Baptist History, Heritage & Distinctives –Historic Baptist Ecclessiology – Part Three

Thomas E Kresal Admin · 2 hrs February 5, 2020

Baptist History, Heritage & Distinctives –Historic Baptist Ecclessiology – Part Three

IF GOD’S WORD IS TRUE, THE CHURCH THAT JESUS STARTED STILL STANDS–HAS ENDURED!

2. Church Discipline

“If he shall neglect to hear them, tell it unto the church: but if he neglect to hear the church, let him be unto thee as an heathen man and a publican. Verily I say unto you, Whatsoever ye shall bind on earth shall have been bound in heaven; and whatsoever ye shall loose on earth shall have been loosed in heaven.” (Matt. 18:17, 18, AV, with corrected tenses of verbs in verse 18.)

This text suggests three simple questions that believers in an “invisible” church might try to answer:

a. How can a wronged brother tell his grievance to an “invisible” church?

b. How can an “invisible” church decide an issue, make known its judgment to a trespassing brother, or execute that judgment “if he neglect to hear”?

c. Is not the authority to “bind and loose,” whatever this means, in verse 18 given to the same church that is in view in verse 17?

Obviously the reference here is to an organized assembly; and obviously such organized assemblies must always have existed from that time to this in order that faithful followers of Jesus might obey His instructions here given.

Thomas E. Kresal from: Sermon: “Ten Bible Proofs Of Baptist Perpetuity” by Rosco Brong

http://baptisthistoryhomepage.com/brong.sermon.bapt.perpet.…