David Bahn – Reflections

There’s quite a brouhaha going these days over new airport screening methods by the Transportation Safety Agency. A man in San Diego threatened to have a TSA employee arrested if he touched him inappropriately. Airline pilots are refusing to submit to the new procedures. There has even been a congressional hearing on the matter. An invasion of personal privacy is not easily tolerated in these days and times.

Matthew 18:15-20

“If your brother sins against you, go and tell him his fault, between you and him alone. If he listens to you, you have gained your brother. ¹⁶But if he does not listen, take one or two others along with you, that every charge may be established by the evidence of two or three witnesses. ¹⁷If 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 a Gentile and a tax collector. ¹⁸Truly, I say to you, whatever you bind on earth shall be bound in heaven, and whatever you loose on earth shall be loosed in heaven. ¹⁹Again I say to you, if two of you agree on earth about anything they ask, it will be done for them by my Father in heaven. ²⁰For where two or three are gathered in my name, there am I among them.”

Jesus calls for his disciples to confront a brother or sister who sins against them. Their actions are not to be left alone. Their faults are to be exposed for what they are. The disciples are even to enlist the help of others in dealing with this issue. It is even to be a matter of public confrontation if the one confronted refuses to repent.

Note, however, that Jesus is talking about someone sinning against a brother or sister in Christ. It’s the one sinned against who is to go to the person and seek reconciliation. This is no call for the church to seek out people for the scarlet letter or to bring private sin into public view carelessly. Note also, however, that matter is not brought to the attention of others if the offender repents. If he repents, the brother has been won. Satan has lost. Good will and relationships have been restored.

We have no call from God to vigilantism or overzealous moral policing. We do have a call from God to make relationships right before him and with one another. We are to call on others to aid that cause. This is no invasion of privacy; it is an exposure of Satan’s ploys, and a process that honors the God who has forgiven our sins and desires that all people should repent and believe the Good News of Jesus’ love.