We Need Each Other More Than We Think (Part 1)

Ever been disfellowshipped?

If so, you know some of the pain that can be there. If not, I’m glad for you.

I’ve never been disfellowshipped personally—at least to my knowledge—but it happened to my family nearly fifty years ago, when I was a young child. We had moved to a new town and started attending a local congregation. We were a cute little family, if I do say so myself: two kids with two lovely parents, ready to get involved in the church. What congregation doesn’t want that?

Well, apparently this one. After about a month, the elders came to visit my parents at home. They talked for about an hour, and at the end of the meeting, the elders told my parents that it was probably best if we didn’t come back. No explanation was given—just a “you’re not welcome anymore.”

Some questions may have formed in your mind. No, there hadn’t been a fight or other difficulty during that month. And there hadn’t been any pre-existing relationships or conflicts; we weren’t even from around there at all, having moved from out of state. The only thing we can figure is this: my dad had been in ministry in another state, and some of his sermons had been published in one of our fellowship’s journals. We suspect that someone recognized his name, objected to something he had preached, and decided that it was better if we weren’t part of the congregation.

Unfortunately, in our tradition, disfellowshipping has been a way that leaders have often dealt with groups or people that they have found to be problematic, unsavory, or heretical. We’ve disfellowshipped individuals, families, college professors, other congregations, and even whole groups who hold a position or belief that we consider wrong. Of course, we absolutely do not have the market cornered on this practice; other Bible-believing groups use the practice, too, and it has a long history in the annals of the church. If you need a story from a present-day church, the recent Christianity Today podcast The Rise and Fall of Mars Hill (2021–22) tells painful stories of individuals cut off from that prominent congregation. Sadly, though, there are plenty of other stories, known and unknown, of whole denominations and individual congregations doing the same.

Even more sadly, this is a way that Christian behavior mirrors some of the most damaging and painful tendencies of our modern world. The phrase “cancel culture” gets thrown around nowadays, but I think we all know what it feels like when we make a mistake, offend someone, or otherwise get crossways with a person or group, whether in person or online. What are the most common responses? They write us off, laugh us off, or cut us off. It’s secular disfellowshipping!

Disfellowshipping is one version of what is historically called “church discipline.” This term refers to strategies that church leaders deploy when members persist in sin or begin to propound teaching that goes against the gospel or other conclusions from the leaders. We find guidance in this matter both in the Gospels—in one of the few places Jesus actually uses the term “church”—and in Paul’s letters. Jesus’s instruction for us, regardless of whether we are the ones wronged or are the ones in the wrong, is to go to the other person privately and try to resolve the problem. If that doesn’t work, as Jesus says in Matthew 18:15-17, we should go again with another one or two believers; the next step is to take it to the whole church, and only then do we break relationship with the other person. 

Paul’s instruction comes in 1 Corinthians 5, in a situation of rank and open sin; it is not exactly clear what Paul intends the church to do, but he seems to encourage them to exclude the sinner from church fellowship, even using the rather shocking language of “handing him over to Satan” (v. 5). However, the second half of the same verse is key, in that it provides a rationale for this instruction: “that his spirit may be saved on the day of the Lord.” How could a person’s spirit be saved if they are permanently kicked out of the church? Many have concluded that Paul’s intention is to ban such people so that they come to their senses—that they realize the error of their ways, give up their sin, and return to fellowship. Returning to the church is what will prepare them for salvation.

To be honest, disfellowshipping can seem quite strict and restrictive to modern ears, shaped as we are by our culture of self-determination and self-indulgence. But before we go further, we need to remember its positive foundation. The whole concept of church discipline grows from the idea that the church is fundamentally vulnerable. We are vulnerable to wrong ideas, to manipulative people, and to the wiles of our spiritual Enemy. And that’s why, in Scripture, the leaders of God’s people are often called “shepherds of the flock” who have the responsibility of caring for and protecting the church. We need protection, and God provides shepherds to do just that.

This language appears in the Old Testament, perhaps most famously in Ezekiel 34, where God (through the prophet) accuses Israel’s leaders of failing in their task as shepherds. The text’s sobering conclusion is that God himself will step in and act as shepherd. When we turn to the New Testament, we find the image in Paul’s exhortations to the Ephesian elders (Acts 20:28-31) and in Peter’s encouragements to elders in 1 Peter 5:1-4. The latter text explicitly connects leaders’ identity as “shepherds” with Jesus’s role as “Chief Shepherd” for the church at large (see also John 10:1-16). 

In other words, even though disfellowshipping is something that is typically hurtful, harmful, and painful, it is built on a view of leadership that God intended for the church. There is no question that, as it says in 1 Timothy 3:1, being a church leader is a “noble task”! I give thanks to God the Father for continually raising up men and women to serve as shepherds (whether officially or unofficially) for his people in the church, to Jesus Christ for serving as our great example as leaders, and to the Holy Spirit for empowering leaders for their work.

In the next post, we’ll think about some reasons disfellowshipping has come to be a prevalent practice among us.