Church Discipline: An Act of Love

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Republished with the permission of and our thanks to the author, and to Faith in Focus, Magazine of the Reformed Churches of New Zealand, Volume 36/2, March 2009, from a series of articles, “Marks of the Church.”

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By the Rev. Michael Willemse

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In the context of our society’s infatuation with individualism, clamour for human rights, praise of tolerance and intolerance of those who speak in absolute terms of right and wrong, discipline is fast becoming a dirty word. Many, if not most homes revolve around the wants (“rights”) of children rather than the principles of parents; and “good, old-fashioned discipline” has become a foreign concept. This has been exacerbated by the removal of S59 from the crimes act…

[Editor’s Note: Section 59 of the New Zealand Crimes Act provided a statutory defence for every parent of a child and every person in place of the parent of a child to use force by way of correction towards the child, if the force used was reasonable in the circumstances. – from the New Zealand Police website http://www.police.govt.nz/news/release/3149.html accessed March 31, 2009]

…and the resultant fear we all have of disciplining our children in public. These changes in our society have also been felt in the church; and, in particular, in the way people view church discipline. It has been well said that “when it rains in the world, it drips in the church.” Where once church discipline was a regular and valued part of church life, it has now become much more rare.

Al Mohler, President of Southern Baptist Theological Seminary says, “The decline of church discipline is perhaps the most visible failure of the contemporary church. No longer concerned with maintaining purity of confession or lifestyle, the contemporary church sees itself as a voluntary association of autonomous members, with minimal moral accountability to God, much less to each other.”[1]

So why is church discipline important? And why did the reformers and why do our own confessions regard it as a vital mark of the true church?

To answer these questions, let’s look at the foundation for church discipline, the reasons for church discipline, and the goal of church discipline.

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The Foundation for Church Discipline

Before creation, God set His love on those that He had chosen in Christ (Eph. 1:4). But in both the Old and the New Testaments, when God saved people, He made them part of a covenant community – a community to which He has bound Himself and which bears His name. God’s purpose is to reveal Himself and His glory through those He has chosen. This is why He set apart Israel in the Old Testament and the Church in the New as His holy people (Ex. 19:6; 1 Pet. 2:9,10). When His people live as He has commanded, they show the world what God is like. When they don’t, they “bear His name in vain” (Third commandment).

The church (in continuity with the OT people of Israel) is the centerpiece of God’s work in this world! “His intent was that now, through the church, the manifold wisdom of God should be made known to the rulers and authorities in the heavenly realms …” (Eph 3:10). This means that we cannot have too high a view of the church corporately. There is nowhere else God reveals Himself to the world.

At this point we need to throw off the individualistic mindset of the Western world. God’s Word has little place for God’s people as individuals living in little worlds of their own making. Rather, it almost exclusively addresses them as members of a community in covenant with God. Most of the Bible is addressed to that community and speaks about how we are to live as that community. It is in community that God shapes and refines His people and God’s ultimate purpose is to purify for Himself a redeemed community (Eph. 5:25-27; Titus 2:13-14) with whom He will dwell forever (Rev. 21:2-4).

But God’s goal is not only to make His people holy at the end of time. He is already at work amongst them through His Spirit so that they might begin to show His holiness now. Because we bear God’s name, how we live now will either honour or dishonour Him, even as a child’s actions and attitudes affect how people regard their parents.

All of this forms the foundation for church discipline. God calls His people to be Holy as He is Holy and their conduct in community reflects on Him. Church discipline begins with the holiness of God and the community that He has covenanted with to represent Him in this world. We recognise this when we profess our faith, “affirm[ing] our union with Christ and his church” and committing ourselves to play an active part in “the life of the church, honouring and submitting to its authority;” as well as affirming our part in the church universal.[2]

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Reasons for Church Discipline

God’s holiness is not only the foundation for church discipline – it is also the prime reason for it. Our first and most important concern in cases of serious sin should be for the glory of God and His name. While we allow such sin to continue unchallenged, God’s name is dishonoured and He is robbed of glory. This does not mean that we have no concern for the person involved, but our prime concern is the fact that the church’s witness to the holiness of God is compromised. This is why, in the Old Testament, God repeatedly accuses His people of profaning His name (Ex. 20:14; Eze. 36:20-23; Am. 2:7) and often acts – even when His people have turned away from Him – for the sake of His own name. As people who profess to love God, we should be zealous for His glory.

A second reason for church discipline is the purity and unity of the church itself. Sin, whether public or private, is like a cancer which erodes the health of the church body – an unsightly blemish on the bride of Christ. And, like cancer, sin spreads from one member of the body to another. When Paul wrote to the church at Corinth, he challenged them because they boasted about a member’s incest as a demonstration of their Christian freedom. Paul says “Don’t you know that a little yeast works its way through the whole batch of dough?” (1 Cor. 5:6). He goes on to speak about the need to separate ourselves from the sexually immoral, greedy, idolaters, slanderers, drunkards and swindlers within the church! “With such a man do not even eat. … Expel the wicked man from among you.” (1 Cor. 5:11,13). Likewise Paul warns Titus “Warn a divisive person once, and then warn him a second time. After that have nothing to do with him.” (Titus 3:10).

When weaker members observe the sins of others going unchallenged (for example, an unmarried couple openly living together), they may well assume that the behaviour is not sinful – or, at least, that they can get away with it. When stronger members observe the same thing, their confidence in the elders is undermined and division results. So, in this way, both the holiness of the church and her unity are undermined.

Conversely, where the church disciplines her members in the case of serious sin, members are encouraged to examine their own conduct and to seek to be holy. This principle is demonstrated in the Old Testament account of Achan’s sin during the battle of Jericho. (Josh. 7). The whole community had to accompany Achan and his family to the valley of Achor and stone them. No doubt many of those who stoned them had coveted the riches of Jericho too.

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The Goal of Church Discipline

The goal of church discipline is not only motivated by a passion for the holiness of God and His church but also by love for the offender. The great goal of church discipline is not the expulsion of the offending member from the church in some tit-for-tat manner – it is the restoration of the sinners themselves. Church discipline is motivated by a deep concern for the offender’s eternal welfare. It recognizes that eternal life is more important than comfort in this world and so it seeks to confront the offender with eternal realities. In the same way that Moses called Israel to obedience at the end of his life, church discipline sets before the offender “life and prosperity, death and destruction” and calls them to “choose life.” (Deut. 30:15,19). For these reasons, church discipline should be carried out prayerfully and (often) tearfully (Acts 20:19) – “the Lord disciplines those he loves.” (Heb. 12:6)

In the case of the member involved in an incestuous relationship in 1 Cor. 5, Paul urges the Corinthian church to “hand this man over to Satan, so that the sinful nature may be destroyed and his spirit saved on the day of the Lord.” (1 Cor. 5:5). It seems that the church did so and that this produced remorse and repentance in the offender so that in 2 Cor. 2:5-11, Paul now urges the church “forgive and comfort him,” and to “reaffirm [their] love for him.” This is always the goal in church discipline – that the actions of the church in withdrawing the privileges of membership and finally in expelling the offending member would produce the fruit of repentance in their life so that they might be restored to fellowship with God and His people.

The whole church is involved in church discipline. The process which Christ lays out in Matthew 18:15-20 begins with a private conversation between two members and only escalates to a public matter in the church in the face of continuing lack of repentance. At each step in the process the offender is called to repent. In fact where a church is diligent and loving in exercising discipline at the level of personal relationships, many times God is pleased to bless this so that the matter is resolved and no further action is

needed. This, too, is part of the ministry of reconciliation to which we are all called in 2 Cor. 5:11-6:2.

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Conclusion

Church discipline is a good gift of God intended to testify to His holiness, to ensure the holiness of His people, and designed to lead wayward members to repentance and restoration. It rests on love for God, for His people, and for the offending member. Without church discipline, God would be dishonoured, the church’s purity and witness undermined, and sin allowed to grow unchecked in the life of believers. Church discipline is an act of deep love for God and His people – and a sign of a living and vital church.

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Endnotes

[1] Mohler, R. Albert. Church Discipline: The Missing Mark. http://www.the-highway.com/discipline_Mohler.html – accessed March 31, 2009.

[2] Reformed Churches of New Zealand – Public Profession of Faith, Form 2.

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Rev. Michael Willemse is Minister of the Word and Sacraments in the Reformed Church (Reformed Churches of New Zealand) of Hamilton, New Zealand, http://rcnzonline.com/hamilton/.

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