As I am wont to do, I started a firestorm on Facebook once again. (If you are enjoying the blog, you might also enjoy following me there and joining in our discussions.) The whole thing started first with a post I shared on the proper response to Bruce, now Caitlyn, Jenner. In the course of discussion, the topic of the accountability of a believer was brought up, and yeah, I was the *guilty* party.
The back story for those of you who were not a part of the original discussion began as a discussion on whether Jenner’s story should have been handled in such a public manner. As Jenner was already a celebrity long before this issue hit the press, I do not see how keeping it private was an option, particularly since the paparazzi had already outed him long before he made his public statements. Given that, I can see why he chose to do the original Diane Sawyer interview, but I will always have a problem with semi-pornographic images on the magazine covers to promote sales, so I have a problem with the Vanity Fair spread which I consider to be nothing but a play for attention.
Now, if this was all I knew about Jenner I would have kept walking. People have the right to freedom of speech, celebrity news will always be news, and I have no say in the decisions that other people make unless I help pay their bills – and as I can barely pay my own that narrows the field considerably. Except for one little thing, Jenner claims to be a Christian.
This one little fact changes the game, and now Jenner’s story affects my story giving me the right to chime in. Please note, I did not ask for this right nor did I seek it out. In my previous post on Jenner, you will find that I addressed my brothers and sisters in Christ and not Jenner, but that was before I knew he claimed to be my brother/sister. (And for clarification, at the time that post was written Jenner had requested to be referred to as Bruce.)
However, this also raises several questions:
1. What right/obligation do we have to discipline a member of the body?
2. Who decides which issues warrant Church discipline?
3. How is discipline administered today?
4. Where does grace and mercy come into play?
And really, these questions just hit the high points of what is a seriously complicated issue. Let’s just acknowledge that upfront.
The first question is easy to answer as Paul dealt with in these passages:
As for you my brothers, do not grow weary in well doing. If anyone does not obey what we say in this letter, take note of that person, and have nothing to do with him, that he may be ashamed. Do not regard him as an enemy, but warn him as a brother. 2 Thessalonians 3:14, 15
I wrote to you in my letter not to associate with sexually immoral people – not at all meaning the sexually immoral of this world, or the greedy and the swindlers, or idolaters, since then you would need to go out of the world. But now I am writing to you not to associate with anyone who bears the name of brother if he is guilty of sexual immorality or greed, or is an idolater, reviler, drunkard, or swindler – not to even eat with such a one. For what have I to do with judging the outsiders? Is it not those inside the church whom you are to judge? Purge the evil person from among you. 1 Corinthians 5: 9-12
And really, the second question is answered within the last text – sexually immoral, greedy, idolater, reviler (one who speaks abusively), drunkard, and swindler. I love it when the Bible just lays it out there for us, and I think there are a few of these things on the list we should really start paying attention to as we seem to have forgotten everything written here except sexual immorality. And when we do remember, let’s be honest, we only apply it issues such as homosexuality, transgender, and abusive situations outside of marriage while giving adultery and premarital sex a free pass and excuse abuse within marriages – not Scriptural, and not cool.
Is this judgment? Yes, but it is judgement exercised withing the Scriptural ordain realm for believers.
Which brings us to question 3 –
Dear Lord, I wish I knew the answer to this one, but the truth is we Christians have made one big heaping mess out of this thing called Church. There is little to no unity between bodies and, frankly, little cohesion within most of our bodies. Trying to invoke discipline is pretty much pointless, as people who get mad at one church just pack their bags and go the one on the next block.
So does this mean we just roll over and play dead when one of our brothers or sisters is living a life that is contrary to Scriptural mandates, not at all! Rather, I believe that this is where we confront in love and with a broken heart those areas with hope of restoration and healing.
And this plays into question 4 –
I don’t think it is a valid rebuke if there is no compassion in the rebuke. Correction offered with a sense of smug superiority is not the point and runs counter to what Paul is saying. In fact, correction with the wrong heart makes us that reviler and abusive, and therefore warranting the same type of correction we are trying to dole out.
As a personal check, I never approach anyone unless my heartaches over what they are doing to the body or to themselves. A few years ago, a good friend who is active in ministry was involved in some blatant violations of Scripture. The specifics do matter, so don’t ask. It killed me to tell her that I could not be a part of what she was doing because both she and I knew it was wrong. It meant that I had to withdraw my support from her ministry and discontinue her involvement in mine. I made the promise to her that I was there for her at any time she wished to address these issues in her life and would walk with her if she chose to walk away from these things. The memory of it all still stings, and I am still praying that she will make the honorable choice because I miss my friend.
However, I am clinging to these words:
Now if anyone has caused pain, he has not caused it to me, but in some measure – not to put it too severely – to all of you. For such a one this punishment by the majority is enough. So you should rather turn to forgive and comfort him or he may be overwhelmed by excessive sorrow. So I beg you to reaffirm your love for him. 2 Corinthians 2:5-8
My brothers if one among you wanders from the truth and someone brings him back let him know that whoever brings back a sinner from his wanderings will save his soul from death and will cover a multitude of sins. James 5:19, 20
Did you catch that phrase at the end of the first passage? “Reaffirm your love for him.” That is the one element that I am not seeing in this whole debate. Where is our love for our brother? Real love, not just a blasé acceptance, but love. The concern for what he is doing to himself, and I am not even talking about the surgeries, I am talking about the wounds to his heart and soul that motivates us to keep loving even as we speak the truth. Because real doesn’t hide the truth from another, it calls it like it is holds accountable for our actions so that we might learn to make better choices. It walks with us through the process of healing and doesn’t shy away from our wounds.
But in all there is the need for balance, because real love doesn’t nag and it doesn’t berate us until we can’t emotionally function. It knows when to back off and give us space so that God has clean shot at our hearts. Love knows when to set a boundary that says, “I will not condone or support what you are doing, and so I can’t be a part of this destructive spiral. I am still here for you, all you have to do is call, and I will be there. But while you work this out, I am going to stay out of your way and respect you enough to make your choices but I will not be a party to you hurting yourself or the body of Christ.”
Learning that balance may be one of the hardest things we will do as believers. It is so much easier to get mad and feel righteously indignant over it claiming that we defending our God, but the truth is we were never called to defend God. We were called to proclaim truth, show love, and to shake the dust from our feet when that message is rejected.
Or we find ourselves tempted to fall to the other extreme where love becomes unqualified acceptance of every behavior in an attempt to avoid being harsh and judgmental. We convince ourselves that love would never walk away, it would never call another’s actions bad or evil, and that it would never place consequences on those behaviors. However, when we do this we are neglecting to honor the fact that God is holy and he has called us to be holy, and that means we cannot give even our tacit approval to those things that he calls evil by allowing them to happen in his bride, the Church.
Frankly, this is why I think there is not clear cut answer to that third question. We have neglected the call to holiness because the call to love is far easier. We have chased numbers for our pews and church reports without making disciples. We have pandered to people’s desire for community and acceptance but not ministered to the issues of their hearts. We have treated Church attendance as an equal substitute for an encounter and relationship with our Lord. We have created an entire culture who claim the title without submitting to the authority of Scripture because they were never taught the necessity for it, and in doing so portrayed God as a liar.
As Christians, we made this mess first within our churches and then in world by failing to be a witness of the life changing power of knowing God. It is time we stopped bellyaching about having to clean it up, and just get in there and do the work.
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Excellent post. Thanks, Emily!
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