Amen. Let's stand for the reading of God's Word. Our primary text for today will be Matthew

Chapter 18, Matthew Chapter 18, verses 18, or I'm sorry, verses 15 through 17. I'll read the text in

its entirety. When I finish reading the text, I'm going to say, this is the Word of the Lord,

at which point I would appreciate very much if you would respond by saying thanks be to God. Again, our text is Matthew chapter 18, verses 15 through 17. The Bible says this.

If your brother sins against you, go and tell him his fault between you and him alone. If he

listens, you have gained your brother. But if he does not listen, take one or two others with you

that every charge may be established

by the evidence of two or three witnesses if he refuses to listen to them tell it to the church

if he refuses to listen even to the church let him be to you as a gentile and a tax collector

this is the word of God all, please be seated and we will

begin. Today we are addressing the topic of church membership and what we've done if you're

joining us for the first time, we typically, the steady diet more often than not here at Covenant

Bible Church when it comes to the preaching is expository

preaching through whole books of the Bible. And so we recently have preached through the book of

Joshua and then we follow that up with the book of Ezra. And then Lord willing, next week we're going to

start in the book of Matthew. So we did Joshua, we did Ezra, and we're going to start the book of Matthew next Lord's Day.

But we've taken a little bit of a break in between the completion of Ezra and the beginning of Matthew next week

to talk about church polity, polity simply meaning governance.

How is the church governed?

What are the offices that make up the local church? And so we've discussed three primary offices within the local church, that being elders, deacons, and church members. Two of these offices

being ordained offices of the church, that being elders and deacons,

offices of leadership to varying degrees, elders being a higher office, deacons being a lower office

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