What is Church Discipline?
The concept of church discipline might bring to mind public shaming or heartless rebuke, but the term actually comes from the same term we use for “disciple”. That is, a disciple of any belief system follows the disciplines in that system. Whether is be an athlete who disciplines himself to practice everyday when he doesn’t feel like it or the Christian who seeks to obey everything that Christ has commanded.
With that being said, it is helpful to think of church discipline in three veins.
Formative
This is the kind of discipline most common in the Christian life and involves practices that help to guide the believer. Practices like prayer, fasting, silence, and solitude are often called “spiritual disciplines”.
These are also the kinds of interactions we are called to have everyday with other believers as we love one another in words and in deeds. We talk about the grace of God and point one another to him.
With this kind of discipline, there is the formal aspect of gathering together to learn about our faith and to worship our God together. There is also the informal aspect of calling one another, eating around a table together, and normal everyday conversation.
Corrective
Everyone is on a conformation journey of being made more like Christ. This process of sanctification recognizes that we often don’t do the things we want to do and do the things we don’t want to do. This inner war we wage against the deeds of the flesh is incomplete until the day of Christ’s Return.
We recognize that we always don’t want to get out of bed when the alarm goes off. Or we’d rather cuss someone out than turn the other cheek. But out of our better selves, those that have tasted and seen that the Lord is good, we have pre-emptively seen the need to ask people to help hem our wayward hearts in. Those familiar with the term “accountability groups” recognize that we ask a group of other people to hold us accountable to living a certain life, even when, and especially when, we don’t feel like it. We give them the license “to faithfully warn, rebuke, and admonish us as the case shall require”—as our Church Covenant says.
As with Formative Discipline, there are both formal and informal aspects to Corrective Discipline. The Informal is the conversation we share together and warn or rebuke or admonish in the moment. It is the coffee meeting where someone reminds us that what we are saying or how we are living is not keeping in line with the Gospel. The formalized aspect is what we see in Matthew 18 where Jesus gives a clear process for how we are to restore one another in a spirit of love. As someone does not acquiesce to the informal rebuke of a brother or sister, they are to bring in other witnesses to the hard-heartedness toward obedience. If the brother or sister is still not compliant in following Christ in a way that honors him, the elders of the church are to formally direct the discipline. This looks like giving a pathway toward reconciliation, or removal from areas of service, or prohibition of partaking in the Lord’s Table (so as to not do so in a dishonorable way).
Declarative
If the brother or sister still does not relent and amend his or her ways to follow Jesus (especially as articulated in our Church Covenant), then the elders are to tell it to the Church. This is not something done haphazardly but after much prayer and consideration. This is what is termed “excommunication”—literally, “out of communion”. This is the final step in the process because when the Church removes someone from membership, they are declaring that given the person’s actions, they are not a true Christ-follower. As such, it is a very sober reality that ought to be taken with utmost care.
All three types of Church Discipline have the goal of conformity to Christ-likeness. There is never a point where someone is not able to receive the grace of God as he is ready and willing to be enjoyed by those who repent and believe in Christ’s saving work of salvation and lordship of their lives.
FAQ
How shall we relate to the one excommunicated?
Unfortunately, the practice of shunning has been wedded to the concept of excommunication. When someone is declared an unbeliever by the church, they are to treat the person as an unbeliever. What does that mean? We share the Gospel with the person, remind them of the grace of God, invite them to coffee to talk about their relationship with God. We don’t pretend like that person is in right relationship with God. Instead, as we would do with any unbeliever, we seek to love them in words and in deeds.
