Amen. Let's turn our attention to the ministry of the word tonight, and let's ask the Lord for help as we come to that word. Father God, we open up your word and we wish to see great things in it. Would you help your servant to unpack this difficult theme? preaching to his people from the heavenly Zion. And may we be caught up in the rapture of it, Father. And may that sound be received in good soil, good soil of hearts that are jealous and even zealous for unity and are desirous to maintain the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace. For it is in Christ's name we pray. Amen. Last week, I laid out varieties of divisions in the church and their purposes. And this week I would like to return to that theme. And what I'd like to talk about tonight is how to discern division in the church. How to discern division in the church. And what I'm wanting to lay out here is a way in which we can engage in some type of reconnoitering, some type of spying out of the seeds and saplings of division, because really the goal in maintaining the unity of the Spirit and the bond of peace is not to respond once the weapon of Satan has struck the church and caused division. We must do that, of course, but we must be preemptive in how we think about unity. And even though it is a difficult business, we have to spy out with our eyes and with our own experience what division looks like and how to understand it. So, I want to begin first off by saying that we need to carefully distinguish between ought and is in church division. Let me say that again. We need to carefully distinguish between ought and is, the way things ought to be, and then the way things are. When it comes to division in the church, we need to steer a straight course between realism and hope. That is, though we should be hopeful that our common bond in Christ and the relevant clarity of Scripture on the matters of division should keep us sticky, we should also be realistic about our expectations. So let's think about ought and is for just a moment. On the one hand, it is true that any church filled with love and desiring to submit themselves to the teaching of Scripture should be willing to work through any conflict. However, if you approach church conflict with that one assumption, you will be disillusioned and despairing. Why? Well, very simply because not everybody plays by the rules. And that brings us to the is. The reality is that there are sheep and wolves in the church. There are genuine Christians and there are false professors. And even among the genuine Christians, there are mature, long-suffering Christians. There are self-aware Christians who have a realistic view of their own sinfulness and their own slow progress in the faith. And therefore, they have great patience for those who are less mature in the faith. In fact, they are very patient with them because they want to disciple them. They're not trying to feed party spirits and create divisions, but they want to do exactly what Paul says in Ephesians 4 when he says that the body makes the body grow. They are part of that healthy, organic body that is trying to come along other parts of the body to make it grow. But then there are also less mature Christians. who may have much zeal, but this zeal has not been tempered by longstanding battle-worn seasoning in the church. Accordingly, they are exceedingly patient with the slow progress of growth in their own lives, but have little to no patience for others who may be struggling in their own walks." And then there's everyone in between. And this is the kind of raw realism that we need to join to our ideals. If we do not join this raw realism to our ideals, we will give in to the temptation of Satan to divide over the pettiest matters imaginable. So in our desire to maintain the unity of the spirit and the bond of peace, we need to engage, as I said, in some form of preemptive reconnaissance. that seeks to realistically spy out seeds of division in the church. So I'd like to offer this evening three seeds of division that we should be aware of. Three seeds of division that you need to be looking for. And here's the first one. The first seed or sapling of division is gossip and slander. Now the Puritans had a saying. that the person who gossips has the devil on his tongue, and the person who listens to gossip has the devil in his ear. Gossip is one of the most lethal weapons in Satan's arsenal. As I said a few weeks back, the Nazis know this, the Russians know this, and that's why they did and continue to engage in propaganda, campaigns of propaganda and disinformation. But when we think about gossip and slander, I do believe that it's something that we need to talk more about because even in the last two years in our own church, as our church has been ripped asunder by gossip and slander, shameless gossip and slander, the kind of gossip and slander that does not care about our brother or sister but simply wants to promote a particular agenda, I have heard every kind of justification for gossip and slander imaginable. The kind of justification that really evacuates any meaning in the word gossip and slander itself, to where gossip and slander just doesn't mean anything. In fact, gossip and slander is only what you call what the other side is doing against you, but it doesn't apply to you and your party as well. And here are some of the justifications that people give. They'll say things like this, but what I'm saying is true. But beloved, just because something is true doesn't mean it is your business to go broadcast it to everyone without first going to that person out of a desire to guard their dignity and keep the ninth commandment. brother. And we do that when we refuse to go to our brother or sister. We talk about them and around them, but not to them, which is what Matthew 18 tells us to do, to talk to them. But we talk to others. But listen to Proverbs 18.8. The words of a whisperer are like delicious morsels. They go down into the inner parts of the body. Our temptation, when confronted with gossip, is not primarily truth-seeking. That's not what it is. It is taking in garbage. That's what gossip is. We want to know the scuttlebutt. We want to be in the know. And none of this comes from wisdom, however. When someone approaches you, please listen to me, this is very practical, you can use this perhaps even tonight. When somebody approaches you with something like, have you heard about so and so? We should immediately be on our guard. We should immediately feel uncomfortable. I don't know about you, but when this type of activity comes to me, and as a pastor it does come to me quite often, I feel like I need to go take a shower. I feel icky. I feel like trouble is brewing. I feel like dissension is brewing. And we need to feel uncomfortable about that. And I want to suggest to you that when somebody, a brother or sister, comes to you with such morsels of gossip, you need to ask at least three simple questions. They're very simple. The first question you should ask them is, are you concerned to guard this person's reputation? Are you? Are you concerned to guard their reputation? Secondly, and this is a very important question, have you gone and spoken to this person about this concern? These are the instructions that our Lord gives us. And if you're ever wondering why the Lord gave us Matthew 18, such a pivotal and fundamental part of church life, it's because Jesus knows the heart of man. He knows that even in a regenerate community of the New Covenant saints, we still wrestle with the flesh. We still come into this blessed sanctuary with the defilement of the world and the flesh and the devil, and we're still given to the proclivity to dissension and division. And so he gives a very, very clear four-step process of how to deal with offenses. You go to them one-on-one. They don't listen. You take two or three. They don't listen. You take them to the church. They don't listen. You put them out of the church. It's that simple. But the third thing is this, if they have spoken to the person about this concern according to Matthew 18, then the next question should be this, Friend, are you sharing this with me because you want me to go with you to address these concerns with you according to the second step of Matthew 18? And if their answer is yes, then you listen to what they have to say, and then you go to that person with this brother or sister, acting as a witness, that's the point, and you hear the other side. Now, however, if the answer is no, If you ask them the question, are you telling me this because you want me to go with you in line with Matthew 18, and they say no, then immediately you have discerned the motive of that person. Do you understand me? Because if they don't want to go to the person, they're not concerned with restoration. And restoration is the goal of Matthew 18. The goal of Matthew 18 is not to put somebody outside the church. Now even there, and we must not forget this, even in the event that somebody is put out of the church, what does Paul tell us in 1 Corinthians 5? The action of the church, not just the elders, not just the deacons, not just a part of the congregation, but the action of the church in deciding that this person is to be treated as a tax collector or a Gentile is delivering that person over to Satan for the destruction of their flesh that their soul might be saved. The most damaging thing that we can do is let somebody get away with unrepentant sin. Now, why do we want to do that, beloved? Because all of us have the same proclivity. We are constantly trying to mitigate and minimize the level of drama in our life. Right? Don't we have enough drama? Doesn't our social media feed and our news feed give us more drama than we can take? And so we come to church, and indeed this place is a sanctuary, and it shall always be by the grace of God, but sometimes the sanctuaries turn into a courtroom. And in that courtroom, we must plead for the soul of our brother and sister to repent of their sin, and if they will not, they may no longer in good conscience bear the name Christian." So this line of questioning, these three questions, reveals the motive of the person sharing the information with you. So that's the first seed, if you will. But let me go on. Let me just say another excuse that people give about gossip and slander, and I've heard this more times than I like to recall, is they say, but I'm just seeking counsel. That's what I'm doing. I'm just seeking counsel. I remember one man told me that he had sought counsel from everyone in his life, even a sailor that he was working with that he didn't even know. And he decided to share all the garbage of all the nonsense that was going on in his life and in the life of his church with a complete stranger. Let me make something clear. There is a difference between seeking counsel and garnering support or validation. Those are not the same thing. Proverbs 11, 13 says, whoever goes about slandering reveals secrets, but he who is trustworthy in spirit keeps a thing covered. You know, the definition of a safe person, maybe you've heard us talk about that before. Definition of a safe person is not somebody who's going to keep something scandalous concealed. We're not talking about cover-ups. That's not what we're talking about. What we're talking about is that we're all a big mess, okay, and we're going through this thing called sanctification. And we need people in the church that we could share our burdens with, that we could share our sins with, that have a genuine desire to see us overcome those sins. And sometimes what that means is bearing with them patiently. And that is a person who is a safe person. Proverbs 25, 9 and 10. Listen to this very carefully. argue your case with your neighbor himself, and do not reveal another's secret, lest he who hears you bring shame upon you, and your ill repute have no end." Let me tell you something, beloved, and boys and girls, this is very important for you to hear. Listen to your pastor. If you continually go around revealing the secrets of other people, you will lose trust in the eyes of people. And let me tackle it from the other angle. You got somebody that's coming to you and they're telling you all this garbage about other people. Guess what they're gonna tell other people? The garbage about you. So be very leery about people who go around revealing the secrets of others. Proverbs 13.3. Whoever guards his mouth preserves his life. He who opens wide his lips comes to ruin. Proverbs 29, 20. Do you see a man who is hasty in his words? There is more hope for a fool than for him. Just recently, confessions here, I took my family to a neighborhood block party. My wife and I, we talked about this. We were very intentional about this. There were going to be unbelievers there. In fact, almost all of them were unbelievers. There were a few Christians and it was pleasant to make their acquaintance. But at this block party, people were getting drunk. In family worship that night, I told the boys, I read them a proverb and I said, Now, do you notice the wicked and foolish things that were coming out of the mouths of those people who were intoxicated? Yeah, daddy, we saw that. Well, let me explain to you what's going on. You see, most of us have this thing called a filter. And it's a filter that sits between our brain and our mouth. And that filter is called discernment and wisdom. And you see, the more you intoxicate your body with alcohol, the more that filter disappears. And then what you begin to do is anything that comes to your mind, it just goes directly to your mouth and there is no filter. But you see, some Christians don't need alcohol to do that. They just talk and talk, whatever comes in their mind, they just talk and talk. Again, beloved, I say, this is not from wisdom. There are many things that I feel that I want to say, but I have to guard my mouth because what does Solomon teach us in Ecclesiastes 3? There is a time for everything. In my marriage counseling, I always tell young couples, I'm like, you have to think very carefully, wife, you have to think very carefully, husband, about when you decide to bring up a difficult and sensitive topic to your spouse. You know, wives, when your husband's getting home from a long, hard workday, he's tired, he's probably frustrated, It's not the best time to bum-rush him with all the honey-do-list items that need to be taken care of and how all the kids are being punks and that they need to discipline. There's a time for that. But when he gets home, that's probably not the time. And same with a wife. There are certain times that are unwise, yea, I should say foolish. And so also, there are times when you can see that a brother or sister has an open ear and they're listening. And there's other times that their ears are closed and their mouth is wide open and there's no place to get a word in edgewise. At that point, you keep your mouth shut and you wait for the proper time. So be on your guard against gossip. Great harm comes to churches who are more concerned about personal agendas, party spirit, and hearing scuttlebutt. The genuine believer among us must band together to create a firewall of dignity about every member. Is that your desire, Grace Covenant Church? You know, we teach our children the Ten Commandments, and one of those Ten Commandments, as I've already made mention of, is the Ninth Commandment. You shall not bear false witness against your neighbor. We should do everything in our power, everything in our power, to preserve each man's dignity and save each man's pride. But a second seed or sapling of division is grumbling. Now, what is grumbling? I think we probably need some definitions here, because not all grumbling is the same. There is constructive criticism, and then there is what I'm calling quarrelsome, aimless grumbling. Quarrelsome, aimless grumbling may be defined as a dissatisfaction with something or someone that is more concerned with venting, manipulating, and winning an argument rather than understanding and resolving the issue. Quarrelsome, aimless grumbling is unwilling to compromise, uninterested in trying to understand the person's point of view, and is most interested in being heard rather than listening. So let's, let me unpack that a little bit, because I think there's a lot to say here. As I see it, there are three types of grumblers, okay? Here's the first one. Those who are discontent with something but have a viable and reasonable solution to the problem. You know, there are people who are actually interested in unity. You know, anybody can grumble about something. Anybody can. But only the wise man or woman comes with a solution tempered by patience in the process. What's the second type of grumbler? Those who grumble for the sake of grumbling and have no solution. These are generally people who are unhappy with most things in their life. Grumbling is just a part of the warp and woof of their character. Maybe some of you kids have watched Winnie the Pooh. Who do you think of? Eeyore, right? I mean, that guy doesn't have anything positive to say. He's a little black rain cloud, right? And sometimes there's people like that in the church. And sometimes you could spot them because they're alone because nobody wants to be around them. They share communion with them. They love them, but we bring enough trouble and problems and stress into the sanctuary as it is from our own lives, and we don't want to add to it more little black rain clouds. tend to either be those who have never really been in a leadership position and are ignorant of the multifaceted complications of leadership and therefore play the role of the armchair quarterback. We've got it all figured out. I mean, you know the picture of an armchair quarterback, right? Usually a morbidly obese man sitting in an armchair with a 16 ounce of some horrible beer that no man in his right mind should ever put to his lips. and he's got the remote in his hand, and he has the audacity to criticize what the quarterback did. Whereas, if he tried to run a 40-yard dash, he'd probably have a heart attack. Or, these tend to be people who desire honor and respect, but are unwilling to extend the same to those with whom they are in conflict. Well there's a third category of grumblers and this is the most dangerous. Those who grumble for the sake of inciting rage in others and influencing a massive takeover. We actually see this, you don't need to turn there, I'll just tell you the story, but in number 16 we see the story of the rebellion of the sons of Korah. They opposed Moses, the man of God. They were envious of Moses and accused him of being overbearing. This is what he says in 16.3 of the book of Numbers. They come to Moses and they say, You've gone too far, for all in the congregation are holy, every one of them, and the Lord is among them. Why then do you exalt yourself above the assembly of the Lord? Sounds like a communist. Now notice immediately, the faulty assumption upon which this charge is based. Moses never contended that he was more holy than the others. Moses never contended that the whole assembly of Israel was not holy to the Lord, nor did he assert that the Lord was not among them. So what is this exaltation that the sons of Korah are accusing him of? Well, first off, it was a matter of position and function. If you read carefully in Numbers chapter 4, you'll find out that the sons of Korah's job was to help transport the holy furnishings of the sanctuary, the Ark of the Covenant, the altar, the lampstand. They were like the road crew for a band, right? They're just always sloughing around all the camp material. But secondly, it was a matter of envy and jealousy. You can also see in Exodus chapter 6 that Moses and Aaron were the cousins of the sons of Korah. Have you ever fought with your cousins? Ever fought with your brother and sister? Right? There's that sibling rivalry, right? But Moses and Aaron were the ones who were chosen by God to lead Israel while Korah was stuck on the wilderness moving crew. It's the same spirit within our own age that thinks that everyone should be equal in function. Everybody agrees, well, people who read the Bible, that we're equal in being. God made man in his likeness and in his image. We're all created equal, that's true, but not every function in society or even in the church is the same. Not everybody is qualified to be the president of the United States. Not everybody's qualified to be a senator. Not everybody's qualified to be a pastor or a deacon. Some people aren't even qualified to be members. But God initially told Moses and Aaron, after this rebellion came to them, He told them to separate themselves from the congregation because He was going to consume the whole congregation as a result of these men's rebellion. And the fascinating thing is that instead of Moses and Aaron saying, sounds like a great idea God, go for it. No, what do they do? They plead with God. They plead with God not to judge the whole congregation for the sin of one man. And so what does God do? God tells all the congregation of Israel to separate themselves from the sons of Korah, and Moses says, If the ground opens up and swallows up these rebellious members, then you will know that the Lord has set His choice on us. And that's exactly what He did. He caused the earth to open and it swallowed them up. And Moses said that as a result of this, you shall know that these men despise the Lord. Number 1630. To defy God's leaders when they are calling you to repent is to despise and rebel against the Lord. And beloved, if I could just speak to the parents for a moment. Keep in mind that your children watch your prevailing disposition to the government, to the authorities, and to your elders, and to your deacons. And I just want you to know, okay, this is just simple wisdom, okay, that our children are parents. And if they see a spirit of rebellion in their parents, they will learn to take up that same spirit of rebellion. And ironically, that spirit of rebellion may come back against you. So these are two seeds and saplings of division. You have gossip and slander, and then you have grumbling. But let me take a third here. And I'm titling this, Take an Analysis of a Person's Life. And if you would, please turn in your Bibles to Titus chapter three. Titus chapter three, verses eight through 11. And I will address this next week as well. I'm just going to open it up this week and come back to it next week. Titus chapter 3, verses 8 through 11. Paul is speaking to his servant Titus, who is a pastor. And there was apparently rampant division in the church. And it was coming from a group of people who were defying their leaders. And I want you to listen to what he says, Titus 3, 8 through 11. The saying is trustworthy, and I want you to insist on these things so that those who have believed in God may be careful to devote themselves to good works. These things, good works, are excellent and profitable for people. But, verse nine, avoid foolish controversies, genealogies, dissensions, and quarrels about the law, for they are unprofitable and worthless. As for a person who stirs up division, after warning him once and then twice, have nothing more to do with him. I want you to notice in verse 10, that is a thumbnail sketch of Matthew 18. Once, twice, and then be done with him. Knowing that such a person is warped and sinful, he is self-condemned. Now I want you to notice in verse 8 that Paul tells Titus to insist on his members devoting themselves to good works and that these things are excellent and profitable for people. And I want to camp there for a moment. A mark of a divisive person is that they are typically not very involved in the life of the church and therefore not very profitable to the life of a church. Maybe they don't attend service very often. They don't serve much. They take a lot, but they give very little. It is the experience of many a pastor that sometimes the people that demand the most attention, the most time, the most counseling, sometimes even the most financial assistance tend to be the ones who are never satisfied and end up causing division or even leaving. Now, of course, there are exceptions to this. Sometimes people are just providentially in a season where they have a lot of needs and simply don't have the bandwidth to give back. That's understandable. But people who are naturally takers, I repeat, people who are naturally takers also tend to be people who naturally grumble. There's an air of entitlement among these people. Such people, Paul asserts, are not profitable to the life of the body. And so we must take mental notes of such things, especially when the elders charge someone with division. Mull over in your experience what you know about that person. Now I want to draw your attention to 1 Timothy 5.24. 1 Timothy 5.24, this is a very important verse, 24 and 25. The holy apostle says, the sins of most people are conspicuous, that means obvious, going before them to judgment, but the sins of others appear later. So also good works, here we go again, are conspicuous, they're obvious. Good works are obvious to the prophet of the body of Christ. And even those that are not cannot remain hidden. Beloved, time always bears this out. Time will always tell. Time will always tell the character of a person. Beware of the sleepers of division in the church. This is why people who are constantly hopping from church to church can be immediate red flags. Why are they hopping from church to church? Are their leaders never good enough for them? Do they have unrealistic expectations of either the leaders or the congregation? Do they have an agenda that gets no traction in a church, so they move on to the next church? Keep this in mind. If someone is constantly leaving churches or getting excommunicated from churches because they are unhappy with the leadership or the congregation, it is only a matter of time before they are unhappy with your leadership and with you as a congregation. So beloved, this is why there is something exceedingly noble about longstanding church membership. Think of the family for a moment. Even in a healthy family, there will be every kind of disagreement, every kind of blow-up, every kind of dysfunction. But a healthy family is able to prioritize what is most important and agree to disagree about certain things they cannot change. At the end of the day, they all share the same blood, and that's what keeps them together. And though we receive many wounds from our family, we also inflict just as many wounds. Wounds can be healed through humility, grace, patience, and love. And when those wounds are healed, guess what? The bond, the bond goes deeper. We can say, we've been through much, and we're still together. And don't get me wrong, there are times when division is necessary, but even then, division can happen graciously. How much more should this be the case with the church of the living God? So keep in mind, beloved, as we close out tonight, that there was plenty of evidence, scare quotes, levied against our Lord, but the scriptures tell us that their testimonies were not corroborated. Jesus was unjustly accused of crimes He did not commit. Remember also that the archenemy of every Christian is Satan himself. His very name, HaSatan, means accuser. He is the accuser of the brethren and we as a church need to guard ourselves from taking up the posture of the accuser of the brethren. A wise man once found himself accused of every kind of evil and slanderous accusation imaginable and he told his accusers this, you don't know the half of it. I'm worse than you think and so are you. Proverbs 17.14 says, The beginning of strife is like letting out water, so quit before the quarrel breaks out. The quickest way to quit before the quarrel breaks out is to stop and recognize how much sin we carry in our own hearts. That doesn't solve everything, nor does it justify wrongs committed against you, but it does slow down our angry outrage. The reason the Son of God appeared was to destroy the works of the devil. The power and potency of the devil's works were destroyed on the cross of Calvary. Jesus has set you free from the self-centered motives of creating divisions and factions in the church. If you have done this, Jesus stands ready to forgive you, but you must repent of your sins and believe in him, and you will be cleansed, forgiven, and accepted in the beloved. Let's pray.