Mary has left Bill and announces to him she is going to divorce. Mr. and Mrs. Jones are taking the elders out for dinner each Sunday, trying to persuade them that they should withdraw the congregation from its present denomination to join another. After a loud and protracted argument, Sally and Jane have declared that they do not care to speak to one another again; it has been four weeks since the fight and they refuse to reconcile. Peggy knows she is pregnant out of wedlock. Harry has discovered that the church organist is a homosexual. What do all of these people have in common? In one way or another, they all need the blessings and the benefits of church discipline.
But if they belong to the average church, none, or at best few of them, would be able to profit from the healing, purifying balm of discipline. And discipline, in such churches, would not be considered a blessing or benefit, but an outmoded relic of the Dark Ages, unsuitable to a modern congregation. That is the tragedy of the church of our time.
Many of you who are pastors, elders, and church leaders know that your own congregation is remiss in the exercise of church discipline. Perhaps you say, “Well, it is so tar gone, there isn’t much hope of reestablishing it in my church.” Or, possibly, in frustration you reply, “Sure, I know we ought to have church discipline, but I wouldn’t know where to begin. Besides that, I don’t even know how to exercise discipline; they didn’t teach me anything about that in seminary.”
For all such persons—for the uninitiated in ministry and for the experienced who see a need to be more biblically effective in church discipline—this book is written. To the timid, to the confused, to the willing but ignorant, I say, there is hope. You can indeed institute, reinstitute, or strengthen church discipline in your congregation.
How do I know that is true? Because the Lord Jesus Himself set forth the basic principles of church discipline, because He who stands amid the lampstands cares about your church and wants you to practice discipline. Whatever He requires of His people He gives both the wisdom and the strength to do. That is why I say it is possible to have discipline in your congregation; yes, in your congregation, if it is a church where the Word of God is preached and where, in spite of many irregularities, beneath all there is a fundamental desire to please the Lord.
There are many congregations across the land in which church discipline is being revived: this is a most encouraging sign. Indeed, it is evidence that the recent surge in evangelical thought and concern extends deeper than many have supposed. Since discipline is a primary means available for drawing a line between the church and the world, one of the chief ways of identifying God’s people, and a pivotal element in distinguishing a true church from a false one, it is of utmost importance to reestablish good discipline in this period in which there has been much confusion in determining the true churches of Christ.
Moreover, in the biblical counseling revival, those involved have discovered that church discipline is an essential tool. Indeed, it is this revival that has spurred the new interest in church discipline. Without it there is no way to bring many counseling cases to a satisfactory end. With discipline all cases can be resolved. That interest, of course, views church discipline from the counselor’s perspective. It thinks of discipline in its narrower sense as a tool for counseling. Looking at discipline from another, broader viewpoint, counseling may be thought of as an essential part of the processes of church discipline. Both perspectives are valid and important. But either way you look at it—and we shall consider the matter from both sides in this book—counseling and church discipline are inextricably intertwined; neither can be carried on effectively and biblically without the other.
Much more could be said about church discipline in this introduction by tracing its course down through the ages or by showing how it was used for the wrong purposes in harsh and harmful ways and how, in reaction, it was laid aside. It could be shown that this, in turn, led to the easy takeover of the mainline evangelical churches by liberals who, because the practice of church discipline had been abandoned, were able to espouse their heretical teaching with so little opposition. It could be shown that much of the weakened state of the churches in the present time is the direct result of a failure in church discipline. Divorces occur, church splits take place, false teaching is introduced and the like, because the means Christ outlined for forestalling such things, the process and application of church discipline, is no longer intact. But, having simply said that much, let us move on.
One of the greatest tragedies resulting from the failure of church discipline is the wreckage of homes strewn across the land. Had discipline been in place and properly functioning, few of the marriage failures and the child/parent problems now facing the church would have occurred. They would have been nipped in the bud by lively, loving disciplinary action, dealt with summarily, and in most cases, coupled with good biblical counseling (which, remember, is an essential element in effective church discipline) would have been put to rest. Failure of church discipline as a viable function has led to chaos in the church. And this chaos, in turn, has led to every other form of difficulty and trouble.
From what I have said, you can see how important church discipline is, can’t you? Indeed, the work of the church cannot be (indeed, is not being) conducted properly apart from church discipline.
“Well, then, what is church discipline, and how shall we go about establishing and practicing it?” you ask. I shall try to give you adequate and satisfying scriptural answers to those two questions.
I consider myself qualified to write about this matter only because over the last twenty-five years, in one way or another, I have been forced to face most of the issues connected with church discipline as I have pastored churches, taught and practiced counseling, and dealt with case after case in question-and-answer sessions at pastors’ conferences. These endeavors have driven me to the Scriptures for God’s answers, and while I may not have all of them, I think that I have enough to help you get biblical church discipline under way and functioning well in your congregation. At least that is my desire and my prayer. You will have to judge whether or not I have succeeded.