From the desk of Pastor Ben

Church Discipline – Fourth Step

“If he refuses to listen even to the church, let him be to you
as a Gentile and a tax collector.”     (Matthew 18:17b)

The fourth step in church discipline is ostracism. If a sinning believer won’t listen to the church, the congregation must banish the person from the fellowship and treat him “as a Gentile and a tax collector.” Both groups were considered despised outcasts by the Jews of that day. “Gentile” mainly referred to non-Jews who practiced their traditional paganism and were not part of the worship and social life of the Jews. But the Jewish “tax collector” was more hated than a Gentile because he was an outcast by choice, being a traitor to his people.

Christ here is not teaching prejudice toward non-Jews. He came to save ALL people — some of His most noted followers (Matthew and Zaccheus) were former tax collectors. And notable Gentiles (the centurion whose servant was healed) also believed. The point with church discipline is that any believer who persists in sin must be expelled and treated as an unbelieving outsider.

Stubbornly unrepentant church members, who resist all attempts at discipline, must be completely excluded from the blessedness of the assembly’s company and encouragement. Such people willingly reject the standards of the gospel, and like Hymenaeus and Alexander, they shipwreck their faith. “Handed them over to Satan, so that they will be taught not to blaspheme”(1 Timothy 1:20; 1 Corinthians 5:4-6). We can do no other that to urge those people to repent and be restored to fellowship, or to let them go in their sin over to the world and the devil as a last resort.

Ask Yourself:
This is a very hard teaching. It goes against our modern sensitivities. But I think we have forgotten about what sin really means and what it costs. How much of our sensitivity have we lost concerning the evil of sin and the grave insult it os to God’s holy nature?