When Someone Sins Against You (Matthew 18:15-20)

Introduction.

You don’t have to look very far to find hurting people. Everywhere you go you find hurting people, maybe you yourself have been hurt. I’m going to ask you a question have you ever been hurt by somebody else or have you ever been offended by somebody else.

I want to ask another question and I want to word it carefully, and the wording of it is chosen with care. Have you ever had somebody hurt you offend you to the point that it would be appropriate to call what they did a sin against you? That’s a different thing. Maybe to answer that we need to define sin. Sin is anything that is a violation of the law of God. That’s different to a crime, a crime is something that’s a law that violates the law of the land, but a sin is that which violates say the law of God. So, if we’re talking about somebody sinning against us then we have to talk about how someone did something against us that was a violation of the law of God. Say they did something like told a lie about you. God says thou shalt not bear false witness, and that lie didn’t just hurt your feelings it hurt you reputation. Or let’s say they stole something from you now God said don’t steal so that’s sinning against you and that could be called a sin because it’s a violation of the law of God.

There are other things we could use as specifics but how many of you would say that somebody has sinned against you? Now here’s the question, how do you handle such a thing . Well, I can just off the top of my head of several things that you might do. 

One is  to suffer in silence and never say anything to anybody. Secondly you might make sure you tell everybody and somewhere in between those two extremes are a lot of other possibilities. So, the question is what do you do when somebody sins against you? Well Jesus answers that question here and I would like for us to see what he had to say. 

This just may be one of the finest passages on relationships in all of the bible in fact, it just might be one of the greatest pieces of literature ever written when it comes to talking about relationships. Because he discusses what happens when somebody sins against you. Let’s listen to what he has to say.

15 “Moreover if your brother sins against you, go and tell him his fault between you and him alone. If he hears you, you have gained your brother. 16 But if he will not hear, take with you one or two more, that ‘by the mouth of two or three witnesses every word may be established.’ 17 And if he refuses to hear them, tell it to the church. But if he refuses even to hear the church, let him be to you like a heathen and a tax collector. 18 “Assuredly, I say to you, whatever you bind on earth will be bound in heaven, and whatever you lose on earth will be loosed in heaven. 19 “Again I say to you that if two of you agree on earth concerning anything that they ask, it will be done for them by My Father in heaven. 20 For where two or three are gathered together in My name, I am there in the midst of them.”

(Matthew 18: 15-20)

The  passage I just read in Matthew chapter 18 is often referred to as a passage on church discipline and it could be considered that to some degree, simply because one of the things he tells people to do is take a problem to the church. This is the first of many passages in the New Testament on church discipline the others include, First Corinthians 5, Second Corinthians 2, Galatians chapter six, First Thessalonians 5, Second Thessalonians 3, First Timothy 5, Titus chapter 1 and Titus chapter 3, Hebrews chapter 13. Second John and 3rd John all contain instructions concerning church disciple. However, this passage in Matthew is technically different because this one has to do not with what a church initiates but what an individual initiates. This is not so much something that is directly pertaining to church discipline as it is something that pertains to an individual conflict between two individuals. 

Note, Jesus says in verse 15, “If a brother sins against you”, now this is not if a brother hurts your feelings, this is if a brother does something that is a sin against you, what you should do then. In response, Jesus gives three basic instructions, 

Firstly, go to the person privately, secondly, take somebody with you and third take it to the church. So those are the three things he tells us to do, and I want us to look at them individually and carefully. over the next three day.

“If your brother sins against you, go and tell him his fault between you and him alone. If he hears you, you have gained your brother.

(Matthew 19: 15)

Let’s assume somebody has sinned against you, that’s a critical point, not someone has hurt or annoyed you, this is what you are to do if a brother or sister in Christ sins against you.

I’ve mentioned before this is part of a larger discourse, we are breaking in the middle of the discussion about offenses, he says it’s a fact of life if you’re a human being of any age you are going to have offenses come against you, that’s a fact of life.  He warns us that some people are going to despise you as a believer that’s just going to happen, So Jesus says now I’ve told you earlier in the discourse that offenses are going to come, and some are going to despise you, and now he addresses what happens prior to this and how to respond. He has addressed people when they are the offender first and warned them against causing another believer, particularly a new believer to fall. So now he turns and addresses the offended. So having warned us not to be an offender he now says, put yourself in the position of someone who has been offended.

One other quick comment before we continue, I mentioned earlier that this passage is often referred to as church discipline and I don’t object to that, and yet at the same time there is a difference because in this case somebody has to have sinned against. Technically church discipline is a broader issue.  If you look at all those passages that I read off a moment ago you will note that church discipline can be initiated because of an individual sin, someone may committed a sin or even a doctrinal issue can be involved and community discipline may be enacted. But this isn’t strictly church discipline, this is about when somebody sins against you personally and what do about that.

The answer is begun to be unpacked in verse 15. It says, “go and tell him his fault”, what is wrong between you and him alone. So the first thing is spelled out in verse 15, you are to go to the other person and see if you can sort it out. It may just be you misunderstood a situation, and all can be resolved without involving other people. In reality when somebody does something against us our first reaction is not to go to the person it’s to go to somebody else and complain about it, but that’s how gossip gets started in a church. As an aside, if you are the person receiving the information that is somebody comes to you and says so and so has offended me or sinned against me what should you do you is say well then maybe I should go to that person and use your name and talk to them about this, the answer I can assure you will ordinarily be, No, no, no, don’t do . And then say, well frankly, it’s not my responsibility to do this it’s your responsibility. Go and talk about it first with them before involving other people.Doing that can solve a lot of problems before they escalate. Told you this was good practical advice. So if you think someone has sinned against you, first go on you own and talk to them about it.

I have one little caveat and I hesitate to say this but I do think it might be legitimate to go talk to somebody else first or advice on exactly how to do this (in principle)  if you’ve never done it before it  wouldn’t hurt to go talk to somebody else about how to do that, and I say that based on Galatians 6:1 which says “If a brother or sister be overtaken in a fault you which are spiritual go restore them with a spirit of meekness”.

Maybe you might need a mature person to help you but don’t just go to anybody go to somebody like a spiritual minded leader in the church and ask that person for some general advice. Then, as Jesus says go alone and speak to this is in person in a face to face meeting. My advice is, do not, do not I repeat do this on the telephone. Do not, do not I repeat write a letter or an e-mail. More trouble has been caused by the writing of letters than almost anything else, A letter or email can be misread and misunderstood, it only can covey one side of an argument, it can quite unconsciously convey a tone which it would never meant to convey or it cannot allow the posture of heart to change in response to the other persons reaction. There is only one way to settle it and that is face to face, the spoken word can often settle a difference where the written word would only exacerbate.

So he says in the verse go to the person alone that means this is a private meeting, do not you take your best friend with you. There should only be four eyes in this meeting there should be only four eyes and four, ears present this is a private meeting. This is not my opinion, the text says go alone.

But  what do you do when you get there, “tell him his fault” the Greek word translated tell means to uncover, it means to put forward a case, so you’re telling him in such a way as to prove your case. Let me make another suggestion here, if you don’t have proof and maybe you shouldn’t go unless you have proof. If you don’t have proof but you’ve got overwhelming circumstantial evidence I have a practical suggestion from years of experience in dealing with this with other people and my suggestion is that you begin with a question, is it true? That means you immediately give the person a chance to give their side of the story, but assuming that you’ve got proof, then you are exposing what happened. 

Now it is entirely possible but the person didn’t even what they have said or done had had such an effect, there was a sin of ignorance so to speak, maybe that is involved here, and maybe not, at any rate Jesus says that you are to tell the person you are to expose the fault to them. That is the idea, another suggestion of a very practical sort, is don’t do this with anger. If you are still angry wait until the anger subsides. You should do it as quickly as possible to try and nip a situation in the bud, but you must get a hold of any anger before you do this.

Now let me just throw a personal observation in here, this doesn’t mean you don’t communicate with emotion, as a matter of fact you should complicate any discussion you have with how the situation made you feel. So, lead with the fact, but it is Ok to say how these things made you feel. That’s a good piece of advice in all communication not just in this one. Lead with the facts, not with the emotion and you’ll get a lot better result quicker. Alright the situation is somebody has sinned against and at the right time you go alone to that person and calmly and sensibly and rationally sit down and tell the person your case of how you feel they have sinned against you. That is one of the finest pieces of advice I could ever give you about human relationships, and it come straight from the mouth of  Jesus over 2000 years ago, amazing.

If we would just do that a lot of misunderstanding a lot of trouble would be prevented and you wouldn’t have to go through a lot of hassle that you’re going to go through if you don’t do it. That’s what Jesus says, that’s the procedure, here is the possibility outcome. It says you might gain a brother or a sister, in other words if you go to that person and they say, OK, I see what you mean, I’m sorry. I am sorry I offended you, I apologize, forgive me then what’s happened you have gained a brother or sister in Christ.

We’re human beings and we make mistakes, and we sin, but when our sin is revealed to us we can say I’m sorry. Up to this point this passage is assuming that the other person says that. Paul says in Ephesians chapter four that you are to forgive others even as God for Christ’s sake has forgiven you God has freely forgiven us. Because Jesus Christ died for us, he took our sin and bore the consequences of it right and freely forgives us the most incredible fact of history one of the most central and critical issues in all of relationships is forgiveness and it’s rooted in grace and love in the cross. If this person ever says I accept I have sinned against you, forgive me, then the biblical thing to do is say, I forgive you, and that is what this passage is all about.

But what if they won’t accept it, or won’t ask for forgiveness, what should we do next. Well, we will look at that next time.