Everybody's well, but some of
us are, so we're excited for that. We're excited for that. We're going to continue in our
little mini-sub-series out of the sub-series of 1 Timothy on
church membership. And so while we're continuing
to look at the church, continue to read 1 Timothy because we
will pick up there soon in the weeks to come. But today I want
to continue in what I've now entitled The Beautiful Church,
a little tiny little series called The Beautiful Church. What are
we to be? What is the church supposed to
be about? What are some things that the church should know and
understand as it relates to the teaching of the New Testament?
And so today we're going to look at two specific places in scripture. We're going to look at Matthew
chapter 18. So you can turn there with me.
And that's the first book of the New Testament, Matthew chapter
18. And then we're going to reference
several other passages in several other places, but we're going
to also look at the tone and the nature of Paul's writing
to Philemon as sort of like a proof text
for some of this. So here we are in the Word of God. Here we are together as the sheep
of Christ. Here are we. Wondering, you know,
what's next on our plate? Where are we going from here?
And what do we need to know? What do we need to be doing?
Well, the beautiful thing about all of that is that we can know
what we are to be about because the scripture gives us that information. There's a great mystery in the
world called the gospel. Paul said that it was shadowed
and covered until the day of Christ, until the preaching of
the apostles to preach Christ, it was revealed. Christ is the
mystery unfolded. He is no longer a mystery for
us. We know Him, we see Him because
He knows us. And the Christian life is not about what the culture
has said that it should be. Being a Christian in America,
being a Christian in Georgia, being a Christian in the southeast
region of the coastal empire and low country, we are not supposed
to take our cues from the world, from the churches of the world,
from the habits, from the historical essence of everything that has
ever taken place. What being a Christian is all
about is not the bumper stickers, the T-shirts, the knickknacks,
the Hobby Lobby, scripture on the wall, pictures
on the table, real men love Jesus, that kind of stuff. This is not
Christianity. This is not living for Christ,
living in Christ. This is just like putting icing on dung. Now, I know a lot of dogs who
would eat that. Some kids would try it. Some well-meaning brave
men probably would too, but we wouldn't eat it. The grotesque
idea of that type of food is the way I view cultural Christianity. It's what I feel in my spirit. It's what I feel in my heart
and mind. It's what I think about, and
it drives me to a place of brokenness. Because people play the game
of Christianity, they play the game of church, and every preacher
who's ever stood in the pit bed, we don't play games here. I mean,
that was my motto back in the early 2000s. I could raise my
hand and I'd say, what's my motto? No, and everybody in the entire
congregation would say, no games. We're not playing games here.
And it had a context. So everybody who's ever preached
has said that. Everybody who's ever preached
is saying the exact same thing that I'm saying today. Everybody
has the same sentiment, but not everybody is talking about the
same thing. Because there's always a mindset
with the man talking that he has a picture in his head, or
a particular persons or person, or a particular type of ministry,
a particular congregation, or a particular denomination. There's
always something there, right? And for those who may have a
similar picture, they're going, yeah, I agree with you. Amen.
You know, the amen corners. We amen what should be called
platitudes and cliches. But we often don't amen true
shepherding of God's people. We often don't amen the solidarity
of the unity of the whole council of Christ. There's nonsense afoot in our
world today, even amongst sovereign grace or so-called slash reformed
or so-called slash Calvinistic or Baptistic or whatever, whatever
your historical moniker might be for a particular iteration
of a theological system. There in that lies a problem. Because just as many of you and
I have had conversations about things, we can say the same word
for months and not even be on the same page. My brother Trey and I are going
to have a conversation sometime next week or two about the invisible
church. Because what I mean is not what
he means. Some people might think, well,
are those the empty chairs in the invisible church? No. We are here, commanded by Christ,
to be a people for His glory, to display His manifold wisdom.
Psalm 104, all the stuff that God has done, all the things
that He's put His hands on, all the things that He feeds. And
yet, both songs that we just sang, the lyrics of those songs
are found in Psalm 104. Isn't that coincidental? I decided
to read it, so I opened it up. I thought, I haven't read this
song in a while. There's not a whole lot of pre-planning and
pre-service readings. So we're learning, and if we're
going to learn about who God is, and we're going to worship,
and we're going to thank Him, some people say, God is so good, and when
they say that, what they're meaning is, God gave me a car. Or what they mean is, God gave
me a spouse. God gave me health in my body.
Blessed be the name of the Lord. Beloved, we should praise God
for every small, minute detail of our lives. As I sat down to lunch Wednesday,
I didn't eat anything Thursday, Friday, Saturday. As I sat down to lunch Wednesday,
I'm looking at this food and I'm thinking, this is immaculate food. This
is amazing food. Had some creamed corn in there,
some chicken in there. Some collard greens. Good stuff. And I'm thinking, my goodness,
in the scale of the world, this is gourmet royal food. Gourmet royal food. And there was some kind of carrot
cake in there that was just like somebody had dropped it in the
floor and scooped it all up, put it back in the bowl. It was
delicious. Delicious. We should be thankful for that. We should be thankful for the
potato chip that we might only eat. We should be thankful for
the lack of food. We should be thankful for the
lack of help. We should be thankful for the lack of relationships.
We should be thankful for the troubles and the trials and the
problems because blessed be the name of the Lord in the context
of Job, he cries that out when he gets news that God God has
killed His children for no other reason but to show Himself faithful
in the heart of Job. You see, if you don't know the
Lord of the Bible, that upsets you. And what I'm not saying, if you're
not saved, I'm talking about even for the believer who hasn't
truly learned as part of the body. Not only who God is, but
then who we are in relation to him. To display who he is, the
church is to do that. And we do that, this is review,
we do that in two specific general categories. We do that in the
proclamation and the defense of the gospel of free and sovereign
grace. True gospel. There are many,
many, many false gospels. Any gospel that is a variant
of the truth is a lie. And we disavow all of them, but
we do not destroy those who believe it. We love them, and we evangelize
them, and we bring them close, and we disciple them, and we
do whatever we can do out of the cost of our own lives and
time that God may be glorified in their redemption that has
already been accomplished and finished at the cross of Christ,
if they belong to Him. And then the second part of that
is that we grow to learn and understand and rightly divide
the truth of Scripture as a people in order that, now listen to
this, in order that, so maybe there are three things, in order
that we might live as a people together for His name's sake. by His grace. Sound familiar?
We are a people for His glory by His grace. And that's cliché. It means a lot of different things
to a lot of different people. So last week we looked at a dump
the marble bag on the floor church membership. And today we're going
to focus on that a little bit deeply, more deeply, in what
I believe is an imperative reality of the local church, and that
is to understand church discipline. To understand what it means,
what it is, biblically speaking. And I could go anywhere in the
New Testament. I could go to any New Testament letter, any
New Testament letter, and there is church discipline. Any New Testament letter. But
because we have institutionalized the Kirk, the church, because
we have institutionalized Christianity, because we have socialized and
made it a club that's beneficial for not only us and our, you
know, our kicks to do spiritual things, but it's also a way for
us to be active in this, that, and the other, and also good
for our business, good for our reputation. I might want to run
for public office one day. I need to be in the right congregation. hogwash. We are here so that we can live as Christ
has commanded us to live. No exceptions. We're here in covenant with one
another. That means a promise. Understand
that God's covenant with His people is irrevocable and it's
unconditional in the context of what we must provide because
He has provided for Himself a lamb for the slaughter. I want you to hear this. This is
theological things. These are the revelation of God
to His people. This is the Spirit that teaches
us these things. And so I want us to know this.
I want us to understand this. And there are some other things
that I'm going to go through in the next few weeks in rapid succession. I've
already talked about leadership, elders and deacons. We've gotten
that under our table. We've gotten that on our table.
I'm going to talk about worship. We talked a little bit about
gifts and service of the ministry last week. We're going to talk
about preaching and its point. We've talked about prayer already.
I'm going to emphasize with a complete sermon about what is biblical
fellowship, and then I'm going to talk about the responsibilities
of the individual members of the church in these ways, including
financial support and giving and responsibilities of ministry
and service and other things related to life together in our
culture in the 20,000th century, 21st century. I had to think
about that for a minute. But today we're going to talk
about discipline. So I want us to hear the word, and then I'm
going to opine for a minute, and then we're gonna get into
the text. In Matthew chapter 18, Jesus, there's a lot here. There's a context here that's
so difficult to absorb if we're not really in it. And I'm willing to say that few
of us have read the gospel of Matthew this week. So for the
sake of the theme, Jesus is teaching His disciples. And they've come
to Him and they've been talking amongst themselves and they've
come around and they've all started, you know, well, you know, I'm
better than you, you're better than me, blah, blah, blah. You know, John, you're the most
humble. Peter, you're the most passionate. You know, who's going
to be the greatest in the kingdom? Sort of like most ministers.
They think Christianity is a competition. They think that Congregationalism
is a competition. They think the ministry is about
what we can provide to make the community wanna be in here. The
same thing that happened in John chapter six when Jesus provided
a meal for 10,000 people miraculously and then he said, now, all I'm
gonna give you is my flesh and blood. And they went, you're
nuts. And every single one of them left. So when we preach
Christ, Unless God calls people to that desire by the Spirit,
they're not going to stick around forever. Your relationships and your friendships
in life are key to your evangelism. They should be the centerpiece
of it. But your evangelism is not moving to a decision by that
person to believe something or accept something or receive something
or do something or acknowledge anything. Your evangelism is
means naturally through which God will, by the Spirit, regenerate
His elect people when He desires and only when He desires. So
as long as people in my life are willing to put up with my
constant exposure to Scripture in every aspect of life, they can hang around. And we'd be fools when someone
asks us about something biblical, and even when they're so far
out in left field that they seem like they're brain dead. We'd
be fools to rebuke them and belittle them instead of just sit down
with them and teach them the truth. Timothy says that this command
flows out of love, right? Jesus' disciples love themselves. They did, just like we love ourselves. Who's the greatest, they said. And Jesus, in chapter 18 of Matthew,
He brings a child, and He puts a child, a child. I'm not talking about
a middle schooler, I'm not talking about a fourth grader, I'm not
talking about a second grader. I'm thinking, like Julia, a child,
a preschooler, a walking, toddling, whatever. And he stands this
child in front of his disciples, he says, truly, I say to you,
our main, it is so that I say to you, unless you change and
become like children, You will never enter the kingdom of heaven.
Don't you hear that? Don't you hear that? There's
a reason why we're starting there, so that you can get the tenor
of what Jesus is teaching. His disciples that He chose,
who were following Him, who were doing miracles, who were preaching
the gospel, who were being used by Christ to bring about His
glory visibly, they were like, who's going to be the greatest?
He said, you need to change how you're thinking, because if you're
not like this, you're not even getting into the kingdom of heaven. Same
thing he said in John chapter 3 to Nicodemus. Got all the right
theology. Nicodemus wasn't wrong. Nicodemus
was blind. Nicodemus was dead in his religiosity. He was dead in his theology.
He was dead in his prophecy. He was dead and Christ made him
alive. How? By the Spirit. God the Spirit. What does it do? It changes our
minds. We no longer focus on any other means. We no longer
focus on any of these other things. We trust in the proclamation
of Christ alone as our righteousness. Period. And the context here is he's
saying whoever humbles himself like this child is the greatest
in the kingdom of heaven. Dependence of a child, humility
of a child, but yet what do we tell everybody? Grow up! Paul
tells Timothy that, doesn't he? Do not continue in childish ways. Well, he's talking about childish
means, childish attitudes, childish mindsets. Childish activities, but not
childish faith. And whoever receives one such
child in my name receives me. But whoever causes one of these
little ones who believes in me to sin, it'd
be better if a brick was tied around his neck and he'd be drowned
in the sea. Now that's Jesus. Jesus, that's
not very loving. Of course, I'm not Jesus and
neither are you and none of us have the authority to act or
speak that way to anybody. This is Jesus teaching his disciples. It wasn't a prescription. It
was a picture. So then he's talking about those
who are tempted to sin, those who lure other people to sin,
those who cause people to sin because of the way they approach,
the way they live, the way they speak, what they do. He thinks about the rebelliousness
of things. And then he asks, he says, you
know, you got a sheep herder, and he loves his sheep. There's
livelihood, but he relates to these sheep. He's taken care
of these sheep for years, and he's got a hundred, and one of
them wanders off. He leaves the 99 intact, and
he goes and finds the one. This isn't prescriptive either,
by the way. This isn't what we do, okay? We don't run after
goats. We don't run after rebellious
people. It's just a picture. That when God the Father, through
God the Son, by the power of God the Spirit, saves, regenerates
one of His sheep, rejoicing, celebration, and thanksgiving
is the outcome. Then verse 15, which is our text
for this morning. If your brother sins against you, go tell him
his fault. between you and him alone. If he listens to you, you have
gained your brother. But if he does not listen, take
a few others along with you that every charge of his sin against
you may be established by the evidence of two or three witnesses.
What are the witnesses there? They're listening to what you
say. They're witnessing you. If he refuses to listen to them,
tell it to the church. And if he refuses to listen even
to the church, let him be to you as a Gentile and a tax collector. Truly I say to you, whatever
you bind on earth shall be bound in heaven and whatever you loose
on earth shall be loose in heaven. Now he is talking to and only
to his disciples, but this instruction is carried over into the apostolic
writings of the New Testament. We see Paul talking about it
in Thessalonica. We see Paul talking about it
in Ephesus. We see Paul talking about it in Corinth. We see it,
church discipline. So, church discipline, when we
think about it, if I said, okay, everybody this morning, due to
recent events, is under church discipline, we'd have a stomachache. Well, what happened? Well, for
those of you who weren't at the fellowship last week, we got into a food
fight. Everyone would start to think,
what did I do wrong? But discipline isn't always about
what's wrong. Discipline is sometimes about what is not right. And
discipline, by definition, is loving correction. Loving correction. I have severe
tendinitis in this elbow. And it's awful. It's awful. And part of the therapy that
I have to do is take this little vibrating devil stick from Hades
and rub it on that spot, and rake it down like this, and then
divide it like that. It's supposed to tear the tendon
a little bit. And when I turn it on, the cats, it sounds like
a purr. Purr. And they get all up on
me trying to figure out what new cat this is. So it's doubly,
it's painful. Very painful. But it's necessary for me to
heal. That's discipline. Discipline, we've already said
this, is twofold. It's formative, you got it? And corrective. formative and
corrective. So if we were, and I won't read
through Philemon for the sake of time, but if we were to go
to Paul's writing to Philemon, it was formative. Philemon did
nothing wrong. He had all legal means to arrest
Onesimus. He had judicial means to imprison
him. He stole from him. He violated
the law in two ways. And he had every biblical right
to have Onesimus arrested and put in prison. Because Onesimus
stole from Philemon and then abandoned his post as a slave. And we're not going to get into
the ethics of slavery. It's wrong. But Jesus didn't
come to the world to deal with ethics. He came to the world
to display his glory and redemption. So Paul meets Onesimus and through
the gospel God converts him. And so now Paul says that Onesimus
is his spiritual son. And when he finds out what Onesimus
has done, of course, Onesimus as a new believer is repentant. In other words, his mind has
been changed. He knows now when Paul confronts him about the
fact that he stole and ran away, that he should go back and be
a slave and face his punishment. But Paul goes a step further
in formative discipline by writing Philemon and saying, Philemon,
I've met your slave. He's wronged you. Legally, you
have all means. Biblically, you have all means.
But for the sake of Christ, there's a different way. I have a right! But is that right
wise in the nature of gospel? So formative discipline would
be like, what is taught? What is taught to the people
of Ephesus? What is taught to Philemon? When he comes back
to you, he's going to be more valuable to you as a brother.
He will serve you now more than he ever would have as a slave,
even though as a slave he should have served you as Christ, as
if you were Christ, as if you were serving Christ. Now he's
coming back to you as a brother, so it's going to be doubly beneficial
for you. And when he comes back, his debt
is paid. He owes you nothing. And I encourage
you to receive him as if I were coming to you. Open your arms
and your home and your life and your treasures to him as if I
were coming. Formative discipline. So see,
it's not always because somebody's in trouble. And Philemon could
have easily said, I hear what you're saying, Paul, and I hear
that it's wise, but right now I need to do this. And Paul would
have probably written another letter. Second Philemon. I don't think you're hearing
me. Then it would have been corrective. You see. So formative discipline is oversight
through preaching and teaching, instruction. Formative discipline
happens through the ordinances, what we learn and remember and
obey through the Lord's table and through public baptism. Formative
discipline is loving service, learning the one another's. Have
you ever gone through your Bible, no matter what translation you
use, and looked for the one another list? They're everywhere. There's
tons of them. Love one another, respect one
another, help one another, serve one another. and so on and so
forth. These are commands. These are
commands that are given to us through the teaching of the New
Testament. And if we're not doing them, we are disobeying God.
But the formative discipline through the teaching that we
might learn what we ought to be doing because it's the therefores
of the Bible, because of the gospel, because of Christ, because
of grace, therefore live this way, act this way, think this
way, behave this way, reconcile this way, and then that's what
brings us to the next part of discipline. It's done out of
love in both sides because the love that Christ has for us in
giving of Himself, the mind of Christ, as Paul teaches to the
Philippians, should be ours and is ours because we have this
mind in Christ. because we have it, then we can
walk in it. We don't often walk in it because we're not disciplined
enough to be in the assembly to learn to do so, nor have the
opportunity to get face-to-face enough with people that we feel
comfortable opening our lives to them so that they may serve
us and us them. But there is the corrective side
of discipline. When the prior formative, instructive, teaching
discipline is ignored, is rebuked, is qualified by certain conditions
or rebelled against, bringing disunity, frustration, fear,
suspicion, arrogance, and public shame to the name of Christ,
then corrective discipline happens. Corrective discipline is happening
every single moment of our lives. Every single moment, in every
aspect of our life. It's happening all the time in
our church. I am disciplined many times during the weeks.
You are disciplined many times during the weeks. It's not like
going to the principal's office. The elders have to write letters
to correct simple things through the teaching, instruction, and
scripture. We've missed the point. Some of you have said, Tippins,
your attitude, you have a bitter spirit. That's church discipline. And if I say, mind your business,
Dummy. Now you're on my poop list. How
can you preach the word of God and have a poop list? And of course that's a ridiculous
example, but it happens all the time. It's when someone decides
to double down and then rebel against the disciplined things
that the Bible teaches like gathering together, like submitting, like
being quiet, like not gossiping. that it comes a problem. The
very nature of the occasion of First Timothy is that people
wouldn't stop to give the elders time to manage and oversee and
correct the issues. This is taught and commanded
by Christ right here in this text. Let's go through it. Verse
15, Matthew 18. If your brother... Stop right
there. So this is talking to you. Let's
just Let's misapply the Bible for a minute and let's just replace
the disciples with you. No, I don't want to do that. But you
know what I'm saying. There is an application here that he's
given these men who then teach the church to do the same thing.
First and foremost, he teaches something In the epistles, the
Bible teaches us in the letters that the elders are responsible
for corrective informative discipline, not individual members of the
church. Why? Because wouldn't it be something
if I open up my Bible to preach and then one of you said, I'm
sorry, pastor, I'm bringing so-and-so before the church today. First,
I've heard. Can it happen? It can happen,
and it has happened. Some of you have witnessed it
recently. For those of you who have been
around 10, 11 years, we've seen it happen several times. And
we've seen reconciliation a few times, and we've seen expulsion,
and we're still waiting for reconciliation. But the scripture will teach
that church discipline, corrective, And here's an incredible thing
that you're going to go, wow. Informative discipline, discipleship, same
root, discipline, is about keeping and growing
relationships, isn't it? It's about when it manifests
problems with relationships. When you've got two people sitting
on the front row and they have discord, and their discord, because
of their friend circles and because of their intimacy with other
people, begins to cause fear in the hearts of the church,
it's wicked, it's demonic, it's evil. And I say that because
that's what the Lord says. That's what Paul says. There
is no such thing as the Spirit of God causing fear and division
in the body of Christ. Well, the truth will always divide. Not that way. The truth will
divide through proper, orderly, obedient, humble, loving correction,
according to the scripture. And any other way is satanic. And any other person who insists
on that, they themselves are Satan's puppets. Dogma like that
bothers some people. And some people have told me
that, even recently. Pastor, when you say that, it
just bothers me. And I'm sorry it bothers you. And maybe the
Lord will show me that I probably should just say it with a little
less emphasis, but my, I don't know what my heart rate is, but
I know my heart rate's higher when I say that. Yeah, that's
68. That's high. No, I'm just joking.
I can feel it. I can feel, you know, oh, I just
wanna get down for a minute and take a little breath. Jesus gave the apostles the,
quote, keys of the kingdom, that in their writing and in the commands
that God gives us through them, we are able to do, lock and unlock,
receive and not receive, judge and not judge accordingly. So if your brother sins against
you, If you don't consider him a brother at any time in the
process, you go bye bye. Your voice is shut. Your mouth
is zipped. Your platform is nil. Because
you've passed judgment. Yeah, but he said. Yeah, but he did. You notice how most of the time
Matthew 18 is invoked when someone's upset about something someone
else did but it's not a sin. Or the next part of that phrase,
if your brother sins against you. Sometimes we're such busy
bodies that we're so interested in what other people are doing
through our observation, it's because we're not serving. We're
not serving Christ at all. We sit on our spiritual heinies
worrying about what everybody else is not doing right when
we can't see our own problems. That's not okay. We're not gonna
be a church that allows that. That in and of itself will cause
you to be brought publicly before the church if you don't stop
after you're told not to. Why? Because that's what the
Bible teaches us to do. See, this isn't high attendance
day. This isn't bring your friend day, is it? This is teach the
church day. And so, if your brother sins
against you. So what that means is, is that if there is someone
in the fellowship of the body of Christ who is your brother's
sister. That word is universal. Just
like mankind is human. If they sin against you, they
do something to offend you personally. They've done something to you.
Not because you're offended about something. Not because you're
offended because they might be wrong. Not because you're offended
because it's something you observe. You have an obligation as a humble
servant and brother or sister to go to them and encourage them
in the faith, but you have no responsibility to call them out. But if they sin against you,
what are some examples? Do I really have to give them? So I guess you have to decide,
is it a sin against me? And if it's not, it's over. And if we dwell on it, we're
the sinner. But let's say for the sake of
example, it happens and it will happen and it does happen. Somebody
says something, somebody does something, somebody says a coarse
joke that's out of flavor and it personally attacks you and
you feel, what do you do? Hey, brother. When you said that
yesterday, it really hurt my feelings. How hard is that? Why is that
so hard? Or, when that happens, this is what I feel. Not, you're an evil person. You're so mean. I've told people
they're mean because they are. After not being corrected. There
are mean people. There are people who don't care
about anything but their ideologies and the way that they think they
should handle things because they're Jesus Junior, you know? They're the little spirit. Go tell him his fault. You did this to me, you said
this to me, and this is what I feel. And if he listens to
you, How do you know if He's listened to you? I am so sorry. I'm sorry. Forgive me. I didn't mean to. I apologize. What can I do to make it right?
Here's what I stole back. Forgive me. Where do we go from
there? Rejoice. It's over. It's over. We don't dig. Well, what else
have you done? Well, what else have you said?
What else do you believe? You don't do that. That's not
what the church is about. So you've gained your brother
back. You see, brother, brother, brother, brother. The relationship
is mending. Church discipline is almost always about mending
relationships. So if he does not listen, take
one or two others along with you. Now we have the instruction.
This doesn't give us the instruction as the church. This is what the
Bible is showing that the apostles were taught in this particular
instance. How many more hours of conversations they have with
the Lord about this. We know more because we can see.
We can see what Paul writes about how to deal with things. We can
see what the apostle James says when he writes to the Jewish
Christians about their favoritism. Corrective discipline. about
their gossip, about their wishy-washiness. God called this. No, he didn't.
I've changed my mind. God's called me something. You
know, this isn't happening. This is happening. Fickleness.
It's not of the Lord. Well, I misunderstood. You didn't
misunderstood. You just not listened to the
instruction of Christ. Take two or three others with
you. Who are those people? Spiritually sound, wise, quiet
people. Why? So that they can hear you
say to the person, you've sinned against me in this way and I
asked you earlier, I told you earlier and you cussed me out.
I told you earlier and you said that I was wrong. It was none
of my business. Because you did this to me. Now
what are the witnesses for? Those witnesses must be spiritual.
You know what happens if those witnesses go back and tell anybody
else they are murderers? You know what happens if those
witnesses get online and ask for personal counsel from other
people? They are murderers. You know
who you get your personal counsel from? Your elders. Or your spouse. Because 9 out of 10 dentists, how do they always get those
9? Because they interview 1,000. And then they take 9 of the ones
who said yes and 1 of the ones who said no and say, 9 out of
10 dentists. I mean, come on, statistics,
charts, marketing. Friends, we don't do it. So when someone sins against
you, and then you go to them and you say, hey, you sinned
against me, and then they go sin against you again by telling other people,
or you then go tell other people this person sinned against me.
I'm really worried about this person. I think we need to pray
for this guy. I think we need to do this. I think we need to
do that. This guy's really a dangerous person. This guy's really scary.
You know, he's probably going to do it to you. Do you know
there are heinous sins that have taken place in the body of this
church, in the life of this congregation, that some of you will never know?
Heinous, wicked, evil things. that have been said and done. And by the mercies of Christ,
when the brothers and sisters have gone to these people and
said, you know what, you did there was an absolute wicked thing, and
I can't let this go. You have got to stop. And they've said, I am sorry.
Forgive me. I won't do it again. And the
relationship grew. So the evidence of two or three
witnesses is that the charge has been made. And that's if
the person hasn't listened. Do you know what that means?
That means we don't get to decide, how do I decide if a person's
listening? If they say and if they give an answer and are willing
to talk through it and work through it, that is good. When a person tells you to stay
out of their life and to mind your business, then you might
need to bring some witnesses. Is it a one-time thing? Listen,
we don't get to decide what conditions. Well, unless he says this or
does this, I'm going to take it to the church. No. What if three weeks from now
he does it again? Ah! Take it to the church. No. It's a new
offense. We start over. As long as people are walking
in correction, willing to learn, even if they struggle. Imagine
some sins that we all carry around that we can't escape. For me,
it's mostly attitudes. Internal attitudes. Bitterness. Cynicism. Paranoia. Those are three big
ones for me. And they're quick. They come
on like a wave. It's like, oh my gosh, five minutes later,
it's over, but I drowned. I got to do some CPR, get the
water out of my lungs. It takes me a day or two, especially
when I sin and that stuff. And heaven help me if I do it
on a Saturday. That's why I try to avoid people on Saturdays.
Because the devil works, right? Well, what does it matter? Because
you leave my house at 9 o'clock Saturday and have a fight with me, this
pulpit's going to be blank next morning. Brother Trey's out of town, we
in big trouble. Mike, one of you guys will just have to read
the Bible. That's fine, we'll just sing and read and pray.
Where's James? Who else is sitting here? Oh,
must have had a fight last night, you know. If he refuses to listen to the
witnesses, and what do the witnesses do? The witnesses then can encourage.
Let me give you an example. A specific, ridiculous example. I changed the way, one time in
a church, of how the offering was taken. You notice we don't
take an offering, we don't pass a plate. There's a reason for
that. Because it bothered me, the compulsion of the way it
was done at the time. And so now that I got away from
it, I've just never gone back to it. So I got the box in the
back and the internet link and all that other good stuff. But
I just did that because I thought it was prudent as a pastor to
do these things for the sake of our worship and time together.
Because I had a young sister come and say to me one day after
service, because the deacon was shaking the thing right in her
face. She's the only one on the aisle. And so she takes all the money
she had, which was $20, and put it in the plate. And after service,
she comes up teared up. That was all the money I had
for the week. Can I get it out? You know, I'm like, you know
what? We're done with the plates. Well, in a leader meeting one
night, on Tuesday night, I had this dear older brother. I've got a problem, Pastor. He
did it right. I've got a problem. What is it? You just think you're God around
here? Something like that? No. Well, you think you run everything? No. I run the pulpit and the
worship service. That's about it. Everything else,
y'all can handle. You can cut the grass, clean
the building, I don't... Well, who gave you permission to stop
passing offering plates? I was younger. I said, God, really? And now that we're at
it, why'd you put that acrylic podium up there? I said, because
the lectern was 18 by 7, and my Bible didn't fit on it. And
it weighed 700 pounds when I needed to move it. It was one of those
broad, I mean, I had to do my notes from this side to the center
to this side. Oh, I need to go back. Literally, it was the size
of a piece of paper. Well, nobody gave you permission
to do that. 1968, so-and-so built that for
the church. Where is it? I said, I gave it to a church
plant down in Alameda. Oh, you just... And I stopped,
hummed myself, and I said, you know what, brother? I said, you're
bringing a charge against me. And we quantified them, and there
were two other witnesses in the room. And then those witnesses
listened to what he had to say, and I listened, and I said, and
if you're right, I will go before the church and confess these
sins and ask for forgiveness. I said, but if you're not right,
you'll go before the church. Why? I said, because, have you
talked to him? Yeah, we and so-and-so had a
breakfast yesterday about this. And we agree. Well, good. Those two witnesses,
after 30 minutes, talked to this man concerning Christ, and he
got up off his chair, and he walked around and grabbed me.
Old man, strong man, and he would not let me go. Like a mama hug,
and cried on my shoulder. And we were very close for my
remaining tenure there. Witnesses are there to help reconcile. Not have stones to throw when
the time comes. Every step of discipline is to
reconcile. And when reconciliation happens,
even in a small way, we rejoice in it and we continue to grow
in it. We have to be patient in that. There are some things
that we think are sins that the person's just, their character's
different, their temperament's different. People think I yell
and I'm mean and I'm angry. No, I just, I'm an open air orator. I coached baseball. We yell. I'm not going to scream in your
face. If he refuses to listen to the
witness, if you can't get reconciliation of the relationship, repentance.
I'm sorry, forgive me. Take it to the church. Now how
do you take it to the church? Well, call sister so-and-so, brother
so-and-so, text message, messenger, Facebook, tweet, no. Take it
to the elders of the church. Take it to a deacon of the church
that the leadership may look at it and present it in such
a way that the church can be informed through the pulpit,
not through the telephone. Because there's a real specific
way that we inform about discipline. Brother so-and-so is accused
of doing this and refused to listen. We're going to deal with
it in two weeks. Call them, reach out to them,
because what's the point of taking it to church? That everybody
in the body who has means and wisdom now can reach out to them.
Not to get their side of the story, murderer. To call them
specifically to the carpet and the charge of the very thing
that they're not doing. What might that be? Not reconciling
with his brother. Not listening to the commands
of Scripture. Not willing to be patient. Not being in the
body. Not coming into the context of discipline and sitting under
the teaching. Taking matters into their own
hands. And so on and so forth and so forth. So then the church
has a go at it, right? It's not like, here we are taking
it to church today. And everybody knows about it.
All in favor? No. There's no voting. I got
mentors that tell me I'm ridiculous for not having a democratic process
in the church. I think it causes division by the mere function
of it. It's ridiculous. Why would we
vote as to whether or not we're going to obey the command of
the Bible? All right, well, we're going to change and I'm going
to stop preaching We're gonna vote on it. We don't have no
more preaching everybody in favor everybody imposed. What happens
in the opposed? Well, we're leaving Why now you're
under discipline for abandoning the body? And you think that's funny because
it's ridiculous But I've seen it and you have to that's why
some of you think it's funny. You've seen it ridiculous Well,
I think we need to vote on what songs we sing well, how about
the only songs are gonna sing are the ones that we can play
and or the person that actually does the picking likes. You want
to sing some different songs, then help pick them. Because you might not think that's
an aggravation, but I'm telling you what, Saturday afternoon,
you go, ah, I didn't do the songs. I mean, what do I sing this week? It's a service. We're not going to vote whether
or not to obey the Bible. We don't stand up and say all
in favor of expelling this adulterer. All in favor of, you know, expelling
this. That's like saying we get to
decide what the Bible says. We get to be God. And then what
do we do then with the division? I'll tell you what happens. True
story. People showed up for a call by
the personnel committee to dismiss the senior pastor of a church
that I was on staff with. And he had 40-something people
out of 300 in attendance. that voted against him, and about 700 other members that
weren't there, or active members. And so, long
story short, after the man was affirmed by Democratic vote,
he stands up there in the pulpit and says, all you people who
voted against me are under discipline. And all the people that didn't
show up are under discipline and have two weeks to give their position
or they're excommunicated. And the 200 and something that
voted for him, if they'd have had hay forks and torches, it
would have made sense. Yeah! Now tell me that's unity. It's
God blaspheming garbage. But that's what we do. And beloved,
we've all made silly mistakes like that. So the church gets
to come in and then make effort to reconcile this person in simple
obedience to the formative discipline of the Bible. If we don't stay
where we're supposed to be, and do what we're supposed to do,
and learn what we're supposed to learn, and listen to what
we're supposed to hear, then we're not ever going to see reconciliation. If he refuses to listen to the
church, Let him be as a Gentile and a
tax collector. What's that mean? You have no more obligation to
him. You have no more interest in him. You have no more responsibility
to him. He is not permitted to be in
our lives anymore until he changes this behavior. I've always found
it odd through familial seasons, you know, we've all have this
person in our house, in our families somewhere. who's always causing
problems and causing fights or always causing tension, always
got something smart to say. But yet they keep getting invited
to all the family events as if nothing's happening. And then they get in your face
and they choke you and they slap you and then, you know, your uncle invites them over
for a cookout same afternoon. But now you can't go because
you don't want to be choked, slapped. And your uncle's like,
oh, what is that? See, that's the problem when
church discipline isn't holistically received. When we continue to
try to have relationships with people who have abandoned the
church, who, according to the apostles, have abandoned the
faith. I still believe the gospel. You do not. You say you do. But you do not, if you abandon
any of the correction, you've abandoned the truth. Doesn't mean you're unconverted,
doesn't mean you're lost, doesn't mean that you're whatever. It
just means that you are apostate. So that you are not walking in
the truth. Read 1 John, we went through it at length, didn't
we? Let Him be to you as no one. See Him in the grocery store?
Oh, it's so good to see you. Isn't that weird? People that
call you the devil and then hug your neck a year later in the
grocery store? And what I want to do, I wish I felt the same. I've got a stick. I just say,
I'm glad to see you. I'm continuing to pray for you.
I hope that one day you're reconciled. And then they walk off. Are they forgiven? Absolutely.
My friends, that doesn't work like that. It doesn't work like
that. Church discipline is a gift to
the church. I got a whole lot of peas that
are about to pop out of my mouth. You ready? Church discipline
protects the gospel. It protects the gospel. Because
we are correcting, like in 1 Timothy, see there's always a tie here.
All the stuff's coming out of this so that we can understand
some of the application as we're going. There is always application
in the New Testament letters. It's not always only about the
gospel. It is therefore because of the
gospel, this due. Okay? Our assurance is not in
our doing. Our confidence is not in our
doing. But it sure does make life better. It sure does give
us joy. It sure does bring us into intimacy. And when we see reconciliation,
Christ and His truth is upheld. Church discipline protects the
gospel. It disavows any alternate views. So somebody in the congregation,
you know, they're reading, they're thinking, they're philosophizing,
they're doing all these sort of things. Hey, I got an idea. What
about this? Yeah. How would Christ answer
that with a lamb? He would say, that's an interesting
position, let's talk more about it, let's have some meetings
and let's discuss it. Let's get the Bible out, let's just have
coffee and let's go over it. There'd be no animosity, there'd
be no stress, there'd be no forcefulness, there'd be no anger, there'd
be no suspicion, and then eventually the word of God would be true.
But there are very few people who actually love one another. Because part of loving one another
is simply being able to receive the instruction of how to deal
with it. And to be satisfied in that instruction. So church
discipline protects the gospel. Church discipline promotes humility. Because what do we do? What does
Paul say? Those who are spiritual, go to the one who sins, lest
you also, oh this is John, I mean, also be snared. and do so as
one who is a recipient of grace. Jesus gets into that, doesn't
he, in verse 21? The unforgiving slave who's forgiven
a bunch of debt and then goes and shakes down his neighbor
for his five dollars and the king finds out about it and sells
all of his children and family and dogs and rabbits and everything
else into slavery, puts him in jail. Because if we're not forgiving
others, then how dare we say that we're forgiving? Church discipline provides boundaries. It sets up clear and present
boundaries of what the church is supposed to do in every circumstance,
what the church is supposed to say, how the elders are supposed
to act, how the deacons are supposed to act, how the church is supposed
to act, how we're supposed to receive, how we're supposed to
reject, It sets boundaries so that we're not walking around
like a child or a leaf tossed to and fro. We're not. I'm here. I'm not here. I believe
you. I'm standing with you. I'm not with you. We know we're
not to talk about it. We know we're not to gossip.
We know we're not to be cynical. We know we're not to be bitter.
We know we're supposed to pray. We know what we're supposed to
do. And the elders oversee that. And it is a nightmare all the
time when things are bad. When things are good, it's like,
this is the best day of my life. But those boundaries protect
you also by not allowing me to deal with it according to the
world's wisdom. Church discipline promotes Christ,
the mind of Christ. have this mind among you, which
is yours in Christ Jesus." Though he was God, he did not take equality
with God. Let's do the King James. He thought
it not robbery. Did not take equality with God,
something to be grasped, but made himself nothing, a slave,
obedient unto death, even on a cross. Therefore, God exalted
him, that on the name of Jesus, He had him above all names, that
every knee, every tongue, Jesus is Lord. That's the mind. That is, we
should all mimic Christ in that way every single occasion. It promotes the mind of Christ.
Church discipline, as I've already said, permeates all aspects of
life as a church. So it's always happening. There's
always ways. If you and I are at your house
and we're working on something, there's always some corrective
or formative way in which the Word of God will have influence
over what we're doing, whether it be our attitude about it,
our stewardship of it, or just the plain fact that we don't
need what we're doing. And if you've ever done plumbing,
you know what I'm talking about. It plainly deals with error. Church discipline is the only,
listen to this, the only and only plain way to handle doctrinal
disputes. Corrective teaching, formative
teaching. This is what the Bible says we
should do. This is what the Bible says we should believe. Let's
get back on the same page. Everybody sit down. And the person
who refuses either of those is the offender. And there are many people in
their hearts, if they ever hear me say that, they will say, that's
not true. Yeah, but, that's a big old but, it'll keep you out of
heaven. It's wider than the doorframe.
I'm just making a play on words. Narrows the gate that leads to
righteousness. Beloved, that's a gift of God to believe in the
sovereignty of God, in the work of Christ Jesus, and He as our
righteousness imputed to us. That is the only hope we have
to enter the gates of heaven and eternal life, and it is a
promise to the elect alone. And beloved, if we know this
truth, we are reminded of that by the Spirit when the Word of
God is instructed to us, even when we do it with a smirk. He
softens us so those who refuse correction and instruction are
to be treated as an unbeliever. Doesn't mean they are, but they
must be. So that our only intimacy with them, if I dare
use the word, is evangelism. It pursues love and it practices
that unconditionally. And it purifies the church, because
as hard as it is when we see things happen, it grows us closer
together when we see reconciliation and unity. And it purges and
purifies the church. There's another P. And the removal
of those who aren't with it. It's easy, as I said two weeks
ago, it's easy for people to just have a theological checklist
and say, yep, yep, yep, yep, yep, I'm with ya. That doesn't
mean you're with us. Bunch of people have had theological
checklists with sub-lists and sub-lists, but yet they refuse
to listen to the shepherding of the church, of the Lord. And
at the end of it all, the greatest thing about it is that it praises
the Savior. It praises Him. It praises His glorious grace
because it is all about knowing that we are recipients of God's
grace and therefore we can exercise grace and patience with others.
Beloved, there's never a time, listen to this, there's never
a time when we should be in a hurry like someone's on fire. Unless
someone's on fire. When I was in the fifth grade,
I was trying to get my brother, Joshua, in trouble. He wanted
to call my Uncle Greg. He loved Greg. He still loves
Greg. But he wanted to call my Uncle
Greg, so I dialed Greg's number and actually dialed the fire
department on purpose. He thought it was Greg being
funny, so he goes, the pots are on fire, and hung up the phone. 10 minutes later, whoo! I got in big trouble. Big trouble. I thought I was
going to prison, but it's Claxton. They like to crank the trucks
up, so. But I did get in big trouble. We don't act like that. We don't
need to bring the fire trucks when there's no need. We don't
need to bring the guns when there's no threat, because God is sovereign. He saved his people through the
Lord Jesus Christ and it is a finished work and we proclaim that through
our teaching and through our instruction and through our weeding
out of error and weeding out people who believe error. But
our hope is that they will believe the truth. And then we rejoice
in that. You know what? We've come to terms. We see. And we
also have a responsibility to do the things. The very fact
that we do the Lord's table every week is an act of obedience that
we may reminisce and be united in the death of Christ. We may
taste the same thing and experience these things together as a church.
That's to remind us of what God has done in Christ. So we praise
the Lord when we do these things. We praise the Lord when we're
patient. There we go. Church discipline is patient. Because love is patient. So with
all of that, beloved, I just want to say that I love you with
the affection of Christ. And I do so through my labor
in prayer, and I do so through my labor in teaching, and I do
so in my labor through constant fleshly, sometimes sinful burden
to do more. But if I can do nothing but what
God has called me to, it is of great benefit to you. So please
listen and learn that we might live together as a loving people. Let's pray. We thank you, Father, for the
truth of Christ that he himself has taught us directly from his
own words about church discipline. And so, Lord, as we worship,
as we meet, as we gather, as we focus on those problem areas
of our lives, no matter what it may be, we thank you that
you are patient with us, that you are patient with your people,
that you discipline those who you love, because we are legitimately
yours. You've adopted us in Christ.
And Father, we pray for those who are unable to be with us.
We pray, Father, for Brother Jesse and the ministry he is
doing. Lord, we pray for other congregations around us, Lord,
who seem to be coming to the knowledge of the truth. Small but mighty. We thank you
for the work of evangelism that takes place in our lives every
day. Lord, we pray for our plans that they would be pleasing to
you, that they would be purposeful according to the commands that
you've given us, that what we are wanting to do and desiring
to do would be genuine and pure, and that we would see your people
of our communities come to faith and join us in covenant to be
a family. Father, we pray for the possibility
of church plants and Bible studies around the country and around
the world. We pray for the raising of shepherds and pastors, of
leaders, of teachers of Scripture. It's going to affect intimacy
and change according to the Gospel in the lives of many. And so, Father, as we take this
table today, remind us of why we even are able to pray and
how we're able to stand before you righteous this day. Because
of the blood of Christ, because of the cross of Christ, Jesus
Christ, our righteousness, in his name we pray, amen.