The Forgotten Authority: Reclaiming the Keys Text: Matthew 18:15-20
Introduction: A Kingdom Without Keys
We live in an age where the church has become allergic to authority. In our democratic, egalitarian, therapeutic culture, the very idea of church discipline strikes the modern ear as harsh, judgmental, and frankly, un-Christlike. We have traded the sharp sword of the Spirit for a soft pillow of sentimentality. We have embraced a kind of sloppy agape that would rather watch a brother wander off a cliff than risk the unpleasantness of grabbing him by the collar and telling him he is headed for destruction. We want a kingdom, but we don't want a king who lays down non-negotiable laws. We want a body, but we want it to be a spineless jellyfish, not a body with a backbone.
Into this timid and compromised situation, the words of Jesus in Matthew 18 land like a cannonball. Our Lord does not give us a polite suggestion or a helpful hint for conflict resolution. He gives us a direct, four-step command for how His church is to function as His embassy on earth. He gives us the keys to the kingdom. And what we have done, for the most part, is leave them hanging on a hook in the back room, gathering dust, because we are afraid of what the neighbors might think if we actually used them to lock the door against wolves or unlock it for the penitent.
This passage is not about being mean. It is about the fundamental nature of love, purity, and authority in the covenant community. A church that refuses to practice discipline is a church that refuses to love its members. It is a hospital that refuses to diagnose disease because it might offend the patient. It is a family that lets a rebellious child play with matches in a room full of gasoline. The process Jesus outlines here is not an optional extra for the spiritually rigorous; it is the essential immune system of the body of Christ, given to protect her purity and to restore her wandering members.
We must understand that this is a gospel issue. The authority of the church to declare who is in and who is out is a reflection of the authority of the gospel itself, which declares that all who repent and believe are in, and all who remain in unbelief and rebellion are out. To neglect this process is to muddle the gospel and to tell the world that sin is not really that serious, that repentance is not really that necessary, and that Jesus is not really a king.
The Text
"Now if your brother sins, go and show him his fault, between you and him alone; 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. And 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 the Gentile and the tax collector. 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."
(Matthew 18:15-20 LSB)
Step One: The Private Duty (v. 15)
The process begins with a personal and private responsibility.
"Now if your brother sins, go and show him his fault, between you and him alone; if he listens to you, you have won your brother." (Matthew 18:15)
Notice the first word: "if." This is a conditional reality in the church. Christians still sin. The church is not a museum for saints but a hospital for sinners. The issue is not whether sin will happen, but what we do when it does. And what we are commanded to do is not gossip about it, not tweet about it, not complain to our spouse about it. We are commanded to "go." This is an active, courageous, and loving confrontation.
The confrontation is to be private: "between you and him alone." The goal is not public vindication but private reconciliation. You are not trying to win an argument; you are trying to win a brother. The language here is beautiful. If he listens, "you have won your brother." You have gained him back from the clutches of his sin. This is an act of spiritual warfare and loving restoration. To refuse to do this, to let bitterness fester or to talk behind his back, is to sin against your brother yourself. True love does not ignore sin; it confronts it head-on, in private, for the purpose of restoration.
Step Two: The Corroborating Witnesses (v. 16)
If the private appeal fails, the matter is not dropped. It is escalated with due process.
"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." (Matthew 18:16)
This is not about ganging up on the person. This is a direct quotation from the judicial principles of Deuteronomy 19:15. Jesus is grounding the life of the New Covenant church in the righteous standards of God's law. This principle protects everyone. It protects the accused from a false or malicious accusation, and it protects the accuser by bringing in objective parties to establish the facts. The goal is to confirm "every fact." We are moving out of the realm of "he said, she said" and into the realm of established testimony.
These one or two others are not your personal cronies; they should be mature, respected believers. Their purpose is twofold: to witness the confrontation and the brother's response, and to add their own voices to the appeal for repentance. The goal is still to win the brother. This is a more serious appeal, a more urgent warning, but it is still motivated by a desire for his restoration.
Step Three: The Corporate Verdict (v. 17)
If the man remains obstinate, he is now sinning not just against an individual, but against the testimony of the church. The matter must therefore be brought to the church's formal assembly.
"And 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 the Gentile and the tax collector." (Matthew 18:17)
To "tell it to the church" means to bring the matter before the formal, gathered body of believers, represented by its leadership. This is the final court of appeal on earth. To refuse to listen to the church is to show contempt for the authority that Christ Himself has established. The man who does this is making a clear statement: "My will, my sin, is more important to me than the fellowship of the saints and the authority of Jesus Christ."
The verdict is therefore stark: "let him be to you as the Gentile and the tax collector." This is the language of excommunication. It does not mean we are to be hateful or cruel. It means we are to recognize the reality that the unrepentant person has created. He has chosen to place himself outside the covenant community. He is to be regarded as an unbeliever, a mission field. This is a final, drastic act of love, a spiritual amputation to save the body, and hopefully, to shock the excommunicated person into realizing the gravity of his sin, leading him to repentance (1 Cor. 5:5).
The Heavenly Authority (v. 18-20)
Jesus now explains the foundation upon which this staggering authority rests. It is not a human authority, but a delegated, heavenly authority.
"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." (Matthew 18:18)
This is one of the most misunderstood verses in the Bible. This is not the church telling God what to do. The grammar here is crucial. The future perfect passive participle means that whatever the church faithfully binds or looses on earth will be that which has already been bound or loosed in heaven. The church does not create the reality; it recognizes and declares it. When a man is unrepentant, heaven has already declared him to be bound in his sin. The church, acting on the basis of God's Word, simply makes that heavenly verdict official on earth. When a man repents, heaven has already loosed him, and the church has the glorious authority to declare him forgiven and restored. We are an embassy, not a legislature. We are declaring the King's decrees.
And where does this power come from? It is not in bureaucratic process, but in the very presence of God.
"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." (Matthew 18:19-20)
These verses are directly connected to the preceding context of discipline. The "two or three" in verse 20 harks back to the "two or three witnesses" in verse 16. The "agreement" in verse 19 is not a blank check to ask for a new chariot. It is agreement on these weighty matters of kingdom judgment. When the church gathers lawfully, in the name of Jesus, to adjudicate a matter of sin and repentance, they are not alone.
The King Himself is present. "I am there in their midst." This is not primarily about a warm feeling in a prayer meeting, though it includes that. This is a judicial statement. Christ the King is presiding over His own court. That is why the verdict of the church has weight. It is not the verdict of a mere group of men; it is the verdict of a court where King Jesus sits as the chief justice. To defy the ruling of the church is to defy the King who is present there.
Conclusion: Reclaiming Our Courage
The modern church is terrified of this passage because we have become terrified of our King. We have lost our nerve. We have traded our birthright as a royal embassy for a pottage of cultural acceptance. We have allowed the fear of man to completely overwhelm the fear of God.
But this process is a profound mercy. It is mercy to the sinner, calling him back from the precipice. It is mercy to the church, protecting her from the cancer of unrepentant sin. And it is an act of faithfulness to our Lord, who gave us this authority not for our own glory, but for the health of His bride and the honor of His name.
We must repent of our cowardice. We must repent of our individualism that says, "my spiritual life is just between me and Jesus." That is not biblical Christianity; it is American consumerism with a religious veneer. You are part of a body. Your sin affects the whole body, and the body has a God-given responsibility for you.
Let us therefore pick up the keys we have neglected. Let us learn to love one another enough to confront, to warn, to plead, and when necessary, to exclude. For in doing so, we are not being harsh. We are being faithful. We are acting like the true church of the Lord Jesus Christ, who is present in our midst, and who will one day return to judge the living and the dead.