Restoring the Repentant

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I want to invite you to take out your Bibles and turn to 2 Corinthians 2. As we continue in our exposition of 2
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Corinthians, we began several weeks ago as we have been doing a verse -by -verse study of this important epistle, and we have found ourselves today in chapter 2, verses 5 to 11, and the subject of today is restoring the repentant.
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Following the Reformation, an important question arose among the
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Reformers, and that question was, what constitutes a true church?
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What is required for a church to truly be considered a true church?
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Rome argued, of course, that it was the only true church. And so, if you think of the definite article, the, any group that would say, we are the true church, is on the side of Rome because they're saying, we're the one, we're the only one.
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Whether it's the Mormons or the Jehovah Witnesses or even Rome, when they add that definite article, they're saying, we're the one, the only one.
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Well, the Reformers weren't concerned with being the true church because they understood the true church is all believers around the world.
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That's the body of Christ. But they said, there is a sense in which we want to be a true church.
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So, how can we understand what it means to be a true church?
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Our church, the church down the street, the church in the next town. How do we know if it's a true church?
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And they came to three conclusions. They said, the first marker of a true church would be that it would have to faithfully preach the scriptures.
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That it would have to faithfully preach the gospel. If the gospel is absent, there is no church. The second is that it must faithfully administer the sacraments.
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If there is no administration of baptism, if there is no administration of the Lord's table, there is no church.
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For these things are required of us. In fact, in Baptist churches, we don't even use the word sacrament.
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Often we use the word ordinance. Because the word ordinance means a law or a command.
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We are commanded to baptize. We are commanded to observe the Lord's table. Therefore, it's not optional.
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And a true church will preach the gospel. And a true church will observe the ordinances or the sacraments.
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But the third thing that was necessary. The third thing that was in this list of essentials for a true church is the one that I would say today is the most controversial.
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And that is that the reformers came to the conclusion that a true church must faithfully exercise discipline.
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A true church must faithfully exercise discipline. For if sin is allowed to be performed without any interruption or call to repentance, then how can we truly call ourselves a true church?
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Well, it is in this last one that we find ourselves beginning to look around and say that is something that's missing in so many churches.
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In fact, it's so foreign in so many churches that some people have never even heard the term church discipline.
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Few churches practice it and even those who do often have members within them who won't support it.
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And when it comes time to actually do it, churches often split over it.
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Churches who attempt to faithfully practice discipline often face splits, internal strife, and some have even had lawsuits filed against them and media backlash.
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One here in Jacksonville made it all the way to Fox News. This was many years ago.
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So the subject of church discipline is not one that is easy to understand. Neither is it one that many people even want to discuss.
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But we have to today because today we have come to the point where Paul in this letter is actually dealing with the subject of church discipline, but he's dealing with the most positive part of church discipline ever, and that is a person who repents and is to be restored.
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You see, church discipline does not have the purpose of simply punishing the wayward, but the purpose of church discipline is to restore the wayward.
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And what do we do when the wayward has returned? We reconcile them to the body.
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And so that's what we're going to see Paul talk about today. Let's stand together and we're going to read the word of God as it comes to us in these few verses.
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Beginning in verse 5 of 2 Corinthians, Paul writes this. Now if anyone has caused pain, he has caused it not to me, but in some measure not to put it too severely to all of you.
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For such a one, this punishment by the majority is enough. So you should rather turn to forgive and comfort him, or he may be overwhelmed by excessive sorrow.
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So I beg you to reaffirm your love for him. For this is why I wrote, that I might test you and know whether you are obedient in everything.
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Anyone whom you forgive, I also forgive. Indeed what I have forgiven, if I have forgiven anything, has been for your sake in the presence of Christ, so that we would not be outwitted by Satan, for we are not ignorant of his designs.
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Let's pray. Father, I thank you for your word. I thank you for your truth.
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And I pray even now, O God, that you would keep me from error as I preach. And I say this,
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Lord, every week, not to simply be a man who is overly repetitious, but I ask you every week to keep me from error,
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Lord, because I know of my failures. And I pray,
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God, that you would keep me from those while I'm in this pulpit. Protect me, protect your people. Open the hearts of your people to hear your word.
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Apply your truths to our heart. And Lord, may your Holy Spirit be the teacher today.
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And O God, if there are those here who have never bowed the knee to the Lord Jesus Christ, if there are those here who still today stand outside of Christ, finding something in themselves for which to be satisfied,
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I pray, Lord, that we would not be satisfied in ourselves, but that we would shed all things and run and hold firmly only to him who can provide us salvation.
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And to him we give the glory. And we pray it in his name. Amen. What is church discipline?
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Church discipline, as it has been defined, is the practice of addressing a person who has been found to be in habitual, unrepentant sin, and after a process of restoration has been sought and unable to be accomplished, the person is then removed from the body.
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This is described for us by the words of Jesus himself. This is not something that we invented.
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This is not a medieval, some kind of inquisition thing that arose out of a desire to go and find out the people or burn the witches or something like that.
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That's not what church discipline is. Church discipline rests solely on the command of Christ himself, and then it is expounded for us in the epistles.
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So if you want to see it in the words of Christ, open your Bibles with me to Matthew 18 and let us just see how
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Christ defines this idea. Now many of you who have sat through the new members class or many of you who have been in the academy class or you've sat in on our classes on what it means to be a part of a church, you've heard this before, but some of you are new, some of you have never heard this, and it's never a bad thing to be reminded.
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But in Matthew 18 verse 15, Jesus says these words. He says,
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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.
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By the way, tonight, it's so interesting because tonight we're talking about how to reconcile issues within the church.
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Tonight's academy class, because we're in church life and ministry, it's all about reconciliation within the body.
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And the very first issue of how to reconcile within the body is to be honest with one another privately.
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If you have an issue with someone, go to them privately and talk to them rather than going to someone else and talking about them.
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Rather than creating a coalition against them. But seek to reconcile with the person and do so privately.
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That way if repentance is established in private, the move, the issue need go no further.
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It need never be discussed again. It is over. Jesus says, You've won your brother.
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Verse 16, But if he does not listen. If he does not listen, take one or two others along with you.
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That every charge may be established by the evidence of two or three witnesses. Jesus is appealing to an old covenant principle that no one is to be judged guilty on the basis of one witness.
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In fact, I was called for jury duty one time. I was asked, Are you willing to cause someone to be judged based on one witness?
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I said, Without any other corroborating testimony, without a video or audio or something. No. If it's just the word of one person,
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I can't take the word of one person. They excused me from jury duty. Because I guess they wanted to be able to judge someone based on the evidence of one witness.
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And I can't do that. The scripture says there must be more than one witness. And Jesus uses that example here.
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He says, If he doesn't listen to you, you take two or three witnesses because you might be wrong.
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That's an important part of this. You who are calling this person to repentance, you might be in error and therefore make sure that everything is righteous.
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For you're dealing with a sensitive issue. Anyway, you're calling someone to an account.
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You better be right. Verse 17, If he refuses to listen to them, tell it to the church.
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Now what's interesting, this is only one of two times Jesus ever uses the word church in all of his preaching that we have recorded in the gospels.
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It's used twice. It's both in Matthew. One is in Matthew 16 where he says, I will build my church and the gates of hell will not prevail against it.
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And in here where he says if a person is sinning, they've been called to repentance by two or three witnesses and they refuse to repent, it's to be taken before the church.
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So it's interesting that the times that church is used in the gospels is very few. And one of those times, one of only two, is that the corporate responsibility of the church to address sin.
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The corporate responsibility of the church to address sin. You tell it to the church. Not for gossip's sake, but for the sake of his soul.
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That he would be called to account, not just by the preacher or not just by the elders, but by the body of Christ would call this man or woman to repentance.
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And then this very important phrase, and if he refuses to listen even to the church, let him be to you as a
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Gentile and a tax collector. Now those two groups had one thing in common, they were not allowed in the temple.
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Gentiles were not allowed in, neither were tax collectors because tax collectors had abandoned their fidelity to Israel and had turned to Rome and therefore were considered to be outcast and were not allowed in the temple.
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Therefore, this is where we get the doctrine of excommunication. Because those who have been called to repentance by the church and refuse to repent even to under the call of repentance by the church are to be excommunicated.
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And Jesus goes on to say, whatever you bind on earth shall be bound in heaven. Whatever you loose on earth shall be loosed in heaven.
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There is an authority given to the church. And again
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I say to you, if two or three of you agree on anything they ask, it will be done by my Father in heaven.
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For where two or three are gathered in my name, here I am, there I am among you. By the way, that last verse is not about church gatherings.
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Everybody says, oh man, I go to church, I go with two or three of my friends, we go to Starbucks, we have coffee and that's church.
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No, it ain't. Well, where two or three are gathered, that's the church. That ain't what it says. It says the basis upon which discipline is to be administered within the body is on the basis of the witness of two or three witnesses.
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Therefore, where two or three are gathered, there I am in the midst of them. That's where the two or three comes from.
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It's related to that. You can go have Starbucks all you want, but don't call it a church. It's not.
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Church has structure. The Bible says, let all things be done decently and in order. There is order in the body of Christ.
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So this call of Jesus is a call to order in regard to sin.
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And the final step, as I said, is the step of excommunication. A step which many people don't want to even talk about and many people don't want to discuss.
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And so what we end up with, as Brother Andy often refers to, the two ditches. We end up with two ditches in the modern church.
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The one ditch on the one side is the ditch of the unwillingness to discipline.
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And I would say many churches fall in that ditch. We ain't going to deal with it. We ain't going to talk about it. This person here is sleeping around on his wife, cheating on his wife, still coming to church, still sitting with his family.
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Nobody's going to say anything to him because we don't want to offend him. Hey, he gives a lot of money. Oh, did
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I not touch a nerve? Oh, we don't want to offend him. He's a deacon. He ought to be stoned.
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And if he's an elder, called out publicly, then stoned. Don't get upset with me.
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I'm just saying we are in so many churches it's not even dealt with. It's not even dealt with.
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They just don't talk about it. And this is why the megachurch is so appealing to so many people.
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Because it's easy to hide in a group of 2 ,500 people. It's easy to hide when no one is willing to call anyone to repentance.
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And the small group leaders are being led by people who aren't even saved. Am I being a little ugly?
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I'm being a little ugly, but it's true. So you have an issue where there's a ditch on one side where no discipline is practiced.
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But beloved, may I tell you there's a ditch on the other side? And that is where some churches are so quick and harsh with their discipline.
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And these churches have no intention of restoration, only excommunication.
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They are only looking to bring the hammer of justice and never the bomb of restoration.
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Beloved, tell me I'm wrong. I will tell you I have met people. I met a man who looked me in the face. He said, I wish
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I didn't have a job so that I could go through my life and call people to repentance and walk throughout the church and call people out for their sins.
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I know him personally. He reveled in judgment.
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And beloved, if you revel in judgment, if that's your heart, that you are the spiritual nitpicker and everybody's in sin who doesn't do it just the way you do, then you're also in a ditch.
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If you're calling for church discipline just because someone does something different than you, as long as it's not sin, you got to be careful because that's a ditch too.
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It's called heavy handedness. And the Bible calls us away from that.
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And so where is the right way? Where's the right way?
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The right way is to follow the biblical mandate, not to hurt the faithful, but also not to be unwilling to address the sinful.
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Not to create an atmosphere of fear, but also not to create an atmosphere where anything goes and nothing's ever addressed.
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And so church discipline must be married to a right understanding of God's law.
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It must be married to a right understanding of God's order for the family,
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God's order for the church, God's order for life. All of those things must be in right order.
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And it always, always, always, if I can't stress this enough, it must always be done for the purpose of restoration.
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Again, going back to Matthew 18. Go to your brother. If they repent, what do you do?
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Let it go. It's over. Take two or three witnesses.
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If they repent, what do you do? Let it go. It's over. If they're brought before the church and the weight of the church causes them to repent, now everybody knows.
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And guess what everybody's got to do? Let it go because it's over.
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But the problem with us, and I don't mean us as a people, I mean us in general, us as humans.
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The problem with humans is we don't let it go very well. We don't let things go.
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We let things do. So Paul here in this passage is giving us a picture of what restoration should look like.
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What is the desired effect of discipline? The desired effect of discipline is restoration. And Paul is admonishing the
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Corinthians to restore a repentant person. He has been addressing some of the controversy in the
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Corinthian body. We've been looking. We looked at verses 1 -12 to 2 -4 over the last couple of weeks.
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And he's already responded to those who have accused him of vacillating, who have accused him of being dishonest in his dealings and calling his integrity into question.
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He's addressed those people and now he turns his attention to someone within the Corinthian body who has sinned and apparently undergone some form of discipline and as a result they have repented and now they need to be restored.
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Now there's an important question. And here I'm going to put on my teaching hat for a minute. Because the question from this text is who is this man?
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Paul is addressing someone in the body who has been put out and now has repented and is coming back and he doesn't tell us who it is.
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Now it's important to understand he knows who it is. They know who it is.
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But here we sit 2 ,000 years removed from the writing of this letter and we don't have any other information except for what's written here.
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We don't know who this is. We don't know what he's done. All we know is what
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Paul writes about his restoration. But let me just give you a couple of thoughts. There are two hypotheses among commentators about who this person is.
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And I want to give you both of them and I'm going to tell you which one I lean towards. Not because I necessarily want you to think the way I think but I'll tell you why
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I think the way I think and you can do with it what you will. The first hypothesis is that this is an unknown antagonist who has attacked the
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Apostle Paul as a result of his journeys that we just got done reading about.
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Remember he had these journeys he was supposed to take and he didn't fulfill what he was supposed to do. So there's this antagonist against Paul and whoever this person is has spoken out against Paul and now he's repented of it and needs to be restored.
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And the reason why some take that conclusion is because Paul says in this section he says if you've forgiven him
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I've forgiven him. Right? And so there seems to be in this something personal for the
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Apostle Paul. That's why some come to that conclusion. Now again I'm not saying that's the right answer.
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I'm saying that's one answer. This is an unknown antagonist who has attacked the Apostle Paul in some way shape or form.
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He has offended the body. He was excommunicated as a result. He has repented. He's been welcomed back and Paul says
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I'm over it. You should get over it. That's possible and certainly within the bounds of reason.
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The second is a little bit more firm and I like firm. So you might know which way
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I lean. But I like what Albert Barnes has to say. Albert Barnes is a commentator and he was without a doubt.
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He thought he was right. Now you may think he's wrong. That's okay. Albert Barnes says this.
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He says there is doubtless here an allusion to the man and the incestuous relationship.
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You say what in the world is that? Well the incestuous relationship that he's referring to is in 1
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Corinthians 5. In 1 Corinthians 5 Paul says there's a man among you whose sin is so bad it's not even accepted among the pagans for this man has his father's wife.
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There was a man in the Corinthian church who was committing adultery with his father's wife which we would assume to be his stepmother and this man
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Paul says needs to be brought under judgment. He needs to be brought under church discipline.
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He needs to be put out of the church. Paul says put him out for the salvation of his soul because you are not addressing it and Paul chastises them for not addressing it.
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He says you ought to be ashamed of yourself. This is a key standard version but that's basically what he says. He says you ought to be ashamed of yourself.
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You have not addressed this man. And so as the idea of this understanding comes to light here's what possibly happened.
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Paul writes 1 Corinthians to the church. They realize they've got this man among them who's sinning who's not been addressed so they bring the full weight of church discipline upon this man and they bury him in this shame of sin and have excommunicated him.
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As a result he has repented. Now he wants to come back and they don't want him back. This man sinned in a way that's not even acceptable among the pagans.
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See even the Romans didn't accept incest and they considered step families, what we call step families or intermarried families, they considered that incestuous relationships and therefore they wouldn't even accept that.
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And so here's this man who has sinned against the church who has been excommunicated by the church.
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He's repented of his sin and what do we do with this man? Now again
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I can't prove it. I can only give you my reasoning. I think it certainly fits into the character of what
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Paul is saying here and I can say this. Paul doesn't give us a clear identity of this person and therefore from now until the end of the sermon we simply know this person has sinned and is being restored.
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Whatever the sin was we've looked at two possibilities. You are welcome as the body of Christ to come to your own conclusion on that.
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I tend to think that Albert Barnes is on to something when he addresses the man from 1
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Corinthians because again this is someone that the whole body knew about and Paul didn't even have to address the issue because it was so well known.
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So there's my position and the reasoning behind it.
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So regardless of who this person is, Paul gives five steps for restoration.
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Here they are outlined for you and how we're going to outline them through the text. And I want you to know
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I can smell the food too. You saw five points come up on the screen. I know you're nervous.
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But stay with me. I hope that this will all make sense to you because Paul is outlining here five things to consider when we address the subject of reconciliation.
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And by the way I mean we are a church that practices church discipline and there are very few but there are a few people.
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One in particular right now who is under the discipline of the church. What would we do? How should we behave if this person were to be back among us in a state of repentance?
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Paul addresses that here. This is absolutely practical.
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Absolutely practical. First he says in verse 5.
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Now if anyone has caused pain, he has caused it not to me but in some measure not to put it too severely to all of you.
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Now here's what's difficult about this and I don't want to say it from the outset. 2 Corinthians has been one of the most difficult books to study and outline for me as I've been preaching for quite a few years.
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But simply because of the way Paul words things in this book is much less structured than he does in like Romans and Ephesians and other places where it's apparent he's being much more precise in his doctrinal clarity.
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This is written almost as if it's an emotional letter. Paul is writing with his heart and so it comes across sometimes a little choppy and the different translations don't help.
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I tried, I was looking at the King James and I was looking at the New American Standard Bible and different things as I was translating and looking at the original
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Greek and I'm looking at these things and I'm saying none of this is easy. Because that's sentence by itself. Now if anyone has caused pain, he has caused it not to me but in some measure not to put it too severely to all of you.
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That just sounds weird. But here's basically what he's saying. When he says if anyone has caused pain, he's not saying that this is an uncertainty but rather he's attempting
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I believe to be somewhat delicate. He's not saying hey because Bob caused you pain, which would have been easy because everybody knows
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Bob. We don't have a Bob here do we? But you know what I'm saying if they said Bob caused pain, he doesn't say that.
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He said if anyone has caused pain, he's being delicate in his words.
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He knows who this is. They know who this is. They know that this person has brought pain to them.
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Now let me ask you this question. How has this person brought pain to them? The answer is simple. Sin always one way or another brings pain to a people.
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This person has been found within the body to have sinned against the church, sinned against God and he has brought pain within the body.
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I've heard people say this. They'll say oh my sin only affects me. Never. Never is it true that your sin only affects you.
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I mean Brother Andy and I we go to set free and we preach a lot and at set free a lot of those men are dealing with coming out of addiction and things like that and I've had many many conversations with men who come out of addiction and one of the things that is often said you know
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I thought it was only hurting me because I was the one who was getting high. I was the one who was about to die.
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I was the one who was dealing with these things. No that hurts everyone. Hurts everyone around you and within the body sin is like cancer.
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If there is one within the body who is sinning and not being addressed it's like a metastasizing tumor.
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It's only getting worse. So Paul says if anyone has caused you pain he's pointing to the fact that we can recognize the fact that this person has hurt the church.
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We can recognize the fact that this person has hurt themselves. They've hurt their family. They've hurt us.
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But notice his use of language. This is where it's a little tough in the Greek. He uses two phrases. He says now if anyone has caused you pain he has not caused it to me.
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That is actually a bad translation in the ESV. Paul is not saying he's not caused me any pain.
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In fact I'm going to tell you what translation gets it the best and you're going to laugh.
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The New Living Translation. Get upset. New Living Translation translates this
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I think the best. He says I'm not overstating it when I say the man who caused all the pain hurt all of you more than he did me.
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That's what Paul's saying. He's saying he hurt you more than he hurt me. Not that he didn't hurt me at all but the pain is there because you're there.
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I'm not there. You're there. I'm not the one who's having to deal with this. You are.
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So you're recognizing that this pain has been among you. I'm divorced from the situation.
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I'm not there. You are. Paul is recognizing the fact that this is a church that's hurt by this person.
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He's not saying the pain didn't hurt him at all. He's saying I know your experience is different than mine.
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And understand we have to deal with that too when someone comes to us and they've been hurt by someone else. We have to understand that their experience in that hurt is different than ours.
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When someone comes to the elders and say they've been abused. Okay we have to deal with that person having been hurt differently than us because they didn't lay a hand on us.
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They didn't strike us with a rod or with a belt or with their fist.
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But they struck you. Okay you've been hurt differently than us. And Paul's saying that.
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I understand this pain has to be recognized. Nobody's saying it didn't happen. Nobody's saying it didn't happen.
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But he does say this. He says in some measure not to put it too severely. That's the way it is in the
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ESV. Basically what he's saying. Two Greek words. He's saying don't overstate the pain either.
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Don't say the pain didn't happen. But also don't overstate what happened.
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Be honest. Be honest about what has happened. What has truly taken place?
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Recognize the pain. We all know and I know some of your guests don't know.
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A few years ago we had a person who robbed us essentially.
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And we know the pain that that caused. I cried for a week. My wife and I loved this person.
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Still love this person. They still have refused to repent. But we it wouldn't be right to simply say nothing happened.
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No something did happen. Pain happened. And we can recognize it. So Paul says listen if anyone has caused you pain it's to all of you.
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This pain has happened to all of you. Alright. We can recognize that.
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Recognize the pain. Part two is have you done anything about it?
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Well the church did. That's what part two. Discipline has been rendered. Look at verse six. He says for such a one this punishment by the majority was enough.
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The word punishment there is so interesting because it's only used one time in the Greek New Testament.
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It's only used once and it's right here. It's only used here. And if you look at other sources of the
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Greek language of that era and you look at what this word punishment means, what it really means is under an official censure.
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This is church discipline. This person hurt the church and this person has been put under an official church discipline.
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An official censure by the church. And Paul says that's enough.
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You ever seen somebody in a boxing match and the person's down and the boxer's going and the ref puts his hands in between and says that's enough.
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Well this person, whoever it is, has hurt the body.
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The body has responded in discipline and Paul says it worked.
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It has been sufficient. And how do you know that the discipline is sufficient?
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They repent. That's how you know. That's the answer. How do we know, verse six, how do we know the punishment by the majority?
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And by the way I love the fact that he says by the majority because what that means is the church was behind the work of discipline.
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This wasn't something that split the Corinthian church. The church got behind it. I told you earlier and I'm telling you the truth.
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I've seen churches that have divided over the subject of discipline. Not because the person didn't need to be disciplined, but because there were people in the body who were unwilling to support the moving forward of discipline.
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And it will destroy a church if the church isn't all on the same page.
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Why do you think we teach on it here? Why do we think we talk about it? Do you think we want to do it? Do you think the elders just sit up at night looking forward to it?
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No, we hate it. But we also believe it's part of what it means to be a true church.
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And if we're going to be a true church we're going to have to deal with these things at times. And you have no idea how many long phone calls and meetings that have gone hours addressing these issues.
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And by God's grace it rarely gets very far because by God's grace God gives people the ability to repent.
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And then that's it. And that's why you don't ever hear about it because you don't have to hear about it because it's over. So the discipline's rendered by the majority and that was enough.
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So what's required? Number three, restoration is required.
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Look at number three. He says, so you should rather turn to forgive and comfort him or he may be overwhelmed by excessive sorrow so I beg you to reaffirm your love for him.
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You understand if a person's repented and they're not welcome back into the body you are leaving that person out to dry.
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You are hanging them out to dry. You see at that point the person needs to be loved because the purpose of discipline is restoration.
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Therefore if restoration has taken place it's over. It doesn't have to continue.
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You no longer have to give the person a cold shoulder or put a scarlet letter or any of that junk that goes on.
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We can receive them back. We can restore them.
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And we do it because we're called to repent. You guys remember the parable
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Jesus told about the man? This is in Matthew 18. The man goes to the master that he owed all the money to and he said,
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I can't repay it. And the master forgave him and then he went out and found a man who owed him much less and he said repay me and the man said
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I'll repay you soon and he says no pay me now and he put the man in prison and when the master heard about it what did he do?
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He called that man in and he rebuked him and he judged him and he condemned him.
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Do you know where that parable lies in your Bible? Right after the command for church discipline.
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Matthew 18, 15 -20 is church discipline. The parable of the unforgiving servant is
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Matthew 18, 21 and following. Because Jesus gives us that parable to go along with the church discipline situation to say how is church discipline supposed to find its finality?
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Not in excommunication but in restoration. And if you can't forgive someone, how will you be forgiven?
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Discipline cannot continue once repentance is achieved.
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Discipline cannot continue once repentance is achieved. Now the person may still have consequences.
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I do have to throw this in there. Let's say a person kills someone. They go to jail. They repent.
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That don't mean they get let out of jail. They have certain consequences. A person steals a lot of money.
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They restore them to repentance. They may still not give them the checkbook. There may still be consequences right?
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It's just a reality. Life comes with consequences. You reap what you sow. You deal with those things. But restoration within the body is restoration to love and not count a record of wrong against them so that you are not constantly bringing up to them the failure of their past.
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Do you know people like that? That all they do is revel in your failures of the past?
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Let me ask it a different way. Are you a person who only revels in the failures of others?
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And no matter how repentant they are, you live your life in a constant state of remember when.
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Paul says they must be restored and it's required.
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Now the next verse he says this is actually a test of obedience.
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Look what he says in verse 9. He says for this is why I wrote you that I might test you and know whether you are obedient and everything.
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See I understand. He's calling them to do something. He's writing to them and he wants to know that they're going to obey.
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That they're going to do what is right. He says I want to test you. Paul tells them that in this matter they will actually prove their obedience and their obedience will be to Paul but understand this there's no distinction.
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You can't say well I'm not going to listen to Paul I only listen to Jesus. That's not how it works because Paul wrote under the authority of Christ and Paul writes under the inspiration of the
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Holy Spirit of God and in Paul's relationship to the church at Corinth he had apostolic authority to lay down this divine standard and they were called to obedience and so are we.
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I said this a few weeks ago I'll continue to say it. When we read the scriptures there is no difference between when
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Paul speaks and when Christ speaks when it comes to the level of authority because it's all inspired by the Holy Spirit.
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This is why I'm not a fan of red letter Bibles. Now if you like a red letter Bible because you want to be able to see
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Jesus' words as distinguished from the other words because that helps you in your study I'm not saying it's wrong but what happens is we begin to get some idea that the words of Christ and the words of Peter and Paul and the other apostles are in two levels of authority and that's not the way the
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Bible comes to us. The Bible comes to us under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit of God and therefore it is all from God.
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Will we obey what the word says or will we piece it apart and say oh well Jesus didn't say that?
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No. Finally Paul says this. Paul says that in the midst of all of this, in the midst of this restoration we're actually going to do something else very practical.
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Not only are we going to welcome the sinner in not only are we going to bring the person back but we're also going to refute
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Satan in the process. Notice what he says. He says anyone whom you forgive I also forgive indeed what
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I have forgiven if I have forgiven anything has been for the sake of yours in the presence of Christ so that we would not be outwitted by Satan for we are not ignorant of his designs.
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What's Paul saying there? Paul is saying this understand this. Forgiveness is a corporate activity and forgiveness is something the church does so that Satan does not bring a wedge of division among us.
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When the person repents and is welcomed back the church restores them as a whole not half do and half don't no we all do because the easiest way for Satan to get a foothold in the church is to bring division in the church.
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The word in the NASV is the word schemes.
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The word in the King James Version is the word designs. Satan has schemes.
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Satan has designs. Satan has all of these things that he is attempting to divide the church over.
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I can tell you so many times I have seen churches divide over this issue of sin and discipline and sometimes it's the unwillingness to discipline and sometimes it's the unwillingness to restore the repentant and as a church we have to be willing to do both.
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We have to be willing to stand against sin and we have to be willing to restore the repentant person when they repent.
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Welcome them back. Not to a constant barrage of I told you so's but to an atmosphere of loving reconciliation.
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You see the beauty of 2 Corinthians is the practicality of it.
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This is one of the most practical books in your Bible. I don't know how often you study 2 Corinthians but 2 Corinthians is so practical because it's dealing with real life stuff.
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This is something that can and does happen in churches. Some passages are hard to apply.
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This one ain't because this is calling us to restore the repentant person and once that restoration happens we are to keep no record of wrong.
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That's one of the definitions of love. Love is patient. Love is kind. It does not envy.
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It does not boast and it keeps no record of wrong.
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One of the things we often need to repent of ourselves is the unwillingness to let go of things that people have done to us once they have repented.
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I'll make this real practical real quick and I know I want to finish but I want to say this. This all could be applied on a personal level in many of our relationships because how often do our relationships go bad because we are unwilling to reconcile with someone who has repented?
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We are unwilling to restore a relationship when someone has repented.
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Are you a person who keeps bringing up things from the past? Are you a person who keeps reminding someone of their sin even after their sin has long been forgiven?
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As the gospel is applied to us we must be willing to apply it to others.
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As the gospel is applied to us we must be willing to apply it to others. And what is the gospel to us?
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That we have come to Christ with nothing. Nothing in my hand
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I bring. Only to the cross I cling. Naked come to thee for dress.
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I didn't bring anything to the gospel. The gospel brought me everything through Christ and when someone comes and needs forgiveness from me with nothing
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I have the same responsibility to forgive them in the way Christ has forgiven me.
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Restoration comes when we understand that as we have been given much so too must we be willing to give much.
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Let us pray. Father I thank you for the opportunity to be reminded today about the importance of reconciliation.
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The importance of being brought back into relationship. The importance of the need for restoration.
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And Lord we know as we've talked about some today there are those who have been divided from our body and we pray for their repentance.
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We pray for their restoration. Moreover Lord we pray that the little relationships that go on, the little relationship interruptions that go on among us
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Lord that they would be quickly repented and quickly reconciled and that we would not be drug down into the drama of disfellowship based upon our unwillingness to forgive our brothers and sisters in Christ.
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Let us love one another as Christ has loved us. Let us forgive as Christ has said.
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As many as is necessary Lord. And as God has forgiven us separating us as far as the east is from the west from our sins.
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Lord may we forgive those who sin against us. In Jesus name.