What is excommunication?
Excommunication is where a church outcasts a member or members of the church if they have sinned (for the cases I've seen - it's only used for divorce or sexual immorality. It's possible other churches excommunicate for other sins as well).
When a member is excommunicated, they are not welcome back to the church they were excommunicated from. Church members will not have any form of communication with them, or rather they are not supposed to do so. Some churches that practice excommunication will say it's a "sin" to sit down and eat with them.
How is this justified in a church?
The scripture that is used to justify this behavior is:
Matthew 18:15 - 17 NIV:
“If your brother or sister sins, go and point out their fault, just between the two of you. If they listen to you, you have won them over. But if they will not listen, take one or two others along, so that ‘every matter may be established by the testimony of two or three witnesses.’ If they still refuse to listen, tell it to the church; and if they refuse to listen even to the church, treat them as you would a pagan or a tax collector.
Most churches take the last bit "pagan/heathen or a tax collector/publican" as, "We should not talk to them or have anything to do with them." This may make sense to some, but if this is the case - it contradicts the surrounding context.
What is the surrounding context?
This text is surrounded by the Parable of the Lost Sheep and the Parable of the Unforgiving/Unmerciful Servant.
Matthew 18:12 - 14 NIV (Parable of the Lost Sheep)
“What do you think? If a man owns a hundred sheep, and one of them wanders away, will he not leave the ninety-nine on the hills and go to look for the one that wandered off? And if he finds it, truly I tell you, he is happier about that one sheep than about the ninety-nine that did not wander off. In the same way your Father in heaven is not willing that any of these little ones should perish.
Matthew 18:21 - 35 (Parable of the Unforgiving/Unmerciful Servant)
Then Peter came to Jesus and asked, “Lord, how many times shall I forgive my brother or sister who sins against me? Up to seven times?”
Jesus answered, “I tell you, not seven times, but seventy-seven times.
“Therefore, the kingdom of heaven is like a king who wanted to settle accounts with his servants. As he began the settlement, a man who owed him ten thousand bags of gold was brought to him. Since he was not able to pay, the master ordered that he and his wife and his children and all that he had be sold to repay the debt.
“At this the servant fell on his knees before him. ‘Be patient with me,’ he begged, ‘and I will pay back everything.’ The servant’s master took pity on him, canceled the debt and let him go.
“But when that servant went out, he found one of his fellow servants who owed him a hundred silver coins. He grabbed him and began to choke him. ‘Pay back what you owe me!’ he demanded.
“His fellow servant fell to his knees and begged him, ‘Be patient with me, and I will pay it back.’
“But he refused. Instead, he went off and had the man thrown into prison until he could pay the debt. 31 When the other servants saw what had happened, they were outraged and went and told their master everything that had happened.
“Then the master called the servant in. ‘You wicked servant,’ he said, ‘I canceled all that debt of yours because you begged me to. Shouldn’t you have had mercy on your fellow servant just as I had on you?’ In anger his master handed him over to the jailers to be tortured, until he should pay back all he owed.
“This is how my heavenly Father will treat each of you unless you forgive your brother or sister from your heart.”
Also, how did Jesus treat pagans/heathens and tax collectors/publicans? Did he excommunicate them/ignore them or did he reach out to them?
How did Jesus treat pagans/heathens and tax collectors/publicans?
Matthew 9:9 - 13 NIV:
As Jesus went on from there, he saw a man named Matthew sitting at the tax collector’s booth. “Follow me,” he told him, and Matthew got up and followed him.
While Jesus was having dinner at Matthew’s house, many tax collectors and sinners came and ate with him and his disciples. When the Pharisees saw this, they asked his disciples, “Why does your teacher eat with tax collectors and sinners?”
On hearing this, Jesus said, “It is not the healthy who need a doctor, but the sick. But go and learn what this means: ‘I desire mercy, not sacrifice.’ For I have not come to call the righteous, but sinners.”
Matthew was a tax collector, yet Jesus said, "Follow me." and they had dinner at Matthew's house with other tax collectors and sinners. It was the Pharisees who questioned why Jesus had such company around Him, but Jesus knows that it is those who sin that need healing. Jesus did not ignore Matthew or outcast him because he was a tax collector.
A good example of a "heathen" as using the definition of one who is "foreign or a gentile" would be the woman at the well because the Jews generally didn't associate with the Samaritans. Yet, Jesus sat down with this woman who was a foreigner/a gentile to the Jews. Also, Jesus did not sit her down and say, "You're sinning because..." He told her God's word without specifically condemning her for her sin(s). His disciples were even a bit shocked to see Jesus talking to a Samaritan woman. Jesus did not ignore this Samaritan woman, or pass her by. He sat down and witnessed to her in a way that wasn't saying, "You're wrong." or, "You're going to Hell." and a result of Jesus talking to that one woman - many Samaritans believed.
John 4:7 - 42 NIV:
When a Samaritan woman came to draw water, Jesus said to her, “Will you give me a drink?” (His disciples had gone into the town to buy food.)
The Samaritan woman said to him, “You are a Jew and I am a Samaritan woman. How can you ask me for a drink?” (For Jews do not associate with Samaritans.)
Jesus answered her, “If you knew the gift of God and who it is that asks you for a drink, you would have asked him and he would have given you living water.”
“Sir,” the woman said, “you have nothing to draw with and the well is deep. Where can you get this living water? Are you greater than our father Jacob, who gave us the well and drank from it himself, as did also his sons and his livestock?”
Jesus answered, “Everyone who drinks this water will be thirsty again, but whoever drinks the water I give them will never thirst. Indeed, the water I give them will become in them a spring of water welling up to eternal life.”
The woman said to him, “Sir, give me this water so that I won’t get thirsty and have to keep coming here to draw water.”
He told her, “Go, call your husband and come back.”
“I have no husband,” she replied.
Jesus said to her, “You are right when you say you have no husband. The fact is, you have had five husbands, and the man you now have is not your husband. What you have just said is quite true.”
“Sir,” the woman said, “I can see that you are a prophet. Our ancestors worshiped on this mountain, but you Jews claim that the place where we must worship is in Jerusalem.”
“Woman,” Jesus replied, “believe me, a time is coming when you will worship the Father neither on this mountain nor in Jerusalem. You Samaritans worship what you do not know; we worship what we do know, for salvation is from the Jews. Yet a time is coming and has now come when the true worshipers will worship the Father in the Spirit and in truth, for they are the kind of worshipers the Father seeks. God is spirit, and his worshipers must worship in the Spirit and in truth.”
The woman said, “I know that Messiah” (called Christ) “is coming. When he comes, he will explain everything to us.”
Then Jesus declared, “I, the one speaking to you—I am he.”
Just then his disciples returned and were surprised to find him talking with a woman. But no one asked, “What do you want?” or “Why are you talking with her?”
Then, leaving her water jar, the woman went back to the town and said to the people, “Come, see a man who told me everything I ever did. Could this be the Messiah?”They came out of the town and made their way toward him.
Meanwhile his disciples urged him, “Rabbi, eat something.”
But he said to them, “I have food to eat that you know nothing about.”
Then his disciples said to each other, “Could someone have brought him food?”
“My food,” said Jesus, “is to do the will of him who sent me and to finish his work. Don’t you have a saying, ‘It’s still four months until harvest’? I tell you, open your eyes and look at the fields! They are ripe for harvest. Even now the one who reaps draws a wage and harvests a crop for eternal life, so that the sower and the reaper may be glad together. Thus the saying ‘One sows and another reaps’ is true. I sent you to reap what you have not worked for. Others have done the hard work, and you have reaped the benefits of their labor.”
Many of the Samaritans from that town believed in him because of the woman’s testimony, “He told me everything I ever did.” So when the Samaritans came to him, they urged him to stay with them, and he stayed two days. And because of his words many more became believers.
They said to the woman, “We no longer believe just because of what you said; now we have heard for ourselves, and we know that this man really is the Savior of the world.”
That means that we are to witness to them, and pray for them to return to the Lord. We must not give up on them - even if they continue to refuse, their heart will become hardened and only through God is that person going to change. God can replace that heart of stone with a heart of flesh (Ezekiel 36:26)! We need to keep encouraging this person to get back on the right path.
This person in this verse, is already a believer at first and has just lost their way. Ordinarily, we would treat them as a brother and sister in Christ who is continually focused on what God wants for them and for their life. If they were a believer, we wouldn't be witnessing to them about the word and confronting their faults if they have done no offense. After an offense has been done, we would be witnessing to them, explaining with scripture that their course of action is not okay to God, and that they need to make things right with God. If we were their friend before, this doesn't make us any less of their friend now - it puts us in a position where we are to help. What changed is that they have strayed off the narrow path, and we must do what we can to encourage them to get back onto the narrow path. We are trying to help a struggling believer come back to the Lord and get on the right path unlike a believer that is already on the right path.
Excommunication is where a church outcasts a member or members of the church if they have sinned (for the cases I've seen - it's only used for divorce or sexual immorality. It's possible other churches excommunicate for other sins as well).
When a member is excommunicated, they are not welcome back to the church they were excommunicated from. Church members will not have any form of communication with them, or rather they are not supposed to do so. Some churches that practice excommunication will say it's a "sin" to sit down and eat with them.
How is this justified in a church?
The scripture that is used to justify this behavior is:
Matthew 18:15 - 17 NIV:
“If your brother or sister sins, go and point out their fault, just between the two of you. If they listen to you, you have won them over. But if they will not listen, take one or two others along, so that ‘every matter may be established by the testimony of two or three witnesses.’ If they still refuse to listen, tell it to the church; and if they refuse to listen even to the church, treat them as you would a pagan or a tax collector.
Most churches take the last bit "pagan/heathen or a tax collector/publican" as, "We should not talk to them or have anything to do with them." This may make sense to some, but if this is the case - it contradicts the surrounding context.
What is the surrounding context?
This text is surrounded by the Parable of the Lost Sheep and the Parable of the Unforgiving/Unmerciful Servant.
Matthew 18:12 - 14 NIV (Parable of the Lost Sheep)
“What do you think? If a man owns a hundred sheep, and one of them wanders away, will he not leave the ninety-nine on the hills and go to look for the one that wandered off? And if he finds it, truly I tell you, he is happier about that one sheep than about the ninety-nine that did not wander off. In the same way your Father in heaven is not willing that any of these little ones should perish.
Matthew 18:21 - 35 (Parable of the Unforgiving/Unmerciful Servant)
Then Peter came to Jesus and asked, “Lord, how many times shall I forgive my brother or sister who sins against me? Up to seven times?”
Jesus answered, “I tell you, not seven times, but seventy-seven times.
“Therefore, the kingdom of heaven is like a king who wanted to settle accounts with his servants. As he began the settlement, a man who owed him ten thousand bags of gold was brought to him. Since he was not able to pay, the master ordered that he and his wife and his children and all that he had be sold to repay the debt.
“At this the servant fell on his knees before him. ‘Be patient with me,’ he begged, ‘and I will pay back everything.’ The servant’s master took pity on him, canceled the debt and let him go.
“But when that servant went out, he found one of his fellow servants who owed him a hundred silver coins. He grabbed him and began to choke him. ‘Pay back what you owe me!’ he demanded.
“His fellow servant fell to his knees and begged him, ‘Be patient with me, and I will pay it back.’
“But he refused. Instead, he went off and had the man thrown into prison until he could pay the debt. 31 When the other servants saw what had happened, they were outraged and went and told their master everything that had happened.
“Then the master called the servant in. ‘You wicked servant,’ he said, ‘I canceled all that debt of yours because you begged me to. Shouldn’t you have had mercy on your fellow servant just as I had on you?’ In anger his master handed him over to the jailers to be tortured, until he should pay back all he owed.
“This is how my heavenly Father will treat each of you unless you forgive your brother or sister from your heart.”
Also, how did Jesus treat pagans/heathens and tax collectors/publicans? Did he excommunicate them/ignore them or did he reach out to them?
How did Jesus treat pagans/heathens and tax collectors/publicans?
Matthew 9:9 - 13 NIV:
As Jesus went on from there, he saw a man named Matthew sitting at the tax collector’s booth. “Follow me,” he told him, and Matthew got up and followed him.
While Jesus was having dinner at Matthew’s house, many tax collectors and sinners came and ate with him and his disciples. When the Pharisees saw this, they asked his disciples, “Why does your teacher eat with tax collectors and sinners?”
On hearing this, Jesus said, “It is not the healthy who need a doctor, but the sick. But go and learn what this means: ‘I desire mercy, not sacrifice.’ For I have not come to call the righteous, but sinners.”
Matthew was a tax collector, yet Jesus said, "Follow me." and they had dinner at Matthew's house with other tax collectors and sinners. It was the Pharisees who questioned why Jesus had such company around Him, but Jesus knows that it is those who sin that need healing. Jesus did not ignore Matthew or outcast him because he was a tax collector.
A good example of a "heathen" as using the definition of one who is "foreign or a gentile" would be the woman at the well because the Jews generally didn't associate with the Samaritans. Yet, Jesus sat down with this woman who was a foreigner/a gentile to the Jews. Also, Jesus did not sit her down and say, "You're sinning because..." He told her God's word without specifically condemning her for her sin(s). His disciples were even a bit shocked to see Jesus talking to a Samaritan woman. Jesus did not ignore this Samaritan woman, or pass her by. He sat down and witnessed to her in a way that wasn't saying, "You're wrong." or, "You're going to Hell." and a result of Jesus talking to that one woman - many Samaritans believed.
John 4:7 - 42 NIV:
When a Samaritan woman came to draw water, Jesus said to her, “Will you give me a drink?” (His disciples had gone into the town to buy food.)
The Samaritan woman said to him, “You are a Jew and I am a Samaritan woman. How can you ask me for a drink?” (For Jews do not associate with Samaritans.)
Jesus answered her, “If you knew the gift of God and who it is that asks you for a drink, you would have asked him and he would have given you living water.”
“Sir,” the woman said, “you have nothing to draw with and the well is deep. Where can you get this living water? Are you greater than our father Jacob, who gave us the well and drank from it himself, as did also his sons and his livestock?”
Jesus answered, “Everyone who drinks this water will be thirsty again, but whoever drinks the water I give them will never thirst. Indeed, the water I give them will become in them a spring of water welling up to eternal life.”
The woman said to him, “Sir, give me this water so that I won’t get thirsty and have to keep coming here to draw water.”
He told her, “Go, call your husband and come back.”
“I have no husband,” she replied.
Jesus said to her, “You are right when you say you have no husband. The fact is, you have had five husbands, and the man you now have is not your husband. What you have just said is quite true.”
“Sir,” the woman said, “I can see that you are a prophet. Our ancestors worshiped on this mountain, but you Jews claim that the place where we must worship is in Jerusalem.”
“Woman,” Jesus replied, “believe me, a time is coming when you will worship the Father neither on this mountain nor in Jerusalem. You Samaritans worship what you do not know; we worship what we do know, for salvation is from the Jews. Yet a time is coming and has now come when the true worshipers will worship the Father in the Spirit and in truth, for they are the kind of worshipers the Father seeks. God is spirit, and his worshipers must worship in the Spirit and in truth.”
The woman said, “I know that Messiah” (called Christ) “is coming. When he comes, he will explain everything to us.”
Then Jesus declared, “I, the one speaking to you—I am he.”
Just then his disciples returned and were surprised to find him talking with a woman. But no one asked, “What do you want?” or “Why are you talking with her?”
Then, leaving her water jar, the woman went back to the town and said to the people, “Come, see a man who told me everything I ever did. Could this be the Messiah?”They came out of the town and made their way toward him.
Meanwhile his disciples urged him, “Rabbi, eat something.”
But he said to them, “I have food to eat that you know nothing about.”
Then his disciples said to each other, “Could someone have brought him food?”
“My food,” said Jesus, “is to do the will of him who sent me and to finish his work. Don’t you have a saying, ‘It’s still four months until harvest’? I tell you, open your eyes and look at the fields! They are ripe for harvest. Even now the one who reaps draws a wage and harvests a crop for eternal life, so that the sower and the reaper may be glad together. Thus the saying ‘One sows and another reaps’ is true. I sent you to reap what you have not worked for. Others have done the hard work, and you have reaped the benefits of their labor.”
Many of the Samaritans from that town believed in him because of the woman’s testimony, “He told me everything I ever did.” So when the Samaritans came to him, they urged him to stay with them, and he stayed two days. And because of his words many more became believers.
They said to the woman, “We no longer believe just because of what you said; now we have heard for ourselves, and we know that this man really is the Savior of the world.”
That means that we are to witness to them, and pray for them to return to the Lord. We must not give up on them - even if they continue to refuse, their heart will become hardened and only through God is that person going to change. God can replace that heart of stone with a heart of flesh (Ezekiel 36:26)! We need to keep encouraging this person to get back on the right path.
This person in this verse, is already a believer at first and has just lost their way. Ordinarily, we would treat them as a brother and sister in Christ who is continually focused on what God wants for them and for their life. If they were a believer, we wouldn't be witnessing to them about the word and confronting their faults if they have done no offense. After an offense has been done, we would be witnessing to them, explaining with scripture that their course of action is not okay to God, and that they need to make things right with God. If we were their friend before, this doesn't make us any less of their friend now - it puts us in a position where we are to help. What changed is that they have strayed off the narrow path, and we must do what we can to encourage them to get back onto the narrow path. We are trying to help a struggling believer come back to the Lord and get on the right path unlike a believer that is already on the right path.
