I trust you have prepared your hearts to receive the Word of the Lord this morning, and what a privilege it is to be able to come together and do so, and to once again, get lost in the wonders of the excellencies of Christ. And what a joy it is to be able to proclaim the unsearchable riches of Christ. So will you take your Bibles and turn to Second Corinthians chapter 13; we find ourselves in verses one and two this morning, under the heading "Love's Commitment to Confronting Unrepentant Sin."

One of the great things about expository preaching is you preach the next text, right? And this is the next text, and every text is important. Before we look at it, as well as several other key passages, I'd just like to remind you that if we study church history, we will see very quickly that ever since the resurrection of Christ, the substantial growth of the true church can be attributed to the patient and systematic biblical instruction; people knowing what the Bible has to say, what God has revealed in his word, and seeing that word applied to their lives so that they can live out the Bible; so that they can manifest Christ-like affections and thinking and behavior. That's how the church grew. The grand scheme of church growth had nothing to do with cultural relevance. It had nothing to do with making the unsaved feel comfortable in a worship service. It had nothing ever to do with repackaging the gospel in an effort to somehow overcome resistance. It had nothing to do with social justice. It had nothing to do with meeting people's felt needs. But the grand scheme was always to unleash the gospel - unleash the Word of God and let the Spirit do what only He can do.

In fact, that was our mandate that the Lord gave us in Matthew 28 remember in verse 19, he said, "'Go therefore and make disciples of all the nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I commanded you. And lo, I am with you always, even to the end of the age.'" In his book "The Patient Ferment of the Early Church," Alan Crider says quote, "The sources rarely indicate that the early Christians grew in number because they won arguments. Instead, they grew because their habitual behavior, rooted in patience, was distinctive and intriguing." He went on to say, "When challenged about their ideas, Christians pointed to their actions. They believed that their habits, their embodied behavior, was eloquent. Their behavior said what they believed. It was an enactment of their message." End quote.

Nathan Williams adds to that saying, quote, "Their walk was aimed at seeing those born and raised in a pagan culture - with pagan reflexes, desires and dispositions - completely..." and I love this word, "rewired. That was their goal, to see people rewired to be people with Christlikereactions, loves and temperaments. It was not only about affirming the right points of doctrine - although one who desired baptism would typically be catechized for several years before entering the baptismal water." He went on to add, "The early church was so effective because they focused their time and energy on the renovation of hearts, which then bore fruit as they shone brightly in the world." And finally, he said, "With all the problems to speak of in the current evangelical church, it is likely that this failure to cultivate a distinctively Christian way of life strikes at the heart of our witness in the world."

It is for this reason that we once again return to an in depth understanding, an exposition, of the Word of God. So we can understand what God has said and apply it to our lives. Beloved, you simply will not grow in the grace and the knowledge of Christ apart from the systematic, in-depth exegetical study of the Word of God and the application of it. Without this, you will be banished to an island of spiritual infancy. Your life will be characterized by worldliness, and you will lack biblical discernment. And this is much of what we see in evangelicalism around the world today; you will end up being as Paul described in Ephesians, four and verse, 14, "Children tossed here and there by waves and carried about by every wind of doctrine, by the trickery of men, by craftiness and deceitful scheming, but speaking the truth of love, we are to grow up in all aspects into Him who is the head, even Christ."

This, of course, was the great problem in the church at Corinth. You will remember Paul said they were fleshy. They were worldly. They were still babes in Christ. They manifested jealousy and strife and pride and immorality. They were in need of further discipleship, and like all babies, they would reach for anything that glittered and anything that clicked or rattled. So obviously, when the false apostles came in, they thought, oh, my, isn't this wonderful? And they were seduced into believing lies about the apostle Paul, lies about the gospel, and the result was catastrophic. This is why he has written now Second Corinthians, which we have been examining in great detail.

You'll remember, last week, we addressed the issue of the danger of lingering sin. Remember, in chapter 12, beginning in verse 20, he says, "For I am afraid that perhaps when I come I may find you to be not what I wish, and may be found by you to be not what you wish; that perhaps there will be strife, jealousy, angry tempers, disputes, slanders, gossip, arrogance, disturbances; I am afraid that when I come again, my God may humiliate me before you, and I may mourn over many of those who have sinned in the past and not repented of the impurity, immorality and sensuality which they have practiced." So what is the answer? The answer beloved is a firm commitment to confront sin and error and to do it with patience and love and forthrightness, to systematically present divine truth; and it will include a willingness to discipline unrepentant sin. This is why Peter said in First Peter two and verse one, "Therefore, putting aside all malice and all deceit and hypocrisy and envy and all slander, like newborn babes, long for the pure milk of the word, so that by it you may grow in respect to salvation, if you have tasted the kindness of the Lord."  And I trust you all are longing for the pure milk of the word, and like newborn babies longing for his or her mother's milk, you long for the truths of scripture. Because even as milk is a matter of life and death to a baby, it's the same as believers.

Now let me read our text this morning. It's in Second Corinthians 13, verses one and two. Paul says this.

"This is the third time I am coming to you. EVERY FACT IS TO BE CONFIRMED BY THE TESTIMONY OF TWO OR THREE WITNESSES.

I have previously said, when present the second time, and though now absent, I say in advance to those who have sinned in the past and to all the rest as well, that if I come again I will not spare anyone..."

Herewith, we witness the apostle’s commitment - loving commitment - to dealing with unrepentant sin in the church, which many times called church discipline; a subject that is foreign to most Christians today, sadly, but certainly not foreign to Scripture. A study on church discipline, done by Dr Chuck Lawless, Professor of Evangelism and Missions and Dean of Graduate Studies at Southeastern Baptist Theological Seminary, revealed 12 reasons why most churches do not practice church discipline. Let me read them to you: They don't know the Bible's teaching on discipline. They have never seen it done before. They don't want to appear judgmental. The church has a wide-open front door. They have had a bad experience with discipline in the past. The church is afraid to open Pandora's Box. They have no guidelines for discipline. They fear losing members and dollars. Their Christianity is individualistic and privatized. They fear being, quote, legalistic. They hope transfer growth will fix the problem. And leaders are sometimes dealing with their own sin. Now, mind you, none of those reasons are biblical, but they are nevertheless factors in many churches.

I remember several years ago talking with one so-called pastor whose church has a reputation for all manner of worldliness and immorality, drug abuse, you name it, and heresy. And I remember him saying, "No, we don't believe in church discipline. "He said, "Where would we begin? I'd lose half my congregation. We'll just let God handle that. "That's kind of the attitude with many churches. But what he didn't understand is that God is serious about the purity of his church. What was the first stunning event that took place in the church immediately after it was formed at Pentecost? Was it not the public execution of two of its members, Ananias and Sapphira, in Acts five.

Furthermore, that self-appointed pastor refused to believe that the Lord of the church, the Lord Jesus Christ, has placed the responsibility to maintain the purity of the church in the hands of the leaders and the congregation of the church. We are to be his instruments of righteousness, as we will see as we look at the text before us, as well as Matthew 18 and some other passages.

Now, as we focus our attention on Paul's statement here in Second Corinthians 13, one and two, I believe that we can glean three very important principles with respect to dealing with sin in a church. It requires three things: number one, loving confrontation; number two, patient pleading, and finally, righteous administration. And all three reflect the wondrous grace of God and how he deals with us. Christ is our supreme example. Now notice the text in verse 1, he says, "This is the third time I'm coming to you." Now, as we look at this, we begin to see a pattern, when we understand it in context, and we see the first principle here that dealing with sin in a church requires loving confrontation in the ministry of the church.

Let me remind you of the history of what has happened here in Corinth. On Paul's second missionary journey, he goes to this exceedingly wicked town of Corinth, and he teaches in the synagogue. He's assisted by two other Jewish believers, Priscilla and Aquila. Later on, he is joined by Silas and by Timothy. And most of the Jews there reject the gospel, but you will recall a man by the name of Crispus, who was the head of the synagogue, and all of his family came to saving faith in Christ, and they were converted. So Paul founds the church in Corinth, and after a year and a half, he is brought before a Roman tribunal by the Jewish leaders who have charged him with all manner of wickedness, but the charges are dropped because they are religious and not civil. So the persecution continues to mount. Paul then travels eight days by sea. He goes back to Ephesus, where he learns that the church in Corinth is still filled with factious people. They're selfish, immoral, worldly, some of them believers, some of them pseudo believers. They're unable to break from the culture. We know that Apollos ministered there for a while, but cliques are developing. So Paul hears about all of this divisiveness, all of this wickedness going on, and out of his love for Christ and out of his love for them, he writes a corrective letter. It's not an inspired letter or recorded; it's sometimes called the "lost epistle." The Corinthians then write back to Paul asking for clarification on certain issues, and it's at that point that the apostle Paul writes First Corinthians.

Next, Paul sends Timothy to Corinth to assess how they're doing. Bad news, lot of the same old sinful habits are manifesting themselves. And to make matters worse, these false apostles has slithered into the church and deceived the people, making all kinds of scurrilous accusations against the Apostle Paul and presenting their own form of a different gospel. Now, although Paul planned on staying in Ephesus a little longer, when he hears of this news, he immediately departs for Corinth, gets in a ship and goes another eight days at sea to Corinth, and at that point he's greatly disappointed. It's what he calls the "painful visit" there. He is openly insulted, probably by one of the false apostles. We don't know for sure, but the sad thing is that none of the people defended him. So his heart is broken.

He returns then to Ephesus to give them time to repent. He is very patient with them, praying for them. In Second Corinthians 1:23, he says, "To spare you, I did not come again to Corinth." Again, he's wanting them to have time to repent. So when he receives word of their continued rebellion, their recalcitrance, he writes another non canonical letter. It's called the "severe letter." We don't have a copy of it. He's confronting their sin once again. He gives it to Titus. Titus then delivers it to them, and you will recall that Paul was so anxious to learn how they would respond to that that he was unable to go through an open door that the Lord had given him in Troas, and he wants to go to Macedonia to try to meet Titus. He's praying, hs in agony of heart, wanting his people to come to a place of genuine repentance. And so he meets Titus in Macedonia, and by God's grace, he receives good news that many of them, most of them had repented. And it's at that point that he writes Second Corinthians, where we are today, and he's continuing to call them to repentance.  

Dear Christian, I trust that you are able to see what a long and hard and arduous process, it is to call people that you love to repentance, to deal with their sin, but it does require loving confrontation. Don't just expect it to go away on its own, and it requires patient pleading. It's like a malignant tumor. It dies hard. It takes time. I assume, if you look at your own life and the lives of others, you will see that people never repent on our own timetable, right? Many times it takes days or months or even years. We have to give the Spirit of God time to work, and every saint is on a different schedule of sanctification. We can never rush it. We never should rush repentance, but also, we should never ignore the need to confront egregious sin and to do so repeatedly; and you're not going to do this unless you have a sincere love for Christ and a sincere love for those who belong to Christ, because nothing short of Christ-like love would motivate anybody to be so committed as the Apostle Paul was to these dear people in Corinth. This is the third time I am coming to you. You haven't been confronting your own sin. Some of you are now, but there's still others in the church that aren't.

Let me remind you of this as well. You will recall how forcefully he spoke to them regarding sinful issues in the church. You will recall, there was a man in the church that was in gross immorality, and they weren't dealing with it. And so in First Corinthians five, beginning in verse one. Here's what Paul said, "It is actually reported that there is immorality among you, an immorality of such a kind as does not exist even among the Gentiles, that someone has his father's wife. You have become arrogant and have not mourned instead, so that one who had done this deed would be removed from your midst. For I, on my part, though absent in body, but present in spirit, have already judged him who has so committed this, as though I were present. In the name of our Lord Jesus, when you are assembled, and I with you in spirit, with the power of our Lord Jesus, I have decided to deliver such a one to Satan for the destruction of his flesh so that his spirit may be saved in the day of the Lord Jesus. Your boasting is not good. Do you not know that a little leaven, Leavens, the whole lump of dough? Clean out the old leaven so that you may be a new lump, just as you are in fact unleavened. For Christ, our Passover also has been sacrificed."

Leaven, in Scripture, is always a symbol of influence, sometimes good, certainly in this context and in most contexts, it is bad. One scholar by the name of Mitten says, quote, "Leaven, is not quite the same as yeast. In ancient times, instead of yeast, a piece of dough was held over from one week's baking to the next. By then it was fermenting and so could cause fermentation in the new lot of dough, causing it to rise in the heat. This was a useful practice, but not hygienic, since dirt and disease could be passed on from week to week. Now, in the light of this, once a year, the Jews would break the chain, and they would begin all over again with fresh unleavened dough. Hence," he said, "the influence of a small amount of material carried over from the past was eradicated and a new beginning took place."

Now think about it. You will recall when God delivered his covenant people from Israel, are from Egypt, he required them to bake bread in preparation for their journey, and you will remember that he told them not to use any leaven in the dough which would make it rise. Plushe said there was no time. He said they must be prepared to leave without delay in great haste. Now, why no leaven? What's the symbolism here? Well, again, bread in the Bible, symbolizes life. And the point is, our lives must not be tainted by the leaven, the influence of your old life in Egypt. You simply must not let the world continue to influence your life. You must come out and be separate from it. So they were to leave the old life behind completely. And this is what is symbolized in the Lord's Supper that we just partook of recently a few minutes ago. And of course, none of this can happen apart from faith in Christ, who alone is our Passover. The exodus from Egypt was symbolic of our deliverance from the bondage of sin and the sorrow of death and entrance into the promised land of of divine blessing that we all enjoy as believers.

It's for this reason, in that same passage in First Corinthians five, he said, "Clean out the old leaven so that you may be a new lump." Clean out in the original language, it is an imperative. It is not a suggestion. It is a command and an ongoing command in the grammar - clean out - thoroughly root out, purge out, cleanse the old leaven, "so that you may be a new lump, just as you are in fact unleavened. For Christ our Passover also has been sacrificed." At the Exodus this meant purging out everything leavened prior to the Passover, symbolizing the utter separation from all of the pagan abominations that they were used to being around. And here, the imagery refers to the church's need to be unleavened. We are to be separate from the world, to purge ourself from the influence of sin. Again, as verse seven says, "For Christ our Passover also has been sacrificed." My, what a powerful thought - the one who died in our place to deliver us from the penalty and the power one day the presence of sin is the only one that can help us be separate from the world. Is because of Christ that we have a deterrent from sin.

By the way, many Jews, even to this day, when it comes to Passover, will take leaven and throw it around in their house, and they will throw it up on top of cupboards, behind the refrigerator, under the washing machine. They will throw it in places where it would be very hard to clean, and then they would clean it all out, symbolizing the need to be separate from the world. Aren't you glad that Christ has done that for us, we don't need the symbol. We have the reality in Christ, verse eight of that same passage of First Corinthians five, "Therefore let us celebrate the feast, not with the old leaven," in other words, not with the pagan, ungodly, politically correct, unbiblical, LGBTQ, whatever all that wickedness, let's don't do that - "nor with the leaven of malice and wickedness," like we would see, for example, in the whole woke movement. No, no, none of that, "but with the unleavened bread of sincerity and truth."

The point is simply this, separation from sin in the world must remain a conscious continuous commitment to the believer. The bread we are to eat is the unleavened bread of sincerity and truth. Verse nine, "I wrote you in my letter not to associate with immoral people." Not to associate - the idea here is you're not to keep intimate, close company with immoral people. Then he adds this in verse 10, "I did not at all mean with the immoral people of this world, or with the covetous and swindlers or with idolaters, for then you would have to go out of the world." Evidently, some of those saints had probably done that; they wanted no contact with anybody, and that's wrong. "But..." verse 11, "actually, I wrote to you not to associate with any..." here it is, "...so- called brother if he is an immoral person, or covetous, or an idolater or a reviler, or a drunkard or a swindler - not even to eat with such a one."

Dear Christian, you must understand that it is far more dangerous associating with worldly believers than ungodly unbelievers. It is dangerous to associate with, as he says, so called brothers. You see, worldly professors of Christ will gradually, like leaven, permeate and influence the lives of other people, especially in the church; and eventually it will influence the entire church and corrupt the entire Church. Doesn't take long for one rotten apple to destroy the whole barrel. And he gave a little representative list of sins there - the immoral person, that sins against your body; the covetous, this is a sin against your neighbor, wanting what they have; the idolater, that's sin against God. Whenever a man worships the true God falsely or redefines God or attributes to him that which is not true, he becomes an idolater. Or he says, revelers, these are angry, quarrelsome slanderers or drunkards or swindlers. You have people in the church that act like that and call themselves Christians. You're not to have anything to do with them, and you've got to get that leaven out of there. And if these things characterize a believer's life, and no one is addressing it, there's something terribly wrong. We're not to even eat with such a one. In other words, you don't have fellowship with them socially.

Verse 12, "For what have I to do with judging outsiders?" The point is nothing. I mean, we evangelize the lost, right? We don't judge them for the purpose of purifying the church. They're not a part of the church. Then he says, "Do you not judge those who are within the church." And the grammar in the original indicates a positive answer, an affirmative. Well, of course, that's where you begin. So you cannot allow unrepentant, egregious patterns of sin in a church, otherwise it will infect it. Plus, we should love a sinning brother enough, or sister enough, to confront them in their sin, in order to help them come to a place of genuine repentance, lest they forfeit divine blessing and live under a cloud of divine chastening.

Finally, in verse 13 of First Corinthians five, "But those who are outside God judges." And he says, "REMOVE HTE WICKED MAN AMONG YOURSELVES." He's quoting Deuteronomy 13 five there.

Well, this is a picture of love's commitment to confront sin. So back to our text, you must understand that Paul didn't give two hoots about being seeker sensitive. That would have never gone through his mind. He never once had any concern about offending unbelievers with the truth. He couldn't have cared less about making immature believers feeling unloved by calling them to repentance. You must understand that what Paul was concerned with, what he was passionate about, was personal holiness, not cultural relevance. You remember in Second Corinthians 7:1, he admonished them, cleanse yourselves, "from all defilement of flesh and spirit, perfecting holiness and the fear of God." In Second Corinthians, 11, verse two, "I am jealous for you with a godly jealousy; for I betrothed you to one husband, so that to Christ I might present you as a pure virgin." I ask you, dear friends, what good is a church if it mirrors the world? The world that God has gone to such supernatural lengths to save us out of. Why would we want to become like the world in order to win it? That is not a biblical concept whatsoever. What spiritual power has a church filled with sin that is quenched the Spirit? Has not God said in Leviticus 11:44, "Be holy, for I am holy." Has not the Lord of the church said that he desires, according to Ephesians, five and verse 27 "To present to himself the church in all her glory, having no spot or wrinkle or any such thing, but that she would be holy and blameless."  Dear friends, you show me a church that tolerates false doctrine, that tolerates factious members, that tolerates immorality and other forms of wickedness, and I'll show you a church that has Ichabod written across the doorway. Ichabod in Hebrew means "the glory has departed."

I'll show you a church also, sadly, that's probably packed with 1000s of people, because these are the types of churches the world wants to go to, because they have accumulated for themselves teachers in accordance to their own desires that will tell them what they want to hear and tickle their ears. This is the wide-gate, man-centered, cultural Christianity that is devastating in our world today. Beloved only genuine love has a commitment to holiness, which includes a loving commitment to confront sin.

In our scripture reading earlier in Galatians, six and verse one Paul says, "Brethren, if anyone is caught in any trespass, you who are spiritual, restore such a one in a spirit of gentleness." The term "restore" in the original language comes from "katartizō." It was a surgical term that was used to describe the setting of a bone. And what happens if someone you love has a broken bone? You set the bone? How do you do that? Very gently, very carefully. But it's got to be done. This is going to hurt, but unless we do this, it will not grow properly. This is how we are to deal with those in our midst who are living in sin in some egregious way, "restore such a one in a spirit of gentleness; each one looking to yourself," Paul says, "so that you too will not be tempted." And then he adds this, "Bear one another's burdens." The context here carries the idea of help get underneath that burden of sin, that heavy weight of sin that your brother or sister is dealing with. Help them carry that. Help them deal with that.

And then he finally says, "...and thus fulfill the law of Christ." What is the law of Christ? It to love your neighbor as much as you love yourself. That's what real love looks like. Love doesn't say, "Oh yeah, well, I'll just let somebody else deal with that. Let God deal with that." No. Love is intentional, and it comes, and it tries to restore in a spirit of gentleness. By the way, I'm not talking about Barney Fife here in a church. I've seen that before. You remember Barney Fife? I'm probably aging myself. Some of you kids have no idea who I'm talking about, but on Andy of Mayberry, there's a guy named Barney Fife, and they made the mistake of making him a deputy. He had a badge and a uniform and one bullet in his shirt pocket and a gun. And everybody ends up in jail, right? That's not what we're talking about here. But rather, when you see someone you love living in a way that's dishonoring to Christ, or believing lies or causing division within the church, we are not to just turn our head the other way. We are to try to restore them in a spirit of gentleness, and that's what Paul was doing.

So again, back to our text in Second Corinthians 13. "This is the third time I'm coming to you." Verse two, "I have previously said when present the second time, and though now absent I say in advance to those who have sinned in the past and to all the rest as well, that if I come again, I will not spare anyone." And here we see that disciplining sin not only requires loving confrontation, but second, it requires patient pleading. Don't you see this? This is a lengthy process of calling people to repentance. Think about it. Think of all of the preaching Paul did - all of the teaching, all of the personal discipleship; the individual, one-on-one, confrontations, the letters that he wrote. And now he's saying, "This is the third time I am coming to you." Beloved, again, dealing with sin, even in your own life, it requires time and energy, but it must be done. And certainly, dealing with others, it requires patience; patience to bring people to a place of repentance.

You will recall in Thessalonica, Paul dealt with similar issues. Second, Thessalonians three, beginning in verse six, he said, "Now we command you, brethren, in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, that you keep away from every brother who leads an unruly life and not according to the tradition which you received from us." And then in verse 14, he says, "If anyone does not obey our instruction in this letter, take special note of that person and do not associate with him, so that he will be put to shame. Yet do not regard him as an enemy butadmonish him as a brother." We see this as well in Paul's instructions to Titus in Titus three, beginning in verse 10 and in verse 11, he says, "Reject a factious man after a first and second warning." Reject - it means avoid, steer clear of, have nothing to do with "hairetikos" -  a"factious" man. "...After a first and second warning." There's the patient, pleading. Brother, what you're doing is false, what you're teaching is false doctrine. How you're living is unbiblical, and you're causing problems in the church. You're leading other people astray. It simply must stop. We cannot have this, and we will not have this. You must understand that, and I'm calling you to repentance here, and we'll do it again, and we'll do it again, but eventually that person must be rejected.

May I remind you, the very first instruction the Lord Jesus Christ gave to the church was a four-stage process of church discipline delineated in Matthew chapter 18, let me take you there for a moment. Matthew 18. And here we see all of these principles, loving confrontation, patient pleading, and also a third principle, righteous administration. Notice in Matthew 18, beginning in verse 15, we have the first stage of church discipline, which is one on one. It's private confrontation, he says. And "'If your brother sins, go and reprove him in private.'"  Grammatically, in the original language, the idea is to go to this person immediately. Don't let the leaven of sin have a chance to to spread and influence and corrupt the whole church. Go to them one on one and reprove him in private. In other words, no one else needs to know, we don't spread this around the church. Then he says, "'if he listens to you, you have won your brother.'" What a great thought. The term "won" denotes reclaiming something of great value that has been lost. That's the motivation here, and herein, is the purpose of our reproof, beloved. This is the goal of church discipline. It is not about retribution. It is about restoration. It's about fellowship, and many times it's about salvation.

Think of those who have loved you enough to call you to repentance. I can think of those times in my life. Boy, it's hard to hear, isn't it, to have one say, you know, son, I'm saddened to say this to you, but what you're doing, what you're conducting yourself, is not honoring to Christ, and I love you too much just see you walk off a cliff, don't you realize? And then the specifics come because of my great love for you, I'm just calling you to a place of repentance. I've had to do that with people. I'm sure many of you have as well. I know how hard it is. I know what it's like to say, "you know you may choose to hate me the rest of your life, but I will risk, I will risk that because of my love for you and my love for Christ, and my love for the church, my love for your family, for your children, I plead with you, deal with these things before God deals with you in ways that will bring untold misery to your life."  Beloved, this is a crucial ministry within the body of Christ, but it is often much neglected.

Well, what happens if that person refuses to listen? Well, you go to stage two here. Now the circle of rebuke begins to widen slightly verse 16. "But if he does not listen to you, take one or two more with you, so that BY THE MOUTH OF TWO OR THREE WITNESSES EVERY FACT MAAY BE CONFIRMED.'"  Boy there's such power to this to the Lord's method here. And by the way, in our text, in Second Corinthians 13:1 this is what Paul says at the end of that verse. "EVERY FACT IS TO CONFIRMED BY THE TESTIMONY OF TWO OR THREE WITNESSES." So what we do then is we warn a person, and we tell them that unless you repent of whatever this wickedness is, you need to understand that I will be back with two or three others. And I found over the years that that type of accountability is a strong deterrent to the temptation of sin. Many times people repent at that point.

By the way, in this second stage of this process, several essential safeguards are put into place when you think about it, and this is part of the righteous administration of justice. First of all, with the two or three witnesses, you have an opportunity to confirm the validity of the accusation, or perhaps disallow it, and this protects against false accusations. Maybe you're wrong in what you're seeing in that person. I've been brought into bizarre situations where there's been accusations made and it ends up nothing more than a person's wounded pride or some misunderstanding or some violated preference, maybe a false accusation. That's when all of this is determined, and the two or three witnesses is part of God's original law there in the Mosaic law in Deuteronomy, 19 verse 15, he says, "A single witness shall not rise up against a man on account of any iniquity or any sin which he has committed. On the evidence of two or three witnesses, a matter shall be confirmed." And this is a very important, very important, aspect of this process of confrontation, to protect innocent parties from being abused by some vindictive slanderer or false accuser. In fact, Paul said, in First Timothy five, verse 19, "Do not receive an accusation against an elder except on the basis of two or three witnesses." And then he went on to say, "but those who continue in sin rebuke in the presence of all so that the rest also may be fearful of sinning."

A second safeguard with the two or three witnesses is that it really confirms the appropriateness of the rebuke. Was the rebuke done in humility with spirit of gentleness and restoration in mind, or was it was it harsh? Was it unkind? Was it brutal? Was there some sense of retaliation? Was the sin properly defined? Were the fruits of repentance properly presented? And then a third safeguard as it really confirms the attitude of the sinner. Are they indeed repentant, or do they remain rebellious? And if so, then there are three or four people who will be able to testify to what was going on, and in that case, there's a warning that's to be given in verse 17. "'And if he refuses to listen to them, tell it to the church.'"

And that brings us to the third process of church discipline that the Lord Jesus has given us. Now the circle of rebuke is widened to include the whole church; more prayer and pressure is to be brought against that person. By the way, at the close of the two or three witnesses, when we have to bring it before the church, we always warn the unrepentant person of what's going on, we put it in writing. We tell them what's going to happen. We document the process, the dates, the names, the accusations, everything about it, their response, the time frame before we are going to announce it to the church, along with the biblical reasons. And all along, we are being prayerful, we're being patient, we're pleading with them. And all along, our attitude must be consistent with Ephesians 4:32, where God has told us to, quote, "Be kind to one another, tender hearted, forgiving each other, just as God in Christ also has forgiven you."

Now, normally, in this process, I've seen people just get mad and leave the church. By the way, when they do the first thing I do is call the new church that they go to, and say, look, on behalf of the elders here, you need to understand what's been going on, so that the new church understands. Other people will repent. You'll see great restoration before the church ever knows anything about it. But for those who remain stubbornly recalcitrant, we let them know that unless you repent in one month or two months, or whatever it is, on the first of the month during communion, that time when we all celebrate Christ's forgiveness of sin and the need for us to be separate from sin, your name will be read and a letter explaining to the church what you've done and your refusal to repent will be delivered publicly and you will be treated verse 17 as "a Gentile and a tax gatherer." In other words, you will be excommunicated from the church, ostracized as an outcast, and that's stage four. Stage four is you're put out of fellowship.

You know, folks, I've been involved in ministry for many years, and I can tell you, I've written a number of stage three letters, and it is gut wrenching. I know what it's like to agonize with fellow elders as we've dealt with some people. Usually this process takes a year, sometimes more. It is heartbreaking to have to do that, and what a joy it is when they come to repentance before it has to be done publicly. But there have been times, as some of you have been around long enough to know, when a person's name has been read, and that's the worst pain of all. When that happens, there is a solemn fear that falls over the whole assembly of the church, and suddenly the holiness of God is portrayed in a way that people will never forget. And my, what a deterrent to sin, right? Because God is serious about the purity of his church. And as hard as it is, this is what must be done.

And I can also tell you that there have been times when someone has been removed from the church, that in time they have repented, and they have come back. And whenever sin has been public, and the excommunication has been public, the restoration must also be public. And what a glorious time that is when somebody comes back and restored into fellowship. But most of the time you see people, they just walk away, and then you watch their lives disintegrate. In stage four, verse 17, "let him be to you as a Gentile and a tax gatherer." By the way, the phrase "let him be to you" in the original language is a command. It is an imperative. It is not a suggestion. There is to no longer be any fellowship, any contact, except to call them to repentance. They may be a Christian, we don't know, but they are not to be treated as one, because they're not acting as one. Jesus commands all of us to deal with sin in our life, and if it persists in a person's life, we must break fellowship with that person. And so in stage four, a person is disfellowshipped. And by the way, again when they come back, we welcome them with open arms. We see this in Corinth.

May I remind you of Second Corinthians two, remember, a man was ostracized. He repented. In verse five, Paul said, "Sufficient for such a one is this punishment, which was inflicted by the majority, so that, on the contrary, you should rather forgive and comfort him, lest somehow such a one be overwhelmed by excessive sorrow. Wherefore, I urge you to reaffirm your love for him."

So Jesus gives us four stages. First you go one on one, then two or three. If there's still no repentance, you have to include the rest of the fellowship, as we continue to plead with them that they might repent of their sin. And if that doesn't happen, then you must remove that leaven from the church. By the way, notice in conclusion there in Matthew 18, he closes here with a very important section regarding this whole issue. He says in verse 18, "'Truly, I say to you, whatever you shall bind on earth shall be bound in heaven; and whatever you loose on earth shall be loosed in heaven.'" By the way, this has absolutely nothing to do with the common charismatic claim that we can somehow manipulate God and He will provide us with personal miracles or whatever has nothing to do with that. Moreover, it has nothing to do with binding Satan. Boy, don't you wish we could do that. We just do it and get it over with. Wouldn't have to deal with that rascal. The context here and the grammar, which is a perfect passive participle. All it means is, it could be translated, "will have been bound" and "will have been loosed." In other words, what Jesus is saying here is that when the church follows this process of church discipline, it is conforming to the pattern that I have firmly and clearly established in the Word, and thereby the church is acting consistently with my will and according to my authority. So we have the authority to tell another believer that their sins are loosed, which means forgiven if in fact, they are repented, or that they're bound if they are, in other words, they're unforgiven, they're still bound up in their sin if they are unrepentant. So we're acting on God's behalf. And such a process of discipline is a is a very serious, serious matter.

And finally, verse 19, he says, "'Again, I say to you, that if two or three of you agree," - "symphōneō" in the original language, we get our word symphony from that - "if two or three of you agree. Symphōneō means to produce a sound together. That's what happens in a symphony. So if two or three of you agree, he says, "'on earth about anything that they may ask, it shall be done for them by the Father who is in heaven.'" So when the two or three witnesses has confirmed the sin, the unrepentance, on the basis of the Word of God, and individuals either repent or don't repent, the outcome is something that the Father, who is in heaven, is in complete agreement over.

And then Jesus adds his confirmation to the process as well, saying in verse 20, "'For where two or three have gathered together in My name, there I am in their midst." This verse, unfortunately, has been a common refrain of many Christians praying, lifting up their prayers, as if to say, well, you know, thank goodness we got a quorum here. We got two or three, so the Lord's here in the midst of it. It has nothing at all to do with any of that. The Lord is with us if we're by ourselves. He doesn't need to be...he doesn't need to have two or three. The whole context is that of church discipline. What Jesus is simply saying is, when my witnesses, humbly and faithfully apply themselves to this process, I am there. I will endorse this decision. Again, because I'm concerned about the purity of the church.

Well, friends, I trust that we will all examine our hearts. Boy, we're all guilty of sin, right? And we're all guilty and we're all in need of grace, and we celebrate that. But may I encourage you to love one another, even in your own family, love people enough to confront them when you see some pattern of grievous sin that you know is dishonoring to the Lord, and bring them to place by prayer and patience and love to genuine repentance, try to restore them in the spirit of gentleness, bear their burdens. Thus fulfill the law of Christ. Oh, the glory of the church, right? What an amazing organism that should bring glory to Christ because of its purity, because of its holiness. Let's pray together.

Father, we're so thankful for the clarity of your word, and even though the practical implications of this can be very difficult, nonetheless we know that you have called us to these things for our good and for your glory. And I'm just reminded of what Paul told Titus and in chapter two and verse 11, when he said that the grace of God has appeared, bringing salvation to all men, instructing us to deny unrighteousness and ungodliness and worldly desires and to live sensibly, righteously and godly at this present age, looking for the blessed hope and the appearing of the glory of our great God and Savior, Christ, Jesus, who gave Himself for us to redeem us from every lawless deed and to purify for Himself, a people for His own possession, zealous for good deeds. Lord, we thank you for those amazing truths and the reality behind all of it, and I pray that as a people, we will live consistently with what you have commanded. And finally, Lord, if there be one here today that knows nothing of what it really means to be in relationship with you through saving faith. I pray that today you will bring such overwhelming conviction that they will repent, that they will believe and that they will experience the miracle of your saving grace in the new birth in Christ, for it's in his name that we pray. Amen.