SECOND PART.—THE CHURCH.—XIV.
CHRISTIAN DISCIPLINE.
As to the scriptural way of procedure in the case of those who cause sects and divisions, the word of God is clear enough:
“Now I beseech you, brethren, mark them which cause divisions and offenses contrary to the doctrine which ye have learned, and avoid them. For they that are such serve not our Lord Jesus Christ, but their own belly, and by good words and fair speeches deceive the hearts of the simple” (Rom. 16:16, 1716Salute one another with an holy kiss. The churches of Christ salute you. 17Now I beseech you, brethren, mark them which cause divisions and offences contrary to the doctrine which ye have learned; and avoid them. (Romans 16:16‑17)).
The duty of the church in such a case is unmistakable. For no godly Christian asserts that the apostle here (as in 2 Thess. 3) would rest in withholding personal fellowship with such as. act contrary to the doctrine of the apostles, undermining and destroying the church, the temple of God, by causing divisions and offenses, and deceiving the hearts of the simple. An assembly which sanctions such in its midst, thus opening the door to the enemy and destroyer, would only show that it. has no sense of what is due to God and to His Son, and to the church, as being the house of the living God. If they persevered, in spite of the remonstrances of the godly, in refusing church discipline, they would finally forfeit the character of an assembly of God, and to the godly among them no alternative would be left but separation from that which would be an assembly of God no longer. But the apostle justly began with calling on the faithful to mark such in order to their repentance.
And if separation becomes a duty for every true and faithful believer where the defilement of the temple of God is in question, how much more so, where the honor of God, and of His Son Himself is at stake, as when heresy has assumed the character of heterodoxy, i.e. false and God-dishonoring doctrine! The injunctions of Holy Writ, though plain enough in the former case, are here still more distinct and solemnly decisive, as the following passages show: 1 Cor. 15:12, 13-19, 33, 34, 13-1912Now if Christ be preached that he rose from the dead, how say some among you that there is no resurrection of the dead? (1 Corinthians 15:12)
13But if there be no resurrection of the dead, then is Christ not risen: 14And if Christ be not risen, then is our preaching vain, and your faith is also vain. 15Yea, and we are found false witnesses of God; because we have testified of God that he raised up Christ: whom he raised not up, if so be that the dead rise not. 16For if the dead rise not, then is not Christ raised: 17And if Christ be not raised, your faith is vain; ye are yet in your sins. 18Then they also which are fallen asleep in Christ are perished. 19If in this life only we have hope in Christ, we are of all men most miserable. (1 Corinthians 15:13‑19)
33Be not deceived: evil communications corrupt good manners. 34Awake to righteousness, and sin not; for some have not the knowledge of God: I speak this to your shame. (1 Corinthians 15:33‑34)
13But if there be no resurrection of the dead, then is Christ not risen: 14And if Christ be not risen, then is our preaching vain, and your faith is also vain. 15Yea, and we are found false witnesses of God; because we have testified of God that he raised up Christ: whom he raised not up, if so be that the dead rise not. 16For if the dead rise not, then is not Christ raised: 17And if Christ be not raised, your faith is vain; ye are yet in your sins. 18Then they also which are fallen asleep in Christ are perished. 19If in this life only we have hope in Christ, we are of all men most miserable. (1 Corinthians 15:13‑19); Gal. 5:7-127Ye did run well; who did hinder you that ye should not obey the truth? 8This persuasion cometh not of him that calleth you. 9A little leaven leaveneth the whole lump. 10I have confidence in you through the Lord, that ye will be none otherwise minded: but he that troubleth you shall bear his judgment, whosoever he be. 11And I, brethren, if I yet preach circumcision, why do I yet suffer persecution? then is the offence of the cross ceased. 12I would they were even cut off which trouble you. (Galatians 5:7‑12); 1 Tim. 1:18-2018This charge I commit unto thee, son Timothy, according to the prophecies which went before on thee, that thou by them mightest war a good warfare; 19Holding faith, and a good conscience; which some having put away concerning faith have made shipwreck: 20Of whom is Hymeneus and Alexander; whom I have delivered unto Satan, that they may learn not to blaspheme. (1 Timothy 1:18‑20); 2 Tim. 2:16-1816But shun profane and vain babblings: for they will increase unto more ungodliness. 17And their word will eat as doth a canker: of whom is Hymeneus and Philetus; 18Who concerning the truth have erred, saying that the resurrection is past already; and overthrow the faith of some. (2 Timothy 2:16‑18); Titus 3:10, 1110A man that is an heretick after the first and second admonition reject; 11Knowing that he that is such is subverted, and sinneth, being condemned of himself. (Titus 3:10‑11); 2 Peter 2:1-31But there were false prophets also among the people, even as there shall be false teachers among you, who privily shall bring in damnable heresies, even denying the Lord that bought them, and bring upon themselves swift destruction. 2And many shall follow their pernicious ways; by reason of whom the way of truth shall be evil spoken of. 3And through covetousness shall they with feigned words make merchandise of you: whose judgment now of a long time lingereth not, and their damnation slumbereth not. (2 Peter 2:1‑3);.1 John 2:18-2618Little children, it is the last time: and as ye have heard that antichrist shall come, even now are there many antichrists; whereby we know that it is the last time. 19They went out from us, but they were not of us; for if they had been of us, they would no doubt have continued with us: but they went out, that they might be made manifest that they were not all of us. 20But ye have an unction from the Holy One, and ye know all things. 21I have not written unto you because ye know not the truth, but because ye know it, and that no lie is of the truth. 22Who is a liar but he that denieth that Jesus is the Christ? He is antichrist, that denieth the Father and the Son. 23Whosoever denieth the Son, the same hath not the Father: (but) he that acknowledgeth the Son hath the Father also. 24Let that therefore abide in you, which ye have heard from the beginning. If that which ye have heard from the beginning shall remain in you, ye also shall continue in the Son, and in the Father. 25And this is the promise that he hath promised us, even eternal life. 26These things have I written unto you concerning them that seduce you. (1 John 2:18‑26) John 9-11; Jude 3, 43Beloved, when I gave all diligence to write unto you of the common salvation, it was needful for me to write unto you, and exhort you that ye should earnestly contend for the faith which was once delivered unto the saints. 4For there are certain men crept in unawares, who were before of old ordained to this condemnation, ungodly men, turning the grace of our God into lasciviousness, and denying the only Lord God, and our Lord Jesus Christ. (Jude 3‑4)
No upright and right-minded Christian will contend that the passages cited above, dealing with those tools of Satan, who by false doctrines seek to undermine the foundations of Christianity, do not go on to exclusion from the assembly, when self-will rejects all admonition. False doctrine, heterodoxy, is of all evils the worst, for it directly dishonors God and His dear Son, our precious Savior, ruining the souls of those for whom Jesus suffered and died, to a far wider extent and in a much more destructive way than in the case of moral evil. And if the apostle enjoined the Corinthians not even to take a common meal at the same table with that incestuous wicked person, could he have intended to say, think ye, that they quietly might sit down and break bread with those who attacked the very foundations of the Christian faith, nay, the person of Christ Himself and His work? What! associate and break bread with them at the table of the Lord (Whom they had blasphemed) to “show His death till He come!” The very thought of such a Judas-fellowship is so revolting to every Christian sentiment, that I need not say more about it.
“Be not deceived: evil-communications corrupt good manners,” the apostle writes to the same Corinthians. By this he certainly did not mean that they were to continue with those false teachers in the fellowship of breaking the bread, thus giving them opportunity, gradually to poison the whole assembly? “Awake to righteousness and sin not,” the apostle continues, “for some have not the knowledge of God. I speak this to your shame.” He began, as we ought, with correcting the error in order to repentance. But if they refused the correction and thus became hardened in the evil, was this to be tolerated under plea of unity?
It is to be feared, there are not a few Christians in these days of Laodicean lukewarmness, to whom that solemnly warning rebuke of the apostle would apply. There are some who say that it could not have been the intention of the apostle to insist on the Corinthians excluding those false teachers from the assembly, because he did not expressly enjoin them to do so. Do not his words, “Be not deceived; evil communications corrupt good manners,” express the warning of the Lord and of His Spirit through the apostle distinctly enough? We might just as well say, that the “elect lady,” whom the apostle John warns against receiving into her house any who did not bring the doctrine of Christ (nay, not even to greet him, because by doing so she would make herself “partaker of his evil deeds”), would have been quite free to break bread with the false teacher, the apostle not having expressly forbidden her to do so How crooked and deceitful is the natural heart in its thoughts and feelings, especially in a Christian who abuses grace!
These remarks hold good as to other portions of holy writ mentioned above, which are initiatory.
If then individual Christians who receive a heterodox teacher into their houses, or even greet him, become his accomplices, how much more solemnly is this true of a whole assembly according such an one a place at the Lord's table! The whole assembly would make itself partaker of his evil deeds. “Know ye not,” writes the apostle to the Corinthians, “that a little leaven leaveneth the whole lump?” This principle of divine truth holds good not only in cases of gross immorality as at Corinth, but also in cases of evil doctrine; for the Holy Spirit, the “Spirit of truth,” applies the same words through the same apostle to the Galatians, where it was a question of evil doctrine or heterodoxy (ch. 5:9, 10), adding, “I would they were even cut off which trouble you” (ver. 12). In 1 Cor. 15:3333Be not deceived: evil communications corrupt good manners. (1 Corinthians 15:33) the apostle urges the same principle with regard to evil doctrine as in the same epistle, ch. 5., to immorality, only in different words, as is clear from the whole tenor of ch. 15.
“But,” somebody would say, “suppose, some one has belonged to a gathering, where, without his being aware of it, an evil doctrine has been tolerated, though perhaps not publicly advanced. He is entirely ignorant of it all. Would it not he unjust, nay, cruel, to refuse to such an one a place at the Lord's table in other meetings?”
Yes, the Lord's table! This makes all the difference. It is the Lord's, and not our own table; and for this very reason that which is due to the Lord, and also to His saints in holy fellowship, ought to be our chief consideration. To receive such would be nothing less than linking ourselves with them, the Lord's table being the expression of the one body (1 Cor. 10:1717For we being many are one bread, and one body: for we are all partakers of that one bread. (1 Corinthians 10:17)). Thus we should make ourselves partakers of their evil deeds. Let us put Christ number one, and the “nice Christians” number two, and we shall make no mistake, but if we put the “dear Christians” first, and Christ in the second place, we are all wrong. If we magnify Christ, all is plain. Leave Him out, or make Him—practically—secondary, and all is confusion.
As to the objection referred to above, an incident occurred some years ago which will furnish us with a satisfactory answer. A lady presented herself at a meeting in London wishing to break bread. She had been in fellowship at one of those indifferent gatherings, but said she had been ignorant of the doctrinal question. The brothers to whom she applied, believed her to be honest.
They, however, thought it right to enter into a conversation with her, to ascertain whether she might not, perhaps unwittingly, have imbibed some of those fatally erroneous doctrinal notions. And, behold, in the course of that conversation it became but too evident that she, though unwittingly, had imbibed not a few of them. Of course, she could not be admitted that morning, but had first to be convinced and delivered as to those errors, before she could be “received to the glory of God.” What would have been the consequence if she had been received without such helpful conversation? She would have, just as unwittingly as she had received them, imparted those poisonous doctrinal notions to the minds of other saints in that meeting, perhaps to some of the young. Thus the deadly poison would have been gradually instilled into the meeting.
What has been said shows the indispensable necessity for the greatest watchfulness and care in such cases of impure, God-and-Christ-dishonoring doctrines with their destructive effect upon the children of God. True love for the sheep and lambs of Christ ought to make us all the more careful for them, even where that love might have the appearance of harshness, lest they should be led astray by false shepherds to poisoned pastures. In a meeting where evil doctrine is treated with indifference, i.e. tolerated and harbored, the spiritual atmosphere becomes more or less impregnated with unsound doctrinal notions, though the open teaching and confession of them may be carefully avoided. The doctrinal virus which, though perhaps at first in small quantities, is floating in the air. The devil does not administer the poison to souls by spoonfuls, but in drops, or homeopathic doses, so to speak. It acts more gradually, but all the more sure in its effects on account of being not perceived. For instance, some one in such a meeting uses an ambiguous expression as to the person of Christ, talking about the “sinless infirmities of our blessed Lord.” That expression falls not only upon the ears, but sinks into the minds and hearts of the hearers, who think it quite harmless, the suspicious word “infirmities,” applied to the person of Christ, being guarded by the preceding word “sinless.” Now we know that all human infirmities are the result of man's fall and sin. Hunger and thirst, weariness with its consequence, sleep—are not “infirmities.” Adam and Eve were hungry and ate before they sinned, a deep sleep fell upon Adam before his fall. God had made man perfect. But infirmity implies imperfection, which is the effect of sin, as death is its wages.
“But,” some might say, “do you think that some erroneous notions, floating in the atmosphere of a meeting and thus ignorantly received, could have such an injurious effect upon the souls of honestly ignorant Christians?”
Indeed, they have. I will explain what I mean, by a simple illustration. I remember when a student at the University of Berlin, one day hearing of a remarkable incident which happened in one of the offices of the Ministry of Finance. Several of the officials had been taken ill. At last one of them died suddenly. This led to a close examination of the walls of the office which were painted green. It was then found that the paint contained a great deal of arsenic, and the rooms being heated to a high degree, the atmosphere had become impregnated with the arsenic, to the serious injury of the health of the occupants of those rooms, and with fatal effect upon one of them. Thus their constitutions had been gradually poisoned, without their being aware of it. Were they less injured, because they were ignorant of the presence of the poison? It is just the same as to the effect of doctrinal poison upon the spiritual constitution of Christians.
Those who seek to cover their lukewarmness about the honor of our Savior with the cloak of Christian love and large-heartedness, are often heard to say, that we must admit to the Lord's table every one who has life from God, provided he walks consistently. But suppose, some one came from a neighboring country where the pestilence is raging, the question would not be whether he is dead or alive, but whether he is infected or not. He would be put under quarantine for some time till it became evident that he had not been infected. It would be in vain for him to say, that he does not feel that he is infected. He might have borne the germ of the malady within himself for some days, without being aware of it. Besides, is it consistent for a Christian to be indifferent to a true Christ?
One word more in conclusion. Take the case of some unnatural son having written and published a disgraceful libel against his father. What would be the effect of his scandalous conduct? Why, not only the mother but every right-minded member of the family would insist on the immediate withdrawal of the disgraceful paper on the part of that degenerate son, and on his penitent confession at the feet of the outraged parent. The author of that paper might have been a very kind brother toward his brothers and sisters. Would this be a reason for them to wink at his terrible sin, or to be less jealous for the honor of their father? On the contrary their love for the erring brother, however deeply grieved, as well as their reverence for their common parent, would equally impel them to insist on either the withdrawal of the bad paper, or the removal of the disgraceful son from the house, if all exhortations had proved fruitless. Would not every member of the family that would continue friendly intercourse with the wicked offender, just as if nothing had happened, rightly be looked at as taking the part of the unnatural son? (2 John 1111For he that biddeth him God speed is partaker of his evil deeds. (2 John 11)). And if in such a case a decisive procedure becomes imperative in a respectable natural family, how much more in the family, the house, of the living God, when His own and His Son's honor is at stake.