Day 1

1 Timothy 5

19 Do not entertain an accusation against an elder unless it is brought by two or three witnesses.

But how do you deal with leaders after you are told to respect them, to honour them, then they end up compromising their faith? How do you handle it as a pastor?

And I think that”s what Paul is talking about in 1 Timothy 5:19-20 when he says,

do not entertain an accusation against an elder unless it is brought by two or three witnesses. But those elders who are sinning you are to reprove before everyone so that others may take warning. I charge you in the sight of God and Christ Jesus and the elect angels to keep these instructions without partiality and do nothing out of favouritism.

First of all, this is a general discussion on how to discipline leaders. The senior pastor is the one being told what to do when fellow leader errs. Timothy is a senior pastor or bishop at this time. And he is being told, there must be discipline in church. For everybody to do what they want, ‘€¦ that”s not a Christ”s church that”s anarchy. Paul wants you as a leader to understand that you can”t just do anything you want.

Number two, you cannot live a loose life and yet you still want to be involved in the leadership of the church. Do You have a wife yet you have a concubine? Maybe you think nobody knows but the senior pastor has been told privately by a whistle blower. If after confirming it he does nothing then he is not in obedience to God”s instructions. Obviously, I am not encouraging the idea of acting on someone just because of what a whistle blower said. Verify it first.

This is what Paul is actually saying. You must verify. You must do due diligence. By the time you are disciplining this leader, it is not because of the whistle blower, the whistle blower only triggered your investigation. The reason why you are disciplining him is because you have evidence that he actually did it.

Day 2

1 Timothy 5

20 But those elders who are sinning you are to reprove before everyone, so that the others may take warning.

But the general view is that you cannot allow people to continue doing ministry who are living double lives. If you come to know, that needs to be rectified.

But also , you need to allow the church members to have the freedom to share confidentially any such information . This is including about you as a senior pastor when you are living a compromised life. In that case it will go to the church board that supervises you. Explain to them when you point out these things, it is going to help the elder because he will be rehabilitated for Christ. Maybe the devil is the one getting him in to go down the veiled path. But if somebody point it out in time, they may not have gone down too far. So, it is important to encourage the church to be whistle blowers but to also need to be aware about the whistle blower policy. That when you share with the senior pastor, they will not necessarily act on it. They must investigate for themselves. And if they find out it”s not true, they are going to do nothing about your message. In the meanwhile, you are not allow to share with congregation once you share with the3 senior pastor. That stops roomer mongering. Because people should not be encouraged to malign other people”s names or leaders” names by claiming things that did not actually happen. Generally speaking, people should know that they cannot malign your name and get away with it. I think it is important that that is actually dealt with well.

So, we need to ask ourselves as leaders, in which way are we allowing the church to lose its name? Is it by allowing people to continue in leadership who are down. Or to throw them out because they have sinned and you don”t care what happens to them? We stop them from the ministry and then we have nothing to do with them because we don”t want to be embarrassed? We don”t want to spoil our hands. That will also be wrong. If you are looking for new believers, why do you want to lose the old ones?

Day 3

1 Timothy 5

21 I charge you, in the sight of God and Christ Jesus and the elect angels, to keep these instructions without partiality, and to do nothing out of favoritism.

Somebody said, I think it is important to put more effort in outreach but if you are getting ten new people every month and losing twenty, that”s still a dying church. You should be putting more effort in discipling the ones that are already there. Discipling them, guiding them, as you should be seventy percent of your time. Reaching out to new people then balance of the time.

And that means if somebody is sliding off, you better stop concentrating on outreach just to help the person get back to the fold. You should not lose anybody in any way.

So, what is Paul saying about how we deal with our erring leaders? Number one he is saying do not be quick to receive and act on an accusation before investigating it. In other words, don”t be quick. Don”t let people just spoil other people”s names. And when he says that, do not receive it is not that you reject any accusation off hand or ignore any claim of a member of the church about one of the leaders. Paul here wants you to be balanced between believing and acting on every bit of gossip. He is actually trying to say, be careful.Do not receive means don”t be a gossiper. Just stop gossip instead of spreading it. Stop people telling you stories of what they have no evidence. And if you are a senior pastor, tell them you cannot be the one receiving gossips. Information that should come to you should be verified. Information with evidence. So,do not receive gossip, is what I hear Paul teaching Timothy as a senior pastor to do.

So, don”t receive accusation means you don”t believe it at first, you don”t act on it until it is verified. Gossip can spoil a whole church when encouraged. You will be hearing things like , you know the way I saw that young man standing next to a woman it is like he wanted to talk to her about sex. Why didn”t you wait until he had talked to her? Why are you coming to tell me and there is nothing wrong they did? It is only that you thought he might do wrong. I think any kind of pastor who encourages that kind of gossiping is going to destroy his church.

And Paul is telling Timothy don”t allow that kind of behaviour. It is not really right especially when they are talking about somebody who is a leader in the church.

However, I think what Paul is saying is, do not ignore serious sin in the leader”s life if there is evidence. So, the extreme of rejecting all accusation or, the senior pastor cannot be reached, or you can”t listen such things, is one extreme. The other one of receiving every accusation ..everything.. is another extreme. There is a middle ground. Somebody called Barkley says,

nothing does more harm than when some people are treated as if they could do no wrong and others as if they could not do right.

You are so suspicious of so and so, any rumour you want to act on it even before verifying. But so, and so is so Holy, any accusation you dismiss it without investigation. That will not run your church well. Either extreme is wrong. The extreme of thinking some people are so Holy they cannot do any wrong is what Paul says you should have.

How do you understand the message of Romans three twenty three that all of us have fallen short of the glory of God. It means even the bishop, even the apostle, can fall into sin. So don”t fail to listen to but also investigate an accusation and therefore you allow the person who is being helped to actually be destroyed. Because the person is telling you so that you can help the culprit. You can do something. You can correct him. You can return him back to the fold. But now you are seriously refusing to give any help. They cannot penetrate to reach you so nobody tells you.

They see something which they can prevent getting but they ignore arguing’€¦ I knew it was going to happen but there is nobody to listen to me. That”s not a good church.

Day 4

Matthew 18

15 ‘”If your brother or sister[b] sins,[c] go and point out their fault, just between the two of you. If they listen to you, you have won them over.

But a church that encourages gossip is also wrong. So, there must be an area in between where people know in the congregation that the senior pastor can listen to an accusation that is verified. The senior pastor cannot listen to gossip. They must know that. I think that will be important.

However, in a good biblical church, leadership is plural. It means even the senior pastor has an elder”s board that he reports to. It therefore means that if it is the senior pastor who is sinning, it is still the elders board that can help him, that can correct him.

Don”t cover up somebody else”s sin. When you do it, the scriptures tell us you become a partaker of that sin. If you see me going wrong and you don”t help me, you are a partaker of my sin. That”s why you must help out confidentially because you don”t want to destroy my name. instead you want to help me stop going the wrong way. So, I will go to the senior pastor confidentially. Tell him that he needs to help. For my leader to ignore it is to condemn me to destruction. But also say it publicly is to actually malign my name. There is actually a middle ground. The pastor is being told to be ready to receive accusation but not gossip. Do not be in a hurry to receive gossip. That will not be right. So, I repeat the statement by Barkley, nothing does more harm than when some people are treated and if they could do no wrong, and others as if they could do no right. Those are both pretty extreme.

So, the reason for either extreme is evident. Those whose business it is to correct others they usually have many enemies. Great caution. Therefore, you are advised to be careful when you go accusing someone. And you should be very careful you as a leader who is being told especially in admitting the accusation and acting on it. That”s really why they are being told do not receive. Of course, it is a subject of disciplining elders but you are being told don”t be quick to receive accusations on an elder. And I think that”s good for all of us to hear. But also an accusation against a leader therefore, since you are so careful, must not be automatically received.

Don”t just hear and start acting. The accusation if it is about a leader should be carefully verified. The first person comes you do not act. And it is actually another pastor who has told you the story. Even if it is a pastor, you don”t act on it before another witness. Another one comes, and this one is your bishop, telling you about the same member. You don”t act on it. Wait until there are three witnesses. Then you say this matter now needs investigation.

So, I think it is important to understand why you are so careful. One person can spoil somebody”s character and that may be why they are coming to you. But, that one needs to be investigated. Don”t hear a story and you come to me, what is this story I hear about you? Wait until you hear a second one and a third one before you confront me, in case you start confronting me for just a rumour and it”s not actually true.

I think it will be important that we understand that. Don”t be quick to receive gossip about leaders. And you must encourage people to first look for evidence, do due diligence before they talk to the accused. Otherwise, you are going to be caught receiving or promoting unsubstantiated information of the church leaders. People will start hating each other, for the person who was falsely accused is so unhappy. He is trying to establish who said it and it will destroy your own church.

Day 5

Matthew 18

16 But if they will not listen, take one or two others along, so that ‘€˜every matter may be established by the testimony of two or three witnesses.”

John Calvin. commenting on 1 Timothy, explains why some people are so quick to receive an accusation. Ooh Ng”ang”a was seen drinking alcohol. Ooh yeah, I have always thought he could. That”s a bad behaviour for you as a leader. Why do people want to receive accusations so easily? It is not good.

For example, one of the guesses why accusations’€¦is the sincerer the pastor tries to strive in the Lord”s kingdom, the more he is loaded with spite and more fiercely attacked. In other words, the things he is talking about is asking for such high standards we do not want him. The bible standards are very high and people in the congregation are struggling to keep them. They start thinking, is he also not human? So even before he falls, because you want him to fall, you go accusing him of falling. And you know, in that kind of atmosphere, as soon as the people who wanted him to fall hear a rumour made against him, they quickly start spreading it even further now making things worse.

What about if finally, it may be discovered it had no basis?It was just a gossiper doing his usual job. And yet by that you have acted as if it was true. It will bring an egg on your face they say. It will bring you a lot of embarrassment and that”s not a good thing to be involved in.

So, you need to ask yourself is that how you are leading your church? Do you look eager to hear people”s accusations? I find it very funny that people do not like being asked for evidence because every time somebody tells me a story I ask, what is the evidence? He replies’€¦ it”s obvious. If it was obvious I would not be asking you for evidence. But people don”t want to be asked such questions. They think you don”t respect them for you to ask for evidence.

Paul says no, no. If you truly are a Christian you will insist on evidence rather than receive stories. Why do you enjoy destroying people”s names? Protect people”s names by being careful before you believe a story and being careful before accepting it as a fact. Satan makes most people want to destroy their leader. If you are investigating you are likely to discover people think you are wasting time.

Ignore It”s obvious mantra. Paul says’€¦.. Do not believe something before investigation. Don”t condemn anyone, especially one of your church leaders, before investigations are done. And of course, in the same way, don”t defend someone unless you have facts to defend him. Please weigh the matter. Withhold your decision until the matter is fully investigated. So in that case it is going to be a matter that is verified hence you do not decide either what too early. Many of us are found in that group, where you hear a story about somebody you say, aah yes, I knew it. You even now add yours. But you have not even verified. Or somebody tells you a story of one of your friends and you defend them without any evidence.

I think that would be dangerous for you not to take time and do what Paul is saying.

Day 6

Matthew 18

17 If they still refuse to listen, tell it to the church; and if they refuse to listen even to the church, treat them as you would a pagan or a tax collector

Let”s quote Calvin again who pointed out that there is a spiritual attack that causes people to accuse others. In fact, Calvin says it is indeed a trick for Satan to estrange men from their leaders in church so as to gradually bring their teaching to contempt. Because once you say this pastor did wrong, people now doubt him. His teaching is biblical teaching but you find a way of saying, ahh after all so and so cannot be trusted .. despite the fact that his teaching is from the bible. When the church gets to that vicious circle, there will be no growth.

Calvin says, in this way, not only is wrong done to innocent people, because you have not verified yet, whose reputation is undeservedly injured, but the authority of God”s teaching is diminished.

So be very careful, Paul is saying, before believing a story about a leader. Again, be very careful before defending someone. Let the matter be investigated fully, not lip service. But although the emphasis is on accusation about a leader but also the treatment on others in church must be similar.

There is an old story I am told about a pastor who was defending himself against criticism, and he says, there is a story going around that I told my wife not to go to a certain church and that it has wild meetings. They say my wife went anyway and I dragged her out of that church by her hair. And I hurt her so badly she had to go to the hospital. I am going to respond to these accusations.

First of all, I never told her to stay away from that church. Second, I didn”t drag her out by her hair. Third, she never went to the hospital. Lastly, I”ve never been married and I don”t have a wife.

Do you see the joke? Somebody has created a story about this pastor and his wife, this church leader, and they don”t even verify that he has no wife. So, all these accusations could not have actually happened. Might you be caught to be the one that has done it. I hope it will embarrass you if you go that route.

Again, let”s look at what Spurgeon says in his Lectures To My Students, a book that he wrote. And he says, when a person came to the pastor with gossip, the pastor would say,

” well, all this is very important and I need to give it full attention but my memory isn”t so good and I have a lot to think about. Can you write it all down for me? ‘€˜

Spurgeon says, this would take care of it because they wouldn”t want to write down their gossip. Yeah, don”t start approaching someone that he is wrong if the one accusing does not want to say the basis and write it so that when you go approach the other person you don”t misquote the accuser..ignore it. So, let him put it down in writing. And many people don”t want to put accusations down in writing. They just want you to believe them and so destroy somebody else, sometimes for no good reason.

Day 7

1 Corinthians 5:11

But now I am writing to you that you must not associate with anyone who claims to be a brother or sister but is sexually immoral or greedy, an idolater or slanderer, a drunkard or swindler. Do not even eat with such people.

However, once you have done all the investigations and you discover it is true, those found guilty must be rebuked. And not just rebuked, they must be rebuked in the presence of the whole church Paul says.

That way, the whole church will know that the church does not condone such or any sin, and so he will be disciplined. Yes, that includes all of us, and it includes also the senior pastor. The matter must be addressed forthrightly once it is verified. A public rebuke is quite tough, but if you don”t give a public rebuke how would people know what they did is not good?

And in the process, Paul is admitting it, it is going to create a kind of a fear, but that is Holy fear. That encourages people to want to walk in righteousness, whether you are just a member or a leader. It will help you to commit yourself to holiness. You know, many churches are going through indiscipline because of not following this biblical instruction. Sin is being found in church including among leaders. All because of lack of a straight forward thorough action on those that have gone the wrong way.

Because people say, if a pastor can do that, why not me? So, it is important that the whole church understands that these rules of God are for all of us including leaders and juniors. There are no instructions for leaders that are not applicable to juniors. All of us must live Holy lives and we all must be accountable to one another, for the way we live our lives, if we are truly members of one church, members of one body. We should hold each other to account.

That”s why there should not be a one-man church. Where somebody called a bishop or a senior pastor reports to no one, you are asking for trouble. They defend themselves arguing ‘€¦ I report to God. no, no. Paul shows we need to hold each other to account. And please don”t be in a church where the pastor has nobody to report to.

In the middle ages is when John Calvin lived. The church protected its corrupt bishops. That”s how we end up in what is called the dark ages. Because the pope would be seen with a woman and that is covered up since he claimed he was celibate.

Iam In fact told that, in order to ensure that the bishop cannot be touched, they started saying that you need seventy two witnesses before a matter can be brought to discussion. The bible here is talking about two or three not seventy-two witnesses. So, if you start making it difficult to discipline sinners, you are going to spoil your church.

And so, we need to ask ourselves, what kind of life are we allowing our members to live? Do we discipline them and so do we allow that matter to be taken in such a way that God will be honoured and people will grow in their righteousness?