Rebecca e-mails into asking a question about church discipline.

She writes, in regards to Matthew 18, 15 to 20, I'm wondering what I as a Christian

am responsible to do biblically when a fellow believers living in sexual sin and chooses

to continue after they have been confronted in a loving way.

Pastor John, what would you say?

The practical answer here really does depend on whether Rebecca and the person she's concerned

about, maybe a friend who's sleeping with a boyfriend, I don't know what her situation

is, but let's just say something like that, whether those two people are in a biblically

faithful church, that is a church that considers the Bible as their standard of faith and practice.

And if they are, the answer is, or should be, yes, excommunication can and maybe should

happen.

And of course, she's referring to Matthew 18, and it might be helpful just to walk through

the steps so that everybody has in view, because they're short and they're clear.

Here's what happens in real relationships in a church from time to time, step one,

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

If he listens to you, you have gained your brother.

So step one, you find someone in sin and you go to them.

You don't want to make a public issue out of it, you're not eager to drag everybody's

private sins into the public, you know you've got your own issues, you're taking the

log out of your own eye before you take the spec out of anybody else's, but once you've

done all that appropriate self-assessment and humbled yourself before God and declared

your own dependence on grace alone, then you do go.

...