An Open Letter to Someone Entering Church Discipline

There are not two, but three possible outcomes, if I read Matthew 18 correctly. The third is “it will be found that you did not indeed commit this sin, or that the ‘sin’ of which you are accused is not actually contrary to the Word of God.” Now I would concede that a huge portion of church discipline cases involve things for which the evidence is pretty clear, but that doesn’t push out option #3 out the door.

I appreciate the thought that has gone into this series in what I’ve seen so far.

Matthew 18 actually assumes that the sin has indeed occurred. “If you brother trespass…” But yes, it is also possible that the accusations will turn out to be false. In these cases, the response of the church is simple, so I think the process-development work in this series has been wise to focus on situations where the offense is real.

If the matter is already known, as someone said, what is the need for two witnesses to establish every fact in verse 16? No, read in context, the passage does NOT assume guilt.

The objection you posed was that “it will be found that you did not indeed commit this sin.” This would mean that the sin, independently of whether anyone knows or not, did not happen… and there is nothing to discipline.

Matthew 18 does indeed assume that the sin occurred. No, it does not assume universal knowledge of the sin. That’s a different matter entirely.

15 “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.

The first “if” in the verse sets up action conditioned on sin that actually occurred. Without that, there is nothing to do.

But even supposing that sin and knowledge of sin could somehow be the same thing, my point stands: The church can still only discipline what it knows about, and so the discipline process described in the article wisely focuses on sin that not only has actually occurred but also has become known.

About v. 16, here’s what it actually says…

16 But if he does not listen, take one or two others along with you, that every charge may be established by the evidence of two or three witnesses. (ESV, Matthew 18:16)

Note that the problem that leads to escalation here is “he does not listen.” In the context, this means he is unrepentant of the actual sin referred to in v.15. The two witnesses here are witnesses not to whether the original offense occurred, but witnesses to the continued lack of repentance.

what is the need for two witnesses to establish every fact in verse 16? No, read in context, the passage does NOT assume guilt.

“If he has sinned” assumes guilt. If he hasn’t sinned, then the passage doesn’t apply.

The 2 or 3 witnesses may serve to establish guilt (i.e., they know about it too), to establish lack of repentance (i.e., “the guy refused to repent”), to confirm that confrontation took place (i.e., “We saw the conversation and witnessed that it took place properly), or to add strength in confrontation (because of numbers; i.e., “We are adding our voice to encourage you to repent”).

In any event, the brother in question has actually sinned in this passage.

Matt. 18 is intentionally sketchy. There is not a lot of detail, because it’s laying down principles/a model that will have to be adapted to a wide variety of situations.

It is entirely possible that the two witnesses also know about the sin, in some cases, so they serve the purpose not only of confirming the unrepentance but of backing the “findings of fact,” so to speak, as the problem is escalated to the next level.

I personally make a difference between private and public “sins” in the matter of discipline. Matt 18 concerns a private dispute and assumes nothing, in the beginning, of any guilt or redress. One “brother” is simply alleging/accusing another of a moral transgression against him. If the accused denies the charge, the accuser is then obligated to get two or three “witnesses” in corroboration. These witnesses are not there simply to hear the one accuse the other. That would still be one person accusing the other in their presence, which resolves nothing (Deut 19:15). The witnesses have first-hand, corroborating proof, by one means or another, of the guilt of the accused. If the accused does not accept the proof of the witnesses, then the matter must come before the local assembly, thus making the dispute public in a proper venue. If the church adjudges the accused to be guilty as originally charged, he is to be disciplined out of the church’s membership and considered an unsaved person. Since the issue has become public as far as the assembly is concerned, the verdict of guilt or acquittal also must be made as such to all the parties involved.

My own view overlaps on several points. I also distinguish between public and non-public sins, and I think Matt. 18 has non-public sins mainly in view. There is no reason for a one-to-one confrontation when a sin is public, because it’s in the nature of public sin that it is never really only against one person. The church is sinned against as well and knows it.

So in those cases there isn’t any “escalation path” that makes any sense. The matter should begin and end in the congregation.

I can see, too, how Matt. 18 can be understood to refer only to a non-public sin in which there are at least two corroborating witnesses. But if there are two witnesses who saw the offense, it’s only barely “non-public.”

In any case, while it’s possible to see the two witnesses in the passages as witnesses to the original offense, I don’t see anything in the text that requires that interpretation. The connection to Deut. fits, whether the witnesses are establishing the original offense or are establishing the offense of non-repentance in the case of a known sin.

Carson might not be quite agreeing with me here, but pretty close:

It is not at first clear whether the function of the witnesses is to support the one who confronts his erring brother by bringing additional testimony about the sin committed (which would require at least three people to have observed the offense) or to provide witnesses to the confrontation if the case were to go before the whole church. The latter is a bit more likely, because Deuteronomy 19:15 deals with judicial condemnation (a step taken only by the entire assembly), not with attempts to convince a brother of his fault. By the united testimony of two or three witnesses, every matter “may be established” (stathē, lit., “may be made to stand”—though the rise of deponents in Hellenistic Greek, including the use of stathē, implies that “may stand” is a superior rendering; cf. Zerwick, par. 231; Turner, Syntax, p. 57).

(Carson, D. A. “Matthew.” The Expositor’s Bible Commentary: Matthew, Mark, Luke.)

With the “brother sins” in the first “if” clause of the passage, again, I can see that it’s possible to take “sins” in the sense of “from your point of view” or “in your opinion.” But again, I don’t see anything that requires that interpretation.

Either way, if the sin is perceived and genuine or only perceived, the two witnesses are either going to help clear up a misunderstanding or help move the matter into the genuine discipline category.

With reference to the article and Bert’s objection: “discipline” is not really happening until there is a known sin. The pre-disciplinary investigating and such might, arguably, be “part of the process,” but nobody has “been disciplined” until the church believes there is sin. The writer of the article is looking at the church’s response to known sin.

Here’s a sampling of commentators:

“…in any case the one or two more are not witnesses of the offense; they can testify only that they have tried to help the offender.” (Leon Morris, The Gospel according to Matthew, The Pillar New Testament Commentary (Grand Rapids, MI; Leicester, England: W.B. Eerdmans; Inter-Varsity Press, 1992), 468.)

“The assumption is clearly that the offence is something of which others can easily become aware. The supporting parties will need to be able to be independently aware of the problem. Otherwise the appeal to multiple witnesses would not make any sense. The addition of ‘one or two’ gives the ‘two or three’ stipulated by Dt. 19:15 (cf. 17:6).91 The presence of the supporting parties ensures that the initiative is not a confused one, based on a misunderstanding, but is also concerned to enhance in the eyes of the one being approached the seriousness of what is at stake.” (John Nolland, The Gospel of Matthew: A Commentary on the Greek Text, New International Greek Testament Commentary (Grand Rapids, MI; Carlisle: W.B. Eerdmans; Paternoster Press, 2005), 746–747).

“„, the next step is to secure peace by bringing in one or two others, evidently to underline the gravity of the problem and to add their wisdom to its solution.” (David Turner and Darrell L. Bock, Cornerstone Biblical Commentary, Vol 11: Matthew and Mark (Carol Stream, IL: Tyndale House Publishers, 2005), 240.)

“Why are the witnesses present? Since they are eyewitnesses of the conversation rather than of the accused brother’s sin, their purpose cannot be to testify later in the assembly of the church about his deed. Deuteronomy 19:15* is thus not introduced in the sense of the biblical text. The two witnesses are used differently, however, not only in the New Testament,31 but also in Judaism. In rabbinic texts an especially important task of the witnesses is to warn the offender about his deed and thus to make it as difficult as possible to condemn him, since only someone who has been warned by several witnesses can later be legally condemned.33 It is not clear whether they serve a similar purpose in our text or whether, as others have surmised, they are to strengthen the brother’s admonition, so that the ῥῆμα here meant not “content,” but quite literally the “word” of admonition.” (Ulrich Luz, Matthew: A Commentary, ed. Helmut Koester, Hermeneia—a Critical and Historical Commentary on the Bible (Minneapolis, MN: Augsburg, 2001), 452.)

” … a church member who is of the opinion that he has a cause of complaint against his brother, reading these rules, and noticing that if he fails in his private attempt he must then ask one or two others to go with him, will probably ask himself, “Is my case really so serious that I can get one or two other persons of sound judgment to go with me; or am I, perhaps, making a mountain out of a mole-hill?” The main reason, though, necessitating taking along one or two others is stated in the words quoted from Deut. 19:15: in order that by the mouth of two witnesses or three every matter may be established. Cf. John 8:17; 2 Cor. 13:1; 1 Tim. 5:19; Heb. 10:28.
Questions must be asked and answered. If it is agreed by the two or three—the person who claims to have been wronged plus the witness(es) whom he has with him—that a substantial wrong was really committed, firm but brotherly persuasion must again be used to convince the sinner of his error and to bring him to repentance and confession. It may be easier for two or three persons to succeed in this task than for one. It is implied, of course, that also in the present situation, if the effort of the visitors is crowned with success the sinner will have been won.” (William Hendriksen and Simon J. Kistemaker, Exposition of the Gospel According to Matthew, vol. 9, New Testament Commentary (Grand Rapids: Baker Book House, 1953–2001), 699–700.)

If I understand what some of you are arguing about the assumption of guilt in this passage, and what the witnesses are for, if a brother brings an accusation which is denied by the accused, and any witnesses can only witness the confrontation, but not the supposed act, either the process can go no further, or Matthew 18 does not actually apply to this situation at all, correct? In which case, the accused’s standing in the church would be unaffected, even if the accuser firmly believes the offense occurred.

That is my understanding. It’s possible to take step 1 (one to one confrontation) and step 2 (two witnesses) as a “might be guilty, might not, but the accuser is convinced of guilt” situation. But a problem with that view is that the next two stages don’t make any sense unless the offender is actually guilty. (What would the church be able to do that the witnesses couldn’t do, if the accused is/claims to be innocent? They could question him further/investigate, but that doesn’t seem to be the point. And the final stage is expulsion.)

So to me, the whole thing flows better if the “sin” in v. 15 is an actual, not supposed, sin. There doesn’t seem to be any “fact finding” activity in Matthew 18. That’s not to say the church doesn’t have duties in this area, but Jesus/Matthew doesn’t tell us everything about discipline in this one passage (maybe Jesus talked on the topic for hours, but the Spirit guided Matthew to only give us this overview… who knows? We have what we were intended to have, though.)

The point of this text, seems to me, is to provide an escalation path in the case of a brother who has definitely sinned, doesn’t deny the act, but is unrepentant… and the sin is known to relatively few.

Dave, the passage says, “If your brother sins…” Everything else is predicated on that. If he hasn’t sinned, everything else in the passage doesn’t apply. This passage only applies “if your brother sins.”

If an accusation has been made and there is a need to establish guilt, that is prior to this passage it seems to me. And it may take two or three to establish it. Or more. Or different. And if there is no agreement that he has sinned, then yes, his standing in the church would be unaffected, at least theoretically. Though I am reminded of Ray Donovan’s comment after his acquittal in the late 80s: “To which office do I go to get my reputation back?”

But it seems to me that “If he has sinned” is a casuistic type construction that only applies if the protasis is true. If the protasis isn’t true, then we are in the wrong passage.

The “happy path” of church discipline seems to be stated in the first step alone, “If he listens, you have gained a brother.” This “happy path” isn’t repeated in the later steps, but seems to be implicit throughout.

The ultimate “sad path” is the repeated refusal to listen, with the last effort being the entire congregation working to persuade the offending party. and if he refuses to listen even to the church, then he’s to be regarded as an outsider.

Given the two possible outcomes—restoring a brother versus regarding him as an outsider—it would seem that the purpose of adding witnesses and adding the congregation later is to add “clout” when you’re trying to explain to the offender the gravity of his refusal to deal with his sin. Church discipline should be understood in light of its positive results—restoration—as much as it’s understood in terms of its negative results—removal from fellowship.

Again, the “two witnesses” is a parallel to Deut. 19:15, in which two witnesses are necessary to determine guilt and administer punishment. If it were not so, Matthew 18:15-17 is merely a three stage beat-down of the accused, and one where the New Testament gives little to no counsel about how one is to actually determine guilt.

And in that light, if one is to determine guilt via Torah methods, you have not only a problem of determining where the boundaries of the Old Testament law end and the methods of the church begin, but you are also going to necessarily make private matters public. Hence I can’t make any other conclusion but that Christ here is setting this up as not just the sentencing phase.

Or, put in terms that someone who works in criminal justice ought to understand instinctively, if you issue the verdict and then actually figure out what the evidence means, you are asking for a TON of problems. The one thing that I can concede here, though, is that Larry and Aaron’s view is way too widespread in our circles, simply because if you mention Matthew 18 to a lot of people, the notion that it is a three stage beatdown is going to be the response.

Bert’s reasoning here makes more sense out of Deut 19:15 and the necessity of the “evidence” from the witnesses and the purpose of the process of Matt 18, although I probably wouldn’t call the other view a “beatdown.” Invoking Deut 19 was to counter a one-man verdict, or rush to judgment type of handling. Introducing rabbinic usage or reducing the point of witnesses to admonition, gravity, or some such post-assumption of guilt. Worse, saying Deut 19 is not being used in the OT text intention, especially the opening lines of its purpose against an I said/he said scenario. In the other NT appeals to Deut 19 the word “evidence’ is always found seemingly for the purposes of determining guilt. Maybe “evidence” has a meaning that is not apparent or appropriate. I’ll let the linguists and biblical theologians wrangle here, perhaps over 1 Tim 5:19 in particular.