Sin in the Community – Luke 17:1-4

I was not supposed to talk about how others had sinned against me, but here I was with a college friend of many years, and a fellow pastor, telling him the situation from my perspective, impugning others who had hurt me.  He quietly and gently said, “So you didn’t keep your promise not to talk about this.”  That gentle rebuke hurt, but it moved me to repentance.  Did he forgive me?  He did.  And he invited me to fill in preach for him in his church when he had to be away.

And he said to his disciples, “Temptations to sin are sure to come, but woe to the one through whom they come! It would be better for him if a millstone were hung around his neck and he were cast into the sea than that he should cause one of these little ones to sin. Pay attention to yourselves! If your brother sins, rebuke him, and if he repents, forgive him, and if he sins against you seven times in the day, and turns to you seven times, saying, ‘I repent,’ you must forgive him.”  (Luke 17:1-4 ESV)

Sin, in the community of those who seek the kingdom, must be taken very seriously because of its destructive nature.  Jesus has been warning about the dangers of loving money and he knows how tempting that sin is.  So he seeks to train his disciples about sin and how the community of believers should address it.

There will always be temptation to sin simply because we are sinners.  But to be the source of the temptation will be strictly judged.  If I seek to get another to disobey the Lord in order to meet my own sinful craving, I am leading one of God’s little ones, His children, a fellow believer, into destructive behavior.  And He will be very displeased with someone who hurts His children.

If someone sins against me I cannot let it lie.  For my brother’s or sister’s sake I must rebuke them to help them toward repentance.  Sin is too destructive to let it continue.  And though the common Jewish teaching was to forgive three times, the kingdom community must exceed that.  Sin is both supremely dangerous and yet evocative of supreme grace when accompanied by repentance.