and it was obvious. And I say, Daisy, you don't know me, and you don't know my heart.

You can't judge me.

I can say what. All kind, tell Daisy you just wrong.

You didn't.

I can say whatever I want. So now Daisy goes and she gets Louis, because now it's okay to talk to Louis, because now Louis knows about it too, and now you both come to me. And now we both, I have to deal with two people who are saying, Keith, you're wrong.

Because at that moment, if Daisy's wrong, Louis would be the helper. Because if Daisy goes to Louis and says, you know, Keith did this, and Louis says, well, that's not a sin. He told you your dress was ugly.

That's mean, but it ain't a sin. I mean, you know what I'm saying? The second and third witness become, as it were, like arbiters. They help to understand whether or not this is truly a sin. I think this is honestly where elders would get involved.

I think the second step, and you know what the biblical elders are. We talked about them a few weeks ago, the men who have been ordained to that position, and they're trustworthy. That's where I would say you would come to me, right?

Person sins against you, you've gone to them, they've refused. Then you come and say, okay, pastor, I went to this person, they refused. Can you mediate? Can we talk? Can we try to deal with this? Okay, now, yes.

Now we can. And we go and we try. That's when it becomes difficult, because now if they say, I'm still not wrong, and they have the weight of the witnesses, and this is why later he talks about the two or three, and what's bound in heaven is bound on earth, and all that stuff.

That's tied to that.

The whole two or three are gathered in my name, it's tied to that two or three witnesses. That's all part of that. Because the idea is the two or three witnesses are acting on behalf of the church. They are functioning, as it were, as the arms of the church reaching out, trying to pull this person out of sin.

They're functioning, as it were, like the arms of the church. So now the person has still refused to repent. It says they are to be brought before the church. For what reason? So that the church can call them to repentance.

Bringing them to the church is not for immediate excommunication. The reason you bring them before the church is not to get them out of here. No, you bring them before the church so that the whole church can look at me.

Whoever it is. And say you are in sin, and we all agree. Think of it this way. Let's say you've got a man in the church. I'm not going to put myself in this category. Let's say you've got a man in the church who's cheating on his wife.

It's not funny, but it's a bad situation. A man in church cheating on his wife. Another man knows about it. He goes to him. It's not a sin because my wife's mean to me. She doesn't cook good. I've been doing this a long time.

If you think that's an exaggeration of the crazy that I have heard, that ain't even touching it. People are nuts. Brother Andy, say amen. He's been doing this longer than I have. And he knows the level of crazy people get when they are in sin.

And so you go to them. God wouldn't bring me this woman if he didn't want me to be happy. She ain't your wife. Yeah, but she makes me happy.

God don't care if you're happy.

He cares if you're holy. It's a very important distinction. So you bring him before the church. The whole church calls for personal repentance. The person will not repent. At that moment, the church has a decision to make.

And it may not be at that moment that the church excommunicates. There may be a time of counseling, a time of trying to win that person back, a time of working with that person. But there will come a time where the church will have to say no more.

You are no longer a part of this body. You have demonstrated your unwillingness to repent. And, therefore, you are no longer a part of this body. You say, I can't believe you tell somebody they couldn't come to church.

I mean, somebody says, well, couldn't they just come and sit in church? At this point, I would say it's not a good idea. Because the and here's where I'm going to go with this. Go to 1 Corinthians 5 because this is what it looks like.

That's Jesus' command. 1 Corinthians 5 is what it looks like in practice. Paul is writing to the Corinthian church. He has been told about some sins that are going on in the church. And so he is responding to this.

And in Chapter 5, he writes about a report of sexual immorality. It's so strange but true that it is often sexual immorality that is the sin that is the problem. But notice what it says. It is reported that there is sexual immorality among you and of a kind that is not tolerated even among the pagans.

For a man has his father's wife and you are arrogant. Ought you not rather to mourn? Let him who has done this be removed from among you. So here's the picture. Somebody in the church is sleeping with his step-mom.

I mean, that's it doesn't say his mother. It says his father's wife. So the assumption is it's not his mom. If it was his mom, I think it would say his mom. And even in this time, the step-mother was considered incest.

This is why Paul says this is not practiced even among the pagans. Because if a man slept with his step-mother, that was considered to be still a form of incest. So he said, even the pagans don't do this.

Even the Romans don't allow this nonsense. And yet, you are doing it. So it goes on, verse 3, it says, For though absent in the body, I am present in spirit. And if present, I am already pronounced judgment on the one who did such a thing.

When you are assembled in the name of the Lord Jesus, and my spirit is present in the power of the Lord Jesus, you are to deliver this man to Satan for the destruction of the flesh, so that his spirit may be saved in the day of the Lord.

What does it mean to deliver him over to Satan? My only way to understand that, and I think that I am correct, is that he is removed from the body. He is basically put out into the world. Now see, in 2020, it don't work the same way it would have worked in the year 45.

Right? When Paul is ministering in Asia Minor. And he is going from Iconium, to Lystra, to Derby, to all these cities, and Corinth. Because at that time, there wasn't the First Baptist Church at Corinth, and the Second Methodist Church at Corinth, and the Presbyterian Church at Corinth.

There was the church at Corinth. Therefore, if the guy got excommunicated from the Corinthian church, he was out. Like if somebody gets excommunicated from Sovereign Grace Family Church, they could literally go down the street to Bold City and be welcomed with no questions.

I mean, I assume. I don't know the leaders at Bold City, but I'm just saying. I'm just saying that's the next church down the road. They go over here to Duval Station, and they'd probably be welcomed in.

And again, without question. Because we're so anxious to welcome people, that often we don't even question where they came from. That's not every church, and again, I could be wrong about both. I'm just saying they're the closest ones to us.

But literally, there's a church on every corner. So people say, well, then you can't practice discipline anymore. No, we still got to do what's right, even if other people don't. We still got to do what's right, even if it's not going to be followed through by other people.

So the excommunication happens. The goal is that the person now separated from the body will yearn for that and recognize the need to repent. That's the whole turn them over to Satan for the destruction of the flesh so that they'll be saved.

So that they'll turn from their sin and come back. And I do think the weight, the onus of that would have been much more powerful then than now. Because now, if somebody left the church, it would just be, well, I'll go to another church.

But it doesn't mean we don't do it. It just means the effect will not be felt as powerfully as perhaps it once was. Now, I want to stay in 1 Corinthians 5 for just a moment. Because some people will say, you can't practice church discipline because you're never supposed to judge.

Matthew 7, 1, judge not lest ye be judged. And normally that's all people know. They don't read the rest of it. Where it says to judge with righteous judgment. Don't judge as the unrighteous do, but judge with righteous judgment.

There's a whole context to the words, judge not lest ye be judged. But notice what Paul says beginning in verse 9. He says, I wrote to you in my letter not to associate with sexually immoral people. Not at all meaning the sexually immoral of this world or greedy or swindlers or idolaters.

Since then you would need to come out of the world. But now I am writing to you not to associate with anyone who bears the name of brother if he is guilty of sexual immorality or greed or is an idolater, reviler, drunkard or swindler.

Not even to eat with such a one. For what have I to do with judging outsiders? Is it not those inside the church who you are to judge? God judges those outside. Purge the evil person from among you. Notice that last phrase, purge the evil person from among you.

How do you know? It's an act of judgment. It's a judicial act on the part of the church. It is an act of judgment, but it's an act that is sought in righteousness. Not in personal vendetta. Not in an attempt to try to defame or demean or diminish.

You are trying to restore. But it begins with recognizing that a sin has taken place. But I like what Paul says here. He says, we don't judge people outside. If I walk down the street and I see people doing sinful stuff, I'm like, yeah, wretch is going to wretch.

That's the way wretches do. I'm not surprised when sinful people do sinful things.

That's what they do.

But when somebody in the church is habitual, unrepentant, persistent sin, that's not what we're supposed to do. There is a different standard within the church than in the world. And therefore, I don't call the unbeliever a hypocrite for living in sin because they're doing what is by nature their desire.

But the person in the church who calls himself a follower of Christ, now let me back up for just a second. All of us battle sin. So what's the difference? It's habitual, unrepentant sin. Repentance is a daily activity.

I have to repent today of doubt. I have to repent today of frustration and anger. As you guys know, we had a loss. A very good friend passed away yesterday. It hurts. And it comes with a degree of frustration, anger, and sadness.

I'm so thankful for the Psalms when I see the psalmist cry out to God with those same emotions because it shows me that it's okay for a moment to go to God and be broken and seek that he restore us. But that's the point, right?

Nobody's perfect, and we're not saying you have to be perfect, but there is a difference between fighting sin and living in sin. Yeah, drunkard is his lifestyle. This is why, and we don't call it this anymore, but this is why back in the day when a man and a woman lived together in a home and weren't married, it was referred to as living in sin because it was a behavior that was perpetual.

If you move in together, that's the choice that you've made. I've told this story before. I'll tell it very quickly. Years and years ago when I first became a pastor, I was 26 years old when I took over here.

So, man, I'm getting old. But had a very kind old man.

Looked like Jack Palance.

You know who that is, the old actor? Sweet man, came to church, and he was so kind to me. He would always compliment the service, and he always just had very kind words, and I liked him. And I liked his wife, or at least what I thought.

So he came to my office one day. Hey, I want to talk to you about joining the church.

Let's talk.

Come to my office.

So we sat down, and I said, So, tell me about you and your wife. Oh, she's not my wife.

Tell me about you and your sister. Because here's hoping.

And he's like, Oh, no, she's not my sister. I'm like, Cousin? I mean, I'm trying to get them out. And he goes, No, no, she's my girlfriend.

He's a kissing cousin.

Yeah, yeah. And I said, Are you all living together? And he said, Yeah. I said, You know, that's a sin. Even if you're 75, it's still a sin, just so you know. It's not like an expiration date. Like, after retirement, we can do what we want.

You know, don't really work that way. And so I said, Brother, I love you. You're really a kindly man. I said, But why don't you marry this woman? I said, What is it that's keeping you from? Oh, well, we don't want to get married.

But he had some reasons, you know. And I said, So you'd rather live in opposition to God's command, because marriage, at this point, would be inconvenience and economically difficult?

Yes.

I said, Okay, well, just so you know, you can't join, because we would have to immediately discipline you. You know, it's like you can join for a minute, and we'll turn around and kick you out. So how about we just tell you you need to repent?

You are living in habitual, unrepentant sin. I don't see it that way. I don't care how you see it. What do you mean you don't see it that way? Because we don't get to choose what is and is not sin. I'm not the man who made the rules.

But I will tell you this. The guy who, the one, I don't want to say guy. I want to say God that way. The one who authored life has the right to set the rules. And to do life the way the author of life intended life to be done is the best way to do life.

I've said that for years. To do life the way the author of life intended it is obviously the best way to do life. So I want to finish. I'm out of time, but let me finish with one last thing. There are times when this particular pattern that we talked about, the private rebuke, private rebuke of witnesses, there are times when people will circumvent that.

For instance, let's say we were in church, and somebody stood up and said, I am currently cheating on my wife, and it's none of anybody's business. I'm going to keep doing what I want to do. At that point, no use in a private conversation.

Dude's already said it. I mean, you know what I'm saying? Now, we still might have a private conversation, but the point is it's now public. And if you think that's an exaggeration, that's almost exactly something that happened.

A woman stood up in church and said, I'm living with a man, and we've been living together, and nobody here should have an opinion. It's my life and not yours. And she said this to the church, and you know what the church did?

Nothing.

We'll get to that later, but it was a long time ago. The point is that kind of immediate public statement would require an immediate public response. And therefore, they're circumventing the steps on their own.

It's sort of like if you go out and shoot somebody in broad daylight and there's 50 cameras on you, the evidence is there. It's not a matter of having to get witnesses anymore. Everybody's seen you do it.

Now it's a matter of how do we move forward from here. And also there's an issue of someone who is seeking to bring division in the church. Titus talks about the person who seeks to divide the church, you warn him twice and then remove him.

Because there's a difference between somebody who's sinning in the church and somebody who's sinning against the church. You understand the difference? If somebody's coming here and actively trying to divide the body, they have to be dealt with quickly because that kind of division.

I mean, how many times? You have all heard of churches that have split. Churches never split on accident. It's because there's a splitter among them. Somebody is leading the charge to split the church.

So keep that in mind. There are times where the pattern may change slightly. But the goal is still the same. Restoration and protection. So let's use my time. Was tonight helpful? Was it encouraging?

Well, good.

Let's pray. Father, I thank you for this opportunity to be in your house again and to talk about your word. I pray that this has been enlightening, encouraging, and ultimately, Lord, if there has been reproof or rebuke that has been used in this, Lord, I pray it be beneficial to us all.

Most of all, Lord, that we would draw closer to your son, Jesus Christ, in whose name we pray.

Amen.