When we go through things, things become more clear, and we make some changes and alterations. The title for paragraph 12, I believe, was something like, The Governing of the Church, Discipline and Principle, and then paragraph 13 was like Discipline and Practice, and we're gonna kind of rename those, and paragraph 12 I want to give the title, The Governing of the Church, The Admission of Members, The Admission of Members, and then paragraph 12 will be The Governing of the Church, Proceedings of Discipline, Proceedings of Discipline. And as I Came back to this again recently, I realized that paragraph 12 is really addressing the issue of biblical church membership. And for those who are members, there is a disciplined life that we must engage in together, and that is touched on there in paragraph 12. But then paragraph 13 kind of gets us into the bigger picture of what we typically think of as church discipline, confronting your brothers, bringing several with you, coming back to the church, having the church be engaged in this, and we'll talk about that process here in a moment. But paragraph 12 is addressing the bigger issue of church membership itself, that it is indeed a biblical matter. So let's come to paragraph 12 and 13, and let's just read both paragraphs together. They do relate closely to one another, as you're going to see, but again, they touch on those two distinct subjects. Paragraph 12. As all believers are bound to join themselves to particular churches when and where they have opportunity so to do, so all that are admitted unto the privileges of a church are also under the censures and government thereof according to the rule of Christ. Paragraph 13 says, no church members upon any offense taken by them, having performed their duty required of them towards the person they are offended at, ought to disturb any church order or absent themselves from the assemblies of the church or administration of any ordinances upon the account of such offense at any of their fellow members, but to wait upon Christ in the further proceeding of the church. So let's look first at paragraph 12. If you have the sheet, the little handout there, you'll see I want to look at this by way of three maybe subheadings. The obligation of church membership, the privileges of church membership, and the submission of church membership. Now, I want to note that I have three subheadings, but I want to come back and draw your attention in paragraph 12 to, again, the semicolon. We've talked about these things before. Let's just kind of highlight them again. Usually the semicolon is kind of a new thought after the semicolon. It's gonna break it up. So if you have one semicolon in a paragraph, you really have two principal ideas. So if that's the case, why do I have three subheadings, okay? So let me see if I can make that a little more clear. Notice the first phrase up to the semicolon. As all believers are bound to join themselves to particular churches when and where they have opportunity so to do, New thought, so all that are admitted under the privileges of a church are also under the censures and government thereof according to the rule of Christ. So our first subheading, the obligation of church membership, is everything up to the semicolon, okay? Our second two points are taking the last phrase from that semicolon and then it says so all that are admitted, all right, and all the way to the very end of the paragraph. My second and third subheadings that are on your sheet. concern that section, all right? I'm seeing two ideas in that last half, really, of the paragraph, and we'll highlight those more as we come to them. But this first point, the obligation of church membership, I believe it's printed on your sheet, the part from the confession I take this from says, as all believers are bound to join themselves to particular churches, when and where they have opportunity so to do, all right? There's an obligation for you as a believer, as a Christian, to join yourself, to join yourself to a church. And this has been touched on already two different times in chapter 26. I wanna show you where. In chapter 26 in paragraph two, turn back there for a moment. Chapter 26, paragraph two, This is where we talked about visible saints and churches consisting of visible saints. All persons throughout the world professing the faith of the gospel and obedience unto God by Christ according unto it, not destroying their own profession by any errors everting the foundation or unholiness of conversation, which is life, are and may be called visible saints and of such visible saints ought all particular congregations to be constituted. So paragraph 2 in chapter 26 is simply telling us that churches are to be made up of visible saints. Those who make profession of the gospel, as it says there in paragraph two in the opening, professing the faith of the gospel, and those who live in obedience to the gospel, these are visible saints. And in regard to their profession and their obedience, as long as they don't say anything or do anything that would sink the ship, we might say, they may be considered visible saints. And churches are to be constituted or made up of visible saints. So Chapter 26, Paragraph 2 is really making a statement about churches, not so much believers themselves. The churches are to consist of these kinds Now look over to paragraph five. Paragraph five, in the execution of this power, and that is all power that's been given to Christ, in paragraph four, in the execution of this power, wherewith he, Christ, is so entrusted, the Lord Jesus calls out of the world unto himself, through the ministry of his word, by his spirit, those that are given unto him by his father, that they may walk before him in all the ways of obedience which he prescribeth to them in his word. New idea. Got a strong break here, period. Those thus called, he, Christ, commandeth to walk together in particular societies or churches for their mutual edification and the due performance of that public worship which he requireth of them in the world. Now here we're making a very clear statement about those that are called by Christ, those that are saved, those that are given unto Christ by the Father, they are commanded They are commanded to walk together in churches, all right? Now, so those are the two places already that we've kind of had this idea in 2612 kind of hinted at or pointed to, all right? But in 2612, further stress is placed on the obligation of people to join themselves, believers to join themselves with churches or these particular societies, as it says back there in paragraph five. Further stress is placed on that language of command. Remember what we just read, 26.5, those thus called Christ commands to walk together. Further stress is placed in paragraph 12 on that command language And it says that so commanded they are all bound to join themselves to churches. Go back to paragraph 12. Look at the language in that opening phrase. As all believers are bound to join themselves to particular churches. Notice the phrasing. Bound. Joined. All. The confession is stating that every believer, all believers, none are excluded, must, ought to, they are bound to join a church. Now, you've probably had conversations with people, maybe you've had this conversation with yourself before, right? I don't really need to join the church. I can just go to the church. I can just kind of show up. I can be present. Why are you all so wrapped up around the idea of joining? Can't I just go to the gym and not pay my dues? Can't I just show up every now and then? Why do I have to join? I mean, joining sounds so formal. It sounds so official. And then you can almost, like, tell what the next phrase is I'm going to say. It's so legalistic. You ever heard that one before, right? You bunch of Baptist Pharisees just want to heap law on top of my head more and more and more, all right? Now we're going to talk about the Sabbath, yeah. You do it on Sunday, too. You're probably Sabbatarians, too, that kind of thing. All right. Well, it is very official language. This is true. And the reason we believe it's official and formal language is because Christ commands that his people join themselves. They are bound to join. They are to commit themselves to one another. So the confession uses very strong language. All believers are bound to join themselves to particular churches. You might notice also here the qualifier when and where they have opportunity so to do. Well the qualifier here should not be taken as an excuse not to join a church. I don't live close enough to a church. I don't have a church anywhere near where I live. Well. You really want to kind of press that a little bit. Where do you live? Like, you know, the Arctic, you know, or something like that? Surely there's some church that you could find that's close by you. Rather than being an excuse not to join a church, I think what's happening here, it's simply reinforcing the boundness of the matter, saying that when and wherever you find yourselves, you have an opportunity and you need to take the opportunity and be quick to join yourself to a church body. Now I might add that in the event that a believer does find himself, not in a location near a church. And near is rather subjective, isn't it? You know, well, I have to drive 20 minutes to get to that church. And this is by the guy that on Monday through Friday drives an hour to get to his job to feed his family, all right? But he won't drive 20 minutes on a Lord's Day to feed his family spiritually, all right? So it still doesn't change, even if it's not close to you. it still doesn't change the obligation. There's still an obligation. The confession is seeking to demonstrate that this is a matter of obedience to Christ's command, hence it is an obligation. And if this is the case, now it's obviously not the case with anyone here today because everybody made it today, all right? But if this is the case, then one should seek to remedy the situation. In other words, what am I gonna say next? Move, move. If you find that the job that you have to support your family is inadequate, you will climb over mountains, you will cross over oceans to find a way to provide for your family. It's more important that your family is fed spiritually than it's fed physically. So it should obligate you to greater effort to find a way to get a church. I don't know how many times in pastoring over the years, I've had someone tell me things like, oh, you know, I've been looking for a new job, and I found a new job, and it's over here or whatever. My next question is going to be what? Where are you going to go to church? Oh, well, you know, we're going to move, and we're going to get a house, we're going to get that job, and we're going to look for a church. Before you look for a new job, Before you look for a house, you make sure wherever you're going, there's a what? There's a church. A good, gospel-preaching, Bible-believing church. Hopefully one that holds our confession. But I know that doesn't always happen, all right? But you need to make sure your family will be spiritually provided for. Your boss offers your promotion, and it's across the country, and there's no good church to go there. Tell your boss you're happy with the job you have now. Don't move your family and starve your family spiritually. Less like an aside. But questions, comments, thoughts, surely that probably generates a few things. Billy? Yes, sir? that we had at one point a lady that was driving two and a half hours from Arizona to come to our church on Sunday. From where? From Arizona. West? Yeah, west. Two and a half hours west of San Angelo. And then we had another couple of girls that would travel in an hour and a half from San Sato, the other direction. Yeah, I think it really starts with that idea of do you believe this is a biblical command? Do you believe it's a biblical matter? Because if you believe it's a biblical matter, I mean, now we've eliminated the option of, do I have to do it or not? Because it is a biblical matter. And so now I start to try to find ways to make it happen. And so Tom, and then Ryan. Also, talking about Texas geography, if you go to San Antonio, Very near downtown, there are these old 19th century homes that are just little cubicle homes. And they're called Sunday houses. And very often, the farmers who live maybe 30, 40, 50, 60 miles away come in on Saturday evenings, stay at a home that they'd already set up. It's called making it happen, isn't it? Yeah, that's interesting. Thanks, Tom. Ryan? But I was very humbled once to meet a man in Mexico City who took I want to say three to four hours public transit one way to come to Sunday worship, and which meant three to four hours back on public transit. And I'm very humbled by that. Obviously, in terms of reform for even evangelical churches, it's going to be a lot sparser in a country that's predominantly Catholic. But I was very humbled by that. Yeah, that's great. Yeah, you know, this same matter is gonna come up here in just a couple of paragraphs when it comes to associationalism. Because, you know, you got your church, it's like in podunk nowhere, and the nearest church you could have association with is like six hours away. Get in the car. Start driving. Get a ticket. Start flying. I mean, you need the fellowship, the mutual accountability, edification, and communion that comes from other churches. You find a way to make that happen. I'm not saying it's not hard. I'm not saying it's not inconvenient. I mean, but everything in life often gets hard, you know, in that regard. Parenting's hard. You don't like ship your kids away. And if you did, don't confess it this morning or this afternoon. Confess it later. You keep them and so yeah, Jeff. Oh, yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Mhm. Yeah, we do live in a convenience age, don't we? And if it seems to make it uncomfortable for us or difficult for us, oh, this is church, it should be easy. Really? I mean, Satan's doing all he can to battle against you when it comes to church. He's gonna make Sunday tough. He's gonna be busy on Sunday. Okay, well, let's move on. So that's something to say just about the obligation of church membership. Secondly, the privileges of church membership. Notice the confession goes on. And it talks about all these believers that are joining themselves together as they have opportunity and they're getting that done. And so, now this is a phrase that's kind of a touchstone. transitory phrase. It's moving on to the final phrase. But I don't want us to move past it too quickly. It says, so all that are admitted unto the privileges of a church, and then it's going to say, are also under. But I want us to just pause on that phrase. All that are admitted unto the privileges of the church. Well, we're presented at least with two points here to stress. One, notice the language that is used of admittance, admittance. Stress is being placed here on the responsibility and the place that the church has in giving permission to someone to join. One does not join of his own will. You don't just walk up and say, I wanna join. All right? You can walk up and say you want to join, but you can't just, therefore, join because you say you want to join. All right? True. Rather, one needs to seek admittance of those who, to borrow from language that we have been using of late, those that hold the keys of the church. The key is the power to let one in or to keep one out. One must be allowed in, and this on the basis of the deliberations of the body to which they seek entrance. Jim Renahan makes this note in his commentary on the confession. He says, when admitted to a church, notice that the church decides to admit a member, indicating that no one may intrude self into the church. That's an industry phrase. intrude self, that one must understand obligations and responsibilities. Church membership, he says here, is a weighty matter. You have to gain admission. You don't just get in in that regard. Notice also, though, it speaks to the issue of the profit of entrance. Do you notice the phrase there that's used? One is admitted unto the privileges of a church. Now, it's not the intention of this particular paragraph to lay out what all those privileges are. But let me take just a moment and mention some of them. Why join a church? What is the advantage to you to join a church, or if you're speaking to someone else, it's not wrong to think about what those privileges are. I mean, if you go to join the gym, you know, you get certain what? You get certain privileges. I went to join the Planet Fitness once, three or four years ago or whatever, and for ten bucks you can get yourself in and get use of, you know, almost all the equipment. but not everything. If you wanna use everything, you gotta get the bonus membership of $20 a month, and then you get to bring a friend, then you get to use the massage chair, and then you get to use the cancer-causing light ray machines in the back, you know, whatever, and if you feel too healthy, you'll lay on those for a few hours and you'll be sick. So, you get the point, and you get to pay a little bit more, and they start laying out all the privileges of why you want this more membership, all right? Well, we often face those kinds of things, but when we come to the church, there are benefits and privileges and blessings that we might consider in being a member of a church. And I don't think it's wrong to think about them. Number one, let me just quickly run down a list of about nine things, all right? Number one is this, pastoral care. Pastoral care, all right? Someone comes to the church and visits, even if they come and visit for maybe a while, all right? I'm probably going to develop some kind of relationship with them. I'm going to try to meet them the first day they come. We may get to know one another. We may go to lunch or something like that. But my level of pastoral responsibility has not really kicked in yet. I mean, I'm just being a Christian. I'm being a Christian brother. I'm getting to know you. I'm talking to you or whatever. We're going to lunch together or something like that. But I'm not yet their what? I'm not their pastor. I'm not responsible for their soul. I'm not going to give an account for their soul. I may even want to be their pastor. But I'm not their pastor until there's some sense of covenanting together in that life of the church. And that's something that you don't have yet. You may have brotherly care, but you don't have pastoral care. Someone watching out for your soul. I'm not going to give a lot of text with these. There are many of them. The main one there is Hebrews 13, 17. You can look that up later on. Secondly, and this follows directly from pastoral care, there is a privilege, a blessing for someone who is a member of the church of protection. of protection. What is the Bible, and you could say pastoral or leadership protection, what's the image that's often used of the pastor and member relation in the Bible? It's a shepherd and what? Sheep. Now, in this kind of a setting, I'm both sheep and shepherd, you know, which is, you know, not the greatest for you, I suppose. We all have the Good Shepherd. We all have the Lord Jesus. He is not a sheep, all right? But there's a sense of protection. Why? Because your soul is in danger each and every day you're out there in the world and there's a need for someone to give some kind of watch care, soul care for you. Paul tells Timothy in 1st Timothy 4, 16, pay close attention to yourself and to your teaching. Persevere in these things for as you do, you will ensure salvation both for yourself and for those who hear you. Paul tells Titus in Titus 1, Verse nine, that the elder needs to hold fast the faithful word, which is in accordance with the teaching that they may be able to exhort in sound doctrine and refute those that contradict. Why? Because the devil, as Peter says, is like a raging and roaring lion seeking someone to devour. And he loves mutton in that regard. And he's looking for sheep that he might devour. A third blessing is consistent and regular teaching. We might put in this just the concept of the means of grace. A regular consistent diet of the word of Christ. Number four takes us out of the pastoral teaching realm into the realm of fellowship, Christian koinonia, Christian partnership with other believers. You ever stop and think about all the one another's of the Bible? And there are many, are there not? Be devoted to one another. Give preference to one another. Be of the same mind as one another. Love one another. Be at peace with one another. Build up one another. Accept one another. Admonish one another. Greet or welcome one another. Wait for one another. Care for one another. Serve one another. Tolerate, I love that one. Tolerate one another. Speak the truth to one another. Be kind to one another. Be tenderhearted to one another. Forgive one another. Have spiritual conversations with one another. Be subject to one another. Regard as more important the other than yourself. Teach one another. Comfort one another. Encourage one another. Be good to one another. Stimulate one another to love and good deeds. My goodness, there's so many. Confess your sins to one another. Pray for one another. Show hospitality to one another. Be humble toward one another. Did you get all those? That's a lot of things, isn't it? You can't do that unless you're joined to one another. You can't do that unless you're in covenant. All those commands are given to churches made up of saints. It's exhortations given to believers to walk together in a certain way. And that is a privilege you cannot afford to go without. And it's a privilege you can't truly have in the biblical sense unless you're in covenant with other members of the body of Christ. This is one of the reasons when we're gone from church for a while, we feel it. We don't like to be gone. We want to be present. Just having a good talk at lunch about the fellowship meal and what a joy it is to kind of sit down with somebody. break bread in that sense and have a meal together and look across the table and talk to them and encourage them. But just as sure as the Bible gives positive commands that are fellowship oriented, it also gives negative commands. Listen to some of these. Don't judge one another. Don't sue one another. Don't divide from one another. Don't bite and devour one another. Challenge one another. envy one another, lie to one another, speak against one another, complain with one another. All these things are things that we're often tempted to do in those one another relationships, but that the scripture tells us to be guarded against. We have to guard against those kinds of things often by applying the more positive type of fellowship commands of bearing with one another, caring for one another, loving one another, things such as that. A sixth, a fifth thing, a fifth blessing or benefit for the body is what I would call spiritual accountability, spiritual accountability. This is where it gets a little tougher to sell, if you will, the whole church membership thing, because now you're talking about, you mean if I come to join your church, I'm going to become spiritually accountable to Joe? I don't know. Joe's kind of hard. Joe's kind of tough. I don't know if I want to be spiritually accountable to Joe. No, Joe's a nice guy. To put yourself in a position where you're now spiritually accountable to someone else, that requires a level of vulnerability that most people aren't really comfortable with, are they? You mean they're going to be watching my life? I don't know if I like that part, alright? Well, the scripture says things like this in Galatians 6.1, bear one another's burdens and thus fulfill the law of Christ. You can't do those things unless you have a close relationship with one another where you're accountable to each other. There are other places as well. The book of Jude in verse 20 says, but you beloved build yourselves up on your most holy faith, praying in the Holy Spirit. Keep yourselves in the love of God. waiting anxiously for the mercy of our Lord Jesus Christ to eternal life and have mercy on some who are doubting. It goes on to talk about snatching some who are like in the fire, all right? You're in danger of sin and error and you're responsible for them. You need to keep your brothers accountable. James 5 verse 20, it talks about turning a center from the error of his way. You know, to do that, you have to have some kind of close proximity in your relationship. And just to back up a little bit here, too, if you're going to go to your brother and confront him in his sin, which you're going to have to do at times, all right, it's best to have established already a loving, gracious relationship where you personally yourself are vulnerable and want to make yourself accountable to him too. So you're not just the aloof church member who sees all the Aryan brothers and starts lobbing bombs at them from your safe. bunker over here. No, you're in the battle with them and you're helping them and they know you. When you go to your brother and you confront him in his sin, does he know already that you love him? Does he know already that you care about him? Have you tried to strive in the Christian life with him prior to that moment so that when you do go, you have some credibility? Does that make sense? I hope that makes sense. A sixth blessing, counsel, admonishing one another. We are to do that. We are to come and offer counsel to one another. Another blessing, financial assistance. Financial assistance is a blessing in the body of Christ. We should do good to all people, but Paul says what in Galatians 6? Especially to those who belong to the household of God, to the household of the faith. There are many verses we can look at there as well. Another blessing is membership in the body of Christ gives you a place of service. I'm always leery of the guy that comes to visit the church and the first Sunday he wants to know, hey, where's the pastor? And he comes, pastor, this is so-and-so. And the first question he asks, is there a place to preach here or teach? It's usually the young seminary student, you know? You get the guy, he's hungry, he's eager, but he hasn't thought about much other than just what he wants to kind of get out of the thing, all right? I'm usually kind of leery of that, but why? Because we're not here just to do what we want to do. We're here to share our gifts with one another as they might benefit the body. Well, there are other blessings, other privileges of church membership as well, but I'll move on and we'll save some of those for another time. Questions, comments? There you go. Somebody's taking notes. Thank you, Venus. All right. Any comments or thoughts there? Yeah, Billy? Excuse me. I'll move this. Tons of lists. It's just full of lists of people. And the book of Revelation even points to a book in which there's just lists of names of people. And so I just think that's a really interesting flex. And then also, I like the fact that it's talked about as a privilege in our church to be joined to a church. Cleaving. Yeah, that's good. Can everybody hear what Billy was saying there? It's a passage in Acts 9 that talks about Paul joining the church in Jerusalem. It's the same word used for cleaving to your wife, cleaving to your spouse. And it's a great, great concept there. Good picture. Anything else? All right, well let's look at the last point here regarding paragraph 12. So we've seen the idea that membership is obligatory. It's not like an option in that regard. There's an obligation of church membership. There are privileges to church membership. And when we join the church, we are in submission to something. Notice the submission of church membership. Are also, that last phrase, are also under the censures and government thereof according to the rule of Christ. So in short, one who joins himself to a church and experiences the blessings of membership in that church comes providentially under her discipline and as such she is now under the rule of Christ who is operating, who is active in and through his church. Hence that last phrase, according to the rule of Christ. Now it's at this point that confession attaches a couple of proof texts, and let's look them up together. First Thessalonians 5.14. Who could read that one for us, please? First Thessalonians 5.14. Any takers? Everybody's looking down. Nobody wants to have eye contact. Okay, Ben. First Thessalonians 5.14. Second Thessalonians 3.6. You can do that one. Okay, Tom. 2 Thessalonians 3, 14 and 15. Two verses there. Okay, Joe, thank you, sir. All right, so let's read these and let's kind of think in terms of how might these verses express the idea of being under the censures and government of the church according to the rule of Christ. So 1 Thessalonians 5, 14, let's start with that. All right. So there are some in the church who are faint-hearted and they are to be encouraged. There are some who are weak. They are to be helped. Everyone is going to need patience, but it's the first group really that we're kind of stressing on here The unruly. What do we do with the unruly brother? We admonish them. We admonish the unruly brother, all right? 2 Thessalonians 3.6. 2 Thessalonians 3.6. Now we command you, brethren, in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, Alright, now let's put that with what we just read. We just read that an unruly brother is to be what? Admonished, but here the unruly brother is to be what? I'm sorry? Kept away from or avoided. That's going to be hard to kind of admonish someone that you're avoiding. So might we have here a picture and a sense of progression? So maybe someone is proving themselves unruly or undisciplined and we strive to admonish that brother. And sometimes that brother may what? He may listen. And he may become ruly. He may become disciplined. He may be one that now submits to the rule of Christ, to the rule of Christ as it's expressed through the church. He humbles himself. He repents. But there are other times, are there not? The unruly one is not repentant. The unruly one will not be ruled. He will not be reigned in. It may come to the point where this unruly one needs to be avoided or kept away from. 2 Thessalonians 3 verses 14 and 15. Now we have someone who is straying here. They do not obey our instruction. They don't obey the apostolic instruction that is now present in the letter. They don't obey the teaching of Christ. They are not to be associated with But, or for the purpose of what? Putting them to shame. We wanna appeal to the fact that perhaps they still have a conscience, perhaps it's not completely seared, perhaps they realize before the Lord they need to be living differently, and they're brought to a sense of shame, a sense of conviction about a matter. But verse 15 seems to keep us from becoming unduly harsh with this man. What does it say we should, how should we treat him? as a brother, not as a what? Not as an enemy. We're not to regard him as an unbeliever. We're to regard him still as a believer, but we have to be what? Still very cautious and careful with this one, all right? Hansard Knowles, who was one of our Baptist forefathers in the 17th century, wrote a couple of different books. One book, The World That Now Is, and another, he wrote an exposition of the book of Revelation. And I came across in my reading a couple of quotes from him, and I wanted you to kind of hear them and see how they might relate to what we've just been talking about. Hansard Knowles says, in The World That Now Is, he says, unto this gospel government, speaking about the gospel government of the church, appertain church censures. And now he's gonna give three different types of censures. So you see that word censure there in our confession. These that are joining themselves together, admitted to the privileges of the church, are under censures, all right? The censures that Knowles mentions are these. Admonition. And he uses 2 Thessalonians 3.15 as we just saw. 2 Thessalonians 3.15. Do not regard him as an enemy but admonish him as a brother. Then he mentions another level of censure and that is what they call suspension. Suspension. Or he says, withdrawing from brother or member that hath and doth walk disorderly. And here he attaches 2 Thessalonians 3.6, the one we saw earlier where it says, keep away from every brother who leads an unruly life not according to the tradition. So keep away from him, all right? So he's not listening to the admonitions. You should be just avoiding him in that regard. But then he takes it up another level in Centures and he mentions not just admonition or suspension, he mentions the one you've probably heard of before, excommunication, all right? Excommunication of those members that live in gross and scandalous sins. And here he cites 1 Corinthians 5 verses 1, 4, 5, and 13. And you might recall 1 Corinthians 5 is the text that speaks about the man who's in some kind of illicit sexual relationship with either his mother or his stepmother, his father's wife it calls it, and there they are to cast this one out, they are to remove the leaven, they are to purge the evil from their midst in that regard. Also in Knoll's work, The Exposition of the Book of Revelation, he says this, the purging power and the purifying efficacy of church censures, admonition of offending unruly persons, suspension of those that walk disorderly, and excommunication of wicked, ungodly, and obstinate sinners. And here he lists 1 Thessalonians 5.14, 2 Thessalonians 3, 6, and 15, and 1 Corinthians 5, 7, and 13, at least three of those texts, 1 Thessalonians 5, 14, 2 Thessalonians 3, 6, and 3, 15, are the ones that are used as proof texts in our confession. So he's giving these three different levels of admonition, of suspension, keeping them from the table, and then full-blown excommunication. So I think what we're trying to do here is just see that the language that's in the confession is language that is consistent with the practice of 17th century Baptists at that particular point in time. I wanted to read to you, you might think, I think this language is very familiar. I've read this in the last couple of weeks. If you've been reading the Constitution and bylaws, in the newly proposed bylaws, here's the language that we have. This is under the section in the bylaws on, Let me find what article it is. It's Article 6, Under Discipline, Number 3, Procedures and Membership Accountability, and it's listed on the third step, all right? Let me just read it to you. confrontation of the offending member by the whole church. At this point, the matter must be brought by the elders to the voting members of Christ's covenant reform at his church in a closed session. The membership has a responsibility as opportunity provides to call the offender to repentance and determine possible levels of church censures. And these levels of church censures are what we're trying to get at here that is what we're thinking is consistent with the confession and 17th century church practice. The levels of church censures are these, admonition, We put a text here, Romans 15, 14. Suspension from the Lord's table, 1 Corinthians 11, 27 to 32, or withdrawal from them, 2 Thessalonians 3, 14 to 15. An equitable period of time will be established by the elders in order to optimize the fullest effect of the witness of the membership to allow for the work of the Lord to provide more than ample time for repentance. If there is no repentance, then we move to the final step of excommunication. So these levels of censure that we've put in here, admonition, suspension, or withdraw, and there we mentioned 2 Thessalonians 3, 14, and 15. I think that's all I have on that. Questions, comments, thoughts you have? We're trying to set up a situation where it's not just a one and done, okay? Oh, you blew it, well, you're out of here, you're gone, all right? We need to have, things seem in scripture to be more nuanced than that. And it's not just such a cut and dry type thing. Uh, this allows us to deal with one another patiently yet thoroughly and lovingly yet very purposefully. And so, yeah, Billy. Why are you so tolerant of the submission of church membership? Because I think this only works if it's reciprocal. This idea that the church is going to have government over me, there's a certain sense in which that only works if I'm submitting to it. So for instance, the confession talks about certain seasons in the life of the church where fasting might be important or necessary, you know, like the raising up of elders, things like that. And, I mean, that's something where it's like, you know, the elders might say, okay, we're going to have a day or, you know, a few days or whatever where we're going to fast and we're going to pray. And again, that's just one of those things where it's like, yeah, there's a certain sense in which I need to listen to and obey my elders. But it's not something that really happens with an iron fist. It's a mutual understanding between the membership and the elders that we submit ourselves to. We don't just, oh, well, I'm just kind of slavishly doing it with no joy in my heart because my master told me I had to. Yeah. Other comments? All right. Well, let's move on to paragraph 13. And this is where we kind of get to look at discipline explicitly, all right? Paragraph 13 says that no church members upon any offense taken by them, having performed their duty required of them towards the person they are offended at, ought to disturb any church order or absent themselves from the assemblies of the church or administration of any ordinances upon the account of such offense at any of their fellow members but to wait on Christ in the further proceeding of the church. Well, since nobody here would ever take offense to anybody about anything, we can just skip this paragraph, right? That would never happen. Oh my goodness, we need a recovery of this paragraph in the churches today. The moment somebody sniffs an offense in a church, I'm gone. They don't even come back next week. They're just gone, all right? It's like the easiest thing in the world to just find the new church. I mean, they're everywhere, right? I mean, they're all over the place. And most times when you go to find that new church, they don't even ask you about the previous church. If they're even going to ask you about joining their church, because the whole concept of membership in paragraph 12 is completely sunk often in churches today. Well, I'm sorry. Oh, yeah. If you go to associational church, they're just going to send you back to your other church. And so, yeah, every now and then over the years, you know, we've had somebody appear at our church from Heritage or maybe somebody's appeared from us down there or whatever. And one of the first questions I ask is, oh, great. Good to see you. How's everybody at the other church, you know, or whatever. And that's good. That's great. But yeah, that doesn't fly too well in associational churches. But unfortunately, we live in a day where there's just so many options. You don't even have to go to the associational church. You can just go somewhere else. Well, how are these proceedings of discipline going to unfold, all right? Three things, three ways that I see the proceedings of discipline being unfolded to us here in this paragraph. Number one, it emphasizes personal duty. Personal duty there is no room in the confession or in scripture for the believer to sit there and say Church discipline is an elder function. That's what elders do all right That's the Bible Church down the road But you get the idea If you want a church where you have no responsibility, and the elders just tell you what to do all the time, and the elders do everything, and the elders just rule over everything, that's not our Baptist heritage, all right? That's not the way it happens in the Confession. There is a sense of personal duty. Secondly, there is the necessity of what I'm going to call faithful churchmanship. Faithful churchmanship, all right? Once you've done everything you're supposed to do, now is the time for you to really turn up the faithful churchmanship on your part, all right? And this is where you wait, all right? Thirdly, there are the proceedings of the church itself at large, the whole church. So let's talk about personal duty. No church members upon any offense taken by them, having performed their duty required of them towards the person they are offended at. So, having performed their duty. Let's go to Matthew 18. Matthew 18, what is your duty? What is your responsibility in church membership? Now we could go back, we could go back and we could look at those one another's of the church. Those points of koinonia, all right, of fellowship together. Those aren't just, Matthew 18, I'm trying to do two things at one time and not doing a good job. All right, here we go. Those are not just blessings that you get. Those aren't just privileges that you receive. They are often things that you need to be giving to other people. You need to be loving one another. It's a privilege to be loved by your brothers and sisters, right? It's also a duty for you to love your brothers and sisters. It's not just like come find a pillow. There's lots of cushions here. You like lay down on your little cushion and everybody comes by and like loves on you. All right. You know if you're sitting there on Sunday and you're in your pew and you're on your cushion and and people are coming by and they're going. Hey Joe, how you doing? Hey Matt, how are you? Gloria, how are you doing? We're just so glad you're here today. And you leave church that day and you just go, you know, 37 and a half people came by and welcomed me today and loved on me. I'm not sure who the half person is. 37 and a half people came by and loved on me today while I sat there on my cushion and did nothing. you have not experienced the fullness of church blessing and privilege. Because the fullness of church blessing and privilege is when you're being loved on and you're loving on someone else. The mutual partnership koinonia going on in the body, all right? And here, discipline is part of that responsibility as well, all right? And here's what it says in Matthew 18 verse 15, If your brother sins, okay, you know your brother is in sin. Wait on him to come and tell you what he did wrong because you don't want to be offensive. No. If your brother sins, go and slap him and say, you dummy, what were you thinking? Okay, now we've got two extremes, okay? So it's wise for the man to avoid all extremes, the book of Proverbs, what do we do? Galatians 6.1 says you who are spiritual restore such a one with what? What's the word? Do you remember? Gentleness. Gentleness. Be gentle when you go hit Jeff. 47 people have probably already done it right before you. So be gentle. Be gentle. Be gentle with one another. Do unto others as you would what? Have them do unto you. You want someone to come to you when you're in sin. Now maybe you're not saying it like that, but we need to be rescued from sin. But I want someone to come who's loving, gentle, and gracious, and full of Christ. If your brother sins, go and show him his fault. Notice the next phrase, in private. Don't go in front of the church and have a loud conversation with your friend. Jeff, I've been meaning to talk to you. Hope nobody can hear us today. You know, or don't do it in a restaurant where you're sitting there having lunch with somebody and the guy across, you're talking and he's so loud, everybody. I mean, you almost have to put me in a room where it's like totally isolated. My wife will come in sometimes in my office at the house and she'll say, I'm like, I'm in my office, I'm at my door. Obviously the door is not very soundproof, all right? Go in private. If he listens to you, you have won your brother. That's what you're trying. You're trying for a victory here. You want to win your brother back to that peaceful coexistence with you in the body. He says, if he doesn't listen to you, take one or two more with you so that by the mouth of two or three witnesses, every fact may be confirmed. If he refuses to listen to them, tell it to the church. And if he refuses to listen even to the church, let him be to you as a Gentile and a tax collector. Well, we don't have the time to really dig into this in a lot of detail, but there is a duty. In brief, there is a duty that rests upon you. If you know your brothers in sin, Who's supposed to go to the brother? You. All right? I see Dietrich in sin. And on my way to talk to Dietrich, sorry, Dietrich. I was picking on Joe and Jeff too much. But on my way to get to Dietrich, I see Joe. Hey, Joe, come with me. Let's go get Dietrich. Now it's not what? It's not private. It's not private anymore. The egg is what? It's out of the shell. You can't put it back in there. You keep it private. Keep it between the two of you. Go to your brother. Admonish him. Encourage him. Seek to win him over. Then, if that doesn't work, and if it doesn't work, I will say, after repeated attempts, It's in the present tense here. It's not a one and done. Oh, I went to teach, you're gonna listen. Joe, now, now it's time, all right? No, you keep going to your brother until you realize this is getting nowhere, all right? Avoid those extremes. The one and then a no more, no more grace. Or I'm going to go to this guy for the next 18 years of his life and finally I'll bring somebody else. No. You want to be, you want to take care of things, but you want to do it in a gracious and wise way. Go get others. So this is, this is what you're supposed to do. But now, um, Verse 16, if he doesn't listen, or verse 17, if he refuses to listen to them, that is you and the witnesses that you brought with you, if he won't listen to them, now you tell it to what? Now you tell it to the church, and listen, now it's in the church's court. All right? Probably the best way that kind of a thing's gonna work out logistically is you're probably gonna get the pastors involved. if they're not already involved. What I've found over the last 25 plus years is usually, usually I'm involved even if I don't want to be because, you know, I may be one of the first ones having a conversation with somebody, right? And I may be sitting there going, I really wish somebody else would go talk to him. Lord, could you please send someone else to go talk? And, you know, I don't get an audible out of heaven or anything, but it's kind of, You go. Doesn't really come just like that, but you get the point, right? Because I've seen it. I've seen the problem that now obligates me to do what? To address the issue. All right. Um, but when it comes to verse 17, if they won't listen to them, you and the witnesses, now you tell it to the church, right? And now, now you get to wait. Let's move on. So you confront your brother. He doesn't repent. You keep trying, doesn't repent. You take one or two with you, they don't repent. You've done all the duty required of you, at least in that engaging process. You still have the obligation to love him, care for him, pray for him, you know, help him in any way you possibly can. Faithful churchmanship, what do you do now? What do you do when you realize they're not listening, you've told this to the church? Well, what happens sometimes is, if it even gets this far, the person who's been trying to confront the other person is now offended, is now upset, And it's time to do what? It's time to leave. All right. Notice the three things here that characterize faithful churchmanship. This is a wonderful time for faithful churchmanship. Maintain church order, faithfully attend assemblies, primarily pointing to the Lord's Day worship, and attend the means of grace, namely the Lord's Table. The Confession says they ought not disturb any church order. They ought not absent themselves from the assemblies of the church. They ought not absent themselves from the administration of ordinances upon the account of such offense at any of their fellow members. You can imagine the discomfort, the disconnect. You know that a person four rows behind you, you've been having difficult conversations with. They're not listening. Their sin is spreading in the body. Now you're offended. They're offended. People just begin to do what? They just leave. They just leave, all right? What they're supposed to do, though, is to wait. The church proceedings, now, the third thing here, the confession says, but wait upon Christ in the further proceeding of the church. Remember, the church now has the responsibility to deal with this particular matter. And the church may deal with this in a couple of ways. Maybe, maybe you and the witnesses that came with you, let's say you came to the pastors of the church and you laid this before them and they said, thank you, we're going to look into this matter. They look into this matter and they realize there's no sin here. It should never have been brought to this level, right? And they try to backtrack and maybe they get the parties that are involved and they bring them in and say, brother, I know that this brother came to you about this particular thing. We don't see this as a sin. And now you're trying to comfort the one who's been accused. You're trying to calm the one down who thinks it is a sin. And boy, you're trying to bring all these things together. Can you see here how people are gonna start leaving the church? I can. I've been there, all right? But what should happen? What should happen? Wait. Be patient. Trust. Notice the phrasing here. What are they waiting on? Right. You're not waiting on the elders. You're not waiting on the elders to get it together. Who you're waiting on is Christ in the further proceedings of the church. Now let's give another word than waiting. Somebody help me. What's another word than waiting? Trusting. Who are you trusting? You're trusting Christ. We need to have the confidence that Christ loves the church more than we do. And he is working in the church more faithfully than we are. Now, there may be times when elders, those in leadership, totally blow it. And maybe they blow it to the point that someone is offended and treated wrongly. And this is Ryan's department. He's going to get to this down in paragraph 15. where it's going to say things like, verse paragraph 15, in cases of difficulties or differences, either in point of doctrine or administration, wherein either churches in general are concerned, or any one church in their peace, union, edification, or any member or members of any church are injured in and by the proceedings and censures not agreeable to truth and order. Maybe the elders totally blow it, and their handling of the situation is not agreeable to truth and order, and what recourse does an individual member in a church have? This is one of the beauties of having an association. We can appeal to our brothers to help us, to come in and give us advice and to give us counsel. That's not the first quote-unquote line of defense. The first line of defense is just you going to your brother, and then you have your brothers coming with you, and then you have the church coming. And outside the church itself, we do have an association that can come and give us advice and counsel. Now, the association does not have the power, if you look at the end of paragraph 15, it says the association is not entrusted with any church power property so-called. All right? The association is not going to come and usurp authority over the church and tell us what we have to do. All right? But the association does have some type of authority to be able to come in and give us counsel and advice. And again, Ryan will kind of take us through that later on. Okay. That was a lot to say in a few minutes. Questions, comments? I'm sure I probably created more questions than answers, but we've got a couple minutes. Yes, Ruben, please. Yeah, so if we come upon something criminal, like abuse or something like that, we probably have in that a double responsibility. One, we have responsibility to the authorities. We have to turn in someone, like we find out that someone is a molester of children. All right? We have to address that not just as a church. We can't just say, hey, this is a church matter. No, that's a criminal matter. All right? It's a sin, but it's also a crime. Not all sins are crimes. okay, in the sense that someone just does a sin, you know, you harbor an attitude toward your brethren that is one of self-righteousness, or you're pugnacious, you're argumentative, you're always stirring up strife. Not a crime, okay, but it is sin. Does that make sense? So that has to be dealt with in the church. Sexual molestation of children, that's a crime. It has to be turned over to the authorities outside the church, But it's also a sin, and we'd have to deal with that in some sense within the church as well. And probably in that kind of a scenario, we would then have to wait and work with authorities, you know, because then you have issues of jurisprudence, innocent before proven guilty, or you have to wait on the authorities to kind of do certain things or whatever? But it would be a sin also if they're found guilty and that would have to be taken care of. Does that? Yeah, but as an individual, if I realize that, do I go directly to the authorities and then to the imposter to inform them that this could happen? Or do I, this is what I mean is, Right. Don't we have Somebody's going to have to inform me on this. Don't we have in Texas some kind of a, if you know something's going on, you're supposed to be the one that reports. You don't go run around to find out who would report. You go to the authorities. If I know that my neighbor next door is beating up and abusing his wife every night or whatever, beating his children or sexually abusing his children or whatever, I don't go to all the other neighbors' houses and knock on the doors and say, hey, do you know about this? You know, I just have to call. So, yeah. You were building one, right? I think, you know, it depends on what the crime is. I think if you, for example, were to suspect theft or something from the workplace, you might talk to them first. And obviously, there's evidence of that. You know, you have a little bit more breathing room with things like sexual crimes, particularly those dealing with children. in the state of Texas, there is no such thing as a class of people who are mandatory reporters in the sense that all persons are mandatory reporters. I was thinking that was the case. And there are certain regulations. I think, I want to say you have, look it up online, 24 hours or 48 hours. It's a very quick amount of time. And the good thing to remember is you don't, You don't have to yourself do an investigation of it. And you don't have to have proof. All you have to have is have a reasonable suspicion. You report it and give it to someone else who will, and they may come back to you and say, hey, thank you. We looked into this. We didn't find anything. But I would say, the more you're dealing with vulnerable people, Victims, like children, err on the side of speed and just going. But you would do well to familiarize yourself with the laws of your state, not only so that you act accordingly, but so that you yourself don't do anything where you neglect a responsibility. I know one thing Jason and I have talked about is this program called Ministry State. And Sovereign Joint has used them for a while, but not too much. But there are, I want to say, free courses, or it's very cheap for church members to take courses, which parents could take, anyone in the church could take. And it teaches you some of the, they keep things up to date, so they update the laws in your area. In this case, they're from Texas. They teach you other certain kinds of, I think that's a really good point. I don't know about this, but always, if you're in doubt, and if it's a party who is very vulnerable like your child, just go to the authorities and ask for their advice. Obviously, you can call. It doesn't mean you have to immediately drop. You can call Jason, but within a 24-hour period, you want to try to make some calls or something. Well, I was going to say in regard to like call the authorities, you know, we're talking there in a criminal realm, we're talking about authorities outside the church. So you call the police and then they would, they would tell you kind of where to go from there. Gloria and then Jeff. And then we, I don't know if Billy still has something we're going to need to go, but yeah, thank you. I'm entitled to that for me. They can sit with me when I'm making the papo, but because the witness cried out to me, and I am the one legally responsible to make it known to the authorities, and then they will deal with that even if I don't have any evidence. If only the kids tell me my parents are beating me or they're abusing me. Yeah, we've had in the church in the last, you know, I don't know, 10, 20 years, a lot of mistakes made in this area because we're thinking in terms of, like, the authority of the state, the authority of the church, or just, like, these kingdoms, if you will, that are, like, separated so much, and we have nothing to do with this other one. We just do the church stuff over here, and, you know, we do need to recognize authorities that are placed in positions over us by God, though they're not over the church, you know, to do ecclesial type things, they are authorities, and we have to recognize that. And Jeff, you have a quick comment? You want to say something? Yeah. Billy, did you have something in all that? There are certain things that are just not within the power of the church to investigate and to adjudicate. I mean, we had a gentleman in San Angelo that was a long-time member of our church that decided to help basically a recluse in our county with some work around his property. But this man accused our church member of having stolen something. And he called me and he wanted this man put under church discipline and all of this on the site. Sir, if you think a crime has been committed, you have to contact the authorities. I think Matthew 18 is really instructive for this. Our knee-jerk reaction whenever it comes to an offense, whether it's criminal or otherwise, should not be to get the church involved. It should be to deal with ourselves first. So if it's criminal, contact the authorities. If it's not criminal, even if it's ecclesiastical, You still don't want to get the church involved right away. You want to try to deal with it yourself. So the first, like, basically just don't try to dump responsibility on other people. Try to take care of it yourself. So yeah, eventually, if it's a criminal matter, it might. It will probably eventually become a church matter. But it's not principally a church matter yet until it's been investigated and adjudicated by the proper authorities. All right, lots of good discussion there. We need to go ahead and break. Probably other comments and stuff, I'm sure. We're busted here about five minutes. Let's take a quick break here, and we'll go to the restroom, come on back in, and we'll start worship here very shortly. Let's pray. Father, we do bless your name. We do thank you for your word, and we do pray that you would grant us wisdom, wisdom to help us walk through these kinds of things in a way that is honoring to Christ, loving to our brothers, and demonstrates humility on the heart of the one that's going to go and approach the erring one. And we just pray, God, that in all these things, you would guard your name, that you would do all things for your glory, that we would have your glory as the desire of our souls and the good of our brothers as our intention. We thank you, O God, for this time we've had to talk today.