<p>18:15&nbsp;<i>And- </i>AV &quot;Moreover&quot;. Thus the previous theme is continued. Having spoken of such radical inclusiveness, the Lord foresees and tackles the obvious objection- that there may be cases where a believer has sinned against us, and that, surely, would be a reason for exclusion from the circle of disciples. But of course that would be illogical- if we are to be open to the little ones coming into the circle, then once they are within it, it would make no sense to then throw them out of it because they sinned against us. And the Lord now spells that out clearly.</p>
<p><i>If your brother sins against you-&nbsp;</i>Luke&rsquo;s record adds: &quot;<i>Take heed to yourselves</i>; if your brother trespass... forgive him&quot; (Lk. 17:3). This is alluded to in Acts 20:28, where Paul says we should&nbsp;<i>take heed</i>&nbsp;of the likelihood of false teachers. Surely what he's saying is 'Yes, take heed to forgive your brother personal offences, take heed because you'll be tempted&nbsp;<i>not&nbsp;</i>to forgive him; but have the same level of watchfulness for false teaching'. On another level, &ldquo;take heed&rdquo; suggests that in the case of personal offence, the tendency may be not to actually talk to your brother about it, nor to consciously forgive him in your heart. And it is these undealt with issues which create so much damage, both to us and to others. The purpose of the process outlined here is&nbsp;<i>not</i>&nbsp;<i>just</i>&nbsp;for the sake of the brother who has erred, it isn't just a polite protocol to follow; it is for&nbsp;<i>our sake too</i>, who have seen the weakness of our brother.&nbsp;<i>Unless</i>&nbsp;we talk frankly to him about it, between us&nbsp;<i>alone</i>, then we will end up hating him in our heart (even though it may not feel like that) and we will gossip about him. The frank raising of the issue with our brother is associated with loving our neighbour as ourselves. This is actually the opposite to what we would think; we would imagine that it would be more 'loving' to say nothing to our brother. But in this case, we will inevitably gossip about him and be bitter against him. The practice of true love will result in an open community in which we can frankly discuss with each other the issues which concern us, with love and not hatred in our hearts. This is the teaching of Lev. 19:16-18. No wonder the Proverbs expand upon it so much. And no wonder the Lord appropriated it as a ground rule for His ecclesia- there must be no gossip in the church.&nbsp;See on 5:22.</p>
<p>&ldquo;Trespass&rdquo; is the same word translated &ldquo;sin&rdquo; in 18:21 where Peter alludes back to these words and asks how many times his brother can &ldquo;sin&rdquo; [s.w. &ldquo;trespass&rdquo;] against him and be forgiven. The Lord&rsquo;s answer is basically &lsquo;An unlimited number of times&rsquo;, which indicates that Peter is to forgive without analysing the integrity of the supposed repentance. Luke&rsquo;s record in Lk. 17:3,4 could suggest (if read in isolation from the context) that the sinning brother should only be forgiven if he repents. But the way the Lord clarifies this to Peter effectively offers a far higher level of response to the brother&rsquo;s sin. If he is to be forgiven multiple times for the same sin, even the same day, and if the genuineness of his repentance is irrelevant- then in practice the Lord is teaching to forgive without requiring repentance. The lower level is to forgive only upon repentance; but the only problem with that is that as we behave in this matter, so we shall be dealt with by the Lord. In the Lord&rsquo;s prayer we are taught to ask for forgiveness&nbsp;<i>as&nbsp;</i>we forgive others. It&rsquo;s therefore important for us to be as generous as possible in forgiveness. As so often in spiritual life, taking the lower and easier path (in this case, forgiving only if we receive repentance first) creates a far harder situation for us- in this context, only being forgiven ourselves if we consciously repent of absolutely every sin. Not for us, therefore, could be David&rsquo;s prayer to be forgiven for his &ldquo;secret faults&rdquo; (Ps. 19:12), those that were secret or hidden from himself.</p>
<p>This whole section about &lsquo;taking matters up&rsquo; with our brother and forgiving upon repentance (Lk. 17:3,4) seems out of step with the spirit of the material which precedes it (about doing absolutely anything to receive our weak brother), and with that which follows it (the teaching about unconditional forgiveness regardless of repentance). I suggest it is purposefully out of step with it, and is in fact an allusion to and parody of synagogue disciplinary rules; it is certainly alluding to the procedure for disciple mentioned in the Qumran documents as being practiced in the Qumran community (1 QS [Rule of the Community] 5:24-26; CD [The Damascus Document] 7:2; 9:8). The synagogues had a disciplinary sanction of&nbsp;<i>Niddui</i>, casting out with no further association, and it would seem clear that the Lord is alluding to this when He speaks of making the disciplined brother as a Gentile and publican. There is evidence that later Christian excommunication was called &ldquo;the judgment of the Jew&rdquo;, so clear was the Judaistic basis for the later Christian practice of excommunication (Lawrence Frizzell, &lsquo;Excommunication&rsquo;, in E. Kessler and N. Wenborn,&nbsp;<i>A Dictionary of Jewish-Christian Relations</i>&nbsp;(Cambridge: C.U.P., 2005) p. 152; see too G. Forkman,&nbsp;<i>The Limits of the Religious Community. Expulsion from the Religious Community within the Qumran Sect, within Rabbinic Judaism and within Primitive Christianity</i>&nbsp;(Lund: Gleerup, 1972)). This kind of parody of the language and practices of Judaism is common on the Lord&rsquo;s lips, and I have mentioned such cases throughout this exposition. This would explain the way that He goes on to assume there is some kind of established meeting with a congregation, witnesses etc. Admittedly He uses the word&nbsp;<i>ekklesia</i>, often translated &ldquo;church&rdquo;, instead of synagogue, but the synagogue was the&nbsp;<i>ekklesia</i>&nbsp;for the very first disciples (we note how the early ecclesia is called a &ldquo;synagogue&rdquo; in James 2:2, and early Christian writers like Ignatius and Hermas likewise call the church a &ldquo;synagogue&rdquo;). When recounting Old Testament history and quoting from the Old Testament, Josephus at least nine times replaces the LXX&nbsp;<i>sunagoge</i>&nbsp;with&nbsp;<i>ekklesia&nbsp;</i>(F.J.A.Hort,&nbsp;<i>The Christian Ecclesia</i>&nbsp;(London: Macmillan, 1898) p. 7).&nbsp;<i>Ekklesia&nbsp;</i>as a word doesn&rsquo;t have any religious connotation. And strictly speaking, the&nbsp;<i>ekklesia&nbsp;</i>was not so much the body of believers or synagogue as the called-together assembly of the members at a specific time and place, which in the synagogue context ratified disciplinary decisions. The word developed into meaning &lsquo;the church&rsquo; generally in the later New Testament, but initially it meant a specific local gathering of called individuals at one place and time, and had no universal sense to it. There was no established Christian congregation at the time the Lord was speaking, and yet He speaks as if such a system was well known by the disciples. Hort comments on the use of&nbsp;<i>ekklesia&nbsp;</i>in Mt. 18:17: &ldquo;The actual precept is hardly intelligible if the&nbsp;<i>ekklesia</i>&nbsp;meant is not the Jewish community, apparently the Jewish local community, to which the injured person and the offender both belonged&rdquo; (Hort,&nbsp;<i>ibid.</i>, p. 10). To therefore follow this section to the letter in&nbsp;<i>church</i>&nbsp;life today may be totally missing the point, and acting as the synagogue did- rather than as did the ever forgiving Lord of unconditional &lsquo;receiving&rsquo; of little ones, sinners, the lost etc. This is only a suggestion- my notes on the passage don&rsquo;t always assume that this is the only interpretation.</p>
<p><i>Go show him his fault</i>- The Greek word carries the sense of convicting a person, persuading them; it carries with it the hope of success. It&rsquo;s not a case of merely telling a person that we have noticed their faults, it is an attempt to convict a person of them with a view to their positively changing. The Lord uses the word later when He comments that He does this in love and hope of reformation: &ldquo;As many as I love I rebuke [s.w. &lsquo;tell a fault&rsquo; here] and chasten; be zealous therefore, and repent&rdquo; (Rev. 3:19).</p>
<p><i>Between you and him alone</i>- This is so difficult! We would far rather notice the fault and tell others about it. This teaching is likely one of the most disobeyed principles of the Lord. The sense of being alone together is supported by the command to &ldquo;<i>go&nbsp;</i>and tell him his fault&hellip; alone&rdquo;. The command to &ldquo;go&rdquo; and tell him he fault would seem a mere literary flourish until we perceive that&nbsp;<i>hupago</i>&nbsp;means not simply &lsquo;to go&rsquo;, but to go away, to depart. We are to depart from the time and place of realization of the offence against us, and then&nbsp;<i>alone</i>&nbsp;with the brother, attempt to convict him of a better way.</p>
<p><i>If he hears you, you have gained your brother-&nbsp;</i>The question arises as to whether the gaining / regaining of the brother is to us personally, or to God. It&nbsp;<i>could&nbsp;</i>mean that personal regaining of relationship is in view. But the word translated &lsquo;gain&rsquo; is elsewhere used about gaining or regaining a person&nbsp;<i>to God</i>&nbsp;(1 Cor. 9:19-22; 1 Pet. 3:1), and the word is repeatedly used in the parable of the talents, whereby the servants &lsquo;gain&rsquo; more talents&nbsp;<i>for their Master</i>&nbsp;(Mt. 25:17,20,22). In practice, this surely refers to gaining&nbsp;<i>people</i>&nbsp;for Him. The two are of course related, because to gain a brother for the Lord is to gain a brother for ourselves.</p>
<p>Here the Lord says of a sinful brother: &ldquo;If your brother sins&hellip; go and point out the fault&hellip; if he listens to you, you have [re]gained your brother&rdquo;. But in Lk. 17:3, He says: &ldquo;If your brother sins, rebuke him, and if he repents, forgive him&rdquo;. This would parallel the brother&rsquo;s &lsquo;repentance&rsquo; with him &lsquo;listening&rsquo; to you. Seeing repentance is a state of the heart, and we simply can&rsquo;t know the hearts of others, it seems to me practically impossible to judge the level of another&rsquo;s repentance. The Greek and Hebrew words translated &lsquo;repentance&rsquo; strictly mean a change of mind, and not necessarily any works / actions. God in this sense can &lsquo;repent&rsquo;. It seems to me that we have to recognize a changed state of heart in our repentant brother, without demanding &lsquo;works&rsquo;.</p>