Correcting Sinners and Tax Collectors
If your brother or sister sins, go and point out their fault, just between the two of you. If they listen to you, you have won them over. But if they will not listen, take one or two others along, so that ‘every matter may be established by the testimony of two or three witnesses.’ If they still refuse to listen, tell it to the church; and if they refuse to listen even to the church, treat them as you would a pagan or a tax collector.
Matthew 18:15–17 NIV Read More
The whole point of of this section isn’t to get the sinners out of the church but to get the sin out of the Church. Look at how relational all of this exchange is:
- Point out their fault
- Between the two of you
- Won them over
- Take one or two others along as witnesses
- Tell it to the Church body (3rd to last step)
- Let the Church body correct them
- Treat them like an outsider
Conflict isn’t about busting somebody or gossiping, it’s about winning them over to seek and follow Christ with all of their hearts. Pointing out faults is more about love for the person than anger about what they did. When we care more about people than we do the things they do, we are acting like Christ as He spoke to the woman at the well in Samaria. We are acting like Christ when He wouldn’t stone the woman caught in adultery. Caring about people’s souls more than their sins is where this gloriously deep kind of relationship thrives.
A movie that was great at the time but is now cheesy is the Matthew movie where the script is the Gospel of Matthew from the NIV. At this part, when Jesus says “Tax Collector!” all of the disciples, like rowdy teen-age brothers (which they were, mostly) pounce on Matthew the tax collector. Take this context of Jesus’ whole life. He loved tax collectors and pagans, but He knew it would take some steps to get them to follow Him. Not as many steps as it would take a Pharisee, but He’s not telling you to stone them.
We need to point out one another’s sin if we are ever going to fulfill proverbs like:
As iron sharpens iron, so one person sharpens another. —Proverbs 27:17
But we need to know when we are pointing out sin or just pointing out character flaws that get on our nerves. Keeping it more about our relationship in Christ than our actions will help us keep towards that essential truth.
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