When someone sins against me, do I go directly to them, or am I gossiping to others?

15 “If your brother sins against you, go and show him his fault, just between the two of you. If he listens to you, you have won your brother over.  16 But if he will not listen, take one or two others along, so that 'every matter may be established by the testimony of two or three witnesses.'  17 If he refuses to listen to them, tell it to the church; and if he refuses to listen even to the church, treat him as you would a pagan or a tax collector.

INSIGHT:   God help us all to obey this teaching more.  I wonder if this might be one of the most disobeyed teachings of all.  First, how often do we go directly to the person before we go tell others how badly the person mistreated us?  Secondly, how many of us follow up with step two, or three? 

When I read the letters my first spouse asked some of my former subscribers to write, for her use against me in court, I read of things they accused me of, but which had never been brought directly to me.  The people who claimed I sinned against them, never told me directly, all the sins they claimed I was guilty of in those letters to the court.  Even though the allegations they made were not true, they should not have broken Jesus’ command by going straight to the YouTube public, and then to the court.

The professing “church” is guilty of this sin against Christ too.  When my 1st spouse filed for divorce, she went to the Summit church leaders and slandered me, telling them that I had an affair.  I wasn’t too surprised after all the previous evil she had done, but I was shocked that the “church” leaders never even came to me and asked for my side of the story, after such a serious allegation!  I only found out she had been to them because I met up one day with a guy who worked at the church.  It’s as if they simply took her word for it and felt no need to ask me.  This was a sinful violation of the command of Jesus Christ, and if it was not just a one-time failure, it shows that this “tree” (leaders and the church) were not what they claimed to be.  How very ironic then, that the same year that our divorce was final, 2012, it came out that Isaac Hunter, the head pastor of the church she had slandered me to, had been having an affair with a staff member.  Soon after he resigned, and his wife filed a domestic-violence petition seeking a temporary restraining order and accusing Isaac of abusive erratic behavior and heavy drinking.

When I heard this news, I was brokenhearted because not only were my children attending this church, but I had referred my good friend to the church after hearing Isaac preach and being so impressed.  Even though I didn’t personally know him, I sent him a tearful message (see relevant content) pleading with him to repent and to seek God’s redemption.  I don’t know that he ever heard the message, but the following year, in Dec of 2013, he committed suicide, a final act of sin, showing that he was not in possession of the true grace of Christ, therefore not a true Christan, or a true minister. (Tit 1:16, 1 Jn 3:6-10)

Men, better than me, have ventured to say that 99% of the professing “church” institutions have been deceived by Satan with his “easy believism” false gospel, and since a tree produces after its own kind, so are the members who belong to them.  When a church claims to be a true part of His body, yet they do not obey the commands of King Jesus, they are disobedient at best and counterfeit at worst.  And disobedient or counterfeit “churches” produce disobedient and counterfeit “believers” who also do not walk in the commands of King Jesus, so that the Bible says they claim to know Him but are liars and the truth is not in them (1 Jn 2:4). 

Seven years later, in 2019, my ex-spouse who falsely accused me of adultery to that church, whose pastor did have an affair, and then committed suicide, cried out to a judge while falsely accusing me again, saying of her and the children, “Our lives are ruined!”  What is the lesson in all of this?  God has written all these stories into my life, almost like parables, illustrating Christ’s teachings are still alive today, and warning us that He cannot be mocked, and that we reap what we sow when we disobey the commands of the King.