An introduction to kicking people out of Church (1. Cor 5:1-8)

It is actually reported that there is immorality among you, and immorality of such a kind as does not exist even among the Gentiles, that someone has his father’s wife. You have become arrogant and have not mourned instead, so that the one who had done this deed would be removed from your midst. (1 Cor 5:1-2)

In this chapter, Paul addresses something that has grieved him deeply to hear. He has received reports of a certain sin in the church. Now of course, sin in the church is nothing new. Where there are humans in the church, there is bound to be sin. And there will be grace for the sinner to find forgiveness for it and freedom from it. That doesn’t mean that there’s something wrong with the church, but only that it’s operating normally, and doing what it’s supposed to: Putting redeemed rebels together for their common sanctification.

But you wouldn’t expect to find the type of sins that shock and disgust even unregenerate people, simply because as Christians we are not who we used to be, but we are in the process of becoming holy like God is holy. So there is bound to be an improvement compared to what we were. And as we come further and further in that process, our conscienes grow more and more sensitive, and the sins that we’re dealing with are usually things that we as unregenerate people would not even think twice about.

So when a transgression of this magnitude had happened, you’d expect the church to be at least as shocked and disgusted as the world, and to mourn this atrocity. But in stead, Paul says, they had become arrogant. In stead of being ashamed, they were proud. How could that be?

It seems like the Corinthian Church seems to have fallen into a heresy that uses grace as a means to sin in stead of to holiness. That says Christ died so that I could keep sinning, and not be punished for it, in stead of Christ died to take my punishment and set me free from the power of sin.

They would see their freedom in Christ as a freedom to sin, rather than a freedom from sin. So when they saw what they perceived to be freedom flourishing in such abundance in their church, then in stead of grieving, they became arrogant toward those whom they perceived as slaves to the law of God.

For I, on my part, though absent in body but present in spirit, have already judged him who has so committed this, as though I were present. In the name of our Lord Jesus, when you are assembled, and I with you in spirit, with the power of our Lord Jesus, I have decided to deliver such a one to Satan for the destruction of his flesh, so that his spirit may be saved in the day of the Lord Jesus.  

Your boasting is not good. Do you not know that a little leaven leavens the whole lump of dough? Clean out the old leaven so that you may be a new lump, just as you are in fact unleavened. For Christ our Passover also has been sacrificed. Therefore let us celebrate the feast, not with old leaven, nor with the leaven of malice and wickedness, but with the unleavened bread of sincerity and truth. (1 Cor 5:3-8)

We already saw it in verse 2: “so that the one who has done this deed would be removed from your midst”. Now we are going to get in to what that entails. What Paul is about to teach the Corinthians here has become one of the most unpopular doctrines in the entire Bible. Partly because in some circles it has been abused and misapplied, and partly because it’s not a pleasant or easy thing to do.

But the church has both a right and an obligation to publicly disassociate themselves from anyone who claims to be a brother, but persists in unrepentant sin.

Since this is such a controversial issue, I will be very careful to limit myself to saying what the Bible says, and not draw any conclusions and implications, except for those that are so painfully obvious that there’s no way to avoid them. So with that in mind we are going to make three observations in these verses.

1. Church discipline happens in the context of the church being gathered together:
The church is to carry out this task in unity. Paul orders them to gather the church together and pronounce a judgment on this man in unison. And though he’s absent, he adds his consent to this judgment. Another key passage on church discipline says the same:

If your brother sins, go and show him his fault in private; if he listens to you, you have won your brother. But if he does not listen to you, take one or two more with you, so that BY THE MOUTH OF TWO OR THREE WITNESSES EVERY FACT MAY BE CONFIRMED. If he refuses to listen to them, tell it to the church; and if he refuses to listen even to the church, let him be to you as a Gentile and a tax collector. (Matt 18:15-17)

Jesus goes on to say, in Matthew 18, that when the church is gathered together in unison like this then he is gathered with them. When they are judging according to his word, they are acting as his agents, pronouncing his judgments. And they are as valid in heaven as on earth:

Truly I say to you, whatever you bind on earth shall have been bound in heaven; and whatever you loose on earth shall have been loosed in heaven. “Again I say to you, that if two of you agree on earth about anything that they may ask, it shall be done for them by My Father who is in heaven. For where two or three have gathered together in My name, I am there in their midst.” (Matt 18:18-20)

So church discipline is not something we tuck away and deal with privately. And that public process will benefit everyone in the church, as they are reminded of the dangers of starting down a path of sin. Every one present, if their hearts are right with God, will walk out of that meeting, not with a sense of pride, but with a renewed commitment to fight any appearance of evil in their own hearts.

2. The aim of church discipline is restoration:
The explanation Paul offers for his decision to put this man out of the church is so that he might have a hope of being saved: “I have decided to deliver such a one to Satan for the destruction of his flesh, so that his spirit may be saved in the day of the Lord Jesus.” The word flesh, can mean two things. It can mean our actual body, but it is more often used about our natural inclination toward evil. And that seems to be the most natural understanding here as well, because putting someone out of the church doesn’t really do any harm to their body.

It is also worth noting here, that Satan serves as a tool in this process. Martin Luther said something profoundly true when he said “The devil is God’s devil”. God and Satan are not equal forces battling against each other. God is the only God and infinite creator, and Satan is merely a created being in rebellion to his master. And God is keeping him on a tight leach for as long as it serves his divine purposes. Always remember that!

3. The aim of church discipline is to purify the church:
The third observation from these verses is that church discipline purifies the church. A leaven is a peace of sourdough, that was kept from one batch to the next, to get the new dough to start rising. Once the leaven was kneaded into the dough, the whole dough would take on those same properties, and you could even take a new lump from that dough and keep for the next one.

That is what happens with sin when it gets to exist within the church. It inevitably spreads to the whole church, and no one can remain unaffected by it.

Paul points to the symbolism that God installed into the passover celebration 1500 years earlier, as he freed his people from their captivity in Egypt. On the day when he told them to slaughter a lamb and put its blood on the doorposts of their house. So that the angel that God sent to execute Gods punishment over Egypt would see it, and pass over their house. And then to bake a loaf of unleavened bread, as a sign of his promise of a new nature.

At the time this provided a very real way of salvation from God’s judgment for Israel, but it was yet to be revealed that all of this was pointing to a much greater salvation. 1500 years later God slaughtered a lamb himself. And that lamb was his only son. And the blood from this lamb, his blood shed to atone for sins, covers all those who believe in him and receive him, so that on the day of judgment, God will pass over us. But if God has put the blood of his lamb on our doorposts, he has also transformed us to unleavened bread, and we are not to change that by mixing ourselves with the leaven of malice and wickedness.

Church discipline purifies the church. It helps us by freeing us from a sinful influence that would otherwise pull us down, and it also helps our outward testimony. Isn’t one of the main accusations that are leveled against the church that there are so many hypocrites in it? How many people have been turned off from the Gospel because the church has not done it’s job and cleansed out those who only claim to be Christians, but really aren’t?

I repeat that this is not a pleasant thing to do, but it is important. It’s usually not perceived as a good thing, but we can not afford not to do it. The truth is that some people are of Christ and some are of the devil. And if we allow the latter to infiltrate the church and muddle the line between the two categories, that is a wicked thing to do.

Next time we'll look more into what exactly qualifies for church discipline, so if this is all new to you, please don't go to church this Sunday applying this teaching on everyone you don't like. So please hold off at least until you get the full picture.