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What is Meant by "Church Discipline", and what does it involve?
Meaning Matrix
Corrective church discipline is that form of discipline
which is restorative rather than preventative. It is an exercise of judgment
or censure within the church that brings sanctions for behavior that is unacceptable
for a member of a Christian church.
- Warning, correction, rebuke, admonition, and excommunication
are the primary forms of corrective discipline. Brief definitions are provided
below.
- Warning - a sober statement of caution about the seriousness
and consequences of sin. A warning may be uttered either to those who are
already sinning as motivation to stop, or to those who have yet to sin as
motivation to remain pure in the specified area.
- Correction - a redirection or righting of wrong attitudes,
beliefs, desires, or behaviors.
- Rebuke - a sober statement to a sinning person of the
sinfulness or foolishness of that person's actions, accompanied by the reminder
that the offender should have known better and is without excuse.
- Admonition - a sober exhortation to discontinue sinning,
or to avoid potentially tempting situations.
- Excommunication - a treatment of a seriously sinning
member as a non-member, most visibly by exclusion from the communion table
and removal from the membership rolls. The offender may still attend services,
but is treated as a non-member because his behavior has called into question
the credibility of the verbal profession to which church membership testifies. Only the congregation as a corporate body may exclude a member from the communion
table or remove a member from the membership rolls.
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