I.
This morning we continue our sermon series on conflict resolution.
The passage in Matthew 18 is one of those go-to passages when Christians need a reminder of how to handle conflict in a godly manner.
But as I was preparing for this morning’s sermon, I came to realise that this passage may or may not be about conflict resolution.
I think it would be helpful for us to know why this is the case, so allow me a few minutes to explain.
Our English Bibles are translated from ancient manuscripts. You can see images of some of them on the screen.
And when we come to verse 15, we find a small difference among these manuscripts. Most manuscripts contain the two words, “against you.” So the verse reads, “If your brother sins against you, go and tell him his fault.
With those two words, the passage clearly speaks to a personal grievance—to a situation where another Christian has sinned against us.
But those two words, “against you,” are missing from some of the earliest and most important manuscripts we have. Why they are missing, nobody really knows.
And without those two words, the meaning of the verse changes. It would then read, essentially, “If your brother sins, go and tell him his fault.”
In other words, the passage would not necessarily be about someone who has wronged us personally. It would be about seeing a brother or sister caught in sin and taking the initiative to help that person return to the right path.
So we have a question before us: with one group of manuscripts saying, “against you,” and another group leaving those words out, what exactly did Matthew write?
We are taught to read Bible passages in context—to read the verses that come before and after, so that we can follow the train of thought and understand what the writers are saying.
But in this case, the context does not quite settle the question.
If we read the passage with verses that comes before, where Jesus speaks about causing others to stumble and about finding the lost sheep, the shorter reading— “if your brother sins”—seems like a natural continuation. It is about helping a brother or sister who has gone astray.
But if we take the longer reading— “if your brother sins against you”— then it fits very naturally with what follows, because the following section is about forgiveness and how we respond when someone has wronged us.
So even when we look at the wider context, we find that both readings seem to fit.
To further complicate the matter, a group of scholars understands the verses that come before as Matthew’s superficial reconstruction and therefore argues that they should not be taken as the context for understanding verses 15–20.
You might want to dig deeper to try to solve this interpretation stalemate.
But I would think that we who are not biblical scholars should, in any case, step back and ask: What does the passage clearly call us to do?
We are Christians who seek to live out what the Bible teaches in a challenging world—a world where we see fellow Christians going astray, and where, at times, other Christians may sin against us.
And whichever reading we take, when we read verses 15 to 20 as a whole, we hear Matthew saying this: we are responsible for one another.
He calls us to take the initiative to lead those who are drifting away back to the fold.
And when we have been offended, he calls us, as much as it is possible, to help the person who has offended us to remain within the fold.
In short, we are to be our brothers’ and sisters’ keeper.
This is the basic message that Matthew want us to hear from this passage: God does not call us to stand by when a brother or sister goes astray, or when relationships break down. He calls us to take responsibility for one another.
And what does taking responsibility for one another look like? I want to draw out three things from this passage.
First, we are called to take the initiative.
Second, we are called to exercise loving discipline.
And third, we are called to do all this in prayer.
We know what taking initiative means. And we know as well that it can be challenging in both kinds of situations.
If we believe that someone has sinned, we cannot help but wonder: Who are we to judge, when we ourselves are not perfect? And what if we have got it wrong? To point something out wrongly can cost us a great deal of embarrassment. And what if the person has strong backing? I have heard of a pastor trying to right a certain wrong, only to receive threats from a powerful leader in the church.
Are we still willing to take the initiative, knowing that such negative consequences are possible?
And if the matter is about a personal grievance, it is no easier.
What if we have got it wrong? To raise an issue with the other person when we are mistaken can likewise cost us a great deal of embarrassment. And what if the other person turns the accusation back on us and says that we are the ones at fault?
If we genuinely feel offended and hurt, we may feel strongly that we are the ones who deserve an apology. It would feel unnatural to take the initiative to restore the relationship. And if there has been verbal abuse, we may need time to heal and to face life first before we are ready to face the person who has hurt us.
Knowing how difficult taking the initiative can be, many of us would rather hope the problem goes away on its own.
But more often, what follows is that the people involved drift further apart. Some may leave the church, join another church, or drop out altogether. And the congregation, as well as those involved, may carry the scars for a long time.
Others who choose not to address the matter simply carry on as if everything is normal, while knowing very well that things no longer feel normal.
Some may even “forgive” in advance without ever addressing the issue. And some would simply avoid the other person or group, ignore them, and carry on as though they do not exist.
In all these responses, something has gone wrong. In the Christian sense, death has gotten the upper hand.
Instead of moving towards restoration, relationships become more distant. Instead of life being restored, something slowly dies.
But Jesus gives us a different way. Jesus gives us not just a principle, but a process—four steps for taking the initiative when something has gone wrong.
He does so not because he fails to understand our pain or the challenges we face when approaching someone whom we think has sinned or wronged us. But as we have seen, the normal way of avoiding the problem, withdrawing from one another, or simply carrying on as though nothing has happened can open up new pathways to death, not life.
With Jesus, we should expect something like these four steps. For he is a Saviour who gives life and second chances—and who continues to give them to our broken world and to our broken lives.
When we can agree with Jesus on his approach, we will also see that there is a lot of love in the way these steps are structured. The process starts on the smallest scale possible, which helps to avoid unnecessary embarrassment. And if our well-intentioned initiative is mistaken, a one-to-one conversation would produce the least possible ill effect. The restoration project only grows when the previous step has failed—when our concern is genuine, and the person refuses to listen.
I call this series of actions a restoration project, because even when the church community is given no choice but to take the final step, the purpose remains the same: restoration. Church discipline should never aim at punishing or shaming.
Matthew helps us see this in the way he describes the final step: “And if he refuses to listen even to the church, let him be to you as a Gentile and a tax collector.” (v.17)
What does this mean? It means that we can no longer regard this person as a brother or sister within the fellowship.
But remember who Jesus is. Jesus is well known as a friend to Gentiles and tax collectors. So even when restoration through mediation and persuasion has reached its limit, the purpose is not condemnation. The person is now someone who needs to be won back to Christ.
Our Lord is doing restoration projects all the time, and his church is asked to do the same—for both the easy cases and the challenging ones, for hearts ready for harvest and for hearts that are recalcitrant.
III.
But, as we have seen, restoration does not always mean simply reaching out and forgiving. Sometimes, disciplinary action means taking the fourth step of asking someone to step out of the fellowship. This brings us to Jesus’ words in verse 18 about binding and losing.
Let me use two hypothetical scenarios to help us understand what Jesus is saying.
Imagine a church member having an affair. People around him quietly know, but no one has said anything.
Or imagine a small group where gossiping about another member has simply become an endless chatter, and nobody has stopped to say, “This isn’t right.”
Then someone finally speaks up: “Shouldn’t we address this? Didn’t Jesus say that whatever we bind on earth will be bound in heaven?”
What do you think Jesus is saying?
The church, as we have said, does not condemn sinners, even when it takes serious disciplinary action. So binding and loosing is not about deciding who goes to heaven and who doesn’t—that authority belongs to God alone.
What Jesus is telling us is that when God’s people, gathered under Christ’s authority, name something as sin and call for repentance, heaven stands behind that word. And when God’s people affirm someone’s repentance and welcome them back, heaven stands behind that too. Our discernment, exercised together under Christ and according to his teaching, carries real weight in the spiritual realm.
Notice, too, that Jesus does not give this responsibility to a pastor alone, or simply to the church leaders. He says, “where two or three are gathered in my name.” This responsibility is entrusted to us—to this church, to our small groups, to you and the brother or sister sitting beside you.
What is true is that we hardly exercise church discipline these days. What we do as individuals, we also tend to do as a church: we lean towards “forgiving” in advance and avoiding difficult conversations. Perhaps it is also a very Singaporean instinct. We don’t like things to become awkward, so we would rather smile, stay polite, and let it be.
But having seen this morning that the end goal of discipline is always restoration, and that discipline is a display of God’s love, compassion and purity, we do well to recover the courage to exercise loving discipline when love requires it.
For sometimes, to say nothing is easier. To walk away is easier. To simply “forgive” and avoid the person is easier. But Jesus calls us to something more loving—to care enough to speak, to care enough to act, and ultimately, to care enough to seek restoration.
Where do we find the strength to do so?
IV.
The final two verses of the passage point us to the answer: prayer. Prayer is what stands behind the binding and loosing that Jesus calls the church to exercise.
Jesus then tells us in verse 20 that when two or three of his people agree and come together in his name, he is “among them.” And this is the basis for our confidence that God hears and answers our united prayer. It is not simply because two or three people have agreed together in prayer. It is because Jesus himself is present among us when we gather in his name—as his disciples and as his representatives.
Confronting one who has gone astray and resolving conflict is never easy. We are often unsure when to approach the person involved, what to say and how to say it. And when a decision finally has to be made, we may also be uncertain about what it should look like, so that what is done may pave the way for restoration. For all this and more, we are asked to pray.
And speaking of prayer, perhaps some of us are still asking questions like, “Why is it not the offender who should take the first step?” or, “How is it fair that I should I be the one to begin this restoration project?” Perhaps we want to reconcile, yet we are unwilling to take the first step. Perhaps we know we need to take the first step, yet we cannot find the words to say. Again, we are asked to pray and seek help. For prayer is what stands behind the binding and loosing that Jesus calls us to do.
And so, brothers and sisters, let us remember that what marks us as Christians is not that we never fight, disagree, hurt one another, or even see a brother or sister drifting into sin. We are still broken people, and these things will happen. What marks us as Christians is what we do when they happen. Do we walk away and leave things as they are? Or do we take the initiative, speak the truth in love, exercise loving discipline when necessary, and pray for one another?
For whether a brother has sinned against us or a brother has simply sinned, Jesus calls us to care enough to seek restoration. And in all of this, we do not walk alone. Christ is with us, and his desire is that what is broken among us may be restored.
