Remove the brother

What binds us together in this building? What do we have in common? Christ. Right? Jesus Christ binds us together – we are part of his body. His family. We call each other brother and sister here because we have been adopted by God the Father through God the son. Is it possible to say you are part of the family, but not live like it? Paul says no – because the Spirit of the Father and the Son will begin to shape you in his image.

 Every organization on the planet is bound together by something. And every club or organization has a way to remove someone if they do not follow the rules of what holds that organization. This is not evil. This is just common sense. Someone that hates golf is not going to be part of the golf club. Someone that despises holiness is not going to be a part of the body of Christ. But this is far more then some club – this is the kingdom heaven manifested on earth! This is the temple in which God himself dwells. This is the body of the living Lord and king of the universe. His work is not just to save us from sin, but to save us to holiness.

That is not to say you will stop sinning. But it does mean you won’t stop repenting when you sin, and turn from that sin. You will fight it. Hate it. Avoid it and flee from it.

Again I ask?  What unifies us? Ethnicity? History? Economic or social class? Or Christ? How you answer that question has a massive impact on church discipline.  If your deepest bond is found in Christ then that means if a person lives in sin, it does not matter what other things they have in common with you, that relationship is broken, and if he or she is unrepentant we ought to remove him.

There are certain passages in scripture which are difficult to hear. We don’t really want to hear them. So rather than admitting that they are difficult to hear, we simply say that they are difficult to interpret.  Today we have such a passage.

Remove the brother

1. Shunning the brother
2. Purging the evil person

Shunning him.

One scholar says, “The intention of Church discipline its intention is not to shut Christians off from the world, but to clarify their standing in the world.” This is why Paul writes in verse 9-10, “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.”

We are called to engage in culture, music, the arts, science, architecture, engineering, law, and education. When we do this, we will encounter those who do not belief. In all these field we will associate with  sexually immoral, greedy, swindling, and idolatrous people. And you will associate with them as co-workers, as colleagues, as friends – but not as brothers and sisters. Never. That is what Paul is saying here. There is going be sinners you associate with, but never sinners you associate with who claim to be brother.

When someone you call a brother or sister lives in habitual unrepentant sin – that is when you cannot associate with that person. verse 11 “But now I am writing to you not to associate with anyone 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.”

Two things that we must remind ourselves of before we move on

1. let’s be perfectly clear Christians sin. We all sin. But we hate it. We fight it. We crucify it. We kill it. what we have before in this chapter is a person that does not care about the sin. Does not live repentant. Who says “I am a Christian but I sleep with my girlfriend, and it doesn’t bother me” I am a Christian, but I am a drunk, and it doesn’t bother me John says, “Whoever says I know him, but does not keep his commandments is a liar and the truth is not in him.”
2. The Church is there to protect you. And if you are separated from the church then you are in great danger. Everyone knows when there is a weak bokkie alone that is close to a pride of lions on the hunt, that bokkie is in great danger. Or a sheep that is alone among wolves. It is dangerous to be separated from the fellowship of the church. But its just as dangerous to let a crippling disease among the flock, that makes all of them weak. This is not just about the person it is about the church as well.

This whole chapter, but particularly this last part doesn’t really sit well with our 21st century sensibilities. It just appears unloving. The language in this chapter is confronting: ‘hand him over to Satan’; ‘cleanse yourselves [of this person]’; ‘judge those inside’; ‘purge the evil person’. Where is love, grace and mercy? Aren’t we all sinners? How can we pass judgment like this on others? 

Not only does it not sound loving, but it also seems ineffective? This is often the accusation that is leveled at church discipline. Its so ineffective. We drive people away. And anyways, Even if we do ask a person like this to leave our fellowship, what is to stop them from driving down the road to another church? Maybe in 1st century Corinth where there was one church this was possible. But now they will just go to another church.

When in church leadership you will hear this accusation at some point: What you are doing is unloving and ineffective. And the leadership always need to look in the mirror first to see if the charges are true. But at the end of the day what looks to the world like unloving and ineffective is not how we judge what we do. Let’s see how Paul would address this accusation.

First of all, it is important to note, Paul speaks not about someone who is marked by one or more of these behaviors so that they can actually be labelled ‘a greedy person’ or a ‘drunkard’. He is known as such a person. That is, they engage in habitual, systemic, unrepentant sinful behavior. This person lives in two competing worlds. in two worlds.

Paul tells us that we are “Not even to eat with such a one.” The fact that he says even to eat with tells us he was probably thinking of a private meal. In the ancient near east a private meal would have been a sign of intimate fellowship. Sharing a meal was one of the closest forms of fellowship. What does this mean for today? Well, it means breaking off the relationship that you had with that person before. It means there is a fundamental difference between you, that makes hanging out awkward at times. They know and you know they do not belong.

After a person has been excommunicated, The relationship is going to look very different now than when he is a brother. The communities in the early church loved each other and depended heavily on each other. They were constantly sharing meals. Now suddenly that all stopped. Imagine that. This sounds unbelievable to our hears. I admit even my own. But it is difficult to get around the exegesis. The Greek is pretty simple here. And it is full of Old Testament echoes. It reminds one of being removed outside the camp for uncleanness. This is what would happen when someone had leprosy they would be put outside the camp. Removed from fellowship.

How would that person feel? Alone. And they would come to realize just how much they were missing.  

When Paul earlier had said that he should be delivered to Satan, he is here giving the practical outworking’s of that. Hell is the place where Satan rules. Let him experience hell so that he might want nothing more than to return.

So the question is, is it loving and effective to do this?

Yes and yes.

yes, it is loving. What we often miss it is not just love for the adulterer but also love for Christ and his church. We assume that the best thing for them is to keep the relationship open and not to let too much change.. So, we encourage their Christian friends to keep meeting up with them without rebuking them.  Not only, as we have seen, does this go against what Paul says, it also overlooks the destructive, corrupting influence such a person can have on others. To welcome a ‘brother or sister’ who is living in unrepentant sin and to encourage other Christians to befriend and associate with them, is a naïve and dangerous course of action according to Paul. It also denies the reality of their character as holy pure in Christ (5:7). You see Paul is not just worried about love for the person, he is driven by love of Christ, which also includes a love for the body of Christ.

This brings us to the question whether it is ineffective. When you look at the whole picture no. If only one person can corrupt the whole body, then for the sake of the body fellowship must be broken. So, removing sin is always effective in preserving the church. Will it always be effective in saving the soul. No, and even Paul admits that, he says, “So that his spirit may be saved on the day of the Lord.” The may there is in the subjunctive mood which means that it is possible but not definite.

Therefore, because it is the most loving, and effective course of action the church is called to make a judgement and purge the evil.

Purging the evil

Verse 12 says, “For what have I to do with judging outsiders? Is it not those inside the church whom we are to judge?” The Bible says, “judgement begins with the household of God.” Indeed, through church discipline God’s judgement as in a sense already begun in the church. He has given the keys of the kingdom to the church to exercise over those in the church.  The church as no authority over those who are outside of Christ. The problem often is that the church is too busy judging the world for all their sins, it rarely takes a good long hard look at uprooting sin within. But notice Paul is not worried about the person outside the church – but the man who claims to be a brother or sister. He expects the world to go from bad to worse.  

This might have been the problem in the Corinthian church as well. They were looking out at the world and constantly commenting on how bad it was out there, giving themselves a sense of superiority. Remember one of the biggest problems with the church was pride. Paul is saying, “stop judging the world, unless regenerated by the Spirit of God they are incapable of pleasing God. You however are different, and it’s time to take that difference seriously. It is those inside the church those are the people you are to judge.” As he says, “God judges those outside.

Then he goes on and says, “Purge the evil person from among you.” Paul is using strong language here, especially when taking into consideration the Old Testament background. In fact, the phrase Paul uses here comes up quite a few times in Deuteronomy in the Greek Old Testament, in 13:5; 17:7; 19:19; 21:21; 22:21, 22, 24; 24:7 (cf. Judges 20:13).. In each of these passages it is the same word being used, often in reference to the death penalty

He is building on the Old Testament where the people of God removed certain offenders as an exercise of corporate responsibility, in order to avoid impending judgment and to protect the shalom – or peace - of the community before God. The Law was given for the holiness of the people, and in the OT, the primary way in which certain unrepentant sins were dealt with in the nation of Israel was by capital punishment. Thus, the phrase, “Purge the evil person from among you,” used by Paul in 1 Corinthians 5:13, is cited in reference to death as it pertains to its OT context. This makes sense also in this context, they are being handed over from the place of spiritual life in Christ to spiritual death in the world, from belonging to Christ to being handed over to Satan. This is a foreshadowing of what will happen if they do not repent.

As one theologian said, “Excommunication is thus an outward or formal recognition of an inward reality, namely, the fact that the heretic is no longer oriented to the way, the truth, and the life.”

Allow me to end with a few concluding comments.

1. We must take holiness in Christ seriously. This is not a club – but the church of the living God, the pillar and foundation of truth. Are you pursuing Christ is all of life. Is the conviction of the Holy Spirit yours?
2. Sin should be dealt with firmly. This is the only way to love another person who is unrepentant. If a two-year-old child refuses to listen, and continues to do something he is not supposed to do despite repeated warning, then it would be silly to say, “Don’t worry about it, we just love you anyways.” NO! You say I love you therefore I will take further discipline so that you might learn the way of obedience.
3. This is clear and blatant sin. I hope we can all agree with that. Most cases are not so clear cut. When blatant sin is confirmed, Christians must lovingly and very firmly judge Christians. But in most situations, we must be very slow to judge, exercising great care and restraint. Our sinful flesh has a hair-trigger to judge others. We must have a healthy suspicion of our own pride and keep Jesus’s words ringing in our ears: “be slow to judge”.
4. Remember we always think about the person undergoing church discipline and we should. But let’s not lose sight that church discipline is for the protection of the other members, for the witness of the church, for the sake of the name of our Lord Jesus Christ. Church discipline reaches far beyond the person.
5. Let’s love each other in Christ. let’s love each other to Christ. Let’s be confessing, sin, and fighting sin together. Shoulder to Shoulder. At the end of the day, we are still the church militant. Fighting. Day by day. And sin does not die by hiding it, but by confessing sin. So if you think you can take care of your own sin today. Stop it. You need the body. We will love you. Wherever there is a humility to confess, a desire to repent and a willingness to fight.  God will bless it.

Amen