Building a disciplined church in a chaotic age

John Calvin wrote, “All who desire to remove discipline or to hinder its restoration are surely contributing to the ultimate dissolution of the church."

He is not alone in emphasizing the importance of discipline. Pastors throughout history have agreed that discipline is a defining mark of a true church. Sadly, church discipline has fallen on hard times. The subject is either entirely ignored or greatly misunderstood by the vast majority of Christians in America. It is often ignored because, like the father of lies, we hate authority. 

This is embodied by the liberal “churches” in our country that celebrate defying God’s Word by comforting rebels in their sins. However, theologically conservative churches aren't much better in practice. When they do consider church discipline, it is only in its most extreme application — the excommunication of a member for the most heinous sins.

This is akin to reducing godly parenting to the single act of expelling a rebellious teenager from the house. Church discipline cannot be reduced to a single event. It cannot even rightly be reduced to a series of events. On the contrary, church discipline must be a culture that is carefully maintained by the officers of the congregation.

Steve Timmis and Tim Chester explain this concept well in their book Total Church:

“Anyone who has a family will know that there is more likelihood of success in dealing with acute disciplinary issues with children, if you have shown commitment as parents to creating an environment of care and discipline. Church discipline needs to become a daily reality in which rebuke and exhortation are normal....We need a culture of daily and mutual discipleship.”

In a family, this culture is primarily an extension of the father’s life. It should then be no surprise that a culture of discipline in the “household of God” is largely a reflection of the pastors' lives. Therefore, if churches are to recover discipline, it must begin with their pastors. This is what Richard Baxter meant when he wrote, “If God would but reform the Ministry, and set them on their Duties zealously and faithfully, the people would certainly be reformed.”

There are three primary areas where a pastor can begin creating a culture of discipline: personal holiness, contextual preaching, and pastoral involvement.

First, a pastor must reform his own life. A.W. Tozer declared, “God makes a man holy by blood and fire and sharp discipline. Then he calls the man to some special work, and the man, being holy, makes that work holy in turn.”

Holiness is the most fundamental prerequisite for ministry. The qualifications for the office of elder in the pastoral epistles make it clear that an elder is to be the epitome of a mature disciple (e.g., Titus 1 and 1 Timothy 3). The reason for this is that a pastor reproduces the quality of his life in the lives of his congregants. In Luke 6:40, Jesus explained, “A disciple is not above his teacher, but everyone, when he is fully trained, will be like his teacher.” The congregation is a reflection of its pastor.

Therefore, a pastor must constantly recommit himself to pursuing holiness through spiritual disciplines. He must be a man of Scripture, prayer, and repentance. V. Raymond Edman wisely observed:

“Ours is an undisciplined age. The old disciplines are breaking down... Above all, the discipline of divine grace is derided as legalism or is entirely unknown to a generation that is largely illiterate in the Scriptures. We need the rugged strength of Christian character that can come only from discipline.”

Pastors need to be the source of this type of Christ-like character that confronts our undisciplined age. No sane person would take fitness advice from a severely obese man. Why should anyone submit to the discipline of an undisciplined minister? While all authority is from heaven, on a practical level, a minister will lack the credibility to discipline his church if he lacks discipline himself. A pastor needs to be able to convincingly echo the words of Paul, who commanded, “Be imitators of me, just as I also am of Christ.”

Second, if a pastor is to create a culture of discipline, he must reform his preaching to be intensely contextual. D. Martyn Lloyd-Jones wrote, “Any true definition of preaching must say that man is there to deliver the message of God, a message from God to those people.”

God calls a particular pastor to preach to a particular church. Consequently, preaching needs to address the specific areas of sin in a particular congregation. All of Paul’s letters were crafted to address issues specific to each church’s context. When writing to Corinth, he dealt with their divisiveness, sexual immorality, and faulty understanding of spiritual gifts. When writing to Colossae, he primarily addressed a dangerous mixture of proto-gnosticism, asceticism, and Judaism. The content of his letters varied greatly based on the pastoral needs of each church. The same should be true of a pastor’s preaching if it is to create an environment of discipline.

As Lloyd-Jones said:

“That is what preaching is meant to do. It addresses us in such a manner as to bring us under judgment; and it deals with us in such a way that we feel our whole life is involved, and we go out saying, ‘I can never go back and live just as I did before. This has done something to me; it has made a difference to me. I am a different person as a result of listening to this.’”

This type of conviction is especially true of contextual preaching. Like Nathan standing before King David, it doesn’t shy away from saying, “You are the man!” This kind of preaching is like the airstrike that precedes a ground attack in battle. It softens up the congregation so that they are ready and willing to receive discipline from their pastor.

Third, a pastor must constantly be involved in the lives of his flock. Many men enter the ministry because they enjoy studying theology and preparing sermons. However, these men often fail as faithful ministers because pastoral ministry is a vocation centered on being deeply involved in the lives of people. Good contextual preaching will expose many sins that can only be resolved by a pastor’s active involvement in his people’s lives.

What good is an airstrike if it isn’t followed by a ground offensive? Pastors need to know their people well enough to offer helpful correction and advice, which requires spending time with the individuals who make up their congregation. It is during these visits that much of church discipline is accomplished.

As Baxter wrote, “One word of seasonable, prudent advice, given by a minister to persons in necessity, may be of more use than many sermons.” Children behave differently when their father is around, and similarly, there will be growth in communal godliness if a pastor is truly present in the lives of his people.

I’ve outlined just three ways in which a pastor can create a culture of discipline in his church, and each was only briefly discussed. There is much more to be said. A pastor must seek and fine-tune every means possible to make his church a place that produces godly disciples. John Leadley Dagg, the author of an influential church manual in the 19th century, said: “It has been remarked, that when discipline leaves a church, Christ goes with it.” Many churches — even those that practice a reduced version of church discipline — are functionally Christless. They have no testimony because they have no discipline. The remedy for this begins with the pastor.

Originally published at Clear Truth Media.