by Pastor Chris Jameson
Excommunication can be a confusing concept for Christians, both in its nature as discipline by the Church and because of its natural ramifications for personal relationships. This report aims at giving a brief summary of Christian doctrine surrounding excommunication, its reasons, its aims, and its ends. At the end, it also offers a practical section detailing how we share the world with excommunicants.
Excommunication is best understood by the constituent parts of the word itself, ex-communication. Wherever the body of Christ dwells together, there is community (Jn 17:20-23), but there are those who exclude themselves from this community by their behavior or beliefs and are deemed ex-communicants. This is the final step in what ought to be a long-suffering process to call believers to repentance (Num 14:18; 2 Pt 3:9). Jesus tells us that the Church has been given power to judge when excommunication is necessary, and even proclaims that He stands alongside those who apply this most serious penalty (Mt 18:17-20). Excommunication occurs when a sinner is finally impenitent and recalcitrant, and therefore refuses Christ by rejecting the covenant authorities He has placed over them.
Biblical Guidance on Excommunication
It is of chief importance that we conceive of an excommunicant properly by giving detailed attention to which biblical passages refer to his particular case, and which do not. There is precious little in Scripture concerning excommunication in its varied forms, but there is enough (2 Pt 1:3; Mic 6:8). Since excommunication can refer to A) those who obstinately sin in disobedience, but also B) those who simply reject their faith in Christ, we must be careful to distinguish between the two, and order our behavior among them accordingly.
The Man of 1 Cor 5
The man of 1 Cor. 5 is a professing believer in Christ. He is “among you” (5:1), and he “bears the name of brother” (5:11). The problem with the man of 1 Cor. 5 is not his rejection of the Lord, but instead it is his claiming the name of the Lord while he engages in gross sin, and further, “boasting” that such behavior is allowable in Christ’s Church. This ought to make natural sense, for formally delivering the man of 1 Cor. 5, who believes he is in Christ, over to Satan and shunning him from the Christian community achieves two things in his case. 1) He is grieved, for his claim to be in Christ is invalidated and 2) the shunning of this man achieves purity in the Church, for it is publicly professed that he is not of them, and for the express purpose that the Church not come into ill-repute and be misunderstood in its doctrine for the sake of a licentious man. Likewise, they “do not even eat with such a man” for their mere association with him will naturally lead to onlookers believing that his doctrine of loose living is accepted within the Church.
By contrast, it is God who instead provides judgment for one who becomes excommunicated due to unbelief (“God judges those outside” 5:13); any judgment from the church in the form of shunning or dissociation, is specifically rejected by Paul. Definitionally, as an unsaved sinner, an unbelieving excommunicant is in fact entitled to the same association that we give to “the world” (5:10), for he is now of the world. Paul’s command “not at all” here (οὐ πάντως) is very strong negation, by which we must learn that Paul very much forbids the practice of shunning unbelievers in this world, including unbelieving excommunicants. If this were not so, how could Paul say in 1 Cor. 10:27 “If one of the unbelievers invites you to dinner and you are disposed to go, eat whatever is set before you without raising any question on the ground of conscience.” So we distinguish ourselves from unbelievers, as light is distinguished from dark, but we do not dissociate from them, for “The light shines into the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it” (Jn 1:5).
Therefore, while some general principles on excommunication can be gained from this passage, it is not to be applied to an unbelieving excommunicant, for it in fact represents the opposite of his case. Likewise, the passage in 2 Cor. 2, which most likely refers again to the man of 1 Cor. 5, does not refer to unbelieving excommunicants. This passage instead concerns forgiveness for the man who has personally offended Paul (2 Cor. 2:5). Nonetheless, Paul encourages that the congregation should turn and forgive him, and “reaffirm their love for him,” and “comfort him” likely referring to the lifting of their formal excommunication which they had pronounced for his willful sin. While this man had apparently caused personal offense to Paul, he nonetheless seems to have given up his sinful ways, which precipitates his reclamation by the Church as Paul instructs. We must look elsewhere for guidance on an unbelieving excommunicant’s case.
The Brother of Matthew 18
As in Corinthians, so here too, because Jesus’s instruction concerns a “brother” who “sins against you.” Just as the man of 1 Cor. 5 persisted in licentious sin, the hypothetical brother of Mt 18 persists in stubborn sin. In both cases, the issue is 1) a professing believer in Christ, with 2) odious, offensive, unrepentant sin patterns. For unbelieving excommunicants, by contrast, their primary sin is not offense, but unbelief; he himself has abandoned Christ’s body, and so too its authority over him. Once the brother of Mt 18 refuses to listen to appeals by an injured party, witnesses, and the Church, then he notably receives the same punishment as the man of 1 Cor. 5, that of shunning and disassociation. The implication that “if he listens you have gained your brother” must mean that if he doesn’t listen, he is no longer a brother, for he has been lost.
Therefore, other than in general principle, Mt 18 must not be used to apply to an unbelieving excommunicant, for he is not a sinning brother, nor is he a brother at all, and “what have [we] to do with judging outsiders?” (1 Cor 5:12).
Those Who “Went Out From Us” in 1 Jn 2:19
Here again, the passage regards an excommunication not on the grounds of unbelief, but of errant, sinful belief. The “antichrists” of the prior verse are those who are teaching as doctrines of Christ something like “the doctrine of demons” (1 Tim 4:1). John writes that the central error of these false Christians is their denial of the deity of Christ, yet claiming eternal life in the Father nonetheless (1 Jn 2:22-23).
The goal of the excommunicative acts of the Church in 1 Jn 2:19 is therefore just as it is in the case of 1 Cor 5 and Mt 18, namely to protect the purity of the church by dissociating from those who claim membership therein yet engage in sin, whether carnal, doctrinal, or in mere stubborn unrepentance. What principles may be retained from this passage in the case of an unbelieving excommunicant? Merely this, that he himself has also “gone out from us,” not in the teaching of false doctrine, but in unbelief. In this he likewise evidences that he is “not of us,” by his word and deed. As with the other passages thus far examined, 1 Jn 2:19 cannot further apply in our conception of the unbelieving excommunicants discipline case.
Apostates in Hebrews
Here finally we have a biblical case which applies directly to the unbelieving excommunicant, and so is eligible to guide us in our conception of his discipline. Heb 3:12 says “Take care, brothers, lest there be in any of you an evil, unbelieving heart, leading you to fall away from the living God.” Note the use of the present imperative command to “brothers” alongside the prospective future tense warning against “an unbelieving heart.” The author warns against the possibility that brothers may become unbelievers, in fact he commands that they take care lest this happen, implying an inevitability should they not take care. An unbelieving excommunicant was once considered a brother in the visible church, yet both he and we now both recognize that this one-time brother has an “unbelieving heart.”
Notably, in the very next verse the author provides the imperative command which protects against brothers falling to this unbelieving heart, namely: “But exhort one another every day, as long as it is called “today,” that none of you may be hardened by the deceitfulness of sin.” Calvin held that “delay without engagement hardens sinners.” The word for “hardened” here is sklayrhuno (σκληρύνω), which means “cause to be unyielding.” It is the same word used for the hardening of Pharaoh’s heart (e.g. Ex 7:3), causing his unyielding nature as well, though all logic, justice, and righteousness counseled him otherwise. Moses regularly went to Pharaoh to tell him of his folly, and warn him of worse to come for denying the Lord God.
Hebrews 6:4 speaks further to those who seem to have been brothers, and yet have abandoned the faith. This passage can be confusing, causing some to believe that salvation is no longer even a future possibility for an unbelieving excommunicant, for he “has once been enlightened” and therefore would be “crucifying again the Son of God.”
Calvin says that the key is what “fallen away” means; there is a general and a particular version. General is any sin which causes us so often to fall away, and these may be restored to repentance, and very often are. Particular falling away is not “theft, perjury, murder, or drunkenness” but “a total defection or falling away from the Gospel, when a sinner offends not God in some one thing but entirely renounces his grace” (Comm Heb 6:4). The listing of being “enlightened,” “tast[ing] the heavenly gift,” the word of God, and sharing the Holy Spirit, curiously parallel the ordinary means of grace present in the administration of the visible Church (hearing the gospel, Lord’s Supper, preaching the Bible, and baptism respectively). In other words, the passage refers not to those who have once been truly saved, but to those who have experienced the ordinary means of grace regularly, but without conversion and without ever partaking of the spiritual substance of these means. It is impossible therefore to restore them again, for no one can restore to repentance those who have never repented in the first place.
Calvin therefore accounts of those in Heb 6 as “reprobates,” or those non-elect persons who never truly believed, and never truly will, for they have not been “appointed to salvation” (Acts 13:47-48). But we can not determine whether anyone will believe in the future. How then should we account for an unbelieving excommunicant’s past presence in and perceived promise as a member of Christ’s body?
Mark 4 presents a distinct parallel with Heb 6, for they both employ the illustration of ground with “thorns” (ἀκάνθας, Heb 6:8; Mk 4:7, 18). Jesus tells us that when the seed (the gospel) is spread among the thorny ground that “the cares of the world,” “deceitfulness of riches,” and “desires for other things” choke out the seed, and it produces no effect. The list is not exhaustive, so Jesus could have any number of things in mind; the point is that other concerns choke out growth. The unbelieving excommunicant seems to be one who has produced a crop, and so more akin to Jesus’s “rocky ground,” for he “received it with joy” and he produced a crop and “endured for awhile” yet, having no root, falls away when trouble comes.
Likewise, Heb 6 refers to one who “[drinks] the rain that often falls on it” and “produces a crop,” yet the crop is thorns and thistles. The unbelieving excommunicant was once judged as a healthy producing crop, but as the crop grew it proved to be a thornbush. However, thorns and weeds being much more common than carefully cultivated crops, we merely account of him as no different than other common unbelievers. In other words, in excommunication we all acknowledge “it would take a miracle for this obstinate ground to produce anything but thorns;” but God does miracles all the time, and has done in each one of us who were likewise obstinate ground. So we pray for his salvation as others have prayed for ours, until God may decide to do the same miracle in them that he has done in us.
Turretin, Elenctic Theology, 3.4.15 (topic 18) says “The excommunicated, although outside of the particular visible church of which he was before called a member, does not cease to be a member of the invisible church even after excommunication. Hence Augustine says ‘For we do not separate from the people of God, those whom either by degrading or excommunicating, we reduce to a lower place for repentance (contra Donatistas post Collationem 1.20.28 [PL 43.669]).’” The unbelieving excommunicant may yet be of the invisible church, awaiting the miracle of faith, and therefore we must continue to evangelize him.
The fact that he has once benefitted from the heavenly blessings of the church and has even claimed them as his own at one time nevertheless could not be a miracle of his own making, for such is impossible; it is God who creates the miracle of faith, and we may not pretend. It is God who is in charge of miracles. We may misjudge that a miracle took place in some, for we see through a glass darkly, but this was merely the growth of thorns and thistles, a rotten growth, untrue.
The Necessity of Excommunication
Augustine, Contra Parmen. Lib. 22.c.4, “Every pious reason and mode of ecclesiastical discipline ought always to have regard to the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace. This the apostle commands us to keep by bearing with each other. If it is not kept, the medicine of discipline begins to be not only superfluous, but even pernicious.” Discipline belongs to the elders of the Church, and it is a heavy burden, but one which they carry out in service to both sinners, and to the peace and purity of the body of Christ.
In his Handbook of Church Discipline Jay Adams gives grave cautions for those who do not take seriously the responsibility to execute discipline (79-80). Indeed, the story of OT Israel is one of lack of discipline, by the ruler kings as well as the priests, and it is the prophets who announce the woes associated with neglecting discipline (Mic 6:8). Eli did not discipline his sons for their repeated offenses, and it was he that was disciplined in the end (1 Sam 4:12-18). Paul uses the same exact terms for discipline (“get this wicked person out of your midst!” (1 Cor 5:2)) which 5 passages in Deuteronomy use (Dt 17:7; 19:19; 21:21; 22:24; 24:7). In each instance, the penalty for the one under this excommunication-like discipline is death (Dt 17:8-13). In the Church era, however, we instead proclaim that such a one is “dead in sin.” Adams writes “it is also instructive to note that when an individual or a church failed to exercise discipline, God Himself did. In 1 Cor 11:17-32 we read that God struck members of the body with illness, making them weak and even taking the lives of some of them (v.30). In this section Paul says, ‘If we carefully judged ourselves, we wouldn’t be judged’” (Handbook 85).
Yet Christ’s grace attends all who lead His Church as well, and Himself enables their disciplinary efforts. This grace is that which we have in abundance, but which the unbelieving excommunicant no longer claims. “There remains no sacrifice for sins.” Though such discipline saddens us, we move forward in confidence that we are perfectly forgiven, and therefore in faith that God not only commands such discipline, but is at work in it, “both to will and work his good pleasure” in us as well as in any excommunicant.
Calvin, Institutes, 4.12.10 – “Though ecclesial discipline does not allow us to be on familiar and intimate terms with excommunicated persons, still we ought to strive by all possible means to bring them to a better mind, and recover them to the fellowship and unity of the Church. If this humanity be not observed in private as well as public, the danger is that our discipline shall degenerate into destruction.”
“That means that when you talk with him, you have an obligation to evangelize him” (Adams Handbook 81).
Paul writes “I wrote to you not to avoid sinners outside, but those claiming the name of brother while sinning” (1 Cor 5). It is they who we do not even eat with, but we do eat with those who do not claim the name of Christ, as did Christ himself. He even ate with Pharisees. The shunning penalty is a fierce remedy for those claiming Christ while sinning or teaching sin, but for those falling away the answer is not shunning, but pleading and evangelism, the same as for anyone outside the Church. The turning over to Satan is merely identifying that there are two kingdoms, that of light and dark, and the church is labeling that this person must belong to Satan’s kingdom of darkness, for they profess not to be in the kingdom of the light. Satan can destroy his flesh (for he belongs to Satan’s kingdom), while those who belong to Christ are never touched by the evil one; there is a fundamental difference in the constitution of each, and excommunication is merely a declaratory acknowledgement of this.
Adams, 81, has a helpful example of how and why you can have many fruitful conversations with a reprobate. Basically, rather than shunning them, we are to use all of our interactions with them as an opportunity to preach the gospel to him, without giving him any kind of edge that he has already heard it, or does not wish to hear it. We do not even allow him the ability to use his intellect as an interpreter of Scripture, for he himself has said that he is not in the Spirit, and the Spirit is required for faithful interpretation of Scripture (Jn 16:13). Nobody outside of Christ may claim understanding of his Word (1 Cor 2:14-16; Mk 4:11-12; Pr 1:23; Isa 55:8-9; Jer 9:24). The believer therefore has confidence (1 Jn 5:14-15) to approach the unbeliever, for God will put his words in our mouths (Lk 12:12).
Can an unbelieving excommunicant attend services? Yes. Only if he were still claiming the name of Christ while teaching/believing heresies could he be removed from the service.
Can he fellowship with believers? Yes, though we should take every opportunity to witness to him, every time. Our posture should be one of controlled grief for him, for he is in more grievous danger than those who have not “tasted the heavenly gift.” They should plead with him, but not as powerless, hopeless, and bereaved, for Christ our hope encourages us of his power in the words of the Gospel; he cannot possibly resist if the Spirit calls him back (Rom 9:20; Acts 16:14). We may endure suffering in the form of the excommunicant’s ire, but the NT has much to say about enduring suffering for the sake of Christ. This will be difficult, but hard things are not bad things, and we are called thereunto by our Savior (Eph 2:10 “For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them”).
Our prayers ought to be for his salvation and repentance, even, and especially, in his presence. The newest, most uneducated of believers may yet confound him in the Lord, for He is our strength, and it is Him whom the excommunicant has abandoned, thus he has abandoned any strength of argumentation or objective understanding. He is instead laboring under delusions, under the power of the evil one, and our posture is of pity rather than pure despair. Yet our hope is in the Lord, who can make rebels to be sons as easily as he has already done with us. It is therefore never our confidence that has been faltered, but definitionally, it is in fact the unbelieving excommunicant’s confidence which is shaken, whether he admits this or not. The seed spread among us has had its effect, we have tasted, and do taste still, of the heavenly gift; it is he that has turned his back on glory and miracle and joy, so we stand on the greater foundation, but we always extend a hand to him who has fallen from it.
For a prayer that is helpful in these circumstances, see this post.
