00:00:00.000Welcome to Real Christianity. Today we are talking about why we need church discipline.
00:00:05.300This is an important conversation about church discipline. Guys, so many of you have asked me
00:00:10.460about it and wondering why maybe your church hasn't participated in church discipline.
00:00:16.520I mean, when was the last time you saw your elders gather together to investigate a moral failure of
00:00:24.760someone at your church who's in sin? I mean, I know it's a private matter, but
00:00:30.000Have you seen that happen before? A lot of people have not.
00:00:34.260Or they just haven't even heard how to go about it.
00:00:37.040Yeah, and a lot of people have never seen someone actually removed from the church
00:00:43.640because they were in persistent, unrepentant sin while calling themselves a Christian.
00:00:50.840So we need to figure out why is church discipline so foreign to the modern institutional church?
00:01:00.000And then we're also going to talk about the Bible's command for church discipline and why it's so vital, actually, for a healthy and thriving church.
00:01:31.220They're so encouraging, the ones that are, I guess, favorable.
00:01:35.940And I also take heed to some of those that have some critics.
00:01:39.380Yeah, so if you haven't left a review yet, please go ahead and do so,
00:01:41.860as it does help the exposure of the show with the algorithms and the way that thing works.
00:01:46.060It does, and I think we're probably close to 5,000 reviews at this point.
00:01:49.020I haven't looked in a bit on the actual star ratings, but guys, thank you so much for that.
00:01:54.260I wanted to talk about one thing that Veronica and I have decided to do.
00:01:57.360it's it's a small project but it's something that we're going to do a handful of times a year
00:02:02.480it's called the one-on-one marriage weekend and so we used to do marriage retreats those are fun
00:02:08.260and those were how many couples did we have of those about 15 yeah 15 couples and we see these
00:02:13.840marriage retreats they were so intense to like plan for yeah they're really fun they're really
00:02:18.540great and maybe we'll do them again in the future but at least in this season right now we just can't
00:02:22.660Yeah, so we decided that we want to do, instead of 15 couples for a couple days, and I'm speaking all day, we're going to do what's called a one-on-one marriage weekend.
00:02:31.540So if you want to grab any weekend this year with Veronica and I, and do marriage coaching and date nights together, and we're going to go do some recreational activity, and basically we're going to be double dating for two and a half days.
00:02:47.620And then you can even come to our house church if you'd like. That's an option.
00:02:51.940If you want to do that, you can just go to ultimate marriage forward slash retreat.
00:02:58.860It might be retreats, but I think it's retreat forward slash retreat, ultimate marriage.com forward slash retreat.
00:03:07.440And it's our one on one marriage weekend. They're a little bit pricey because they're one on one.
00:03:12.520We're going to do lots of marriage coaching discussions, get to know you guys.
00:03:16.360And so just don't be alarmed that it's pricey.
00:03:19.140It's for couples that, one, can afford to do so, and two, might need it, that kind of one-on-one attention as well.
00:03:28.100And the last thing I want to talk about is, if you guys have purchased my book, Real Christianity, and several thousand people have, so you might be listening to this episode.
00:03:38.560If you want the PDF study guide, so we created a hard-back study guide, like an actual physical printable study guide.
00:03:47.520It's 60 pages long in the book format, like if you actually bought the book.
00:03:51.700But we have a PDF that you can have for free.
00:03:55.420The only catch is that you have to leave a review for Real Christianity, the book, on Amazon.
00:04:01.520And so if you want to download that PDF for free and get the study guide
00:04:06.340and really go through the study guide and go deeper on the book's content,
00:04:35.400Jumping into today's topic, why we need church discipline.
00:04:38.540As many of you guys know who have listened to the show, Dale and I were a part of large institutional churches for several years down in Southern California when we lived there.
00:04:49.520Churches ranging anywhere from a few hundred people to a few thousand people.
00:04:53.820But during our time in those churches, we had never once heard a pastor talk about church discipline.
00:05:01.240We had never heard how to confront sin in the church,
00:05:04.260and we never learned how to relate with people who are openly living in habitual sin within the church.
00:05:11.500We also never saw anyone held accountable to the scriptures in a disciplinary manner within the church.
00:05:19.640Yeah, and I mean, we're there for years at a time.
00:05:21.620So this is something that you go like, you think you'd see,
00:05:24.260and you're definitely walking around and you're seeing things that are like,
00:05:26.640wow that's that shouldn't be allowed to be going on anymore or adultery or different things that
00:05:34.900are happening or drunkenness that you know people even on staff or or you know this guy's living
00:05:39.900with his girlfriend over here all that kind of stuff that you're like why isn't is there any
00:05:46.580process to kind of deal with this and and um not that you're like the correction police but
00:05:51.700the Bible talks about really keeping a purified church. And we're going to talk about what that
00:05:57.580means today. So there's a variety of reasons that our experience was what it was, that we didn't
00:06:05.460see this. We were, you know, we were in these big institutional mega churches. And the central
00:06:13.620reason that we didn't see this is that most of these churches that we were a part of weren't
00:06:18.340really churches or at least in the biblical sense they weren't churches they became evangelism
00:06:24.340outreach centers disguised as churches but in reality they're there for evangelism outreach
00:06:31.180and they you know they tailor the sermon to the visitors they tailor the music to the visitors
00:06:37.880they tailor the ministries and the programs to the visitors they tailor all the marketing and
00:06:43.580stuff to the visitors um and so it makes sense um you know because basically the church discipline
00:06:52.460becomes really difficult because you can't tell who's a genuine christian and committed to the
00:06:57.500church uh and who's not because you got this kind of mix of like you kind of almost have like three
00:07:04.100categories you got like the people that are committed and are christian you're the people
00:07:08.580who are Christian, but are like, they come 25% of the time. And you can't really call them members
00:07:15.200of the church. And then you have the people who aren't Christians and are visiting and just
00:07:19.880seeking. And so you got this kind of situation going on here. And basically, when these churches
00:07:27.060have created a lost centric gathering, instead of a saved centric gathering, they forfeit the
00:07:35.400process of keeping a church pure, holy, accountable to scripture. I mean, think about it for a second.
00:07:40.900If you're going to hold a person accountable, you know, at church to the scriptures who don't even
00:07:47.620believe in Jesus or believe in the scriptures, how are you going to do that? You kind of get
00:07:54.560yourself into a dilemma. And the only way really that a local church can apply church discipline
00:08:00.160is if they have two things established in their church culture.
00:08:04.340First, they have a saved-centric church,
00:08:07.380meaning that they're focused on the central work of their ministry
00:08:12.180is to edify the saints for the outward work of their individual ministries.
00:08:17.420It's an edification, a strengthening of the body.
00:08:24.440And not centrally about evangelism to the lost.
00:08:29.500I'm not anti-evangelism at a church meeting, but I am anti because the Bible is anti of making the church prioritized focus on evangelism instead of prioritized focus on the committed centric saints that are there.
00:08:46.860So that's the first thing that you need to have that focus is that you're preaching and speaking to and catering to and feeding the committed.
00:08:57.380and the second thing is there must be a clear church membership process of some sort and i know
00:09:09.640that word church membership can kind of sound like a dirty word like oh that's weird church
00:09:14.460membership like you think of like membership classes and things i actually you'll i guess
00:09:20.540you'll hear my argument here in a second but when you you always say i'm a member of a church
00:09:24.580So it's not a weird thing to say I'm a member of this church.
00:09:27.540But when you think of church membership, you think like, I don't know, like a golf course that you have to pay dues to or something.
00:09:34.500But basically what I'm saying, they have a process at the church by which Christians, these are people who have basically have received the gospel, understand what they received.
00:09:47.120a lot of churches that have church membership programs will actually make you recite the gospel
00:09:53.400in your own words to determine if they actually understood what they've accepted
00:09:58.100you've been baptized or are on your way to be baptized
00:10:03.920and you know so finding out if they're first christians and that they can commit themselves
00:10:11.580to this covenant body of Christ in a local expression.
00:10:17.280And this means that these people are willingly submitting themselves
00:10:21.560to the spiritual care of elders at the church
00:10:26.840and formally and publicly obligating themselves to one another.
00:10:32.540And there's a hundred one another's in the New Testament.
00:10:35.720These are universal commands to be applied locally.
00:10:41.120That means that those one another's get to play those out with the people in your local church.
00:10:46.960And many churches do have really great church membership programs.
00:10:50.980I think of Mark Devers Church, which is Capitol Hill Baptist in Washington, D.C.,
00:10:55.140Jonathan Lehman wrote a book called Church Membership.
00:10:59.300It's really small. It's a small, short little book, like 100 pages.
00:11:02.300It's really good if you're interested in reading more about it.
00:11:05.460but how fruitful and important and valuable a church membership program is
00:11:10.960because it allows you to keep your church really healthy, vitally healthy.
00:11:17.180And I tend to agree that church membership is really fruitful,
00:11:23.580and that's kind of my theological and ecclesiological position.
00:11:26.480And the reason is if church discipline moves to its climax enforcement,
00:11:33.700which is to remove somebody from the church like excommunicate somebody from the local church
00:11:40.680they have to have been formally part of something in order to remove that person but if you're
00:11:46.840removing people from something they were never formally part of in the first place then you're
00:11:52.360not really removing them so that's why i really think membership is critical in order as a
00:11:58.560foundation for a church to execute church discipline yeah and as many of you guys know
00:12:05.620we plant house churches and so when a new family comes to our fellowship we first ask if they're
00:12:12.260christians and if they've been baptized and if they haven't that's our opportunity to then share
00:12:17.140the gospel with them but if there are genuine christians who are looking for a new local church
00:12:22.340we often tell them hey we would love to have you come join our fellowship we'd really appreciate
00:12:27.800if you guys would come for about four to six weeks um and then just as a guest right yeah as
00:12:32.520a guest four to six weeks and then um we do ask you guys to at that point you know prayerfully
00:12:37.420with your spouse make a decision as to if the lord is calling you here or calling you to move
00:12:43.880on to somewhere else um the reason we do this is because we want them to know that according to
00:12:49.920scripture uh we are spiritually responsible for them and they are spiritually sorry i'm tongue
00:12:55.840died spiritually responsible uh to us um we're a body or a flock or a building is the bible calls
00:13:02.660it and we're not isolated um we're not isolated individuals who come and go as we please um and
00:13:09.160going to go off and live an independent life we are accountable to one another yeah and this is
00:13:13.560this is a really you know difficult concept for a lot of western christians to think of because
00:13:20.140they love the freedom church where you can just come and go you don't have to tell anybody when
00:13:48.940Basically, when you become a part of church and you publicly, formally make that commitment,
00:13:53.440And you're submitted to the elders at that church.
00:13:55.740You're making a declaration of going, I am responsible to keep an eye on your marriage.
00:14:04.700And you're responsible to keep an eye on my parenting.
00:14:09.180And you're responsible for keeping an eye on my spiritual growth.
00:14:14.060And that beautiful, loving accountability structure is the foundation of a really healthy church.
00:14:23.440And so, yeah, so we say all that is that we really want you guys to find a church that
00:14:35.740exercises church discipline, that has church membership, that's not this kind of hodgepodge
00:14:43.740mix of anybody and everybody, and you don't really know who's who.
00:14:49.720You don't know if you're sitting next to somebody who's day one seeking or day 30 or year 30 in their maturity.
00:14:59.060So let's look briefly at two central passages on church discipline.
00:15:04.880We just laid the groundwork for all that and what the Bible tells us to do regarding confronting and dealing with sin in the church.
00:15:15.580So let's first start with Matthew chapter 18, verse 15 through 17.
00:15:20.560Moreover, if your brother sins against you, go and tell him his fault between you and him alone.
00:15:25.020If he hears you, you have gained your brother.
00:15:26.740But if he will not hear you, take with you one or two more,
00:15:30.400that by the mouth of two or three witnesses every word may be established.
00:15:34.040And if he refuses to hear them, tell it to the church.
00:15:37.200But if he refuses even to hear from the church, let him be to you like a heathen and a tax collector.
00:15:43.760Cool part about this passage is that Jesus uses the word church before the church is even established here.
00:15:48.640So this is in his ministry. Those are Jesus's words right here.
00:15:52.320And and so he's it's just kind of a prophetic moment of the church.
00:15:55.740This is very interesting. And not a lot of people catch that.
00:16:00.100So I want to kind of do some expository preaching on this passage for a second.
00:16:07.300So, yeah, first thing is, if a brother sins against you, go and tell him his fault between you and him alone.
00:16:12.240In the church, if you guys get people that you see some sin in their life or they've offended you or they've hurt somebody, but you've been made aware, like you're the one, the spirit has either revealed or you've been wounded.
00:16:29.220Don't go tell somebody else to correct them.
00:16:32.160It's your responsibility to go and to go alone.1.00
00:16:35.700Now, I would say if it's a married woman,1.00
00:16:38.780see something in another married man's life,0.61
00:16:40.640go as couples because you and your spouse are one.
00:18:14.600Most people never make it to this level.
00:18:17.660They leave because they can't handle the humiliation.
00:18:20.600But it says, but if he refuses even to hear the church, let him be to you like a heathen and a tax collector.
00:18:29.400And that's to be, let him be to you as basically an enemy, basically, that he is unwilling to repent for his sin or his offense that he's made to a certain person.
00:18:50.160It is, you're leaving them to condemnation, spiritually, publicly, socially.
00:18:59.140And so this is what we would do here on an individual level.
00:19:05.520But next, I want to look at, I think, a little bit more practical of a church discipline perspective
00:19:12.400at what Paul instructs us regarding those who are walking, again, in unrepentant sin.
00:19:20.160And this might be somebody at your church, again, who's living with their boyfriend or girlfriend.
00:19:25.780I can't tell you how often we've heard about this, this kind of stuff that, you know, people are living together.
00:19:35.760This may be someone who's looking at pornography on a regular basis that's known about it.
00:19:42.300This might be someone who's getting drunk on the weekends and is, again, calling themselves a Christian, showing up to church and walking contrary to the scriptures.
00:19:52.040This might be somebody who's cheating on their spouse, committing adultery, but still partaking in the church without correction.
00:20:03.500correction this might be somebody who's stealing money from their employer whatever it may be
00:20:09.320but these are issues that we find commonly in in the church um and this is how paul calls the
00:20:18.060church to handle that matter i'll let veronica read it yeah first corinthians 5 verses 9 through
00:20:24.08013 i wrote to you in my epistle not to keep company with sexually with sexually immoral people
00:20:29.100yet i certainly did not mean with with the sexually immoral people of this world or with
00:20:34.680the covetous or extortioners or idolaters since then you would need to go out of the world but
00:20:39.780now i have written to you not to keep company with anyone named a brother who is sexually
00:20:44.440immoral or covetous or an idolater or a reviler or a drunkard or an extortioner not even to eat
00:20:50.920with such a person for what have i to do with judging those also who are outside do you not
00:20:56.820judge those who are inside but those who are outside god judges therefore put away from
00:21:02.000yourselves the evil person what do you think about babe when you hear this passage of scripture
00:21:07.800it's pretty intense like yikes yeah i mean it's yeah it's intense and rough it's it doesn't feel
00:21:16.180good to my flesh but to my faith and my spirit i recognize the importance of it yeah it makes you
00:21:24.680can you can almost feel safe that there's a process for dealing with this um so i'm going
00:21:28.780to break this down you know he's saying i wrote to you in my epistle not to keep company with
00:21:32.440sexually immoral people yet i certainly did not mean with the sexually immoral people of this
00:21:36.900world or with the covetous or extortioners or adulterers since you need to go out of the world
00:21:40.820he's saying i'm not talking about don't keep company with the people who are lost that are
00:21:45.740walking in sexual immorality everybody who's lost is walking in all types of sins he said you could
00:21:52.460spend time with those people because you're you're there to be in the world not of the world
00:21:55.620and go preach the gospel to these individuals he clarifies who he is talking about he says but now
00:22:01.920i've written to you not to keep company with anyone named a brother that's a key statement
00:22:08.280somebody calling themselves a christian yes they've named themselves a brother or a sister
00:22:13.200in the church as walking around with the title christian who is sexually immoral or covetous0.97
00:22:21.080or an idolater or a reviler or a drunkard or an extortioner okay i want you to pay attention0.95
00:22:27.260it's not saying who has committed sexual immorality or who has been covetousness it's0.88
00:22:32.980saying that they are these things like they are sexually immoral it's part of their identity it's
00:22:38.340it's like an ongoing yes it's not it's not just like a one-time situation and it's now it's not0.98
00:22:44.180past tense it's present tense they are a drunkard they are a reviler okay they are an extortioner0.93
00:22:52.640and it says this statement right here that just blows the socks off most christians0.91
00:22:57.200not even to eat with such a person um i'm going to give you a quick story uh i once met with a
00:23:06.800brother at a place for lunch. And this gentleman told me that he would like to be a part of our
00:23:14.840church at some point. And he was walking into some sexual immorality prior to marriage with
00:23:22.500his girlfriend. And I said, hey, thanks for sharing this with me. However, I want to let
00:23:27.920you know, because you've said this, I'm going to offer you a correction. And if you're not going
00:23:35.400to change your ways according to scripture um you and i can't eat to get eat together again
00:23:44.740like we can't be in company with each other um because he's calling himself a believer because
00:23:50.920he's calling himself a believer and he's walking contrary to the scriptures and he was a little
00:23:56.420bit shocked like wait whoa and i go yeah brother i you need to walk according to scriptures if
00:24:01.520you're going to call yourself a christian and um by god's grace he went home he he he made a
00:24:09.080declaration to his girlfriend or fiance uh they stopped the sexual immorality they got married
00:24:14.160um repented for those sins uh marriage is great pregnant and now they're great friends with us
00:24:22.680and and that is a testimony to a godly man who is interested in doing things he received the
00:24:30.980correction yeah receive the correction praise god right praise god verse 12 it says for what
00:24:37.440have i to do with judging those who are outside paul said i'm not judging anybody outside of the
00:24:43.000faith we're not called to judge anybody outside of the church but we are called to judge people
00:24:48.840who are wearing the name brother or sister not so we could be the correction police but so that we
00:25:19.860You know, why are we telling you this?
00:25:21.680Is it just so you have more Bible information?
00:25:25.020No, I want to kind of give you some clarity here. Imagine that you have an island that's like a prison island. And every time someone commits a heinous crime, they are sent to this island. And at this island, there's now a million convicted felons, murderers, rapists, all these different people at this island. There's a million people there.
00:25:49.140Now, let's just say that we took a thousand people from that island and injected them into a thousand churches in America.
00:25:58.800What would that do to those churches?0.84
00:26:04.020Well, I mean, we know what it would do is that the scriptures talk about this idea in Galatians 5, 9, a little bit of leaven leavens the whole lump.
00:26:12.900A little bit of sin turns into a disease if it's permitted to remain there.
00:26:17.720uh and it'll make the church sick right what does it say bad company corrupts good morals right and
00:26:26.840so we also know you've seen this probably like if you're a youth ministry person um if you stand on
00:26:33.160a chair and someone tries to you know say hey you're standing on the chair someone's standing
00:26:38.280on the floor and see who can pull you can you pull the guy up off the chair up from the ground
00:26:42.700onto the chair or can the guy pull you from the ground off the chair onto the ground and every
00:26:48.040time the person on the ground can pull them down it's a illustration of what what happens there
00:26:53.600and this principle of a little bit of leaven leavens the whole lump is a biblical principle
00:27:00.400we're called to purify uh the church and uh and that's an important um uh that's that's the
00:27:08.460important point of what we're talking about. Pastor John MacArthur once said, I really
00:27:13.880appreciate this. He says, nothing guarantees biblical success like church discipline. He said,
00:27:20.460you read that correctly. When it comes to growing a godly biblical church, purity must be the
00:27:27.280priority. Adam Clark, who's a guy that I, he's from the 1700s, 18th century theologian, he writes
00:27:35.480Bible commentaries, and I really appreciated what he said about church discipline. He says,
00:27:39.700If evil is allowed to live inside the body of Christ, the work of God cannot prosper.
00:27:47.300Purity and holiness and righteousness are the foundations of progress in the church.
00:27:52.280Discipline must be exercised in the church. Without it, it would soon look like the world.
00:27:57.880um i just want to remind you guys that jesus is coming back for a clean bride and we're called
00:28:05.180to be representatives of christ to be regenerate to be holy first peter 1 15 says but uh but as he
00:28:12.220who called you holy you also be holy in all of your conduct we're called to be holy as he is holy
00:28:18.500hebrews 12 14 says strive for peace with everyone and for the holiness without which no one will see
00:28:27.360the Lord. We are supposed to be a peculiar people, a different people, a righteous people.
00:28:37.460Alexander Stotch said in a sermon, a lot of quotes at the end of this here, he says,
00:28:43.920love is not just happy smiles and pleasant words. A critical test of genuine love is whether we are
00:28:51.840willing to confront and discipline those we care for. Nothing is more difficult than disciplining
00:28:59.420a brother or sister in Christ who is trapped in sin. It is always agonizing work, messy, complicated,
00:29:06.600often unsuccessful, emotionally exhausting, and potentially divisive. This is why most church
00:29:12.740leaders avoid discipline at all costs. But that is not love. It is a lack of courage and disobedience
00:29:21.020to the Lord Jesus Christ, who himself laid down instructions for the discipline of an unrepentant0.90
00:29:27.280believer. So good. That's a great quote. I've never heard it. So good. Yeah, we need to be
00:29:33.480thinking of it in those terms. Yeah. So what is someone supposed to do about this?
00:29:41.560Like, what's the application? How should a member of a church take this truth and then apply it
00:29:47.580to their church if their church doesn't follow it yeah this is a hard question that we get
00:29:52.840you know it's kind of like the idea is it is it easier to cure an old man of cancer
00:29:59.260or to keep a new baby from having cancer like it's kind of like the idea of like do i want to go back
00:30:04.920into my old sick church that's kind of you know and try to see if i could bring healing to it
00:30:09.020or would i rather go to a new church plant and just start right from the beginning and also just
00:30:12.520before you get into this i would there's this quote that you often say um i don't know who
00:30:18.280quoted it originally or maybe it's yours i don't know um be curious before you're critical yeah
00:30:23.420so it could be a private matter your church could be walking out church discipline with a lot of
00:30:28.640people and they are concealing it they are um you know keeping it as a private matter um but
00:30:33.620generally you'll be able to tell by the fruit of the church yes do you have a church that's holy
00:30:39.200and pure um so a couple points that i want to just leave you guys with is the toleration of sin
00:30:47.700in a brother or sister's life is not love it's hate if you tolerate the sin in someone's life
00:30:55.900that's not loving that's hating them being unwilling to correct sin for fear of pain
00:31:05.040like for you know I don't want to have the painful argument it's like watching a friend fall
00:31:09.800and not willing to grab him because you're like I don't want you to scratch my arms when you
00:31:12.900try to pull yourself up on me okay it's it's it's terrible we must be willing to
00:31:20.220make that correction another important principle every single person in the church should be a
00:31:29.000part of church correction if you've never corrected somebody you're being disobedient
00:31:33.500because there's, I promise you, you've been offended before.
00:31:36.180I promise you, you've seen sin before that you've just overlooked.
00:31:42.660Putting a blind eye to something like that is not loving.