Sermon Notes
Matthew 18.15-20
Thirteenth Sunday after Trinity
10th September 2017
by Edward Carter
I always try to start reading the set Bible passages for a preachment a couple of weeks before the service itself, without doing any background reading initially, simply to ‘immerse myself’ in the words of scripture. I do this as part of my morning prayers.
Having reflected on all the set readings in this way I decided this time to focus on the gospel passage: Matthew 18.15-20. At first sight it seems quite challenging, with an emphasis on matters of church discipline – one of the services at which I’m actually preaching this sermon includes a baptism for a baby from a ‘fringe’ family, which either makes a church discipline sermon extremely appropriate or rather scary! But it’s always important to locate any passage in its bigger context, and these verses are drawn from a chapter all about life in the kingdom of heaven. And of course in a sense any specific passage belongs within the whole sweep of scripture, and sheds light on the good news revealed in Jesus Christ.
Whenever possible I try to look quickly at one or two commentaries or other reference books, and this time I started with R.T. France’s 1989 book, Matthew – Evangelist & Teacher. He has a very helpful section about the ‘binding and loosing’ terminology in verse 18. I was very interested to discover that the pronouns are neuter (not gendered). This suggests that this binding and loosing isn’t so much about people, rather something more general or over-arching.
Another book I looked at was Donald A. Hagner’s commentary from the ‘Word’ series. Like many commentators he observes the resonance between verse 18 of this passage with Matthew 16.19. The thing that caught my eye was a rather technical point about the form of the verbs ‘to bind’ and ‘to loose’. It’s an unusual construction using the future tense and the perfect participle. My interpretation of this is that it conveys both the future and a sense of completeness. So for example Hagner’s own translation of verse 18 goes like this: ‘Truly I say to you: Whatever you bind on earth shall have been bound in heaven, and whatever you loose on earth shall have been loosed in heaven.’
I also looked quickly at Douglas R.A. Hare’s commentary from the ‘Interpretation’ series, and noted his suggestion that ‘…the risen Christ is “in the midst” of each stage of the procedure of verses 15-17, and it is he who has conferred on the congregation the responsibility of binding and loosing.’ What I took from this was a reminder that the life and practices of the church must always be rooted in the power of the resurrection – a power that binds heaven and earth together. Suddenly church discipline feels a bit less scary, because it’s grounded in the certain hope we have – that God’s heavenly kingdom informs and undergirds the life of the world and the church.
Having done this background reading I went back to the passage itself, and started praying for the people I’d be preaching for. At the front of my mind were these questions: What does God need them to hear on 10th September? How will the gospel message most fruitfully encourage and challenge them? How will the people be helped to recognise the presence of the Holy Spirit with them? How can I communicate in such a way that this passage is brought to life for them?
It’s important that an illustration springs out of the passage, rather then being forced upon it. So having reflected on this passage and done some reading, as described above, I then tried to keep my eyes open attentively during the next several days, so I could use something real. I wanted to pick up on Hagner’s insight, about the correspondence between heaven and earth. The illustration I ended up with seemed to do that fairly well, and hopefully will resonate with the two congregations I’m due to be preaching for at Margaret Roding and Good Easter on 10th September.
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