I ask you to turn this evening to 1 Corinthians 5, 1 Corinthians 5. We are continuing in our study of our church covenant, and we have spent two weeks now on church discipline. I've titled it The Guardrails of Church Discipline, and now we're going to spend a third week. And before I go any further, and as you're turning to 1 Corinthians 5, next week is the Lord's Supper, so we will not have our Vesper service. And then March 10th, we will have the first Vesper service of March and we will have a Q&A. So any question that you have about the Church Covenant, about membership, about the Lord's Supper, about anything, please bring it in. We are looking forward to a robust time of discussion. And then the following week, I believe the 17th, Pastor Ken will bring the final installment of our study of the Church Membership Covenant, which will mainly be dealing with how we deal with, for example, business meetings. We use things like Robert's Rules of Orders, why we use that. mainly because the Bible doesn't give us a Robert's Rules of Orders. And then what our obligation is when we leave from this place, which is to join another church, which that's no small issue. Even as pastors here at Grace Covenant Church, one of the things that you may not know is that when somebody leaves this place, they don't leave the membership roles until they've joined another church, which means that we as pastors are still their what? Their overseers. And it's our job to kind of prod them, if it's necessary, to that next step of finding a church. And sometimes that happens relatively quickly, and sometimes it takes a while. But it is an important thing that in our membership covenant we have covenanted to do, i.e. to join a church when we leave from this place. So that is the timeline. Tonight we're looking at the final installment of church discipline, and let me just bring you up to speed of where we've been. In our first message, we talked about some cultural and philosophical reasons why people and churches have aversions toward the idea of church discipline, even the idea of church membership. And then last Lord's Day, what we looked at is we looked at the foundation of church discipline, which I indicated comes out of Matthew 16. John 23, and Matthew 18, that uses this language of the keys of the kingdom. And the keys either open, okay, loose, or they bind. And that language refers to either opening the kingdom of God through preaching the gospel, baptism, church membership, or closing the kingdom of God through excommunication and church discipline. And so we looked at the foundation and then we looked at the process where we opened up Matthew 18 and just walked through what I submitted to you are really four steps. We often think of three, but it's really four steps when you add in the final step of excommunication. And so that brings us to tonight and what we're going to look at tonight is what I really consider to be an actual example of church discipline. Here you have in 1 Corinthians chapter 5 an example in the church at Corinth where the Corinthians were called by the Apostle Paul to actually excommunicate them. Now why are we dealing with this? Haven't we already looked at Matthew 16? Haven't we already looked at Well, Matthew 16 and Matthew 18 were the idea in principle. It was the teaching of this idea, but to actually have a real-life example allows us to see it as a case study that we could actually go through, comb through, and find some details that will help us understand more clearly what our obligation is. So I'm going to go ahead and read in your hearing the entirety of 1 Corinthians 5, verses 1 through 13. The Apostle Paul says this, It is actually reported that there is sexual immorality among you and of a kind that is not tolerated even among pagans. For a man has his father's wife, and you are arrogant. Are you not rather to mourn? Let him who has done this be removed from among you. For though absent in body, I am present in spirit, and as if present, I have already pronounced judgment on the one who did such a thing. When you are assembled in the name of the Lord Jesus, and my spirit is present with the power of our Lord Jesus, you are to deliver this man to Satan for the destruction of the flesh, so that his spirit may be saved in the day of the Lord. Your boasting is not good. Do you not know that a little leaven leavens the whole lump? Cleanse out the old leaven that you may be a new lump as you really are unleavened. For Christ, our Passover lamb, has been sacrificed. Let us therefore celebrate the festival not with old leaven, the leaven of malice and evil, but with the unleavened bread of sincerity and truth. I wrote to you in my letter not to associate with sexually immoral people. not at all meaning the sexually immoral of this world or the greedy and swindlers or idolaters since then you would need to go out of the world. But now I am writing to you not to associate with anyone, this is important, who bears the name of brother if he is guilty of sexual immorality or greed or is an idolater, reviler, drunkard, or swindler, not even to eat with such a one. For what have I to do with judging outsiders, is it not those inside the church whom you are to judge. God judges those outside. Purge the evil person from among you. All right, so what I want to do is I want to look at a few details of this text that are going to help us get a better grasp on this concept of church discipline. The first thing I want to note is that the assumption that Paul has here, and I think it was warranted, is that Either this man was unrepentant or he claimed to repent but was not bearing fruit in keeping with repentance. Now you see the distinction between those two things, right? And I think in this case, I think he was just unrepentant. I mean, if you look at the text, what you notice is a man has his father's wife and the Corinthians are arrogant. which means to say that they are, in some sense, kind of cheering him on, and not so much in the sin itself, but in the sense that such a man committing such a sin could be tolerated by such a people as the Corinthians because of their view of the gospel. And so their thinking was, look how broad we are, look how latitudinarian we are, look how inclusive we are. It's funny because the church deals with the same temptation today, don't we? You know, we may despise the liberals in some sense, but there's a part of us that's like, I kind of want to be as inclusive because then, you know, everybody will like me. And that's the thing that the Corinthians were doing. They were trying to be inclusive, but what were they doing? They were sacrificing, I would say, truth, and they were also sacrificing holiness. And so, Paul, I believe this man was just unrepentant. He may, with the Corinthians, have even been arrogant himself. The second thing I want you to notice this, and this is very important. The Apostle Paul, scholars debate on this, but I'm completely comfortable with saying that the Apostle Paul could have just come out with his apostolic authority and said, kick this guy out, don't even have a meeting, don't even meet, just tell this guy he's done. I think he probably could have done that. In fact, we see Peter in the book of Acts, Simon Magus, or Simon the Magician, wasn't necessarily part of the church, but he believed, and then in some sense, he was added to the people of God, and then Peter found out that he was a fraud, right? And he basically cast him out, and he said, basically, curses on you. I think that's something of an example of what an apostle could have done. But I want you to notice in 1 Corinthians 5, Paul doesn't do that. What does Paul do? He does tell them to cast them out, but he has them go through the protocol of something that looks very similar to Matthew 18. How so? I want you to notice three things. Number one, they were to do it, they were to kick him out, they were to excommunicate him when, verse 4a, they were assembled. Now isn't that interesting? They had to make this decision as a body, not individually. That tells us that as an individual Christian, either as an elder or as a Christian in the congregation, I have no right to unilaterally break fellowship with somebody because what am I doing when I'm doing that? I'm assuming the authority and the power of the keys and of Jesus' name to declare somebody outside of the kingdom of God. Now, that's really important. Because I think if you ask all of us, there's probably somebody in our life that we say, well, I don't think he's a Christian. And that happens, but in the context of a local church, what we don't have the right to do is act like a cowboy in the Wild West, slinging our guns, saying, I decide that you're not a Christian, therefore you're not. We can't do that. The congregation has to be assembled, and they have to, in one voice, make a decision to have this guy cast out. Now notice also that the assembled congregation is in line with what Jesus said in Matthew 18. Take one person, then two. If they don't listen, take it to the church. If they don't listen to the church, If they don't listen to the church, see, you see the aggregate of the church gathered together, then the church says you are to be a Gentile or a tax collector. So this judgment of excommunication is not the exclusive right of an individual of the church, including even the pastors. The pastors cannot unilaterally excommunicate somebody. So number one, the first thing that must be present in the action of excommunication is the assembling together of the whole congregation. Number two, notice in 4B, in the name of the Lord Jesus. Notice that the church does the excommunication not in their own name, this would be tantamount to an individual saying, I, with my authority, declare you to be outside the kingdom of God, but they do it in Jesus' name, not even in Paul's name. Did you notice that? It's not even in Paul's name that they can do that. But they do it in the name of Jesus. Where does this come from? Right out of Matthew 18. Whatever you do, declare in my name, it shall be so, Matthew 18, 19, and 20. So they do it in the power of Jesus's name. He literally says in Matthew 18, Jesus does, again, I say to you, if two or three are gathered on earth or agreed on earth about anything they ask, it will be done for them by my Father in heaven, for where two or three are gathered in my name, there I am among them. So Jesus is present in the action and the pronouncement of excommunication. So we have an assembled congregation, we have the name of Jesus, and now verse four, C, the power of the Lord Jesus. Now what is that? Somebody tell me what that is. We have the name of Jesus, but what's the power of Jesus? Anybody wanna take a guess at what that is? Huh? The power of the? How about the keys? That's what he's referring to. He's referring to Matthew 16, 19, I will give you the keys of the kingdom of heaven, and whatever you bind on earth shall be bound in heaven, and whatever you loose on earth shall be loosed in heaven. So there's the authority of Jesus in his name, but then there's the power that Jesus gives through the keys. And so it's so fascinating to me that when you look at 1 Corinthians 5, you see all the marks of Matthew 16, Matthew 18. They're all there, everything's there. And so what do we take away with? We take away the idea that not even an apostle would assert the authority unilaterally to kick somebody out of the church, but it's something that the church as a congregation has to do. The church must do it when they are assembled together in the name of Jesus Christ and the power of the keys. As we conclude tonight, I'd like to say four things about love because we started this conversation, we started this monologue, let's be honest. We started these talks talking about culture's definition of love and how one of the reasons or one of the aversions to church discipline is that The culture doesn't think that kicking somebody out of a congregation is a loving thing to do. And what we tried to say is we need to operate in our understanding of ecclesiology and excommunication and all these things that have to do with church discipline according to the love of the Bible. So let me say four things about that love. Number one, God's love is conditional on repentance and faith. Now, Some people have a hard time with that. But, you know, I was talking to somebody at home group the other night, and we were talking about relationships, and we were talking about forgiveness. Because, you know, in counseling, the biggest thing I deal with is forgiveness. You know, how do we impart it, how do we receive it, that type of thing. And, you know, we've talked here before about it's not really forgiveness, you don't really grant forgiveness unless somebody asks for it, right? Okay? And where do we get that from? We get it from the gospel. God doesn't say, even if you don't have faith, I'm gonna love you and forgive you. Does God say that? A liberal theology says that, but not the God of the Bible. The God of the Bible makes it very clear that God's love is unconditional for those who are in Christ. How do you get in Christ? Repentance and faith. So I would submit to you biblically that God's love is conditional on repentance and faith. And so we must shed this cultural idea of love and operate with a biblical understanding of love with respect to church discipline. The second thing I'd say is this, and I believe this with all my heart. If I didn't, I wouldn't be a pastor and I wouldn't be here and I probably wouldn't be a Christian. Excommunication is the most loving thing you can do for the unbeliever. I believe that with all my heart. In 1 Corinthians 5.5, Paul says, I believe that it is unloving to tell a person who thinks that they are going to heaven when all the marks of their life and the broken repentance and the absent faith and everything that they do and everything that they say on the whole communicates the otherwise. I believe the most unloving thing you could do is tell them, you're in heaven, you're good, keep on keeping on. Because there is going to be a subset of humanity that on the day of judgment, Jesus tells us this in Matthew 7, are gonna stand before Jesus and they're gonna say, listen, Lord, we prophesied in your name, we cast out demons in your name, we did all kinds of good works in your name. And what's he gonna say to them? Depart from me for I never knew you, you who, listen, this is so important, practice lawlessness. Sometimes we get caught up in church discipline on the idea of, well, they have faith. Yeah, yeah, good, good. Faith manifests itself in lawfulness. Paul says at the end of chapter three of the book of Romans, he says, what shall we say? You know, if we're saved by faith, do we overthrow the law? And this is my paraphrase. He says, on the contrary, we uphold the law. We uphold the law. Faith works, faith manifests itself in works, not perfect works, but consistent works, and the prevailing disposition of one's life out of a faith that is genuine is going to manifest itself in works. And so for me to tell somebody that despite the fact that they're committing adultery or doing whatever they're doing, that you're fine, we're not gonna enact church discipline, I think that's one of the most unloving things you can say. So I think that we need to reckon with this idea of excommunication as exhibiting the loving heart of God. Number three, a love for the reputation of the church and of Christ will excommunicate one who gives the impression to the world that devotion to Christ and his church is not important. And number four, a love for the church, excuse me, a love for the health of the church will excommunicate anyone whose sin will promote and extend ungodliness throughout the church. So Paul says in 2 Timothy 2, 16 through 19, he says, avoid irreverent babble, for it will lead people into more and more ungodliness, and their talk will spread like gangrene. Among them are Hymenaeus and Philetus, who have swerved from the truth, saying that the resurrection has already happened. They are upsetting the faith of some, but God's firm foundation stands bearing the seal. The Lord knows those who are his, and let everyone who names the name of the Lord depart from iniquity. So that's our charge. Everyone who names the name of the Lord is to depart from iniquity. And all the more when a loving brother or sister comes to you and says, brother, sister, love Jesus more than your sin. And they say, pfft, I'm gonna do whatever I want. Okay, well, the Lord, we went after you, we loved you, but the Lord has given us the keys and we are under obligation to love you with the keys. So church discipline, I would submit, is one of the means by which the Lord preserves and sanctifies his church. This is how Jesus talked about it. He said, I am the vine and you are the branches. Anyone who does not bear fruit is cut off and thrown into the fire. So here's my question as we end tonight. Do you as a Christian, do you as a Christian need to fear church discipline? Should you fear it? Here's my answer for you. You shouldn't fear church discipline. You should fear ceasing to love Jesus Christ. That's what you should fear. Because church discipline is meant to root out those who don't really have faith in Jesus Christ. Church discipline is meant to root out those who are fakes and hypocrites. Those who are either knowingly deceiving themselves or inadvertently deceiving themselves. But if you love Jesus Christ, then at the end of the day, when the church comes to you and says, love Jesus more than this sin, if you're somebody who's struggling with same-sex attraction, love Jesus more than the world telling you that everything's okay, love Jesus more than the same sex, love Jesus more, then at the end of the day, if the Spirit of God is within you and He has written the law of God on your hearts, you're gonna come to Jesus. That's what we heard this morning, 1 Peter 2.25. You were straying like sheep, and the chief shepherd and overseer of your soul, you returned to him by God's grace. So you don't need to fear church discipline if you're a true believer. If you're a fake, you should fear it. But actually, you should fear something much greater than church discipline. You should fear the wrath of God. Because the wrath of God abides on you if you do not know Jesus Christ. So I end with the words of the author of the Hebrews in Hebrews 12. Therefore, since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, let us lay aside every weight and sin which clings so closely, and let us run with endurance the race that is set before us, looking to Jesus, the founder and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy that was set before him, Notice where the focus of the author of the Hebrews is. Don't focus on or consider church discipline, consider Jesus, consider Jesus, consider Jesus, the founder and perfecter of our faith. Let that be an exhortation to all of us tonight, whether you're a believer or unbeliever, to consider Jesus. Jesus will keep you from church discipline, Jesus will keep you from the fires of hell, and Jesus will bring you into an eternal relationship with the Father, all right? All right, we've got a few minutes for questions. Anybody have any questions about 1 Corinthians 5, church discipline, guardrails, anything?