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00:00:00 the scripture reading for this morning is taken from um 1 Corinthians chapter 5 1 Corinthians chapter 5 I'm reading from the NIV 1983 translation expel the immoral brother it is actually reported that there is sexual immorality among you and of a kind that does not even occur among pagans a man has his father's wife and you are proud shouldn't you rather have been filled with grief and have put out of your fellowship the man who did this even though I'm not physically present I'm with you in spirit and have already
00:00:43 passed judgment on the one who did this just as if I were present when you are assembled in the name of our Lord Jesus and I am with you in spirit and the power of our Lord Jesus is present hand this man over to Satan so that the sinful nature may be destroyed and his Spirit saved on the day of the Lord your boasting is not good don't you know that a little yeast Works through the whole batch of dough get rid of the old yeast that you may be a new batch without yeast as you really are for Christ Our Passover Lamb has been
00:01:24 sacrificed therefore let us keep the festival not with the old yeast the yeast of malice and wickedness but with bread without yeast the bread of sincerity and truth I have written you in my letter not to associate with sexually immoral people not at all meaning the people of the world who are immoral or the greedy and swindlers or idolators in that case you would have to leave this world but now I'm writing you that you must not associate with anyone who calls himself a brother but is sexually immoral or
00:02:02 greedy an idolator or a slanderer a drunkard or a swindler with such a man do not even eat what business is it of mine to judge those outside the church are you not to judge those inside God will judge those outside expel the Wicked Man from among you this is the word of God thank you very much Jesse right so uh couple of announcements uh before we start uh the cancer support Fellowship uh of FBC we're organizing we have two kinds of meetings on we have within ourselves where we have a discussion on important topics
00:02:48 that affect cancer uh patients last week we discussed the fear of recurrence we had a very good panel of uh patients who got cancer and how they struggled and we had had input from Dr Winnie oncologist and Daniel the psychologist that was a good thing and we're going to move towards supporting people praying for people and ministering to people then on the other hand another aspect of our work is public education and so that is wide in the community and 19th of May uh we're very privileged to have uh the
00:03:24 foremost breast surgeon in the country uh arguably Dr Dr Yip ch ha I'm sure you heard of her she'll come and explain to you what every woman should know about breast cancer how often occurs what you should do what test should be done then the second speaker will be Dr Winnie who's basically an oncologist and she has a huge topic uh to talk about in terms of chemotherapy immunotherapy and targeted therapy for breast cancer because this the stuff is just huge and we can actually keep women with breast
00:03:59 cancer alive for many many years nowadays so if you're interested on how this important topic and half of you are women right so at some stage there will be this problem so you worry about it if it's not for yourself it's for your grandmother or your mothers or your children please come along men don't worry you have your turn we'll talk about prostate cancer at some stage all right so these two will be dealt with so come uh it's free 19th of May at 2:00 there's no lunch don't worry just just come and bring your
00:04:37 friends your neighbor anybody who wants because this is the way we reach out to people in the community as well right so uh so this week next week there'll be we're going to go through some difficult topics uh when we go through the book of Corinthians because it's about the gospel in community and Community has real problems we got lawsuits sexual problems Church discipline marriage so these will be practical topics that will be dealt with one by one so next week our brother yiden will deal with the
00:05:09 thorny uh issue of the church and lawsuits should you when should you sue the church or should you choose sue the church all right so uh then there'll be marriage by do uh Mr John Lee and after that we'll go on so that's the topic today however I've got a very difficult task to talk about the gospel and church discipline I guess this is the most off-putting topic you can find in the entire calendar nobody talks about it but because we are going through one Corinthians you got no choice so therefore just to take in
00:05:45 consideration what Sarah was announcing don't simply join church membership because if you are a member of this church you are then subject to church discipline ah you want discipline you don't want discipline then you sit outside peripheral of the church you're not committed to the church then you won't get the discipline but you fail to understand that the church is a community in a community if we really care about you if we really love you comes discipline which family do you actually have where the children are not
00:06:27 disciplined that means you don't care about your child how how often your mothers told you when she's beating you or or or turning your nose or your ear that I I don't discipline every child outside you know I only discipline you remember that friend I'm sure your mother would have thrown that line at you at some stage it is a sign of love so be careful when you sign up for membership membership is important but you know membership is then you've committed to a community so let's start with the word of prayer father Lord we
00:06:57 enter a very difficult period where we are going to talk about this rather unpleasant topic but yet this discipline is honoring to you this discipline has a purpose and we pray that you open up our hearts today to really understand from your word what discipline means and what church membership means we ask for Jesus sake amen right do you know some people who have been disciplined well the uh in 2014 Pope Francis excommunicated the entire Mafia and for obvious reasons many famous people have been excommunicated from
00:07:36 church molon bapat Pope Pas I 7th in fact uh Joan of Ark when she was captured by the British she was uh actually unfairly excommunicated by a British uh English Bishop who else have been excommunicated from church Queen Elizabeth the first from the Roman Catholic church and even the father of reformation Martin Luther by Pope Leo the 10th on the 15th on 1517 so it seems this has been going on for a while it is an important topic in the 19th century Baptist churches in the United States the data shows that they
00:08:21 excommunicated 2% of their membership per year wow if that happened to FBC which means 2% of a thousand people who are 10 we're talking about 20 isn't it right 40 20 yeah 20 right anyway so so that would be huge isn't it uh if you come into our current time that is much less in the data from American churches show us that 10 to 14% of American Evangelical churches actually practice church discipline the rest they haven't read one Corinthians 5 okay right so and yet despite the fact that they communicated 2% of the
00:09:01 membership per year growth outpace the growth of the general population so discipline is not necessarily something that's stifling Church growth in fact the problem is today we've got modern impediments to church discipline when we come it's it's not the 19th century when we talk about church discipline we got the issue of personal privacy he my my business are you you leader stick your nose into my is it and that's why most people don't like to share they come to sharing they turn green and they walk out do in zoom and
00:09:37 then suddenly you cannot see the face you zoom pop up you can see Shadow because personal privacy we all value our personal privacy but you actually lose some of that personal privacy when you agree to be part of a community there's no personal private privacy when you're in a community you need to understand that moral autonomy what I do my business or what I do with you are you going to come and judge me is it so we actually have a a society where we determine what is right in our own eyes so we have moral autonomy moral
00:10:10 relativism so now you see last time if you talk about divorce oh my God it's like the worst sin in the world now it's okay everybody divorced already right last time you talk about homosexuality now it's okay everybody homosexual be this what I only do what is right in my own ey because it's moral relativism that's a problem too so how are you going to exercise church discipline when there's moral relativism then the other issue is the shame shame is a hindrance to personal fulfillment so noway people not afraid to be Shame
00:10:44 Shame anymore all right uh as long as I'm personally fulfill who cares what people think so these are the modern impediments to church discipline and the other modern impediment is the phenomenon of the mega church where keeping a crowd is more important than growing a community is that oh I cannot do anything so that it'll be so unpopular people start leaving the church Tiding goes down I have to sack all the church workers I mean so those are some of the impediments to church discipline all right but if you look
00:11:15 here at Corinthian the first line to the Church of God that is in Corinth to those Sanctified in Christ Jesus called to be Saints together with those who in every place call upon the name of of our Lord Jesus both their lord and ours Sanctified which made holy see what is the church what is FBC FBC is a collection of people Saints is called to be holy we are that is our calling card right so so Leviticus says I am the Lord your God consecrate yourself therefore and be holy for I am Holy he saves them
00:11:56 from Egypt and the first thing he does in the wilderness of Sinai is to tell them I've saved you now you become like me I'm holy so therefore you be holy and one Peter says you are a chosen rais a royal priesthood a holy nation a people for his own possession that you may proclaim the excellences of him called you out of Darkness Into His Marvelous Light so looking at this passage we can then discern some principles of church discipline the purpose of church discipline one it is expose sin two it's
00:12:32 a warn against sin three it's done to be Redemptive not punitive it's protective for the church and five is to preserve the good weakness of Christ in the Church of Jesus Christ if we are truly a redeemed people now first of all exposure of sin it is actually reported that there's sexual immorality so here is the issue of sexual immorality among you of a kind that's not even tolerated among pagans for a man his father's wife and you're so arrogant ought you not to have mourned let him who has done this be
00:13:10 removed from among you so here sexual immorality includes a whole range of sexual sins and in this particular case a man has his father's uh wife and it's so bad during the last time even today that you've heard of a man having sex with his stepmother I mean run off with the secretary I understand right but run off with the father your mother you know that is so bizarre that even the pagans don't even do it you ask go in office ask anybody run off his mother-in-law mother-in-law never but mother I mean that's bizarre
00:13:53 so so and and they actually are tolerating it so what Paul is actually doing he's exposing the he doesn't hide the sin he Expos it you some of you among you are doing that horrible thing that even the pagans don't even do so a man is father's wife if you look in the Old Testament Leviticus says you shall not uncover the nakedness of your father which is the nakedness of your mother she is your mother you will not uncover her nakedness you shall not uncover the nakedness of your father's wife it is
00:14:20 your father's nakedness which means you don't have sex with your your father's mother or your mother it is absolutely bizarre and if you look at the Corinthian culture why have they done this because they have a very sexualized culture you know there's a Corinthians saying Mistresses we keep for the sake of pleasure concubines for the daily care of the body but wives bear us legitimate children all right so that is a how they view women in those days I would have hoped we have gone way past that today but that's their culture and
00:14:57 in fact you look at them uh the overlooking the Corinthian uh city is a huge hill okay it's an acropolis where there one supposedly 1,000 prostitutes and every night the 1,000 prostitutes which are also priests are double in double uh vocation they come down and apply their trade it was a very immoral place and if you look in the book of Corinthians there are numerous references to sexual immorality chapter 6 chapter 7 chapter 10 it is rif this church is re this WS of sexuality but it's even egregious by secular standards
00:15:41 even secular people will not accept you having sex with your mother all right so now look at Ravi Zacharias and the shocking thing about him is that we never knew he had a double life we never knew has this Behavior always been there it's hidden and unrepented it grow slowly in the dark like a fungus What would keep us from falling to the same sin it happens it happens all the time dri Bon Hofer very interesting quote he's a German Pastor who was persecuted during the time of World War II he says
00:16:23 he who is alone with his sin is utterly alone it may be that Christians not with standing corporate worship common prayer and all their Fellowship in service may still be left to their loneliness the final breakthrough to Fellowship does not occur because though they have fellowship with one another as Believers and as devout people they do not have Fellowship as undev out as Sinners what dri monofer is saying there's a level of our fellowship when prayer meeting worship life group group Gamma or beta
00:17:01 where we actually Fellowship as devout Believers but there is a missing link we don't have Fellowship as Sinners we don't come together and confess our sin and acknowledge the fact that we are sinners and these sins are what we are struggling with and because we don't have that Dimension then people like leaders like us that Ravi Zacharias can go for years and years and years apparently having the fellowship as devout Believers but never being brought to account for the hidden sin so therefore we're setting up
00:17:43 ourselves for the many rabi Zarias and ourselves as Leaders to this problem there needs to be a biphasic fellowship where one when we encourage one another and one when we actually face the fact that we are sinners you know we act the reality is that we are sinful but we act as if we got no sin this doesn't just apply to our private life he says if we say we have no sin John 1 John 1 we deceive ourselves the truth is not in us if we confess our sins he is faithful and just to forgive our sins and cleans us from
00:18:19 all our unrighteousness if we say we are not sin we make him AAR and his word is not in us and and I so often hear murmurings among church members oh that particular leader he did that sin oh my God I mean as if leaders got no sin I mean absolutely shocked they absolutely shocked I I tell and I discuss why should you be shocked if we say we have no sin if any leader say he has no sin something wrong with him right straight away Bible says you're are a liar the moment you say you no sin you real light finish gone so we act as
00:18:58 if we not Sinners we come to church we portray ourselves that we are not Sinners and we don't struggle with sin and when you do that we're not honoring the truth and we're not and then we're going to have one day we will fall right so the warning and you look at this particular Church to do not note the reason for church discipline is not only exposure that we are sinners number two is warning and you are arrogant do you know the Corinthian Church there two sins one is by the guy who has sex with
00:19:33 the mother and the other guy the other sex the sin is about the church the church knows about it Winks about it keep both eyes closed about it so therefore it is tolerated in fact this church is actually proud of their spiritual gifts they speak in tongues they have Miracles they have prophecy but they also had a guy with his mother that's it's okay as long as I can heal people I can touch them they fall down you can have how many mothers you like it's okay it's all right but you see the dichotomy and Paul is
00:20:11 bringing them back to the gospel hey this is bad because you are supposed to even mourn when you see if someone is part of the community and does that don't you feel sad don't you feel upset that this is a part of my body in Christ and he is in great danger you should be having deep anguish of your soul wanting true repentance so therefore the solution which Paul suggests here is that he be removed because such a behavior which is not even tolerated among pagans should not be associated with the Church of
00:20:52 Jesus Christ because the Church of Jesus Christ is a Sanctified body a redeemed body that reflects the holy God and yet you have a church where the people gather they're no different from a political party interact Club whatever where everybody does as they like so the world cannot see the difference so therefore Paul is saying remove the person and in every part of scripture you can see that take no part in unfruitful works of darkness in Ephesians 5:11 expose them we expose sin warn Titus 3:10 warn a divisive person
00:21:30 once and then warn him second time after that we have nothing to do with him uh 2 Thessalonians 3:14 if anyone does not obey what we say in this letter which is what Paul writes take note of that person have nothing to do with him that he may be ashamed do not regard him as an enemy but warn him as a brother we're not supposed to wage war in that person but because we want to love him and warn him as a brother so dealing with sin there are two ways in which we deal with sin in this world one you deal with it in solitude where you
00:22:07 come before God like David did after his sin with B Sheba but and then you the trouble is if you come on your own there's a risk of self deception because you don't know your sin you think you're great but the people around you think you're obnoxious so therefore if you got self deception then you got self forgiveness and that's not real forgiveness there is a danger God Gave You Brothers and Sisters in Christ not just to bring you chicken soup when you're sick but to highlight an honest appraisal of sin so that you actually
00:22:45 have real forgiveness not fake forgiveness if we remain in Fellowship groups whether life group or gamma and any of those groups where we only have the fellowship as devout Believers and no Fellowship as Sinners then we will miss out on this aspect of Christian Life the community where we can actually help defeat the danger the danger is sin and the problem with sin for us is why I don't mention my sin to you is because we let our sins Define us if you told one lie that means you a liar La all right if you you if if you didn't what
00:23:25 so so basically sin becomes the mask in which that defines us so we therefore we we try to deny that mask because we're so closely tied to that sin so we cannot admit the sin because admitting the sin affects our ego so when we have sined we feel very bad which is rightly so we are diminished but the problem is our ego we drag that along so that where we and our sin are so closely tied that we cannot let it go only the people who know they have burdens can be delivered from them so see the main problem with us is we
00:24:08 have sin and we need to get rid of that sin that sin needs to be recognized and dealt with and as long as you tie your sin with your ego and your performance then you can never cut it off it's like going to a doctor and I work in this field so I see men all the time imagine I go to the man but the man comes to me and he has got a blood test and the blood test is PSA prostate specific antigen and the number is up more than three then he may have prostate cancer right it's a wonderful tool and he comes to me and he
00:24:49 shows me the PSA and I say ha your PSA is high you may have your prostate may be harboring cancer he jumps up and screams he say what my PSA is great my prostate is wonderful how dare you tell me my prostate is diseased hello I'm just trying to tell you that you need help isn't it and he takes offense at me because his PSA is high is it my fault your PSA is high is it my fault your your prostate is this no but you tell me my prostate is my prostate is perfect don't you say anything against my Pro my prostate I've got the
00:25:29 greatest prostate in the world right nobody ever seen my prate yeah nobody seen my prostate but you laugh but that's how we approach sin isn't it you think sin is your prostate if he says anything wrong against me my prostate means something wrong against me what the person should says oh doctor thank you very much this prostate is diseased you better take it out that's right so what happens that when we actually have sin the weight of sin does two things for us it humbles us humbles Us in the sense that you don't protect your
00:26:10 prostate you say find me a way that means I am in trouble find me a way to overcome this problem so to do that means I need help for you to say I've sinned and I need help is a very big thing so we're saying the weight of sin forces us to say I need help the second thing is that the weight of sin causes to turn to only one doctor not your local urologist but to Jesus Christ that's what the weight of sin does so there's a difference between humility and humiliation humiliation is this falc deprivation of the ego's craving for
00:26:51 respect you're you so proud of your prostate do you say anything wrong my prostate I get so upset because my prostate and my ego together tight you can see how stupid that is that's called humiliation humility is a voluntary turning away from our fixation for respect to focus on something bigger than ourselves I mean I turn away from my defense of my prostate gland to defend my entire body if I leave my prostate gland down I'm dead you said is asking for help look at the famous Parable Luke 18 of two men who go to the
00:27:30 temple one is a Pharisee and one is a tax collector and they epitomize the effect of sin so if you look at this man he comes the the the the tax collector he knows he is a rogue he knows he's a con man and he says God be merciful to me a sinner right so so what's happening here is that for him to get help it's the wisdom of the CR cross which is upside down to go up you go down salvation comes when he's willing to admit that I am a sinner if he stands up there and says he's not a sinner then he cannot get the
00:28:18 help which is that the other guy so the other guy is much more difficult position why he says thank God I'm not like other men extortion unjust adulterers even like this text C over there I fast twice a week I give tithes of all I get right everything you get you know whether it's a bonus share offering uh pay inheritance everything 10% that's a problem because he's self deceived he thinks that these things are proxy for spirituality he cannot see the end enemy the enemy is what self-righteousness the enemy is
00:29:04 self-righteousness and so therefore he is a legalist but a legalism is more than just depending on performance actually John Piper opened up my eyes when he actually said legalism is not just performance-based the spirit and the life that flows from a failure to be humbled broken amazed and satisfied from the grace of God in Christ if you are not broken if you are not amazed if you are not satisfied by the grace of God then you are resting on something else and that something else must be your credentials your CV the
00:29:45 fact that you are somebody in this world you see when you come to talk about Sin you have Piper says the moment you talk about Sin in your life you have to be humbled you have to be broken because there there's nobody here who has beaten sin and so therefore the cross becomes ever more precious because he has forgiven us of that huge debt so before you actually want to correct somebody else haha today's lecture after that you're looking around for people to discipline right galatian says brother if anyone
00:30:22 caught in any transgression which is many of you and including me you who are spiritual I I I put the inverted commment there should restore him in the spirit of gentleness keep watch on yourself L you be tempted and bear another one another's P burdens and so fulfill the law of Christ it's not that you are not supposed to care uh uh disciplin other people but you're supposed to discipline out of love but before you do that keep a watch on yourself right so the work of the holy spirit is when he comes John says he
00:30:56 will convict the world regarding sin righteousness and judgment concerning sin because they do not believe in me so the issue is that what is the work of the Holy Spirit the work of the holy spirit is to frighten you off so that you let go of all your self-righteousness so so you see the only with the spirit's power and conviction can you come before God and struggle and feel weak and feel needy you know our idea of power you know what our idea of power is he wake up in the morning he says I have the victory of
00:31:31 Christ I think I should take over Peter and preach I think I'm pretty good that's our concept of power but you know the spirit's power is inverted it allows you to go down in order to go up so if you actually feel that you're struggling with the sin and you're too weak to overcome the sin and you really need help and you've been doing this sin over and over again and you're such a horrible specimen and you're almost desperate do you know that's power the power to go down those of you who stand up I'm okay
00:32:10 that's not power that's the devil's plan the holy spirit is the only thing that comes and breaks you down and you feel like a piece of the only way you can feel that is through the power of the holy spirit because no man can stand before God righteous and so therefore the spirit's conviction is actually on the other guy and it's easier for him because in life he's a he's a con man anyway sometimes con man see their need more that's why Jesus came he didn't hang out with the Pharisees who did he
00:32:46 hang out with the drunkards the people who are immoral the prostitutes you know why because they don't have a problem they because they see their need so the wisdom of the Cross is upside side down to go up you go down now the discipline is Redemptive though absent in the body and present in the spirit let's go on to verse four discipline is done corporately when you assemble the name of Jesus and my spirit is present with the power of the Lord Jesus you can to deliver this man to Satan for the
00:33:17 destruction of his flesh so that his Spirit may be saved in the day of uh the Lord so the purpose of discipline is not to condemn him to hell but but to save him so the there is a motive for all church discipline is Redemptive and what does it mean deliver this man to Satan for the destruction of his flesh all right so uh there are two things I want to give you a a read of a parallel passage um in Timothy 1:20 it says among whom were himas and Alexander whom have handed over to Satan that they may learn not to
00:33:59 blaspheme so there's this difficult issue of what does it mean to hand a person over are you going to write a memo or email hey dear Satan this fell no good I I need to send you for some training so that you T him nicely maybe he cow come back later on all right what does it mean so there are two possible meanings I don't have the the the the the answer but it's for you to consider one uh hand him to Satan means you allow him to remove the protection of the Lord from him so that he has physical
00:34:29 suffering even to death you know based on the word destruction so which means Anan safira handed over to Satan they died but spiritually they may have been saved later on Paul he's got a thorn in the flesh which means some sort of suffering so that's physical suffering uh so you you commit him to the realm of Satan number two uh Satan and his principalities and Powers whole sway over people to destroy them to bring them away from Christ so the destru when you talk about for the destruction of the flesh The Word Flesh in New
00:35:08 Testament terms means your your desire to live a life against God so when you go and destroy your sinful carnal nature your flesh which means the flesh which is in Rebellion against God so when you go you leave the church uh uh moves away from him he goes back to the world he lives a worldly life and he suffers as a result of that and when he suffers he realizes that he needs to go back to the church so ultimately it is Redemptive so there are two possible options of this right but again it is not top down we
00:35:42 don't discipline someone because we're better than you but we discipline someone in order to serve the person what is not good is church discipline cannot be done from a posture of self-righteousness we all very good you very bad that is disastrous for the church and that's wrong and that's repulsive and repugnant give you some examples uh uh this was the Wall Street Journal came out almost 15 to 20 years ago Caroline casy she was a believer in a Baptist Church yeah listen Baptist church today all Baptist Church Southwest M Michigan
00:36:22 where she served in the church and worship there for 50 years she served in Sunday School and every week she gave 10% of her tithing to bt76 right and one day the pastor actually excommunicated her and the sin was what questioning the authority of the pastor he charged her with spreading a spirit of cancer and Discord because first of all it's just one Pastor it is not the entire church people do that there was another church in the states that uh excommunicated another woman because she actually devoured the news that the
00:37:04 pastor was going to buy a big house spread gossip GNA excommunicated you think this only happen to the United States well Calvary Church some years ago came out newspaper so I'm allowed to share right everybody everybody reads newspaper right so and then one of these people who actually sued the church actually was a patient of mine so I actually have firsthand knowledge he's a lawyer so I'm allowed to share what is public knowledge not to run down the church but run down the way the church treats people and what
00:37:37 happens that 400 members uh uh were excommunicated suddenly hey AGM they didn't no more name there why because the mission fund the mission fund was opaque nobody knows how much goes in nobody knows how much goes out so because of that they question that and when they question that immediately all the whole gang was kicked out and they got upset you know and then they went and had a lawsuit and all that in the end the lawsuit was actually dismissed because they said the plaintiffs had not exhausted all the Avenues by resolving
00:38:12 the issue bya the AGM which is correct you should go to the egm and resolve it rather than go to the court isn't it right which is wrong thing but again I highlight this is because we don't remove people simply because you question our Authority or you don't like you come out tomorrow actually you know what the question the question building fund ah building fund was supposed to be like 80 million right and they balloon to home 200 over million and who's going to pay and then what they did was they move
00:38:44 funds from other places in the church ministry and all pay for the debt which is the building fund make sure this church don't do that what is building fund is building fund you don't move funds around then you get lawsuit but see leaders have to act and then what is happening here is the discipline is actually because you're protecting the the leaders are protecting themselves that's not how me how how church discipline is done don't do that okay so keep watch on yourself all right before you actually do this so
00:39:18 now if you look at the person who was who was disciplined the next letter Paul writes if anyone has caused pain he has caused uh it not to me but but in some measure but not to put it too severely all of you which means this guy criticized Paul uh criticizes him as well as the whole church for such a one this punishment by the majority which is excommunication is enough so you should rather turn to forgive and comfort him or he may be overwhelmed by excessive sorrow so I beg you to reaffirm your love for him you
00:39:57 see this is what church discipline is about is so that he will come and we will forgive and we will reaffirm our love for him this is why I wrote that I might test you and know whether you're obedient in everything and anyone whom you forgive I also forgive indeed what I forgiven if I forgiven anything has been for your sake in the presence of God so that we will not be outwitted by Satan for we are not ignorant of his designs what is the design of of Satan the design of Satan is to that is to deceive
00:40:25 you and have church discipline cause enity because this church excommunicate me I hate all of them and the hatred grows and not only him his gang will grows so so got him and his merry band of followers they all anti- church and the enmity grows and the devil say wow we are very successful we have planted bitterness in the church you see that is not the purpose of church dis church discipline is to love to forgive and bring the back they is not done out of hatred the other issue is why do we discipline people well
00:41:04 because of protective function your boasting is not good do you not know a little Le leav the whole lump cleanse out the leav that you may be a new lump for as you are unle which what you saying about Le leave is basically a metaphor for evil small imperceptible unproduced effects on the whole so if you look here you have un Le bread and unle bread the big one is the Le bread which got yeast the small one has got no yeast so it doesn't grow so therefore when you put the yeast in you can't even see the yeast but you will see the
00:41:38 effect of theast it balloons out much later on so what Paul is saying is that the reason why you have a excommunication is because that person even though it's one person can affect the whole church which means maybe the whole church will will have sex with the Mother-in-law how however unlikely it is but it could be other kinds of sex right all right so so basically it's a protective function and like any organization you go to any organization whether basat or am or PKR you you you try to pull funny things they will kick
00:42:13 you out any organization has purposes and if you frustrate those purposes and go against those purposes that organization has a right to remove you and it's a fact um if you look at the letters to the Revelation churches in Asia Minor Jesus Takes discipline very very seriously and he says this are the Ephesian church I have this against you you have abandoned the love we had at first remember therefore from where you have fallen repent and do the works that you did at first if not I will come and
00:42:46 remove your lampstand from its place unless you repent lampstand means your church if you don't repent if you I will discipline he will destroy the church she will remove the church pergam therefore repent if not I will come to you soon and war against them with the sword of my mouth again a warning again sadis remember when then what you have received and heard keep it and repent if not you will wake up and I will come like a thief and you will not know at what hour I'm going to come against you so the very Jesus Christ the
00:43:24 author of the church will go against his own church l here so because you are lukewarm neither hot nor cold I will spit you from my mouth those so just discipline is a tiny fragment of God what God is going to do to you as a church collectively if we don't act to keep Holiness look at the Lord's Supper in the Corinthian Church the people who abused the Lord's Supper died and fell sick they were not excommunicated because they love everybody else whatever L suffer sins they don't care but God directly disciplined them by
00:44:04 taking their lives or causing illness Anan safira all they did was transmit the wrong number on bt76 huh nothing what both drop de we go to sgmc heart attack heart attack simultaneous heart attacks can you imagine husband wife uh but God really acts on don't play Play Play This is a God Like pukang says don't play play he will act if the church doesn't act and there are two sins the sins of the individual and the sins of the church if the church doesn't act uh da Carson was um telling a very famous story of a
00:44:45 young man a pastor he knew who went to a small town in the outback of Australia yeah being a young Pastor first time he pastored this church there were about 200 people there and it was very difficult for him he spent 18 months preaching the word of God and every turn he preached the word of God they condemn him even because he was preaching for the word of God and his board didn't support him because the Deacon board was made a whole all the prominent people like all of churches prominent people
00:45:13 the briest people the best businessmen the doctors the the The Architects all no reference the richest people are okay those who drive very big car right but they were crooked in business they were sleeping around they were harsh or cruel at home and he couldn't do anything church discipline because the first person they'll discipline is him so for 18 months he struggled and then he got fed up and he went on his knees and he prayed said Lord I can't take this anymore I'm too young maybe this job is
00:45:51 too big for me so you either take me to another church or you do something and you you know within 3 months people started to die at the end of the year 16 funerals never heard of in a small outb town 16 funerals so the bo all cleaned off no more board came off with a new board and the next year the church grew by another 200 people you see I mean if you don't act God will act because this is his church as pukang says don't play play Corinthians says do you not know that you are God's Temple and God's
00:46:34 spirit dwells in you if anyone destroys God's Temple God will destroy him for God's Temple is Holy and you are that Temple so what is the motivation for us exercising church discipline the motivation is here for Christ Our pass over lamb has been sacrificed let us therefore celebrate the festival not with the all leav the leav of malice and evil but with the unle bread of sincerity and truth so we want to have a bread the body that is not tainted by the yeast right that is pure and the death of Christ makes them new yet they must
00:47:15 get rid of all the old in order to be new precisely because in Christ they are already new see all of us are new we're made in Christ we should leave that sin behind so the motivation for discipline is not that we as a church will look good that means it's outside in i i impose certain standards when you come and Lead worship you must wear a leather shoe no makeup it's not outside in you know it's inside out the motivation for discipline means we are coming from inside because Christ died and paid the price we have
00:47:50 to live up to that price because we are new the holiness is a concept that God is in a separate category in every aspect of his character he's holy in his love Justice Mercy power and knowledge is absolutely perfect and above all of us and we as his people the problem we have to actually live up to that but the Practical issue here in church when we talk about church disine we are pulled in two directions the direction is holiness and the other direction is love y why you want to discipline F not very loving
00:48:33 isn't it come before the whole church everybody T him and then kick him out what kind of archaic stupid thing is this it goes against our modern sensibilities is because we must understand the nature of God you see someone wrote the cruel irony of choosing God's love over his Holiness is that we end up losing both the affection of a familiar body deity isn't worth much only the love of the lord of the Heaven and Earth that dwells in unapproachable light is truly all inspiring when we lose sight of God's
00:49:09 greatness his love loses meaning so it's all about love not about righteousness then God is reduced to your little body and when your little body gives you a compliment it doesn't count for much imagine if someone looked at you and wrote you a letter and said that they love you right go back 10 years she wrote a letter to you Imran okay say Imran I love you one is Queen Elizabeth the other one is our friend in kajang which letter is worth more I know you're immigrant here so so you're not Malaysian so honest answer which one is
00:49:54 worth more not you ask him huh I know you know now na okay he even he knows of Pakistan he know na but which letter is worth more queen queen ah Queen why because the level of moral stature if the moral stature of that person is great the love you is worth something isn't it if say you love he loves you nothing nobody right ah but if if Queen Elizabeth say you you're something you're somebody and so therefore the greater the Holiness is the greater the love you diminish the Holiness then you diminish the love
00:50:36 isn't it paradoxical and we're trying to put Holiness against Love Actually is stupid the Hol of God is seen in the entire Old Testament Moses Burning Bush you going take off your slippers all right to tell you that God is so great and so powerful even the shoes you cannot uh you cannot wear it's not literal I got some church member in years before always come to church take off take off shoes and and walk around the smelly feet I think there more disgusting but he fails to understand that the burning bush allows you to have
00:51:10 an a picture of God's holiness Moses can't even see God sees the back end of God with the light usza touches the ark and dies immediately and Zira nadib and abiu they they offer for worship immediately struck Dead all this tells us that God is Holy and great and the Passover is that perfect picture where you've got the Holiness of God that requires the death of the firstborn son on everybody Egypt regardless of whether you're Egyptian or Israelite and then all you have to do is to kill that lamb and put that blood on
00:51:53 the top of your lle and your firstborn will be saved it is a perfect picture of Holiness and love and so therefore we as people of the Cross have that perfect picture but in modern times we have difficulty as well because we seem to tolerate talk about church discipline all the the leaders Church very panick already why because we live in an age where tolerance is a supreme virtue of the Public Square you know the Muslims have opposite view to Christian you know for them 18 socks with Allah the whole
00:52:34 country is like in turmoil for us they put Jesus name everywhere on the socks you underwear whatever people don't seem to react why because on the Western World tolerance isn't that is a supreme virtue Christians are are cast as intolerant and backward the word fundamentalist is a a really dirty word so marital infidelity divorce profanity abortion homosexuality moral perversion all those are actually tolerated in church because we love everybody ma that is a problem when we exercise church discipline some of us say hate
00:53:20 the sin Love The Sinner they disconnect the sin from The Sinner but the trouble is sin is the expression of the human will you can't sin that was my sin nothing to do with me if you sin you desired that it is your sin you have to own that sin and God hates The Sinner and you need to change and so therefore Hebrews 12 says for the Lord disciplines the one he loves and chastises every son huh did you read the word there every son every single single one you know he chastises every single son he receives if we don't
00:54:03 discipline we claim that we love better than God yeah we know discipline means we are more loving than God God discipline people no good like some people die and all that oh but we are better than God we don't discipline which is ironic Hebrews says for they disciplin us for short time parents it seemed best to them but he disciplines us for our good that we may share his Holiness for the moment all discipline seems painful rather uh um than pleasant but later yields a peaceful fruit of righteousness
00:54:37 to those who have been trained by it so discipline church or in your personal life is actually for our good so the Practical applications let me end the sermon what are practical applications we don't discipline non-believers we we don't discipline non-members in this church so let's say you want to play fast and lose you don't want to be a member or part of our community then then you won't get discipline you you're a visitor all the time Perpetual visitor until the Holy Spirit touches your heart
00:55:13 I wrote to you in my letter not to associate with the sexually immoral not to at all meaning the sexually immoral of this world or the greedy the swinders idol since you would need to go out to the world so he says no point saying that you're supposed to excommunicate everybody because you have to leave the planet to do that discipline is for professed Saints but now I'm writing you not to associate with anyone who Bears the name of brother if he is guilty of sexual immorality greed idolator reviler
00:55:45 drunkard swindler not to even eat with such a one even at the food fair uh for what have I got to do with judging others is it not the those inside the church whom you are to judge God judges those outside God will take care of them Purge the evil person from among you that's so therefore it is a Christian who is subject to church discipline he's inside the church which means part of the church membership where to purge or discipline him and they are sexually moral or greed or doat reviler drunker
00:56:25 these are examples okay okay and and so basically it is serious outward and unrepentant all right so this guy has his father's wife it's so bad that even the pagans don't even have it among themselves so the sin that it is a sin that characterizes the person public outward fruit of the person's life outward serious and unrepentant so if you let's say you got to fight with somebody else the fellow won't apologize to you go and call you bad names tomorrow you call two people next day the whole church then next day
00:57:00 discipline then all of us die all every single one okay because there is no nonner here but the sin must characterize the person it must be public and outward serious and unrepentant and basically the areas are the truth which is Doctrine if you got someone spreading false Doctrine immediately there is dealt with immorality which includes homosexuality and and and love okay if the person divisive and publicly goes against the church publicly uh uh tries to destroy the church the only person we actually excommunicated in our history
00:57:42 launched 35 police reports against this church not out of love out of hatred and I think it took us too long you don't to wait till 35 police reports it should have been much much earlier but it's out and and it's obvious to everybody so it is not a Witch Hunt okay the steps taken Matthew 13 you talk to him take others along take it to the church then you excommunicate it it's a process of which you minister to the person and it's a long long time unless it's very obvious for example the guy who is
00:58:16 excommunicated in one Corinthians chapter 5 has his father's wife you notice uh Paul didn't say hey you go and talk to him first one onone then you going to talk one in five then you discuss to the church was straight away excommunication why it's because it's so serious is outward already everybody know the whole town knows you see I mean so a measure of wisdom so let me summarize the sermon the church discipline is always Redemptive we want to change behavior and grow godliness it is always corporate the pastor or the
00:58:52 Elder doesn't do it alone it is through the whole body of Christ chist is prophetic because it shines God's truth into error and sin and it's also prpic because it is a foraste of future judgment if you think discipline church is is something you wait till real judgment comes so it is warning let me end the story of scarlet clay she was in a Baptist Church not only Baptist chch Reformed Baptist Church you don't get better than that in the United States her son had cogne syndrome which led to a brain tumor and
00:59:33 after many years the son died and she struggled alone with it and when you actually have one child having such uh illness and it's actually terminal the marriage is under strain the husband and her separated and as she struggled with this she did not pray for five years did not attend church for one year and the elders in her church got together and they excommunicated her all right but there was a silver lining to this they after a few years she came to grips with the reality of her son's death and saw God's purposes
01:00:15 in it and her own excommunication and she actually repented didn't join back the same church she wrote a letter to John Piper published in Desiring God website and how that excommunication actually helped her come back to God but the problem was that church excommunicated her and in her letter she says not one person visited my son when he was in terminal care not one Pastor not one cell member no one and they just excommunicated her that is not church discipline church discipline comes with love with
01:01:04 heartache with care so that people feel the love of God we always disciplined in love the Love Is For The Individual so the individual who is so precious should repent the love is for the church to protect the church so that weaker members are not stumbled the love is for the world so that the world can see the transforming power of Christ the love is for Christ so that his honor his Beauty his Holiness is not imputed so church discipline is a thing let us be careful and when we think about discipline it's always
01:01:45 discipline in love let's pray father Lord we we thank you that we have an honorous responsibility as a community and we bring this community to you and father we confess that as a church often times in the past we've been more concerned about growing the crowd rather than creating a community and we as leaders have been afraid because of the prevailing culture of moral autonomy moral relativism personal privacy and exaggerated ideas of love so father Lord we confess before you and we repent we ask of you L Lord to really
01:02:50 come and dwell among your people help us recognize the true enemy the true enemy is sin help us help each other to expose our sin to enter a fellowship of Sinners to warn each other to protect each other and to grow together with each other we ask oh Lord that you come and populate this church and this will be your church and your church will reflect your honor your love and your Holiness we ask for Jesus sake amen amen indeed we are people of the Cross we have been forgiven we have been loved and we have been redeemed and now we can
01:03:38 respond together and sing this song as we live for a holy God [Music] let's sing together a thousand Generations Falling Down In Worship to sing the song of Ages to the [Music] lamb and all who before us and all who will believe will sing the song of Ages to the land your name your name is the highest your name is the greatest your name stands above them [Music] all all Thrones and dominions all power and position your name stands above them all let sing and the angels cry holy whole creation cry
01:05:15 holy you are lifted High holy holy forever and if you've been forgi and if you've been redeemed sing the song forever to the [Music] L and if you walk in Freedom and if you bear his name sing the song forever to the land come on church we sing the song forever and amen and the angels cry holy all creation cry holy you are lifted High holy holy forever [Music] your people sing to the King of Kings holy you will always be holy holy forever your name your name is the highest your name is the great your
01:07:06 name stands above them all above all TR and dominions all p and positions your name stand above them all oh Jesus your name is the highest your name is the greatest your name stands above them all all thres and dominions of and positions your name stands above them all and the angels cry holy all creation Christ [Music] holy you are lifted High holy holy forever your people sing people sing Holy to the King of Kings holy you will always be holy holy forever you will always be you will always be
01:08:49 holy holy forever [Music] you will always be holy holy [Music] forever shall we be seated uh this is a very difficult topic I want to share a few things Peter talked about somebody who suit the church and the church responded these are real stories uh from our history The Church responded with lawyers uh in then he broke him and part of the settlement was he had to do a recording of a confession at the Baptist convention and I brought him there so I know I remember bringing him there two Baptist convention in Old Town
01:09:56 and the camera was there and he had to record a confession then he had to publish in the newspaper a retraction and everything and then there was Financial money had to pay and there was a restraining order these are real stories after that I kept in touch with him you know he never forgave the church and I always wondered these things are very bitter I'll give another story as a keyboard player Ravi Zariah have you ever wondered how his wife felt or his children so there's a website called defending
01:10:39 Ravi and the son published an article called The Lost gospel and he said this no even if my father was guilty how much did any of you reach out to my mother so today there are two things that will come out from this sermon one you say this Peter this Anor they so hypocritical they talk about this I think they should be disciplined or you could point to anyone else yeah I hope my husband is listening to this I hope my wife is listening to this this the other is this the sermon will make you squirm and I will tell
01:11:38 you God wants to make you squirm I Anor Lim stand here struggling with sin and I confess it don't look to anyone else this morning two things the Lord says thus your sin break you then you are like the tax collector two does God's love comfort you and that is my prayer we are all sinners let us walk together encouraging one another and together we'll be an AO authentic church I want to lead all of us in prayer for we all carry our own sins shall we pray Lord this is not we look at the things we hide from others
01:13:07 in darkness we look at the Mas we wear because we don't want to confront that sin and so this morning we recognize you're a holy God you are not a God that swears not a god that is sexually IM moral you're absolutely holy and Lord we say we can't we struggle and so right now seated there I want to give you a moment to confess your sins let's take a few moments to just sit there and I say this God break our heart for what break our heart Hearts breaks yours let's take a few moments to just where you were
01:14:00 seated there confess your sins whatever they are habitual your struggles let's take a moment of silence and let the Holy Spirit speak to you and you may be seated there you're feeling very Def and you say I've been struggling for this for a long time and I can't get out of it and so the Lord says this Turn Your Eyes Upon me for tomorrow is another day and I am with you and you're open I will bring people to you for we walk together and here the second prayer God is saying he is not only holy he's a loving God he loves
01:15:04 you he loves you so much he sent his one and only son to die for you and as Jesus rose Victorious from the grave that Victory is promised to you if you but persevere and so we pray Lord we are a church that can speak the truth in love to one another that we are a confessing Church of our sins to one another and if a person confesses he falls again he repents he walks and he can be confessing the rest of his life but slowly as CS Lois says that trajectory will slowly get better so congregation be hopeful if you feel
01:15:53 you're in bondage you feel you've been doing things last 20 years you cannot change I want to say there is power in the name of Jesus Christ and I ask right now that so God floods you with his love that he loves you so much and you feel it you not just think it you experience that God loves you and he sent his son to die for you I'm going to ask brother Brandon to just sing one last time and as you sing this ster you are so Washed by the love of God it amazes you it brings Su your news and you will leave today
01:16:28 saying there is hope Hallelujah I'm going to pass this time now over to Brandon and you feel like coming in front to Neil Imran doing it I'm going to do it I'm a sinner and there is no shame in kneeling before the Lord apart the time of the Brandon [Music] [Music] and the angels cry holy all creation Christ holy you are lifted High holy holy forever hear your people sing Holy to the King of Kings holy you will always be be holy holy Forever sing again and the Angels Cry and the angels cry holy creation
01:18:20 [Music] christol you are lifted High [Music] hly holy [Music] forever Lord God we close in prayer now we thank you for those who have come in front confessing their sins we are hopeful and we will live hopeful for you oh God the same God who died for our sins and Rose from the dead have given us that power let us be that church there is no sin too big too wide no past too painful that God cannot overcome and I pray you live knowing you are part of an overcoming church and God's people say God bless bless you have an
01:19:26 overcoming week ahead please leave quietly so we can minister to those who are in
