We Must Faithfully Practice Corrective Church Discipline

Where we're going to look at Hopefully some insights and exhortations on While we must practice corrective discipline in the church. But first a word about Jason Johns. He uh and I talked I guess during Jason or right before you did your study break. your reading break and you told me Well, I'm diving into this.

Now that wasn't new for Jason. His heart was centered on that truth and that doctrine. But do we not spend our entire ministry refreshing and renewing and redeepening the basic doctrines of the faith that we need to stand on? And so when he told me. Pastor, this is just gripping me, and this is just.

I needed to study this afresh. I taught a session years ago at the True Church Conference on the doctrine of sin. It did the same thing to me. But right when he said that, I said You're going to preach that at the conference next year, because I could just tell that was what we needed. If you look at our ministry, I'll be 45 years here in May.

One of the foundational pillars was many years ago. When I begin to very intentionally preach. on the sinful depravity of man in a weighty way. And here's what happens, Pastor Jason. I know you've probably seen this.

You preach those kind of sermons. And Satan jumps up on your chest at night and screams in your face and says, It's not working. Your people are down, your people are discouraged, that kind of beats them up. Not if they're regenerate. What happens if they're regenerate?

True believers. They have what I call a crushing joy. The weight of that truth crushes, but the glory of Jesus that saves me, even though I am what I am, is a deep joy. And we ought to be careful of building joyous Christians who don't know why they ought to be joyous. And you nailed that.

Didn't Jason do a good job for us? Praise the Lord. Good word. I wasn't in here, but I heard most of it. I'm going to hear all of it later.

Dealing with a little bit of issue of some things, and so I get a little tired at times, but I'm going to be fine. But we're dealing with discipline this morning, and it's kind of a twin pillar to what we talked about yesterday morning. counseling seekers and making sure Without going overboard and staying in biblical balance, but making sure we have a regenerate church membership. But I don't care how good you do at that and how thorough you are, and some of you are too obsessed about it. We talked about that.

You've gotten out of balance. You came out of easy believism. And then you got a. into the ditch of obsessive uh analysis, morbid introspection. And you don't need to do that either because there's going to be some folks who come into your church that don't know Christ.

Actually, they never come into your church. They just come into the congregation. You can't be a part of the church if you're not genuinely saved. And that's why God gave us such clear principles to deal with those kinds of folks. Always lovingly, always humbly, always trying to shepherd them to the truth.

But sometimes they have to be removed because they will not honor the teaching of Scripture. And so, I want to tell you some things today, and some of this will not be new for you if you're in my classes. In the Pastoral Training Institute. We looked at this for quite some time, probably about three hours of lecture. But I'm going to get it done in three and a half this morning, all right?

So we'll do that. Um No, we won't do that. We're not having our QA, right, Brother Steve? We're encouraging our men to take care of the babies so all the women can go to their QA time, all right? But anyway, as we talk about corrective church discipline, My pilgrimage here, and by the way, what I'm teaching you, I gleaned from all over.

Don't tell Dr. Seal because he's always saying you need to footnote all this stuff. And well, I didn't know I was going to print it ever. You know, just you glean things, you put things together, and then I noblicize it. You know, I take my own experience and understanding and learning and change it all up.

Anyway, We started here at Grace Life Church, and I was a. Um Almost, well, I was a paradox in some ways, not really realizing that I was, because on the one hand, I inherited all of these man-centered cultures. Quick fix, hoop, jump systems to make the church happening and going and exciting. Alongside that, at the same time, I began to institute Reformed ideas, biblically reforming things. And Brother Jono, you and I talked during those days, and we started doing church discipline.

So, over here, we're flooding the church with people who hadn't had good counseling about their conversion and their salvation. We're flooding them into the church because they raised their hand at a revival or something. And then, on the other hand, we're removing. the great majority of them within the next two or three years for discipline. And so here's what I'm telling you.

All of scripture truth is important. You can't leave one aspect out. Because What happened was church discipline made me deal with the doctrine of conversion. It made me deal with the steps to receive new members into the church. As has been said many times, I realized, and you got to understand, this is approaching 40 years ago.

And there wasn't the emphasis in the Christian culture in America like there is today on some of these points. Yeah. I told Mark Dever one time when Mark first went to Capitol Hills Baptist Church. And before he started Nine Marks Ministries, he asked to meet with me. We met.

He knew something of our ministry. And he told me about the nine marks of a healthy church. I thought, that's a good way to organize it. Y'all familiar with Mark Dever, Nine Marks of a Healthy Church. And I thought, that's a good way to organize it.

I like nine marks. Hey, he mentioned that. And I said, Mark, we were nine marks before we knew there were nine marks. And just because it's just biblical. And we begin to wrestle with the fact that we're out of balance here.

And so, slowly, over a couple of decades or so. We begin to remove or reform this. Easy believism, man-centered, mildly biblical stuff, and to put in place a more thorough biblical approach to ministry.

Now, you never get finished, you never get done, but what I'm teaching to you has a lot of shoe leather in it. Actually, 40 years, right? At 40 years that we, in some form or fashion, maybe a little less than that. have been putting these truths into shoe leather.

So all of the naysayers Who would deny the word of God? All the so-called biblical authorities and lead pastors and denominational officials who told me to my face, Brother John. Oh, that won't work.

Well, we're going on 45 years now. And here's what I'm going to tell you. I want you to have at 66 what I have. A healthy church. And I don't have to go lay my head on the pillow at night and wonder.

How cool can I be at 66 to keep people interested and excited? Have you seen these guys? They get old like me and they try to be cool. Here's what I'm going to say. It ain't working.

But if they come and they love you, and listen to me. Because you've taught them to love Jesus. They'll love you all the way through to the end. And boy, I've had a loving, gracious, kind, long-suffering core of people who literally let me grow up here. I literally grew up as a man, as a pastor.

Blunders, failures, immaturities, pride. Had to repent a lot. I didn't embezzle money or cheat on my wife. I'm not saying that, but I mean just blunders and difficulties. And Brother Donnie, you just repent, do the best you can and go on.

Try to be a better leader next week. Amen. And by the way, if you don't grow you up a good pastor, then you'll just get another bad one. And have to start over, so you might as well stick with the guy you got, but get on your knees. And pray for that pastor.

Say, God, I'm going to follow him and honor him and submit to him and obey him and love him. New Testament tells you to do that.

So you keep him right. I'm going to do those things so you keep him right. You go back to your church and tell them Jeff Knollt told us to do that for our pastor.

Well, better than that, Apostle Paul. Told us to be that way in our path.

Okay, I'm chasing some rabbits, but here's what I'm gonna tell you. This has been a journey for us. But I think I'm giving you some concrete things and some things that really resonated in my heart from the Word of God. First of all, just to get this started.

So, Roman 1 and our practical teaching outline, the reason for church discipline. Do all of y'all have the outline? Does anybody need an outline?

Okay, we have a few people. Do I have outline give or outers anywhere? Give them just a minute. They'll start walking down the aisle and you raise your hand up and they'll give you one, all right? The reasons for church disciples, first of all, is ownership.

This just so resonated with my soul early on as a Christian as I was converted right at age, well, right before, I guess, no, right at age 19. and started visiting Baptist churches in I was really disillusioned in what I saw and what I observed. And Thought um It's like they own this thing, like it's their church. Like we have this privilege to. Change the church up according to our own personal preferences or what we think will be effective.

But we have to remember something. It's not your church. It's not my church. It's not the deacon's church. It's not the elders' church.

It's not even the women's missionary union's church. It's Christ's church. It's his bride. Amen. Very quickly he bought it with his own blood.

I'd say it's his then. He says it's my body. And a body always does what the head tells it to do.

Well, there could be some exceptions to that actually.

Sometimes your body does stuff and your head just got to go along with it. But you know what I mean. The principle is the head's the head of the body. Thirdly, it's his bride and he's the groom. He's head over his brother.

She's to submit to him. And then in Matthew 16, he says, he builds the church upon this rock, talking of Peter's confession, I will build my church. As Dr. Adrian Rogers said years ago, he did not say he would build your church or you would build his church. He said, I will build my church.

Now we get in on it with him.

So it's ownership. We had a group come through here years ago, dear, dear brother up in Tennessee, and goodness, this is twenty five, thirty years ago, I don't know how long, long time ago. And I looked out in the congregation that Sunday morning, and there was this group of folks sitting there, and as they left the church, he introduced himself. And said, Brother Jeff, we came to kind of look at you guys and learn from y'all because we're about to start a church, and we're going to start a contemporary church. I said, well, we're trying to build one that looks 2,000 years old.

And he kind of looked at me funny, and it pricked his interest. He began listening to our preaching. uh back then on I guess on the radio and and some cassettes. and God brought him to Reformed doctrinal position. And y'all remember this story because to me, it's one of the funniest stories.

Because if you saw this guy, he's a great guy. He fits this, he would be the perfect guy for what I'm about to describe. They used to do Brother John O a spook house at Halloween. And you know that spook house evangelism, I call it. And they get all these people in there and scare them to death.

They'd leave them in a sinner's prayer and call them all saved. That's silly, blasphemous nonsense that has been done in the name of Christianity. But brother Ricky's job was the chainsaw guy. And he cranked that chainsaw up and he'd chase all pillar around the building and get them scared to death, then cuddle them all up somewhere and give them about a three-minute gospel presentation and declare them all converted. And here's what he said after listening to our preaching for a while.

He said, Brother Jeff, I used to go around with a chainsaw at the spook house trying to get people saved, and all along it's the gospel that saves people.

So, my point is, we don't have the right to do the stuff the Bible doesn't sanction. Command. And it's not that The methods do say something about the message. Why don't we just say stay with the old method? Preach the word in season.

and out of season. Faithfully present the gospel and share it.

Well It's not your church.

So the premier motive. For what you do in quote, designing or shaping or structuring your church, the premier motive must be the glory of God. He bought it, it's his body, it's his bride, he will build it, it must reflect him, it must make a statement of him. His character, his virtue, his principles, his righteousness.

Well, the second word, not just ownership, that's got to grab you. You don't get to do what you want in the church, you do what he wants in his church. Is the word stewardship? I have 12 things here that I've gleaned from others and from myself. 12 things of our responsibility.

as stewards of someone else's property. Number one. We faithfully practice corrective discipline because it glorifies God by obedience to his instruction. 2 Corinthians 2.9, for to this end also I wrote.

So that I might put you to the test whether you are obedient in all things. To the local church at Corinth, he said, I'm testing to see if you're going to obey all that God wants you to do in the church.

Now, if you know anything about the church at Corinth and ancient Corinth, they were a long way from obedience. But Paul said, That's what's what we're striving for. That's what we're headed for. Paul wrote to the Romans, and he makes this little statement about the Roman church. He said, The report of your obedience has reached to all.

Secondly. The second Purpose under our stewardship is to sanctify the Lord's Supper. 1 Corinthians 11:27 says, You're not to eat or partake of the supper in an unworthy manner. An unworthy manner.

Now, he didn't say you can't partake of it if you're an unworthy person. All of us are unworthy persons. But if you have unrepented of sin, You're not to take the Lord's Supper, then you're taking it in an unworthy manner, and you're guilty. the body and the blood of Christ.

So church discipline is necessary because if a brother or sister is embraced and open unrepented of sin, and you just open the doors on the days you take the Lord's table, they're dishonoring the Lord and corrupting the Lord's Supper.

So we must faithfully practice corrective discipline to Sanctify the Lord's Supper. that is, those with unhumbled, unrepentant hearts. who are harboring sin should not be allowed to participate. And of course, that's a statement of their standing in the church. It's in a sense, and I know some churches who settle their discipline cases before the Lord's table every time they take it, and I think that's a proper thing to do.

We don't do it exactly that way, but that's a good way to do it. Thirdly, we practice corrective church discipline as faithful stewards of someone else's property to purify the spirit and the message of the church. Paul writes to the Corinthians when a man in the church was involved in public, open, scandalous immoralities. And he said, man, this guy's behavior is not even known or not even practiced among the Gentiles. In other words, a little leaven is leavening the whole lump there.

He says that in 1 Corinthians 5, 6. And you're ruining the testimony of Christ. You're ruining the truth of who Christ is. In effect, you're announcing to the community that our Christ is a God, is a Savior, who promotes gross, scandalous immorality. That's exactly what we do if we do not purpose to practice corrective discipline.

Number four, we need to practice corrective discipline as stewards of God's property to deny Satan any advantage in the church. 2 Corinthians 2:11, Paul talks of Satan's schemes, his scheme to get in and corrupt. Bring, listen to me, bring sin into the church that it might multiply and metastasize in the church. You've got to keep that from happening.

Now, the challenge is, you'll go to a congregation that hasn't had hardly any. Matter of fact, when I began as a young pastor, I had never heard of church discipline. Never. Never seen it, never heard of anyone practicing it.

So it was radically new. The average Baptist congregation in the South. Has sin that is multiplying and metastasizing. And if a faithful pastor comes in there and tries to move in that direction, it is going to be a very difficult challenge. crisis.

But what are you going to do? You're going to go take that church and then compromise like the last three or four pastors did? Are you going to try with humility but with sternness and firmness to try to build the church back so it will be the church Christ called it to be? Because again, it's not yours. It's his.

You're just the steward of another man's property. There's a lot to say about that, but what I like to tell young guys when they go out to pastor, well, you've got a congregation now.

Now you've got to preach the word and the power of the spirit, purpose to implement solid biblical reforms.

So out of that congregation, you might find a church in there somewhere. That's really what it is. Brett, is not what it is? You keep preaching until you find the ones who really want the truth. And you'll find out a lot of them really don't want you.

They'll say you're the problem. Ephesians 4, the Apostle Paul talks about not giving the devil an opportunity. Because you're not dealing with sin.

Now, let me say this, and I'll try to throw things because I'm having to condense things. I mean, so many of these points could have a whole sermon behind them. And if you and I were talking about a discipline issue in your church, we would spend hours probably talking about some things.

So I'm just gleaning through quickly. But. Oh, I'll get to that later. Number five. We want to be good stewards because By practicing corrective discipline, it proves that we love and that we care.

Brothers and sisters, if the wages of sin is death, If you lovingly, humbly, but often firmly, and maybe with rebuke, if necessary, help a brother get out of a sin or a sister get out of a pattern of sin, you're saving their lives. The wages of sin is death. It may bring death to their marriage if they don't repent. It may bring death to their emotional health. It can bring death to their physical body.

It can bring death to the relationship with your children. Associates. It just multiplies death when there's open unrepentant of sin.

Now, by the way, we don't discipline for sin. If so, everybody gets disciplined next Sunday. We discipline for refusing to repent of sin. When you got saved, you didn't just repent. When you got saved, you became a repenter.

That's what marks you now. And discipline can happen a thousand times a week. One brother says to another brother, they love each other. Hey, brother, I. You don't need to have that attitude now, man.

That's not good.

Okay, you're right. That's church discipline. Amen? That's what we do. Iron sharpens iron.

Now be careful. We have a few people that think they're the anointed corrector in the church. Yeah. We'll talk a little more about that in a moment. If you love somebody, you don't want them to allow sin to destroy them.

And that's why, pastors, Brother Jason, that's why we preach strong. about the weightiness of sin. Not just the imminent and most important issue of it Offends a holy God. That's foundational. That's absolute, but it's going to destroy them.

Number six, we want to be good stewards of this property, this church we're under shepherds of. By correcting Unrepented of sin to deter others from sin. Here's the context of an elder. The text literally says who continues in sin. I'm glad that's in there because if an elder had to be dismissed every time he sinned, there wouldn't be any elders left.

But if somebody's dealt, no, we're not talking about public scandals, okay? We're talking about. The sins we all wrestle with or struggle with. If the elder has maybe an anger problem, for example, and the other elders have talked to him a time or two and he just continues on, then there's a place when you actually bring the elder before the church and correct him. And if that doesn't work, then he can be removed from office.

But the point is, he said if you bring it before the church And correct him, 1 Timothy 5, 20. uh that the others might be fearful of sinning. I remember some of the first times we practiced discipline here. It's been, like I say, many years ago. And people would say, well, what about me?

They gonna do me next? Maybe. Here's what they're saying. We're fearful now of sinning. Good.

Sin will ruin you. Sin will destroy you. Sin will crush you. And sin dishonors the reputation of Jesus. I, as the pastor, need to know that if I sin enough, I could be called out publicly.

Such a good thing! You ever raised children? And spanked one? And the other two look at each other and think, I don't want that to happen to me. The rest are fearful.

of sinning. This isn't complicated stuff, is it? But what happens if weeks and months and years and decades and decades go by? Can we scarcely say a century or two maybe has gone by, and churches just don't practice any discipline? then nobody's fearful of nothing.

You become the United Methodist Church.

Well, the most vile wickedness in the land is promoted from the pulpit. Do you know the history of the Methodist Church? They were the guys that held the standard of holiness. In Europe and in the early 13 colonies.

Now, I like the Calvinistic wing, of course, better than the John Wesley wing, but I appreciate John Wesley's conviction. At least he told everybody you're sinners and you must be born again. You better come to Jesus and get rid of your Anglican baptism. They built the Methodist church off the unsaved people in the Anglican church. We um This was so true in the first few years of purposing to practice discipline because none of us had seen it before.

So you've got people sitting out there that thought.

Okay, it's in the Bible. The pastor is very thorough about that part of it, but I've never seen this. What's going to come of this? And so somebody would be removed publicly from our fellowship, and the next three to five weeks. The church is just kind of in a down mode.

kind of down and A little depressing maybe? Little dispirited? And Satan would come up and jump on my chest and say, see, it don't work. All those people write, it won't work. But you see, what was happening is God's true children were being very introspective.

And very humbled. And they were thinking on it. Matter of fact, in those early years, some of y'all remember this. I remember two distinct times we had services where for a couple of hours people stood weeping and confessing and repenting of sin. It brought revival.

But you've got to go through some down days. Actually, they weren't down. We just didn't know how the Spirit worked.

Some of the greatest works of the Spirit aren't Hallelujah and Run the Isle and Shouting and whatever. I'm not saying God can't do that. Matter of fact, I'd like the reformed guys to get a little bit of that. But Some of the greatest works of the Spirit when people are quiet. contemplative.

Well. Number seven. Another Purpose. Reason for church discipline: it destroys fleshly lust in a believer. After this boy was turned out, our Paul was saying, if you will turn him out of the church there at Corinth, a young man in open, scandalous sin is the context.

He said This will be an avenue where we can destroy, Satan can destroy his flesh that his spirit may be saved, or soul may be saved in the day of the Lord Jesus.

So it has an effect to bring them to shame. In the old days, early Baptists would talk about shaming someone because that's what the Bible teaches. In 1 Corinthians 5:11, you're not to associate with any so-called brother. If he's an immoral person, covetous, or an idolater, or reviler, or a drunkard, or swindler, do not even eat with such a one. That's shaming.

His point is, if y'all have come to the conclusion He's in repetitive open sin, and you've come to the point of removal, and then three or four of you keep hanging out with him and going to eat with him like it's no big deal, then it's not going to have the effect God meant for the discipline to have. You're working against God, bringing him to repentance and restoration. Doesn't mean you're not kind to the brother you see him, but you're always appealing to him in loving humility that he needs to deal with his sin. Number nine, to protect scripture or doctrine from perversion and error. Titus chapter one is very clear about this, to correct our I think the phrase literally in the New American Center is to guard sound doctrine.

And it was quite amazing to me when I preached through 1st and 2 Timothy and Titus. How repetitive Paul was. Chapter after chapter to say, Watch false teachers, correct false teachers, refuse false teachers, get rid of false teachers.

So there's a time when somebody rises up in the church and they're spouting off a false doctrine. We've never lived in a day, I don't think, in the history of the church where there's more stuff written out there. And somebody perhaps with good motives in the church reads somebody's book. And then they come into the church and got a, and feel it's a calling or an edict from God that they take the conclusions of this guy and his book and bring it to bear on their local church. I see it all the time.

And it's uh there's a point in time And sometimes they may have a point on a secondary issue. But you don't get to build the church around your little niche. Around your little last book you read. You know, we had the the home school Nazis. And then we had the family integrated group.

And there's some godly people that we have a lot of homeschoolers here who are godly people, but they don't think the church should be built around homeschooling. And they don't think they're superior because they are homeschooling. The moment they do, we'll get rid of them. It's amazing how many godly people we've had. He went to public schooling.

That doesn't mean that's for everybody. I support both and because the scripture doesn't give me an absolute there. Amen? But some people come in and try to make absolutes out of these things. Then there's a point when you have to say, look, you're out of balance.

And the elders have to say, if you continue on, this is divisive. And quite frankly, it's arrogant. Because you don't have enough scriptural authority. Matter of fact, Paul refers to Greek tutors as he's talking about what the law does for us. I don't think he would use an evil system if it was inherently evil as an illustration for a biblical truth.

I don't want to chase that rabbit too far, but nevertheless, to say you've got to guard against sound doctrine. There's a time to correct somebody who's espousing doctrine that undermines the sound doctrine of the church. Number 10, to shame a brother to repentance. This is really just a tag onto number eight, if you will. But again, 2 Thessalonians 3:14, do not associate with him so he may be put to shame.

You put them out that he might be brought to his senses, if you will. Um Several years ago, we had a man who had something of an addiction problem. A drunkard. He had done quite well, but he fell back into drunkenness one day, and he ended up in South Alabama in a hotel. A roach-infested old hotel.

And we found out about it and began to communicate with him. We love you. We assure you we love you. We want you back at Grace Life. But you can't keep on willfully indulging in alcohol and staying in this drunken stupor.

We need you to repent and come back home. And he refused us, and he refused us. And finally, we sent him the letter that said, We've set a date. We're bringing your case before the church, asking the church to remove you from membership for the willful pattern of drunkenness. We hope we don't have to do this.

And he told me point blank, he said, when I got that letter. that I was being dismissed. I knew I was loved. And it was worth getting this right. He came back to our church.

He publicly repented, became a councilman on the city council in Florence, Alabama. It helps a person realize what they need to do. You have to break out. Of their sin, and there's a shaming element to bringing them before the church that helps God perform that, or God uses that to perform that. We don't really help God with anything, but we do work alongside God.

We're on mission with God. Verse 11: number 11: to restore repentant believers. That's a glorious one. You who are spiritual, restore such a one, Galatians 6:1 advises us. In Matthew 18, when Jesus gave those steps that we refer to so often, if a brother sins and you go and rebuke him and he receives your word and he repents of his sin, you have won your brother.

You've brought him back home. Um One of the very first public sinful issues we dealt with here. A men's Sunday school class, small group we call them, came to me and they said, Pastor, we've got a man in our class who's moved out of his home. He's even moved his furniture and stuff into this house with a woman he's not married to. It's not real known publicly, except in that little community so far.

But we're trying to reach out to them. And I said, well, let's try some more. And they tried some more, very lovingly, told him, you know, as a child of God, you can't openly live in adultery.

Now this may shock you. No, it won't shock you, but that was not that unheard of. that folks on the church roll just do stuff like that nothing ever happens. And um finally a few more weeks went by and Those men again met with me and said, We need to do something. I said, You're exactly right.

They said, Here's what we're going to do: we're going to take our trucks. And we're going to go to his house. And we're going to say, look, we know you're weak, we understand. We don't think we want to come to the spirit of humility. We could fail too.

We'll load your stuff up. We'll get it out of this woman's house. We will take it back to your house if you're too weak to do it yourself. Let us help you. And he would not repent.

So the next week we brought him before the church and he was removed for his refusal to repent. Here's what I'd like to say to my church. If somebody shows us they're at least trying, we're going to work with them. If you're at least trying to fight. We're going to put our arms around you in love.

And try to shepherd you out of it. But he wouldn't do that. He was never um boisterous or harsh in his tone, but he just wouldn't do it. About two years from that, and I was a young pastor at that time. Very insecure.

I hadn't seen these kind of things done. I didn't know what was going to happen. He called me. Told my secretary that he wanted to have an appointment with me.

Now, here's how crazy I am. I thought he's going to come in here with a gun and shoot me. You ever thought that, Brother John? No, I don't know.

Well, Dr. Sim Sim did have a deacon pull a gun on him one time. And he's still here, by the way. Didn't kill him. But um Okay.

It did happen. But he didn't. He walked back there in my office and he was very humble. and very kind, and he said, Pastor, I've sinned. I've ruined a marriage.

But I've repented. And when I got the information, the certified letter that y'all had removed me. It broke me. I'm back right with God. I can't unscramble these eggs.

My new wife and I are in a church. We've confessed it to them. We're trying to serve the Lord. Then he said, Pastor, would you allow me to stand before Grace Life Church and thank them for disciplining me? Because it got me back to God.

That was a real turning point for us because once the flock saw that, it was like God's word works. God's work works.

So it's to bring sinners back home.

Well, number 12, here's one that's not mentioned a lot, and I don't know why, but church discipline is also to expose and remove the unregenerate. There are some that are not supposed to be in our church. 1 John 2:19, I have to do my Jeff Knoblets' rough paraphrase, but they went out of us. That might be shown that they never were really of us, because if they were of us, they would have doubtedly stayed with us. There are some God removes.

Listen, that's not odd, that's not rare, that's part of the process of you being a faithful undershepherd. Always loving. Always humble, always long-suffering, but if they will not work with you. and stay in a brazen hardness. Then you know they're not God's.

They're not to be a member of his church. Um My professor at graduate school, Dr. Millikan, said one time that he said, You know, If you take a pen of sheep. And it's got a goat in it. He said, you can take that goat outside the pen of sheep.

And that old goat will run off and he'll never come back. He said, But if you take a pen of sheep. They're all really sheep. And you take one of those sheep outside of that pen, it'll go away for a little while, but pretty soon it's right back at the pen, walking back in with the rest of the sheep. You see, church discipline is how you find out where the sheep truly are.

and who the sheep truly are and who the goats really are. He said, You call them people goats, what Jesus did. He separates them like the sheep from the goats.

So it is to excommunicate and remove from us those whom God did not put in his church. And like I said to start with, there are going to be those who Come into the church who are not gods, even though we are as careful as we know how to be scripturally when we bring them in the front door. Roman 2, that's reasons for church discipline. Ownership, it's not our church. We don't get to build it and run it our way.

We must follow the scriptures and the weightiness of our stewardship. to perform these things in these ministries. under our Lord.

Now number two, the range of church discipline. Different approaches for different situations. Personal, private sin receives. personal private rebuke. Matthew 18, 15, if your brother sins, go in Private.

We make a really big deal here of that point right there. You better not. Confront a brother in sin and then go talk about him to everybody else. That will get your elders hot upset with you. You go to the nth degree to keep it private and concealed, hoping under God he'll come to repentance and that will end it.

Amen. That's called covering a sin, but covering it in a righteous sense. We don't cover it in an unrighteous, but when you are able to do that, and that happens a lot. You would not know the number of marriages that have been saved at Grace Life Church that 99.9% of the church knows nothing about the fact that they were close to divorce. Because a couple or two dives in on it, it's kept private.

There's proper correction and reproof and love and support, and they fight it out.

Well, hopefully, not with each other, a fight for their marriage. And work it out. And I think I can say this with the utmost credibility: divorce is very rare in this church.

Now it has happened, it does happen, but it's very rare. Because after 40 years of doing what we've tried to do, people don't join this church if they're planning on cheating on their spouse. And that's the way you want it in your community. You want it to be, you know. We're all struggling.

We all fail. Can I get an amen there? We're all tempted, but I want brothers to help me so that I don't go too far. Brother John O. and I, we cancel each other all week long just to make sure we don't jump off the Tennessee River Bridge.

some week but Well, I maybe mainly said to him, Brother, there's lines we don't cross. You struggle at certain levels, but you want brothers and sisters around you to say, whoop, let's stop now. You fight that sin at a lower level than that. You stay away from that woman. You stay away from that man.

But getting full circle back here. Privately reprove them unless it's already a a a large public scandal of course. And let me throw this in there at this point. Not every sin you know in the church needs correction. Might be a good brother or sister.

You think they strive to walk with the Lord, and you see a sin in their life, it bothers you a little bit. You know what you ought to do? Pray for them first. Don't be brother corrector. Don't be sister rebuker.

Not right away, anyway. A man who was a superintendent of the schools here for years told me one time, he said, I learned a long time ago. He said, Pastor, I learned if I see something in somebody's life, and it's not, you know, just destroying somebody or whatever. There's certain things that have to be dealt with immediately, of course. But general stuff, he said, I just put it on a shelf.

And watch it a little while. And if it becomes a pattern, then I'll deal with it.

So, so be, you know, give some grace to a brother and sister to struggle through a few things on their own.

Now all of that's discernment and all of that's balance. I get that. But I don't want sometimes when a church begins to teach these truths, we're too obsessive about it and we're too aggressive. And we need some grace. to let a brother or sister work through some things from time to time.

Matter of fact, my wife has to have grace all the time to let me work through things. And your spouse probably does too. Secondly, there's prominent public sin that must have public rebuke.

Now, that includes a private sin that has not responded. To the steps of correction, you know, Jesus said one go in private and confront the man, Matthew 18. If he doesn't repent, then two more go. If he doesn't repent, then tell it to the church.

So it was a private sin, and you've tried privately to get his or her attention. If that will not listen to that, then there is a time to bring it before the church.

Now, Um I want to point out that I don't think Jesus was saying That's absolutely two steps and then bring it to the church. I think he's pointing out a spiritual principle. I think here's where, like, my Puritan fathers would say: you gotta have some spiritual common sense. Probably we err there a lot.

Sometimes it's the fifth time, and the eighth time, and the twelfth time we've appealed to them. before it comes to the church. But they know by our history it will come eventually.

So, a private sin that will not listen to private rebuke is eventually brought public. But secondly, sometimes there's a sin that's just so open. And so scandalous, it's just generally known. And that we get back to 1 Corinthians 5:5 again, where this man in the church at Carth is just sitting so publicly and scandalously, the community all knows it. And these guys are incorrect.

They're so carnal and immature. They're kind of proud, I guess, about their graciousness, which is a perversion of the truth of grace. Grace does not allow others to ruin their lives. By being permissive about their scandalous and open sin.

So that's got to be brought before the church. and rather quickly. Like the sin of abandoning church. I think generally the community knows when a person hadn't darkened the church door in 10 years.

So there's things that are open and public and obvious that need to be dealt with. Let me throw this out at this point, as you've already sensed by my tenor and my tone. None of this is cookie cutter. Like I said about counseling seeker, just not a mathematical formula.

Okay, we check this box, check this box, now this. It's more dynamic than that. We've been sued in federal court. for disciplining a lady one time. It just there's dynamics that are all over the place.

But you do the best you know to do. Thirdly, there's troublemakers and factious people, divisive people. I think most of these would come also under the heading of a false teacher. Romans 16, 17 and 18, where Paul says, Keep your eye on those who cause dissension. Watch them.

If they keep going, Titus 3:10, warn them once, warn them twice. and then put them out of the church.

So here we have Paul writing to Titus and giving two steps, where it seems like Jesus gave three steps. But I think the point is not the exact steps, but there is an emphasis here that a person that starts a movement in the church, my old pastor used to call them the little group gatherers. They gather them a little group and think, what do y'all think about this? I would think this with all my heart because God's given me a mature body. If someone, matter of fact, I've seen this happen several times.

If someone came to our members and said, you know, we're getting a group together at my house, Jesus United, we're concerned about some things at the church, my members say, We don't do that. That's what they get, but we don't do that. If you've got a problem, the elders have an open door. Bring your Bible and discuss it with them privately. And y'all resolve it right there.

Now, if they're not denying the virgin birth or the authority of scripture. Our justification by faith, if they're not violating a cardinal doctrine or committing some gross open sin, we're going to honor the elders of our church. And by the way, that's worked for these families for 40 years. God's honored their obedience to Scripture there. We had a person a while back that came in, and this person had retired as a high, high up.

CEO, if you will. of a large company. I like the guy. I don't think he thought through what he was doing, but he probably was used to this in his past. But he wasn't here a little while.

And I think he got with my senior associate pastor, Brother Matt. Brother Matt, you can correct me if I got this wrong. And uh he said uh We think about Brothers Jeff Jeff's view on blankety blank blank. And Brother Matt said, Well, go talk to Brother Jeff. I'm not going to talk to you about that.

You're not going to start a movement of questioning the elders' leadership here. And I think he did it with one other person, and they got the same basic response. He got the same basic response. And pretty soon he decided: you know, I think God's moving me to another church. No, God moved him to a non-church.

Because we're just trying. haltingly and blundering at times, but we're trying to be a true church.

Well Troublemakers or those who would create factions must be dealt with. Brothers, I just can't say this strong enough. If you start a movement in the church and get you a little group against the leadership, you may have a valid point, but listen to me. Almost without exception, the damage you'll cause the church is more serious than the point you're making. Are you hearing me?

We'll discipline you first for starting the faction before we'll deal with the issue you're worried about. Because we have a biblical way for you to resolve the issue without causing factions in the church. Are y'all with me? I'll get to that in just a moment, so don't tune me out yet. I know it's Saturday morning.

We'll have a short day today, by the way. But I'm going to tie some things together at the end that I want you to hear because it's some things we blundered on that I don't want you to blunder on if you're doing this.

Well, see, sinful pattern in the life of a leader. We've talked about that to some degree, so I'll not much more than mention it, other than to remind you in 1 Timothy 5. The Bible, or Timothy, or Paul required, Timothy, do not even hear an accusation against one of your pastors without two or three concrete, valid, credible witnesses. You know why? Because if he's a man of God, everybody's going to be firing at him.

If he's a man of God, he's going to be scrutinized. They're going to try to undermine him. They're going to spend everything he says. They're going to try to put him in a bad light. That's always going to be the case if he's a faithful man of God, especially in these new churches Paul was starting, because they hadn't had the time to have any maturity.

So, Paul says, Timothy, don't even entertain an accusation unless two or three people. Have ironclad credibility that they're really doing something that's damaging or wrong. But then he says, if they do, and they continue in sin when they've been confronted. Rebuke them publicly.

So that's the public element here that we're talking about. Many of you will remember that the fifth day of my pastorate here. an associate pastor was exposed to a long-term immorality in a fair adultery. And so before the first week of my pastorate was up, I'm bringing a man before the church, a leader for removal. And you know what God was telling me?

Because, see, I preached all this stuff as the associate pastor, we just hadn't done any of it.

So I became the senior pastor and God said, okay, here you go. Do you believe this or do you not believe it? And I think by God's grace Our elders at the time, our leaders at the time, I should say we didn't have technically elders. But our leaders at the time handled it well and supported my leadership. And we removed that brother.

I think we showed as much compassion as we could. But here's what's startling about it. Almost 150 people left our church because we removed a man from the ministry who was in serial adultery. You talk about God exposing. As Paul writes to the Corinthians.

It's necessary that there be factions among you, that those who are prudent of God might become evident among you. God was making evident. He was approved of God. John Dagg, one of our early Baptist fathers here in America, in his church manual. John Dagg and John Pendleton are both two early church fathers that are very worth reading.

John Dagg used to say: when discipline leaves a church, Christ goes with it. What happens if you don't try to walk in corrective discipline? I'm not saying you're going to be perfect at it, you're going to miss some things, you're going to fail some, but have you ever raised children? I know what happened. The first time you realized I was too strict.

I was too firm. I shouldn't have spanked at that time. Then the next time, Brother John, you're like, well, boy, I missed one. I should have spanked her, honey. And so, what you do is you just give up the whole practice of discipline in the home, right?

You just forget the whole thing. Because you're imperfect. No, you don't. You love your children and your family too much for that.

Well, pastors are the same way. You're not going to do the best you can, stay humble, follow the scriptures. Call some of us that's already made all the mistakes. Don't be a dummy. And we'll help you not make the mistakes we made.

But do what God says he wants done in his church. Because what happens is When you As a pattern, refuse to do this. Christ leaves, and then you're left with worldly gimmicks to get people to come to church. Because the power's gone. The power's gone.

Thirdly, the results of church discipline. Boy, I'm just going to have to paraphrase this and run through it, but I have a whole sermon on this, and I'll refer to it in a moment. The purification of the church in Acts chapter 5, Ananas and Sapphira. Are willfully lying.

Now, listen to me: willfully lying about what they're giving to the church because everybody was giving all they had to promote the well-being of everybody who'd been saved during Pentecost. And Ananas Safari said, Boy, this is a way for us to get a big name for ourselves in the community because this is a hot hattoning thing right now. I mean, thousands and thousands of people are coming to these gatherings of this new movement, whatever it is. And we've heard people speak in tongues and other languages. It was just an exciting thing to get in on.

And Ananias and Safari said, We will use that church to promote ourselves. That's what they're basically saying.

So they lie and say they're bringing everything like the others had brought when really they had kept back some of it. And that would have probably been fine if they hadn't lied about it. Peter says, you've lied to God. God's going to judge you, and God kills Ananissan's fire in the Sunday morning worship service. Aren't you glad God's not disciplining folks that way today?

But there's a principle there for us. Because after that happens, Five results.

So that's a prototype of what we all will experience. Are you ready for the prototype? First of all, the purification of the church. The Bible says after Ananias and Sapphira were removed by God's direct intervention and killing them, that great dread, great fear came upon the others. They looked around and said, Have you got any sin?

We better start repenting if we've got any sin ourselves. And that principle is true. I don't know about you, but I need help to quit sinning. I want to go to a church. That, yes, they're compassionate and yes, they're loving and yes, they're long-suffering, but they're going to help me not indulge in sin because sin wrecks and destroys and ruins, and most of all, dishonors my Lord.

But they could have a purity sweep into their congregation. Brother Jason, kind of like you have when you preach hard on sin, it's a purifying that sweeps through the congregation. I remember when. One of our first Very public dismissals. People left the church, and probably the two biggest money families at that time left the church.

Possibly the wealthiest man in muscle shows at that time left the church. And I saw Alvin Lynch, one of our elders sitting back there, and he told me this story. He ran into the guy who might have been the wealthiest man in the shows leaving our church that Sunday after they made me the senior pastor. And um He told Alvin, I'm leaving. In essence, I'm leaving, and my money is going with me, and this church will go under in six months.

Let's see, in me, it'd be forty-five years. He was not a prophet. Nor the son of a prophet. And somehow. In the providence of God, without even knowing it.

My son-in-law, my daughter, own his house and his property to day. Isn't that remote? We didn't plan any of that. They just told me they were buying this property, and I didn't really know much about it. And I thought, well, that's so-and-so's property.

God's got a A way of teaching us, doesn't he? After those early discipline cases, though, we saw. those two services at least. where there was public repentance. and weeping and confession of sin.

There was a purification. Like we saw right after Ananias and Sapphira. These principles hold for all of us. Secondly, not only purification, but the unification of the church. Verse 12 tells us after Ananias and Sapphire were dealt with, they were all with one accord in Solomon's portico.

There was a new unity. Boy, I want to just pitch his fit right here. What they had was a Holy Spirit-wrought unity. Not this false, fleshly, rot idea of unity, where it's really we're just tolerating the flesh and calling it unity. That's not unity.

Because the moment you don't deal with sin, the Spirit of God is quenched and there's no unity. It has to be a spirit-wrought unity. which requires us to at least be striving. toward the purity of the church.

So they had an unusual spirit-wrought unity among them. Thirdly, the sanctification of the church. In verse 13 of Acts chapter 5, all of this has happened. And there's an interesting phrase here, quote, none of the rest dared to associate with them. In other words, the church was separated.

A big, hey, here's what happened. The numbers went down drastically in one day. There were people looking around in the congregation in Acts chapter 5 in Jerusalem and saying, You sure you want to be a part of this? I'm not sure I want to be a part of this. These folks are serious.

Their God comes down from heaven and kills people who are being hypocrites in the church. None of the rest there's there was a great moving away of those curiosity seekers and those people who were just in on it because it was exciting when there were tongues of fire and different languages being spoken, et cetera, et cetera. I'd like to say to some of my dear charismatic friends, you want to draw people to a church. Quit offering them signs, wonders, and miracles and do some church discipline. And see who's left when you get done.

Let us show you what the church is. Can it get an amen on something like that? Yeah. None of the rest dared to associate with them. I remember it was early on and.

The reputation of us trying to practice biblical church discipline was just a buzz in the Baptist community because I don't know if anyone else had done any of it. That didn't make us special. Like I like to say, there's nothing special about Grace Lap Church at the shows. There's nothing, we're barely normal. We are barely normal, biblically speaking.

But the problem is, so many of you are so subnormal, you think we're abnormal. And that's the way the Baptist community was. And there was so much buzz. Matter of fact, we had a man visit our church, a very fine-looking man and a fine-looking family. You know, you get excited when you're preaching and see a new family.

You think, boy, I hope we can reach them. You know what he was? He was the new Budweiser beer distributor for North Alabama. I thought, oh no, I don't know if this is going to work. And he visited, I think, three times and told somebody: we've decided this is not the church for us.

Sanctification of the Church. Set you apart. from those who are not really wanting to be in a church. Just doing the religious thing because you're in the southeast will not work when you're trying to be a true church. They'll not be drawn to that.

He'll set you apart in sanctification.

Well, verse 14 of Acts chapter 5: after God did the first discipline in the first church in Jerusalem there and book of Acts, we have the multiplication of the church. We've already talked about a lot of people separating and going away, but on the back end of that, The text says, and multitudes of men and women were constantly added to their number. But you don't get Holy Spirit-wrought regeneration growth in the church until you first are willing to do discipline. You got to clean up the hospital to have births. And see, what we're doing is we're hiring people to manipulate people to make false professions so we can say our numbers are up, and God's not saving people, you're just doing stuff.

The multiplied numbers added came after the Annanites and Sapphira discipline. That's a principle for us. It stands for all time. It's one of the results, the multiplication of church. And I love this one.

Well, let me just share this with you. In recent days, on our good days, our small group attendance has been up closer to 900 than it's been in a long, long, long time. And you got to realize when I started and we did that discipline case, our small group attendance was well under 500. Not quite doubled, but that's a substantial multiplication. What you got to realize, maybe in Acts, when we see Acts chapter 5, that process of God, the rest wouldn't associate separating some out and then bringing new believers back in.

Maybe that happened in a few weeks or a few months. I don't know. But it's not probably going to happen that way for you, it's going to be years. It's going to be years. We had significant declines here.

We had significant years of just plateauing. Then the last four or five years, we've had really some significant growth here at Grace Life. And that's all in God's hands. You do it God's way. And by the way, you're always after souls.

You're always trying to reach me with the gospel. You're always encouraging guests to come. but you don't let them join on false or unsound premises. What you'll find after time is you'll outgrow your critics. Our small group guy told me the other day that we just added our fourth.

Our fourth. one year old Sunday school class, 'cause we got so many babies. Very fertile women here in North Alabama. Uh We like lots of babies. But isn't it interesting that we're not doing any of the things to reach the young crowd, but God's letting us reach a lot of young couples?

The last result be the admiration for the church. After a while Those that bunch that probably condemned you and criticized you and We're against what you were trying to do. We'll begin to say, well, we might not join you, we might not agree with you, but we respect you. And we've sensed a lot of that, and I personally have sensed a lot of that in recent years. I'm sometimes amazed at the amount of respect.

and esteem the city officials give Our church. But we make a huge point of supporting our police force, supporting our city council, our mayor, our school system in every way we possibly can. without compromising our doctrine, of course. We want them to know that's the kind of people we are. But the admiration for the church was really seen in my life some years ago when Jerry Rankin.

was the President of the International Mission Board of the Southern Baptist Convention. And Jerry Rankin, out of over 40,000 Southern Baptist churches, chose this church as the model for world missions for all the other 40,000 churches. I went around everywhere teaching. what we do in missions. And I soon learned, though, that it didn't go very far because to far too many of those pastors and churches, it was just another program.

Missions isn't a program we have, missions is why we exist.

Sometimes people ask me, well, what is your true church conference? Is it a Bible conference or is it a missions conference? What's the difference? Can you imagine? The Apostle Paul Having a conference.

That didn't have anything to do with church planning. Every time you see Paul talking in any setting, he's talking about this guy's gonna help this church plant, this guy's gonna help that church plant. I move in guy from this church plant over to that church plant. It was just every time he got together, show me an example in the New Testament where that's not true. Or he's not actually helping a church plant.

Paul could not conceive of studying the Bible and not thinking about the church. I really think I want to be careful here. I want to be balanced because I'm. Grateful for our famed speakers and our conference speakers and our scholars, but brother, everything is about the church. Not just hipping your intellectual, theological acumen.

If it's doesn't help you, if it's not helping the church. It's not helping anyone. We got so many people, they're more loyal to their uh rock star the Reformation Conference speaker than they are their own elders.

Well, I better get off that hobby horse. I don't have time for that. There was a campus ministry leader in Atlanta that. Called me a few years ago and said, you know what, your church is the shot heard around the world. Because of what you guys are doing in missions.

The admiration for the church. The text says in verse 13: after the Ananias and Zephyra thing. After the people began to hold them in high esteem.

Well, that was the phrase. The people, however, held them in high esteem. That means the unsaved, the people who separated yet respected them. And God wants to do that in our communities. Never forget one time I was talking with a lady who was a church member here, and her husband was lost.

And um She said, I'm trying to get my husband to. to come to a church and I've begun to come to your church. She said, Well, I'm really a Pentecostal. She said, I I've gone to a Pentecostal church, but my husband's an unbeliever, and he's told me, I will not go to a Pentecostal church. I'll go to a Baptist church or a Methodist church.

So she went to her Pentecostal pastor over in Florence and said, Look, my husband said he will not go to Pentecostal church. He'll go to a Baptist church or a Methodist church. And that pastor across the river that I do not know to this day told her, take him to Grace Life Church of the Shoals and he'll get saved. The admiration for the church. In other words, that's the kind of church where people find God.

Isn't that what we want to be known for? But we have to humble ourselves and realize that.

Sometimes some of the complaints And accusations of the community have some validity because we're still growing and we're still learning and we ain't got it all right yet. Amen. But we don't quit either. But at the end of the day, brothers, we don't need to be any smarter in our church work. We need to be more obedient to the work of the church.

One guy wrote in a news article some years ago. looking at the decline of the church today and The church moving toward worldliness and amusement and everything else but the things that really matter. And this secular newspaper editor wrote this line: just when we need the church the most, it's become just like us. We're not just a little cleaner version of the world, guys.

So, we don't want relativism in the church. That means nothing is always right or wrong. That's not biblical. We don't want sentimentalism ruling the church. That means because I love you, I'll let you live in sin.

That's just sentimentalism. It's not love, by the way. We want moral absolutism and genuine love. In moral absolutism and genuine love, you care enough to correct and to correct God's way. Always with humility.

always considering you're weak as a sinner too, always with compassion. but always biblical.

Now, here's what I'm going to say, and I'm done. Did y'all put a clock up? How far over time am I? I have no idea. But we're done.

But get this. First of all, remember the First Corinthians five principle. When Paul told The church at Corinth, you've got to deal with this boy in open, scandalous sexual sin. That was not the only sin in the Church of Corinth. Read the book.

There was probably three dozen things they could be publicly disciplining people for. But it was the one that was glaring and had to be dealt with. If you're pastoring a church, God's going to put right on your desk, boom, this is one you got to deal with right here. This is the one. And that kind of sets a precedent that will fix a lot of the other ones.

So, don't think as a pastor, I've got to find every single sin and discipline, every single sin I find in the next month. No, you can't do that. You can't raise children that way, by the way.

Some spiritual common sense comes to play. Listen, you look for the thing that's hurting the church and marring Christ's reputation the most, and you start there. And for Corrent, that was the boy. living in public and open scandalous sin. Secondly, the very first thing you should do is establish a policy that you will resolve conflicts in the church biblically.

And if you don't resolve your conflicts biblically, then you will be disciplined by the elders. I wish we had done that at the beginning. We were disciplining people for everything under the sun, but we kind of would have these mobs that would get together, these groups that would get together, and they were causing trouble. There'd be a conflict, somebody'd get on this side, somebody'd get on that side, and cause trouble. And then we realized the Bible has a lot to say about dealing with conflict and how to get over it and get through it.

Why don't we just Hold ourselves accountable to resolve conflicts biblically. And we wrote a policy from the scriptures of what we're going to do. We voted unanimously as a church. And that solved a world of other problems.

So I wish we had done that, Brother John. Oh, really early on instead of 25 years down the road. It would really have prevented a lot of other issues that we had to deal with. But we're just learning and growing, you know?

So, conflict resolution and actually exercising discipline if somebody refuses to resolve a conflict. Appropriately. You go privately. You deal with your brothers privately and work it out privately. Again, you don't form little groups on your side.

That'll get you under the discipline of the church because you're not resolving your conflict. You know, a lot of times people don't really want their conflict settled. They want to get their way and have a big noise. The last thing I will mention that we should have done very early that would have resolved a ton of problems if we had done it early on is discipline folks for dishonoring the church elders. Discipline and correction for dishonoring the church elders.

Let me remind you that Hebrews 13:17 commands the church to obey their elders, to submit to their elders, and let them lead with joy. 1 Thessalonians 5:13 reminds churches and commands churches you're to esteem your elders very highly, and you're to do this in love. Because of their work. Not because they're special, they're different. No, they're sinners like everybody else, but they have a responsibility the rest of the body does not have.

A burden to answer for the souls of those under their care at the judgment seat of Christ.

So, for that kind of work they're responsible for, you're to esteem them very highly and love. In 1 Corinthians 16, 15, Paul says to be in subjection to those. Men in leadership. And what we found was Somebody would be in sin. And the elders would try to Get with them and elders would contact them, and they'd say they'd meet with us, and then they wouldn't show up.

And literally, sometimes, Brother John, this went in for months. And we thought, well, we gotta do the steps, we've gotta do the steps, the steps, the steps. And we thought, we can't do the steps because they keep running. We literally had elders Like the FBI or something. in their cars surveilling the house, trying to catch them before they got in the house when they came in from work.

Because we had to do the steps. We were doing the best we knew how. And then it dawned on me: wait a minute. If they're acting that way when the elders asked to meet with them, they're not obeying their elders, they're not submitting to their elders, they're not letting their elders lead with joy because they'd rather be home eating supper with their family that night. They're not esteeming their elders very highly.

They're not loving their elders, and they're not being in subjection to them.

So, what we would say is: look, we've tried three or four times, and you keep avoiding us. If you avoid us again, we'll bring you before the church because this is four or five times. You showed utter contempt. and disrespect and dishonor for your elders. Don't join a church if you're not going to honor your elders.

Don't marry a husband if you're not going to submit to your husband. Don't be a child if you're not going to submit to your parents. Though you didn't get a vote in that, did you? You just got born. God's got a purpose in how we function, guys.

And if we had done that, Brother Johno, early on, it would have solved us a million problems. Because a guy who will not submit to his elder is going to cause a thousand other problems in the church.

So you might as well deal with it there. And bless my eldest hearts for many years. I led in all the church discipline cases. I don't anymore. Praise the Lord.

I'll tell you this story and we'll be done. Our elders who have burnt the midnight oil. Try this. Practice the steps of discipline when, really, again, we should have been dealing with that person's dishonoring and disrespect for the office of elder all along. There's no reason to be in a biblical church if you're not going to do that, but.

Years ago, I had generally take July out of the pulpit, and I do two weeks of study and two weeks of vacation. Literally, I had to give Brother Andy Bowling if Andy's in here somewhere. But Andy Bowling is kind of the key in me doing that because we went through some tough, tough days, and I was just burned out and discouraged. And I just happened, I just mentioned casually to the elders. I had a brother outside of my church tell me, you need to take a month off, you need to get away.

And I just mentioned that to the elders because I was the kind of guy. I know you don't believe this, but I was pretty obsessive about leading this church. Pretty strong about it. pretty micromanaging about things.

So it's impossible for me. I thought, Brother Brett, if I live for a month, the whole thing explode. But um I said, I think I'll get away for a month. Andy Bowlinger, Elder. Spoke up.

You got to know Andy. I love him, man. He said, get out of here. That's the way he said it. Get out of here.

I thought, well, okay. And what he meant by that was, we love you, and you need the break. Go on and take your break, brother. And so I did. And I came back, and guess what?

Church was still here. I thought they don't need me after all. Hallelujah. That's nice to know. And we had two ongoing discipline issues in the church that were really cut and dry, they were just clear.

These people would not repent. It was open rebellion. And we've been trying and trying. And that was kind of on my shoulders. I thought, I got to come back in and lead our elders to take care of that.

And when I came back in, Coach Mike Stathams, our vice chairman of the elders, he said, Oh, by the way, Pastor, while you were gone in July, we dismissed those people for the church, so you don't have to do it when you get back. And I thought, wow. I like this. Yeah. And didn't you do that, Coach?

He did it. And he didn't ask me if he could do it, he just did it. That was a beautiful thing to me because, quite honestly. Just being as honest as I can be. I don't think I'd be standing here today if my elders hadn't come on board and taken more and more of that load.

And I'm very indebted to all of them and grateful. That somehow, in the providence of God, I had men who. Just stood with me before they knew if I was crazy or not. And before they knew if I was going to be long-term or not, but they just... Here, what it was that they would say, Pastor, if it's biblical.

We have some fear and trembling, but let's do it. And the rest is history.

So we must Strive toward.

Now, look, if you're just beginning at this. Baby steps, but have a heart to do it. That's all we're looking for in our network of companionship. Just have a heart to go in that direction. Because I'm talking to you with 40 years under my belt on this.

But we can help you a lot. If you want to be in our network, and that's what we exist for. to sharpen, encourage Help one another through these. difficult areas. But it's so, so worth it.

To be in my last third of ministry maybe. That might be a tad optimistic. Last 20% of my ministry, maybe. and have the sweet, united, blessed congregation I have. I would hate to be 66 and face the same battles I faced when I was 26 because I never dealt with them when I was 26.

And I didn't deal with them uh when I was thirty-six or forty-six or fifty-six. I kept capitulating and now I had the same battles. And you'll be like. Me and Brother John Owen, a number of these guys, you'll be like, I love my church. I told my eldest before: if I mess up bad and I can't be the senior pastor anymore, please let me stay a member.

I love these people and I need them. Love the church. Versus, I'm 66 and I can't wait till I retire and get out of this place. And that's the way most Baptist preachers are. And I don't blame them in a way.

Because it's awful what so many of them have to deal with.

Okay, I've talked too much, and I apologize for that.