I have never been one to shy away from confronting people. This includes those calling themselves Christians who are publicly sinning or who are teaching something false about scripture. I think it does a lot of damage not correcting my fellow brothers in Christ when they sin publicly.
However, I have found that when I correct my fellow Christians l it can result in me becoming the target of their wrath and not just from the person sinning, but also from my fellow Christians who don’t like me correcting others. It not only just them simply trying to tell me how I should not be publicly rebuking them, but it has resulted in name-calling some hateful vile things as well.
Most of the time it does start pretty civil, it just ends up resulting in an emotional response from others. Usually, after they ironically attempt to publicly rebuke me telling me it’s wrong to do it to other Christian. A hypocrisy from them that I have found to be a little amusing to see.
In the end, ultimately they will argue that I need to pull the offender aside and privately talk to them about their sin. More often than not they will attach Matthew 18:15-17 to back up what they are saying to me.
I will address the scripture they use in just a moment. However, I must ask, is this really the best course of action for Christians? How does this undo the damage that is done? If a self-professed Christian is passing off false Doctrine, sinning is public, bringing shame onto God, His people, and His word, how can that be resolved in private? How does it answer the charges that are now levied against the Lord and his people of inconsistency and hypocrisy?
The answer is, it does not. It just leaves it out there to “spread like cancer” (II Timothy 2:16-18)
Ask yourself, what effects do you think a Christians false teaching or sin has when done in public? What effects do you think this false teaching/sin will have on God, His people’s persuasiveness, reputation, and influence with all those that believe and the unbeliever who we wish to teach about Him to?
If we do not publicly correct a public sin this could only serve to drive a wedge between Christ and the unbelievers. We’re supposed to be planting seeds not driving wedges. So the idea that God would want this does seem a bit off character for Him. So why does Matthew 18:15-17 tell us to take a fellow Christian aside and out of sight of others to correct them?
Well, it doesn’t, this comes from a misuse of what said. There is a very important qualifying condition that I think people missed when reading Matthew 18 here. It says, very clearly, “if your brother sins against you”. This is not in regards to a public sin, it has to do with a private sin, sin that doesn’t affect the public reputation of God and His followers.
It’s basically saying that if somebody sins privately you should deal with it privately. It’s not saying that you do not deal with public sin in public. However, there are some situations where it may actually be beneficial to deal with public sin privately and I think a person should always consider if it would be better to do so or not.
However, it still doesn’t neglect the fact that the Bible doesn’t say that you cannot deal with public sin publicly. Nor does it even make sense to do so and let the damage go on unchecked by not dealing with it publicly.
We even find that Paul was more than willing to publicly stand up and call out his fellow Christian, doing so to their face “…before them all.” (Galatians 2:11,14)
Correcting your fellow Christian show your love for your fellow Christian(s) and unbelievers. It helps end rumors and slander. It shows people you believe what you teach about what the Bible says.
So if I or someone is correcting you don’t get offended don’t feel that they’re picking on you. We are doing it not only to correct you but to stop the issue the sin/false teaching has created. Ending it there and then instead of allowing it to continue to spread and turn people away from Christ. This is not a bad thing, but a good thing we are done out of love of you and others. And it is a huge mistake that Christians are teaching that we should not or cannot publicly correct one another when nursing is done in public.