I’m convinced that love is the key to faithfully practicing church discipline. I’ll confess it is hard for me to love hardened sinners who have destroyed their consciences and refuse to listen to the truth. It’s hard for me to feel genuine compassion for someone who is abusing his family. But it’s only hard because of the remaining sin in my own heart. When I see my own sin and realize that I could be just as hard-hearted as the worst of sinners, and when I see that the only thing keeping me from unrepentant sin is God’s great grace toward me in Christ, only then can I speak the truth in genuine love and sincerely feel compassion and longing for the souls of hardened sinners. Christ calls pastors to be loving shepherds who deal firmly with those who endanger the flock, but always to do so while bearing the fruit of the Spirit: love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control, just as Jesus did, while He hung on the cross.
