WHEN YOUR BROTHER SINS

WHEN YOUR BROTHER SINS Matthew 18:15-20 September 3, 2006 Given by: Pastor Rich Bersett [Index of Past Messages] Introduction Valerie O'Connor, a high school student in Britton, Michigan, isn't in the habit of shoving her 63-year-old grandfather out the door into the snow. But her grandpa, Okey Howard, is glad she did. He was on fire at the time. A February 2002 ice storm left many Michigan residents without power, so Valerie's grandfather had borrowed a kerosene heater from a friend to keep pipes and family members from freezing. Unfortunately someone must have put something other than kerosene in the heater. When Mr. Howard lit the heater, it exploded, spewing burning fuel onto his arms, hands, and upper body. Valerie saw her grandfather completely engulfed, so she pushed him out the door into some snow and rolled on top of him to smother the flames. She suffered minor burns on her legs. Though badly burned, Mr. Howard had the presence of mind to stumble back into the house, where he used a large extinguisher to put out the house fire. "I knew something had to be done," Valerie said later. "After a moment of shock, I just reacted." Discipline isn’t pretty and it is never our preferred course of action, but it is sometimes necessary if we love those around us and want the best for them. Christians recognize as well that, even more important than our best wishes for others, God’s will is for them to prosper spiritually. C. S. Lewis reminds us that God loves us too much to allow us to be “happy in contemptible circumstances.” God loves us, and therefore He disciplines us. And as our text today points out, He relies on us to get it done. Read text at Matthew 18:15-20 Some Preliminary Observations Before we enter fully into our study of this passage, I want you to consider a couple of preliminary observations that will bear on our understanding of these words of Jesus. The first observation is that as Jesus spoke these words He anticipated the church. On only a couple of occasions did Jesus refer to the church that would be established after His personal ministry on earth was completed. One of those was when He said He would build His church, and the gates of Hades would not overcome it. (Matthew 16:19) The other is here in verse 17 where he outlines the third step in a process of disciplining a sinning brother: tell it to the church (Matthew 18:17). We’ll explain in a moment exactly what was meant as Jesus used the word EKKLESIA to refer to the church as His people gathered. But suffice it to say that, though the church had not yet formed, Jesus knew that it would be born in a matter of months on the day of Pentecost following His death, resurrection and ascension. Secondly, please notice that Jesus assumed something we often forget. He assumed that the brothers and sisters who identified with the coming church would be actively involved in building up the spiritual vitality of one another. They would be spiritual encouragers of one another, accepting that responsibility as part of being in the community of Christ. In the church, individual believers are God’s agents of spiritual encouragement. That is, He relies on us to stimulate and accentuate holy behavior in one another. Thirdly, Jesus asserted here that that encouragement would on occasion involve correcting, even rebuking, one another when necessary. Rebuking and correcting one another for the purpose of sharpening one another spiritually is a regular part of New Testament ministry in the church. (2 Timothy 3:17) Jesus said very succinctly in Luke 17:3, If your brother sins, rebuke him, and if he repents, forgive him. Four Steps of Church Discipline 1. Go to the sinning brother ALONE The key word here is the word “alone.” When you observe sinful, destructive behavior in the life of your brother it is expected of you to help him by bringing correction. The first step requires that you, and you alone, go to him, one-on-one, to discuss what you have observed in the hopes of bringing him to conviction and the repentance that issues in change. We should think of the term “alone” in two senses: First, you as a caring brother are to go to just him, and no one else, about his problem. Of no help at all is gossip and backbiting—sharing so-and-so’s problems with others. Sometimes we let it slip out when reporting prayer requests. Listen, you should speak to no one about your brother’s sin, except to the Lord in prayer for him, before you speak with the brother himself about it. There is a second sense of “alone” here. When you go to your brother, go by yourself so it’s just the two of you. This kind of a confrontation is difficult enough for each of you, so there’s no sense in sabotaging the meeting by adding another person—he’d look like a loaded shotgun to the errant brother. You are meeting with him to make a personal appeal for repentance and change based on your love for him. Balance truth and love—be honest but proceed in a fashion that reassures him that you love him. Another thing to remember—you are not going to him to assassinate his character, to make yourself look better than he, nor to in any way discourage him. So go in love, humility and concern. (A sad example) The result you are hoping and praying for is that your brother will receive you, hear you out and acknowledge his sin, repenting and recommitting himself to living faithfully for Christ. Jesus says if that happens you have won your brother over. (18:15) Praise the Lord, forget the whole thing, don’t bring it up again, move on. If your meeting doesn’t work, that is, if he will not listen, then you must move to step 2. By the way, that word “listen” means to hear and respond in agreement. The second step is to . . . 2. Take one or two others with you There are some very practical reasons for taking others with you. In case you have made an error in assessment or have not approached your brother in the loving way he deserves, these others can help correct you. The other reason for taking them, Jesus says, is to establish truth by having sufficient witness. One or two others can confirm the truth about the sinful behavior and they can help assess the response of the errant brother—whether he really is trying to listen and repent or not. Jesus quotes from Deuteronomy a very popular passage, that every matter may be established by the testimony of two or three witnesses. (Deuteronomy 19:15) It’s easy to see why having others involved at this point is very helpful. But if the first step is skipped and you and two others show up at this brother’s door it will likely be a messy and unfortunate ordeal. Your personal encounter sets the stage for this second step. Whom do you take with you? Clearly, you should take others who, like yourself, love the errant brother and have his best interests at heart. It should be someone you’re fairly certain the sinning brother will respect, someone spiritually mature (elders are a good choice here). Come with truth and love. Make the case of the danger of continuing in the sinful behavior, let your genuine concern for him show as you warn him and urge him to repent, and pray for God’s conviction in your brother’s life. Again, if he repents at that point, praise the Lord, rejoice with him as he repents and renews his commitment to Christ, then forget it, don’t bring it up again unless he slips into that sin again. If he does not listen to the two or three of you, you need to move to the next step. This is getting more and more intense, and there is need for increasing prayer support. Step three: 3. Tell it to the church This seems pretty strong, but remember who is commanding it. This is Jesus, Lord of the Church who says it should be done. And remember, He loves your brother even more than you do. Verse 17 is very brief and to the point: If he refuses to listen to them [the two or three], tell it to the church. That’s it! Does this all seem rather austere and formal? We get this picture of all the folks gathered—you know everybody in their regular seats, families gathered with their kids, the teens seated down front, some visitors in attendance, and now, let’s talk about brother Bubba’s sexual sins! That’s not what is intended. The key is to know what is meant by “the church.” Jesus uses the word that will soon be used by all the apostolic writers, EKKLESIA – a Greek term meaning the assembly of brothers and sisters in Christ. Originally it was used to refer to a town meeting, but came to refer in the church to times when believers would meet for worship, word and ministry. But it didn’t necessarily mean the gathering of everyone in the church family. It was any time a group came together for a specific purpose. You see we think of church as Sunday morning worship services. The other times when believers get together—well, they’re you know, committee meetings and fellowships, things like that. But that’s wrong. Jesus makes it clear that when two or three come together in His name—church is happening! And most certainly, when a few believers who know and love Bubba and are gathering together with the church elders and they’ve already fasted and they’re praying for him with tears—that’s church! The idea here isn’t planting Bubba in a large wooden chair in front of 500 church members, dragging his sins before everyone, most of whom might not even know him. And then demanding that he repent before all of them. No, we’re talking about the assembly of those in the church family who are invested in Bubba’s life—those who know him, love him and are already praying for him. How natural for them to gather with the church leaders in solemn prayer and deep concern for their brother. They are the ones who should make the decision about how best to help restore their brother in Christ. Tell it to the church doesn’t mean a lynch mob bringing vengeful punishment (picture colonial village putting someone in stocks in town square). No, this is a gathering of God’s caring people who have two primary concerns: one, with the errant brother—that, at all costs, he would be right with God, and recognizing that at this point it requires public repentance; second concern = purity of the Lord’s church and obedience to His very direct command. So they prayerfully and tenderly make their case, put it to Bubba and ask for his response, hoping redemptively for repentance. If he repents – great. They receive him, forgive him and celebrate the Lord’s mercy. If he does not repent, the church gathered moves to step #4 4. Let him be to you as an unbeliever This is commonly called “excommunication” (which means to set someone outside the most intimate relationships of the body of Christ). Let him be as a Gentile (unbeliever) or a tax collector (shunned from trusted fellowship). The purpose behind “disfellowshiping” a brother is that he would find the separation painful and miss the blessing of the Lord he used to receive by being with like-minded believers. This is to be a redemptive pain. This seems harsh, but the alternative is spiritually disastrous. Not only is the errant brother encouraged to go on in his destructive lifestyle, but the whole church is endangered by eroded conviction and low expectation of holy living. And how is a pagan, or unbeliever, treated by the church? They are not kept away from public meetings; they are loved and cared for, with a view to winning them to a faithful relationship with Christ. In other words, the disfellowshiped person becomes to the church family as though they are not yet saved. He is put out from under the spiritual protection of the flock of God. The notable example in the New Testament of this level of church discipline is the case of the Corinthian man who was sexually involved with his step-mother. The apostle Paul writes and corrects the indifference of the Corinthian church, calling for them to excommunicate the man, “handing him over to Satan” (1 Corinthians 5:5). The purpose of this action is clear: “…so that the sinful nature may be destroyed and his spirit saved on the day of the Lord.” Paul says, “…you must not associate with anyone who calls himself a brother but is sexually immoral or greedy or an idolater or a slanderer, a drunkard or a swindler. With such a man do not even eat.” (1 Corinthians 5:11) So there appears to be this double reason for the severe, no-nonsense action of excommunication: one, to help bring the errant brother to conviction and repentance; and two, to help keep the fellowship strong in its pursuit of purity and holiness. That is, redemptive for the individual and refining for the corporate body. The complication in our culture is that when a person is censured by a church and is unrepentant, he can just go down the street or across town to another congregation where no one knows his sin or will not bother to help him come to repentance. To tell you the truth, I don’t know what to say about that. I guess we could spend some time shaking our heads about how churches are not serious about holiness or biblical teaching on church discipline. We can bemoan the lack of unity/cooperation among churches. But, bottom line, it is not our responsibility to see that other congregations or denominations follow-through on church discipline. Our responsibility is to study the Word of God to know the mind and will of God and then to do what He says. If someone runs from God’s discipline through a loving church family, there is nothing that church family can do but pray. The authority of the church Let’s return to the last section of our text and see what Jesus says about the authority of the church that He is creating. Verses 18-20 read: I tell you the truth, whatever you bind on earth will be bound in heaven, and whatever you loose on earth will be loosed in heaven. The two terms used here—to “bind” and to “loose”—are metaphors for allowing and disallowing. Please understand the serious nature of what Jesus is saying: God is giving to the church the authority to declare whether people are walking in faith or are not! This is real, and so profound that He says whatever the church says, heaven will affirm it. To emphasize the point further, in verse 19 we read, Again, I tell you that if two of you on earth agree about anything you ask for, it will be done for you by my Father in heaven. I think it is a mistake to apply this verse willy-nilly to all circumstances. This is not a carte-blanche ticket for believers to come and get anything they want. This is laid right smack in the middle of a discussion of one of the most sacred and awesome responsibilities of the church—the discernment and declaration of whether people are right with God or not! And we think we’ve won the lottery and can go shopping for what we want! Let us not cheapen our ministry by superficially applying this incredible promise to our private Christmas lists. Jesus says the very souls of men and women are to be served and judged by you, the church. You will need my Lordship over you. You will need my wisdom; you will need my power; you will need my direction. Pray for these things, and I will most certainly give them to you so you can serve the kingdom of God! Finally, verse 20 confirms the great spiritual reality that the Lord is in some deep and powerfully meaningful way “with” believers when they come together in His name. For where two or three come together in my name, there am I with them. What Will it Take to do Church Discipline Well? Real Commitment to God’s Word and God’s Will Real Love for One Another Real Spiritual Courage [Back to Top]