One Foundation: The Church fulfills her role as her brother’s keeper

Matthew 18:15–20 ¹⁵“If your brother sins against you, go and show him his sin just between the two of you. If he listens to you, you have regained your brother. ¹⁶But if he will not listen, take one or two others along with you, so that ‘every matter may be established by the testimony of two or three witnesses.’ ¹⁷If he refuses to listen to them, tell it to the church. And, if he refuses to listen even to the church, then treat him as an unbeliever or a tax collector. ¹⁸Amen I tell you: Whatever you bind on earth will be bound in heaven, and whatever you loose on earth will be loosed in heaven. ¹⁹Amen I tell you again: If two of you on earth agree to ask for anything, it will be done for them by my Father who is in heaven. ²⁰In fact where two or three have gathered together in my name, there I am among them.”

We heard the Lord speak through Ezekiel: “As for you, son of man, I have appointed you to be a watchman for the house of Israel. Whenever you hear a word from my mouth, you are to warn them from me.” Amen. (Ezekiel 37:7)

Halloween is coming soon. Hopefully our children will be able to go trick-or-treating this year. If we have trick-or-treaters, I encourage you not to do what the woman in Fargo, North Dakota did a few years ago.

Please understand that she had the best of intentions. But it didn’t come across that way. She decided she would give “moderately obese” trick-or-treaters a letter instead of candy. In that letter she encouraged the children’s parents to be responsible in helping their young ones to stay fit and ready for life.

The woman’s letter was reprinted in an article in USA Today. At the end of the online version of the article, there was a chance for people to post their opinion about what the woman was proposing. Those remarks were not pretty. The woman was berated, belittled and verbally chastised.

What do you think about what the woman wrote?

Personally, I think she had a lot of things right.

For example, I think she was right in her desire to help these children. Her letter was caring and compassionate rather than being cruel and callous. She was right in offering encouragement to the parents. She was also right in acting on her conscience.

Having said all that, I think there was a key component missing in her plan. She needed to speak personally and privately to parents. By writing a public letter, she could easily cause embarrassment and hurt feelings to the very people she was trying to help.

This is a common mistake … and one that our Savior urges us to avoid.

When Jesus was talking about how we should handle those who sin against us, he taught, “go and show him his sin just between the two of you.”

But that’s not the way our world deals with sin. Not even close.

Think of what is happening right now in our culture if someone feels the least bit offended or slighted. People begin shouting. There is protesting and rioting. The Twitter mob calls for cancelation. There are demands for boycotts and doxing.

Or people ignore the sin. They let it slide. They excuse it. They rationalize it. If it’s not viral on social media or reported by the news media, then it didn’t happen.

Our culture indoctrinates us into this false belief of the two extremes of pointing out sin or ignoring sin. But let’s not blame it all on the culture. Our own sinful flesh likes to play this game, too. And the game is as old as that tree in the middle of the Garden.

We do the same things our world does. We shout and cancel and protest – just on a smaller scale.

We ignore sin … until it eats us up inside. We become passive aggressive. We gossip. We allow vengeful thoughts to keep us up at night. We think of ways of turning other people against those who hurt us.

Have you noticed that none of this works? Not in our culture. Not in our personal lives. That’s because we are dealing with sin in human, sinful ways. You can never fix sin by yelling about it, gossiping about it, raging against it, ignoring it or minimizing it. The only way to deal with sin is the way Jesus told us to deal with sin. To take decisive, drastic and personal action against it.

Since the time of Cain, men and women have hated being their brother’s keeper. We are no different today. In each of our Scripture lessons today, God teaches us how to deal with sin.

God has very strong words for us in Ezekiel 37: “As for you, son of man, I have appointed you to be a watchman for the house of Israel. Whenever you hear a word from my mouth, you are to warn them from me. When I say to a wicked man, ‘Wicked man, you shall surely die,’ if you do not speak to warn the wicked man against his way, that wicked man will die because of his guilt, but I will also hold you responsible for his blood” (Ezekiel 37:7,8). God drops on us the heavy message of being a watchman for our brother. God’s judgment is as clear as it is severe. If we fail to do the job that God has assigned to us of calling our brother to repentance, God promises to hold us accountable. None of us wants that!

Being your brother’s keeper will surely lead to uncomfortable confrontations. In Galatians 2 the apostle Paul tells how he had to oppose the apostle Peter to his face. Peter was shunning the Gentiles in favor of the Jews. He expected the Gentiles to live and eat and be circumcised like the Jews. Paul explained, “But when Cephas [Peter] came to Antioch, I opposed him to his face, because he was clearly wrong. … I said to Cephas in front of all of them, ‘If you, a Jew, live like the Gentiles and not like the Jews, why do you compel the Gentiles to live like the Jews?’” (Galatians 2:11, 14)

Paul took his job of being a watchman seriously. Because Peter’s sin was public, Paul had to call out Peter’s sin publicly. But he didn’t do it in the Antioch newspaper or by using the first century’s version of social media. Paul confronted Peter to his face – in person. Paul didn’t merely keep his brother. He won his brother over.

Jesus teaches in Matthew 18 great words that all of us should memorize and put into practice daily: “If your brother sins against you, go and show him his sin just between the two of you. If he listens to you, you have regained your brother. But if he will not listen, take one or two others along with you, so that ‘every matter may be established by the testimony of two or three witnesses.’ If he refuses to listen to them, tell it to the church. And, if he refuses to listen even to the church, then treat him as an unbeliever or a tax collector.”

When Jesus says, “Go,” it means that we are not to ignore the sin. We don’t expect the sin to go away by itself. We can’t say we would rather not get involved. We shouldn’t wait for the person to come to us. Jesus says, “Go.”

Jesus lays out the steps for going to your brother. First, approach him privately with his sin, just the two of you. If your brother does not repent, bring two or three others along as witnesses, so the seriousness of the matter may be underscored while its privacy may be maintained. If your brother still does not repent, take the matter to the church so the entire body of believers may demonstrate just how seriously the Lord desires repentance and how greatly the Lord desires to forgive. Finally, if your unrepentant brother refuses to listen to the church, exclude him from the church. This step, like all the other steps is done out of love. Throughout, you are continually reminding your brother that impenitence kills saving faith.

Throughout your personal conversations with your brother, use the Keys that God has given you. “Amen I tell you: Whatever you bind on earth will be bound in heaven, and whatever you loose on earth will be loosed in heaven.” Offer Christ’s forgiveness and loose the sins from your brother when he is repentant. But if he remains stubborn in his impenitence, then you must bind your brother’s sins to him.

As you go you are dealing drastically and decisively with your brother’s sin. That’s because that’s exactly how Jesus dealt with his human brothers and sisters’ sins. Jesus takes all sin seriously. So seriously, in fact, that the holy and innocent Son of God died for sin. Jesus did not protest or boycott his brothers and sisters because of their sins. Nor did he ignore or minimize humanity’s sins. Jesus suffered his heavenly Father’s wrath for his wayward brothers and sisters’ sins. He alone could atone for sin.

Dealing with sin is why Jesus came to earth. When you sinned against God, he did not abandon you in your sin. He did not complain to the angels about how sinful you are. He did not dox you or become passive aggressive with you. God sent his only begotten Son in person for you. To be born for you. To be tempted in your place. To suffer in your stead. To die your death. To rise from the dead as only the Son of God could do. All so that Jesus could reach out to his sinful brothers and sisters. With his precious lifeblood, he cleansed you from all sins. Instead of canceling you, he canceled your sins. He comes to you personally with the Ministry of the Keys to lock the gates of hell to you and open wide the doors of heaven.

That kind of grace and mercy changes you and changes how you treat one another. Now when someone sins against you, instead of being shocked or outraged, you humbly — yet confidently — confront sin. When you confront sin with God’s Word, you are doing God’s will. One-on-one, you are looking for a win. Not to win an argument, or to defeat an opponent, but to win your brother or sister over to repentance. What a blessing when you get to see — up close and personal — the power of God’s Word to convict and comfort! There is no greater joy than reconciliation! This is a moment that causes angels in heaven to rejoice (Luke 15:10). That’s a win-win.

God has designed his Church to be a community of repentance and forgiveness. Repentance and forgiveness – that is the rhythm of the Christian life. We begin each day by praying Luther’s Morning Prayer and crossing ourselves, reminding us of our baptism where we daily die to sin and live to a new life in Christ. We begin each worship service repenting of our sin and receiving Christ’s forgiveness. As part of the baptized body of Christ, we care for our fellow baptized brothers and sisters. When they stray, we go after them. When they wander, we call them back. When they sin, we go to them personally and privately, using the Keys to withhold or extend forgiveness.

It is a joy and a privilege to proclaim to a repentant brother or sister that heaven’s doors are wide open to them. Only divine love would compel Jesus to go after you. Only the divine love of Jesus in you would compel you to go after your sinning brother. Only the divine love of Jesus in your brother would compel him to go after you when you sin.

If that lady from Norfolk, North Dakota had taken the time to visit with parents and share her concerns personally, she might have avoided the public criticism. If she had shared her love privately, some of the children might have been helped.

It is a lesson we all must put into practice the next time Jesus calls us to go to our sinning brother. The only way to deal with sin is the way Jesus told us to deal with sin. To take decisive, drastic and personal action against it. That is demonstrating the divine love Jesus has for you. The divine love that is now inside you. Amen.

We heard the apostle Paul teach us: “I have been crucified with Christ, and I no longer live, but Christ lives in me. The life I am now living in the flesh, I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me.” Amen. (Galatians 2:20)