64 - People of the Church, Part 1 | Church Membership | Church Discipline

Welcome to the Striving for Eternity Academy. This is a Ministry of striving for eternity. It is an academy that we put out there teaching different things. We are right now in our school of systematic theology.

We're glad to have you with us. We're in the last of four books. We've been going basically grouping it by books for four set classes. So that way it's you can group these in smaller amounts, but you can get book four.

Of the syllabus which is at our website at striving for eternity Org, you can pick up the syllabus with the syllabus. You'll get all the notes. So encourage you to do that. What were we going to cover in this last couple of sections of systematic theology?

Well, we're gonna deal with. In this we're calling this book God's program for the ages the doctrines of the church and the last thing. So just to give you an overview we're going to Start with the doctrine of the church.

We looked last couple classes on the institution of the church as an institution. This week we're gonna look at the people of the church. We'll probably look at next week this week we'll see membership who makes up the church and then the You know who runs the church kind of with the leaders.

Then we'll look at church government after that and in an ordinance of the church baptism and the Lord's Supper. Then we get into those discussions of end times. Yes the doctrine of end times. We will be discussing several different things regarding the future.

This lesson as I said is dealing with the issue of the people of the church. And so with that we want to get started. Because we have a lot that we're gonna try to go over now. I'm gonna try to probably do this in two lessons two classes.

One class will deal with the membership of the church and the other class will deal with the leadership of the church. All right and the reason we're gonna do that is because when we get into the Membership, we're gonna be discussing different things of what the members should be doing.

But there is a missing element Within many churches that we're gonna discuss and we're gonna spend a lot of time going through a discussion on This missing element of many churches and it's a vital element.

In fact It's such a vital element that it's one of three elements that in the Puritan age. The Puritans argued if you didn't do this one thing you are not a church. They had three things that were that were defined a church.

One was the preaching of God's Word. Two was following of the ordinances and this third is something so important. They said this is the definition of a church and if you don't have it, they argued you didn't have church.

That's pretty big and yet it's missing in so many churches today now, I don't know whether it's a necessity. But we're gonna get into that in just a bit. So I encourage you to open your syllabus if you have one if not, I encourage you to really quick go to the website and Purchase one they're reasonably priced $25 each.

We may be offering discounts if you buy all four we're gonna we're working on things like that. But with that if you're in lesson number two in your syllabus. We start and it says although some advocate for less organization as a more godly form of church.

There is a clear Indication that there was organization in the early church. Now the reason this is you see some people that they will say that they worship in home churches. Nothing wrong with home churches.

The first century had home churches that met in homes as well in as in buildings. So it's not the where they meet but the issue is that some people try to argue that if you have less structure it's more godly or more biblical and some argue that they're more almost as if they're more spiritual because they worship in a Church setting that has less organization to it.

But the point of this is to show that there was a lot of organization. In the first century church and there should be in church. There's some who argue that when you go safe to the streets and evangelize that that is church.

Well as we look through this and we look at what the New Testament teaches about church. The church had officers we see that to say we see in many passages that we're gonna get to next week. But you'll see that in Philippians 1 1 that the church there was a.

There were officers in the church. The reason that becomes important is if you're gonna say the church is on the street corner. Where people evangelize well, who are the officers who are the deacons who are the pastors?

You see now if the whole church a church body is going out. Well, then you're gonna have pastors associated with that. But when it's people from different churches or just people that meet on the street.

You're gonna see that that doesn't fit the definition of church. We kind of dealt with that in the last two classes and we have a paper that defines on the website that defines what church is. You see a selection process that shows organization this is act 6 you see that the church Realized they had a issue with them with the widows.

They had to identify well. Who's gonna take care of these widows? Someone needs to provide the food and things like that. And so there was a selection process some would argue for the first deacons. That is the word that we see in act 6 they were waiters of tables.

That's deacon us the word we get for deacon. So you see that they there was some organization because they had to know who to select from they were doing select. They were doing voting basically. You see that they had stated meetings in acts 20 verse 3.

That there were stated meetings. They had a meeting place a meeting time. They would meet regularly. They would do things at those meetings like collect an offering like having the Lord's Supper. The proclaiming of God's Word.

These are things they would do in these meetings, but they had a scheduled meeting it shows again organization. Membership role in Acts 2 you see that they had the idea of members that were part of they knew how many were being added to the church.

Along with that you see a widow's registry in first Timothy 5 9. So they knew who is a widow that was on the rolls of the church. So there was church membership. I understand some don't agree with that some say now there wasn't church membership.

There are some churches that do not hold to a church membership. I don't think that we can make. I don't think it's as big of an issue Biblically to make an issue whether there was a physical church membership.

These are people that are on the roll. They're voted into church. These are not or whether it was just everyone knew one another. That's not so much the issue where I would argue in nowaday for church membership is one Protection of the church body with all the lawsuits in America at least.

You want to have to know who's part of the church? We actually would have people sign that they agree with the doctrines of the church. So that when things happen as with this thing, we're going to talk about in just a bit.

It's a sticky issue for some churches and because they don't have church members it makes it hard to practice this one thing without Possibly putting yourself in jeopardy. And so I think that church membership if you want to argue.

It's not a biblical thing. At least I would argue. It's a practical thing in our day and age. And then the issue of that we're going to bring up that shows Organization we're gonna spend a bulk of the time is this issue of church.

Discipline you see this in first Corinthians 5 Matthew 18. We're gonna look in detail, but you can't discipline someone out of the church unless they were a member of the church. But that whole process shows there was organization.

Now, like I said if you're gonna discipline someone out of the church and you follow the biblical process. But you don't have a church membership. You open yourself up to possible lawsuits. And so you have to that is why I say it's a practical issue.

So let's look at the membership. All right, let's start with membership. All right. So when we look at the membership, what is the requirement to be a member of the church? I believe that there's only two things that we see in Scripture Acts 2 verse 41 those who received his word were baptized and were added to.

And added that day about 3 ,000 souls. So you see they were? Received the word and were baptized. So I would say that the two requirements to being a church member would be salvation and baptism now. If you don't have baptism, is it a major thing?

Well, I think it depends. I Get to the topic of baptism in the church ordinances. But we do not have a proper view in at least in America of what baptism Really was like Baptism back in the first century was a major issue.

I I liken it to those who get baptized publicly in Muslim countries where when they get baptized publicly. They're basically identifying that they could be murdered legally because they're renouncing the faith Of Islam and it opens them up to being able to be murdered by anyone.

That means that when you did something like baptism you counted the cost you knew what it was gonna cost in Judaism, you're you're basically dead to them. Okay, you'd be dead to your family. They would bury an empty casket and What would happen would be is that when you got baptized?

You were you were basically identifying yourself as no longer Jewish and what your family would do is they would treat you as if you were dead. Now that's a major issue when you live with your family you work with your family everyone in town you work with them.

You know them to be suddenly cut off. It's a major thing. You're not going to do an act of baptism lightly. It's a major issue. It's a serious issue. And this is why we see so much throughout the scriptures that it almost seems as if it's saying you have to be baptized to be Saved because baptism is so closely associated with Salvation.

Why is that? The reason it is is because baptism was an act that you did to show the world of something that happened inwardly salvation occurs first. When you're saved you're then because they received the word then they were added to the church.

Sorry, then they were baptized and then added to the church. So the point I'm trying to make there is that someone gets saved. How do they express that they're saved that they became regenerate that someone that God did an inward work inside of them well They do an outward work for the world, and that's why baptisms used to be very public.

So everybody knew it would be the talk of the town remember. This is in the time periods where you didn't have big cities like New York City You know or Atlanta or something like that? I mean you basically knew the majority of people that lived in your town and you knew them your whole life.

And you typically didn't travel much beyond your town so when someone got baptized it spread everyone knew about it. So this is the point that I'm trying to make is that baptism had a significance. Not because it saves a person, but it has a significance because if someone was willing to get baptized It meant that they took their salvation their Christianity.

Serious they were willing to take a step of faith that it and that's what it was it was an act of faith to get Baptized because they knew what it meant. We don't have that same understanding that same issue for many of us you know when I when my parents found out that I turned from Judaism and believed in Jesus as the Messiah and believed that Jesus was the Christ and Became converted to Christianity the question that was asked was my mother asked me were you Baptized.

When I said yes, that's when she realized it was a serious thing and They actually thought about Well, bake it basically making me dead to them. About cutting me off from the family as they expressed to me and my mother actually started hitting me because she was so angry with the fact that I got baptized because baptism had a Significance to it and for many people nowadays, it doesn't have that significance.

Okay. So so that's why I think we see that now if a church holds and says they don't believe that you need to be Baptized to be a member. They believe that you have to be a Christian. It in in our day and age in America that might be okay if You were but what you're looking for is a way.

Why is it that someone that would become a member once they got baptized? Because the baptism was a sign that they were really regenerate. They were really be a Christian in our day and age in America at least.

We give a lot of time. Why? Because what baptism used to provide was an Immediate way of looking at someone's life and going this person must be a regenerate because they wouldn't do this. Otherwise, well, we don't have that anymore.

So we'd like to give time to see the fruits of someone's life to see we can't see if someone saved. So, what are we looking for? We're looking to see if they have the fruit of a Christian. We give time so we could evaluate and see whether they're their testimony of being converted actually matches with their lifestyle.

And that's why we end up giving more time. So baptism may not be as important because of that and so we have to Understand that when we look at that We're we're in a different culture. And so I'm not I believe that you should be baptized to be a member.

I think it's a first act of obedience, but or it's really an act of obedience that we should do. But I'm not gonna be hard-pressed to argue that with some people in the American culture. Okay, so I give a little bit of room there.

I know others won't but when we look at what the scripture says they believed they were baptized. That's what they did. So what is the responsibility of membership we looked at this in the last class but the Responsibility of each member is to do his part in fulfilling the objectives of the churches as we discussed in the last section.

We want to serve the body. We are one body as one body. We are going to be functioning together. And so we as we serve one another. We're using the gifts that God's given each of us to serve one another.

That's the role. That's the purpose. So if you feel that your church is not feeding you. Fine, that's not what you should be in church for the church is not for you to receive. It's for you to give and in that giving to others and they're giving to you you will receive.

But it's it's primarily for you to serve others. Now you say Andrew, I don't know a whole lot. What can I do to serve? There's a lot of ways in every church that people can serve there's things that always need to be done.

Ushering cleaning toilets, you know make it put in the bulletins together if your church does that I mean lots of different things you can find ways you can serve and there's some things you're just gonna keep growing.

And learning and serve in different areas. Okay so That's the responsibility of membership. But then we get into this issue that sometimes and we don't really like dealing with this, but sometimes people are not Serving properly.

They're not serving the church. In fact. Sometimes they have to be removed from membership because they're in sin and so let her see in your syllabus the removal of membership and I bring this up because this is a major issue the the you know a couple generations ago about a generation ago most churches didn't practice church discipline at all, even though it's in Scripture and so.

Because why because none of us want to do that. We do not look none of us want to call someone out on their sin. Okay, some people do they like to call everyone else out on sin? Typically those people that like that it's because they want to ignore their own sin.

Alright, it's usually they're in some pretty bit bad sin and they want to point out everyone else's sin. Go look at what they're doing to avoid their own. All right. But those people aside you know Pastors don't want to have to bring someone's sin before them.

I know that having been in the position and having to do that I never enjoyed it to this day when I have to confront someone. I don't like it. But it's something we have to do why because it's for their best interest.

It's not so we can be proud of ourselves. Look, I don't do that sin. No, we want to we want to bring it to their attention. So that hopefully they would repent and mature in Christ. And we're gonna look at that.

So a person leaves a local body of believers because they were there. The church removes them or they remove themselves. All right. Those are two ways and so I mentioned, you know, do I if the church is not feeding me should I leave?

Well, there are some cases where you can leave a church. I think if the church is starting to teach things That aren't right, you know, and we're gonna look at those. I'm gonna look at those at the end really because I want to focus on the stickier one first.

Okay, and that's when the church has to remove an individual. Okay, so the church removes an individual another name for this activity is called church discipline and that's your blank there if you look in your Syllabus your blank is church discipline.

Another name for for removing an individual from membership when the church removes an individual is Church discipline. Now, let me start with the purpose of church discipline. What's the goal of church discipline?

We see us in 1st Corinthians 5 6. And it is for the purity of the church. That's why we do it. So you're boasting. This is 1st Corinthians 5 6 you're boasting is not good. Do you not know that a little leaven leavens the whole lump now leaven is used as an illustration here to talk about a Sin or evil and so the idea that they're making is that when there's a little sin it affects the whole body and It spreads and so the reason that we have to deal with Disciplining members in the church is for the purity of the church to keep it pure.

To keep it honoring to God to keep it to be the testimony in the community. That should be. It's not to beat up a person. But we have to have a higher view of our church the God's body of believers than we do ourselves.

And this is something that is hard for us as human beings. We want people to like us. None of us want to be disliked. Okay, and yet When we're disciplining someone we're having to confront someone about something they're doing wrong there's a chance they're not going to receive it well and we have to do that in in love and We have to do it really for the purpose of not just the purity of the church.

But for the restoration of that believer if you look in 2nd Thessalonians verses chapter 3. Verse 6 and verse 14 you see this that it is for the restoration of that believer. It says in for in 2nd Thessalonians 3 6.

Now we commend you brothers in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ. That you keep away from a brother who is walking in idleness and Do not accord with the tradition that you receive. I Think I read that wrong.

They read that again. Now do we commend you brothers in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ that you keep away from any brother who is walking in Idleness and not in accordance with the tradition that you received from us and now the next verse in Here you you see in this is 2nd Thessalonians 3 14 if anyone does not obey What we say in this letter take note of that person and have nothing to do with him that he may be ashamed.

So the idea here is there is a shame in sin and what we have to do is we must we must Go to that person and help them see that they need to repent so that they're restored to the church. That's the goal it is not to punish them.

But to restore them that's a major difference that many people Practice church discipline in an unbiblical way. What they're doing is they're trying to punish a person. Church discipline is not for punishment.

It's for restoration. The whole thing is and this is important our attitude when we go to someone to to have to confront them in sin. And this is anywhere look you're going to have conflicts with other people even Christians.

Even your fellow Christians, and you have to have a proper attitude. One attitude that you must have is you must have an attitude of love the very next verse from what we saw for 2nd Thessalonians 315 do not regard him as an enemy, but warn him as a brother.

You're warning him out of love. This is the restoration that you want to focus on. There's also a humility in Galatians 6 1. Brothers if anyone is caught in any transgression you who are spiritual restore him in a spirit of gentleness.

That gentleness could also be humility. Gentleness keep watch over yourselves least you be tempted that we should have a humble Loving attitude when we go and confront someone. It should not be in an attitude of self-righteousness.

Or we know better than you it should be an attitude of love and humility. Being careful that we could stumble to you know what you may go and confront a person and find out that you're the one that's In sin we're gonna get to that in a bit, so here's some reasons.

What are some reasons to confront a person well one would be public sin we see this in 1st Corinthians 5 Verses 1 2 it is actually been reported that there is sexual immorality among you and. Of a kind that's not tolerated even among pagans for a man has his father's wife and.

You are arrogant. What you not rather to mourn? Let him who has done this be removed from you you see how he's saying. This is a public sin you shouldn't be what they were doing we think is boasting in the fact that.

That they're tolerating this you know this is a thing. You see this today in some churches if they can could be called churches in America where they want to boast that they are open To same-sex couples and same-sex marriage.

Something that's a sin in God's eyes, and they want to boast that they're open to it. That is the same thing. This is a public sin that should be put away. And people that commit it should be removed from the church, and what they're saying is they're saying look at how Tolerant we are and he says even the pagans.

They don't even tolerate the things that the church is trying to tolerate. So this is nothing new with the church, but you see when you don't practice a church discipline. You allow for sin to fester in the church.

And if it's a public sin Paul says it should be put out of the church that person should be removed from the church. Second Thessalonians 3 we saw that. Another thing would be someone who is causing strife in church.

This is Matthew 18 15 if your brother sins against you go and tell him between you and him alone if he listens to you you've gained your brother. This is notice the element of personal strife. We're gonna get into this passage in more detail.

So I don't want to go into it in detail here. But just the point that if there's personal strife it could lead to Church discipline it could lead to it the reason it in that that I say it could lead to is you're gonna take a slower process when it's personal strife when someone Is doing a public sin, and it's known.

That is making a that's a public offense to the church. And it's ruining the testimony of the church and therefore it has to be dealt with quicker. And had to be dealt with more publicly. All right, and that's one of the ways that we see how how fast do we go through the church discipline process?

It's gonna really depend on how public the sin is. Okay, if this you want to keep that sin Known to as few people as possible you want to keep it as quiet as possible. But if it's something that's already known by the world then you got to deal with it to the world.

All right. This is why when you have well-known pastors that sin publicly it gets dealt with publicly. Because it's it's publicly recognized when you have these well-known people. Promoting disunity is another you see this in Ephesians 4 1 to 6 we see in this passage it says in Ephesians 4 1 to 6 I Therefore a prisoner of the Lord urge you to walk in a manner worthy of the calling to which you have been called.

With all humility and gentleness with patience bear bearing with one another in love. Eager to maintain the unity of the spirit in the bond of peace. There is one body and one spirit just as you were called to one Hope that belongs to your call one Lord one faith one baptism one God and Father of all who is over all and through all and in all you see the focus is on this unity.

Well, you have someone promoting disunity as is you you that's going against this idea of unity. Philippians 127 Paul said let only let only let your manner of life be worthy of the gospel of Christ so that whether I come and see you or I'm absent I may hear of your standing firm in one spirit with one mind striving side by side in the faith of the gospel.

That's how we should be doing it side by side. But if someone isn't doing that Then we have to put them out possibly we want to do is get them to be walking side by side. We don't just jump to church discipline.

I I know that this is a thing I've been seeing online a lot where people who are not members of a church. They don't like what something what someone says or does on Facebook and it's like well, I disagree with you theologically.

I want your pastor's name. You're causing division. You're causing you're you're you're slandering the brothers. I've heard that where someone disagrees with the theological position. So they say you're slandering people.

Because you're disagreeing with the theology. That shows a problem in the person's heart who wants to talk to your pastor they want to try to to force you into accepting their view or something, but the reality is is that Facebook is not the church.

The street is not the church. These print there are principles that we do carry forth. We want to bring someone to a point of repentance. But not if it's not a sin issue. It's just a disagreement and there's people who want to jump to that and publicly.

Oh, well this person. You know because that person is in a public Venue on Facebook. They think they have to make it public if they think there's a sin. Sad thing is those people usually never go to the person first.

That's what you should be doing. You should go to the person first. And you don't just jump to that. We're gonna get to that on what the proper steps are. It's not going to Facebook and publicly announcing you think someone is in sin.

That's violating the steps of church discipline. Because you're you're sitting there and making a judgment and you're not going through all the steps proper. Last one the reason for it is when you have someone that is practicing false doctrines.

Romans 16 what we see here and Jude 4. Romans 16 17 says I appeal to you brothers. To watch out for those who cause division and create obstacles. Contrary to the doctrine that you've been taught avoid them.

Avoiding them means you may have to put them out. Jude 4 says for certain people have crept in unnoticed who long ago were designated for this condemnation ungodly people who pervert the grace of our our God into Sensuality and deny our our only master and Lord Jesus Christ.

So you see there if they're practicing false doctrine. This is how you go about this now. I want to spend a little bit of time in Matthew 18 now I have here something that we you can go to our website at Store Dutch driving fraternity org and you could pick this up.

This is our Sheet, it's basically our process of reconciliation. Notice here. It's a flowchart of steps to follow. Okay, when you are in Basically when you have a conflict with another person you first need to go through here.

Then you go to the next category go through all this check this Next category and then you're gonna come over here, which is side two. Okay. Oops. Sorry. It was down here. Hey, that's better covers my face side two.

This is where we get into church discipline. Excuse me. This is Matthew 18 so you have to follow all this first before you get here. You know what? This is what most people especially people on Facebook and Twitter.

They're not doing this. They're not going through this these steps these many steps as you can see from here. This it's only you can pick this up from us for two or two two dollars fifty cents, I think.

And we can ship this out to you but this is just a good thing to have on hand when you have a conflict with someone or you need to go to someone and Confront them go to our website and pick up this at the store.

And it's the process of reconciliation card and it's just a helpful thing. It goes through the steps the questions you should ask yourself. The questions you should ask the other we have a section on here to ask when before you go to the other person.

Are your motives right? Maybe you don't have the right motives and going to that person. Is it the right time in place? Maybe you need to wait. Is there a lack of self-control on your part? Okay, but if you get through that and you get to the point of church discipline, well, there's steps to follow.

So let's look at Matthew 18 15 to 17 and I want to look at the four different steps of church Discipline here. This is what Matthew 18 15 17 says, okay, you can see that on your screen. If your brother sins against you go and tell him his fault between you and him notice alone.

Important word if he listens to you, you've gained your brother. But if he does not listen take one or two 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 as a Gentile or a tax collector. So with this let's go through the steps the speed of the process as I mentioned is determined on individual circumstances.

But ultimately this is the process. We should follow first personal confrontation. One-on-one notice alone. You try to keep it as quiet as you can if you feel like you have to tell others about it. That's called gossip.

You're bright. You're violating the steps of church discipline and then you're in sin. So that's why we ask question. Do you lack self-control if you like can't wait to tell someone you need to do if you can't wait on the Lord then maybe.

It's a problem that you have. And so you always have to be mindful of that. Okay, personal confrontation. Well, the goal of personal confrontation again is restoration. You want to bring them to repentance.

If they refuse they recognize it's a sin, but they're not gonna repent. Okay, maybe it's a thing where they don't see it as a sin. You think it's a sin. They don't think it's a sin and you have a disagreement.

Then what's the second step? Confrontation with witnesses. One or two people now I'm gonna do something explain something and we have that explained on this chart here as well. The witnesses are just that you go with one or two witnesses.

Witnesses I put in in the our chart here go with one or two witnesses. Not witness to the supposed offense, but to convert confirm the spoken words. They are only to confirm the sin and unrepentance. They should it should be Unbiased witnesses.

They should not get your side first in other words. What happens a lot of times when people say well, let me go get two or three witnesses. You know what they do. They first get two people either. They're good friends who are gonna agree with them.

Or they get people that they tell them. Hey, let's go confront this person. This is what he's doing. And what are they doing? They're prejudging the the the people that they want as witnesses. You know what if you have unbiased witnesses those witnesses may say you're in the wrong.

I had that happen with someone who wanted to confront me on something and they brought in a Another person to be a witness and in listening to the charges that this person had against me. The witness ended up that the witnesses actually ended up saying wait a minute.

It sounds like you're the one with the problem not Andrew and I've been in the reverse of that too where I've Gone with witnesses and there's things where you know, what it wasn't a sin. It was a misunderstanding.

I didn't understand what someone else was thinking. And so what I do when I get to if I have to get to this stage. You know what I do. I go to someone and say hey will you meet with me and another person?

I don't even tell him who it is. I say I need you to meet with me. I Want to get you or you to you know, sound like that. But you won't keep it to a few number of people and you say can can you meet with me?

What's the issue you'll find out when you get there. Now if you lack in self-control, you're not going to be able to do that. You're gonna want to tell them what it's about. So this is one of the things I find for myself is it shows that I'm showing the self-control that I can wait upon God.