Church Discipline

Church discipline is something that is quite important when it comes to maintaining the purity of the Church of Christ and honoring Him. Yet, it is a difficult task and if we must do it, we must approach it with the right formula. Matthew provides such a formula.

By 1996 the tacit application of selected terms of the new constitution of South Africa and an unreported case regarding the Bible had effectively displaced the belief in the Bible by 75% of the population with a new state religion based on humanism

What is church discipline? What is the purpose of church discipline? How should we practice church discipline in light of ministry being founded on grace? This paper briefly surveys these questions, drawing on John Calvin, John Owen, Thomas Oden and modern churchmen and theologians.

The Hammer of God is an interesting fictional theological book concerning three young Lutheran Pastors (two still curates, or ‘vicars’ to use Lutheran language) who all work in the same parish (Ödesjö) in Sweden, except each person arrives several generations apart. The common theme is that they all have their own personal and public issues within the Office of the Ministry, but the main idea is they all struggle with the theological concept of sola fide and/or sola gratia. They more or less all live by God’s Law and often times apply more legalism to a Christian’s application of practical living than what is considered helpful. Through a chain of events each story relates to the other and builds off the previous one and each pastor receives a revelation concerning the Gospel and how the Word comes in power to teach law and Gospel which are always together but always distinctive of one another.

This study is the first monograph to attempt a synthetic treatment of the career of Thomas Erastus (1524-1583). Erastus was a central player in the conversion of the Electoral Palatinate to Reformed Christianity in the early 1560s and a co-author of the Heidelberg Catechism. In the church discipline controversy of the 1560s and 1570s, Erastus opposed the Calvinist effort to institute a consistory of elders with independent authority over excommunication. Erastus’s defeat in this controversy, and the ensuing Antitrinitarian affair, proved the watershed of his career. He turned to the refutation of Paracelsus and a debate with Johann Weyer on the punishment of witches. The epilogue tracks Erastus’s later career and the reception of his works into the seventeenth century.

Baptism is an issue that has long divided the Christian church, and it is an argument that has not made much progress. Each camp discusses the same biblical data, but without hearing each other. This book looks at why we have these camps, and why we persist in misunderstanding one another. It shows how correcting our foundations and assumptions (using biblical data usually ignored in the discussion) suggests a fresh solution to the problem of baptism.

"Church and State in the Swiss Reformation," Calvin Theological Journal 56, no. 1 (April 2021): 11-36.

The Swiss Reformation represents an intriguing crucible for both theoretical and practical manifestations of the perennial challenges of the relationship between church and state. Although many influential interpretations of the Reformation view it essentially as a liberation of the individual conscience from external control, the views of the magisterial reformers in Switzerland shared many points of fundamental agreement with the dominant tradition of the medieval tradition as well as the contemporary Roman Catholic church. A survey of the confessional standards in the Swiss context and its neighbors shows elements of continuity with the received tradition as well as diversity within Reformed confessional identity. The models of church and state associated with Zurich and Geneva can help to identify nuances and differing emphases. At the same time, the variety of Reformed approaches to the relationship of church and state-including church discipline and excommunication-provide important insights into the challenges of pluriformity not only in an early modern European setting but for succeeding eras as well.

Two of the many consequences of the expansion of Europe during the early modern period were the spread of Christianity to areas outside of the Mediterranean world and the large-scale forced migration of enslaved people to work in European colonies. How did the institution of slavery impact on the practice of Christianity in a Protestant colony such as the Cape of Good Hope? This article investigates this question with a study of how the larger context of church practice and dogma influence the reality of a slave-owning society in the district of Stellenbosch during the VOC era. It shows that although a few slave individuals were baptised in the Dutch Reformed Church, only a very small number of them became actual members of the Church. This, it is argued, was related to the inherent contradiction between the requirements of the Church - that its members be knowledgeable and led moral lives - and the reality of a slave's existence - which allowed little opportunity for free time and study and made relationships between men and women technically illegal by not allowing formal marriage. It is for these reasons that so few slaves could be Christians - at least in the eyes of the official Church - in eighteenth-century Stellenbosch.

In his recent Paul and the Faithfulness of God, N.T. Wright suggests in a discussion of 1 Corinthians that the church’s disciplinary practices are intimately connected with its eschatology, such that when “faced with flagrant scandal, the church must do in the present among its own membership what the one God will do in the future in relation to the rest of the world.”  For Wright, the same inaugurated eschatology that suggests the church is to be a foretaste of the life to come also suggests the future judgment by the saints  is worked out through church discipline in the present by the power of the Spirit. 

This paper will survey New Testament passages on church discipline by examining them in their literary and socio-historical contexts in order to assess to what degree eschatology is linked to exclusionary practices of church discipline so that the appropriateness of N.T. Wright’s claim may be evaluated.  Finally, the paper will conclude with a brief hermeneutical discussion evaluating how these insights may apply to compassionately ministering and serving within the contemporary church.

La importancia de la disciplina en la vida y en la iglesia cristiana. Puntos de vista psicológicos, sociales y bíblicos. Links Semana de Oración Profecías de Daniel: TEMA 1 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vq80ECC9fwo&index=7&list=LLow3UCRteCWQysHDGi15ziw&t=860s TEMA 2 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I9AFXhPeDoo&index=6&list=LLow3UCRteCWQysHDGi15ziw&t=1s TEMA 3 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d6cErh_Rv6s&index=5&list=LLow3UCRteCWQysHDGi15ziw&t=3s TEMA 4 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rE4KbvuLcLY&index=4&list=LLow3UCRteCWQysHDGi15ziw&t=1s TEMA 5 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_rfSwwINKPg&index=3&list=LLow3UCRteCWQysHDGi15ziw&t=2s TEMA 6 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ngDGzye9plc&index=2&list=LLow3UCRteCWQysHDGi15ziw&t=1s

The practice of excommunication has, in recent years, been used in a minatory way in both political and ecclesial debates. This paper examines whether this is appropriate by a review of the foundational texts of the practice and comments made by later theologians. A close reading of such texts raises questions about the practice of excommunication which has been based on them, and whether they might not indicate the practice of self-examination and –regulation as much as an institutional discipline. Further, following the work of Francis Moloney SDB, the narratives of the Last Supper suggest that Jesus' own practice, in sharing this eucharistic prototype with Judas, indicates that self-regulation has a stronger dominical precedent than excommunication, and might imply that this is a more appropriate way of policing eucharistic reception.

Hebrews 12 is all about The Church: its suffering Head, Who is its Founder and Finisher; its Father's loving discipline; its behavior; its Old Testament presence and failure; its New Testament glories and warnings.  The Church remains with God: unshaken and unburned... sealed.

A great deal of research has been done on the life and theology of Jonathan Edwards. However, there is a dearth of interest as it pertains to Edwards’s ecclesiology. As such, while certain moments in Edwards’s ministry dealing with excommunication have been dealt with, there is a need to look not only at the cases he oversaw, but also the theology that undergirded that practice of discipline. Setting Edwards in his historical context and looking specifically at both his ecclesiology and his doctrine of the perseverance of the saints, this article demonstrates how these doctrines coincided for Edwards to form a practice of church discipline that was exacting and rigorous in relation to many of his contemporaries in whose churches discipline was largely on the decline.

Addresses forty of the most common and thorny questions about church life. Does church membership mean more than simply joining a social group? Does the church have a responsibility to discipline its members--and if so, what does that look like? Recognizing the many puzzling questions about the critical role of the church in the life of believers, Jeremy Kimble addresses forty key points. Each section considers questions of theology, ministry, and practicality, such as: Is there a New Testament precedent for membership? How does membership relate to baptism and communion? Who should become a member? How is discipline related to discipleship? Should a believer associate with someone under church discipline? Like the other volumes in the 40 Questions & Answers Series, this book raises--and clearly answers--the most common and difficult questions that church leaders and members have. With succinct chapters, this is an eminently practical resource for any church leader, elder board, or ...

In an increasingly individualistic culture, we have somewhat lost sight of the important community aspect of Christianity, particularly when it comes to church discipline. One of the more challenging aspects of modern church ministry is what to do when a person's behaviour threatens the unity and wellbeing of the community. In the nt, we see harsh measures applied to such people, but how do we translate these examples into today's church? This article looks at the practice of exile or expulsion in the world of the nt generally and the Pauline communities specifically. It will then consider the implications of the practice, as revealed in scripture, and the challenges presented to its implementation in the modern church.

"Discipline, Excommunication, and the Limits of Conscience: Magisterial Protestant Perspectives on Church and Civil Authority in the Era of the Reformation," in Das Gewissen in den Rechtslehren der protestantischen und katholischen Reformationen, ed. Michael Germann and Wim Decock (Leipzig: Evangelische Verlagsanstalt, 2017), 110-24.

Reform of clothes and reform of morals. On the edge of discipline of catholic clergy in post-Tridential era

Trident´s council (1545-1563) aspired in many sences to react to criticism of Church by German reformers. Special courtesy therefore focused on sacrament of priesthood and person of priest, because the most secular and scandalous life of superior and inferior clergy at the turn of 15. and 16.century was eligible mark of critique outside and inside of Church. According of reformative regulations was a priest going to be in society a visible mark, hence had to wear different clothes and cutaway hair (tonsure). In Czech countries alluded implementing of priesthood´s reform to many problems.