Steve Stanley’s Reviews > Baptist Foundations: Church Government for an Anti-Institutional Age > Status Update

Corrective church discipline should seek restoration of the offender in a spirit of gentleness [Matt 18:15; Gal 6:1-2; Jas 5:19-20]....We must remember that the desire to punish or inflict vengeance has no place in church discipline, no matter how great the wrongdoing [Rom 12:19].

Equally important to the steps of [corrective church] discipline is the attitude and goal of discipline. Previous generations’ abuse of church discipline led some to abandon the practice altogether.

Church discipline breaks down into two categories—formative and corrective. Formative discipline means forming spiritually mature believers through teaching and training...Every church engages in formative discipline to one degree or another [Matt 28:20]...A steady practice of formative discipline will produce healthier followers of Christ.

The absence of church discipline demonstrates a lack of biblical love in churches.

Some situations warrant departure. Teaching and preaching that obscure or miss the gospel render a church less than a church and are strong warrants for leaving. Moral failures among leaders that render them unfit to lead and yet go unaddressed are also grounds for departure. An overall toxic spiritual atmosphere can develop in a church that makes it dangerous to one's spiritual health or the health of one's family.

We must do justice to all the biblical data, which better fits with a congregational-rule and elder-led structure.

Unfortunately, what often occurs in discussions of church government is that one side of the biblical evidence is elevated over against other biblical evidence. Either the rule of the congregation is elevated at the expense of the leadership, or the authority of the leadership is elevated without acknowledging the final authority of the congregation. Such reductionism must be rejected.

Put together, then, the NT presents a picture of congregational *rule* that is *elder led*. The elders lead and guide the church to fulfill and carry out its responsibilities as the church.

[Most] New Testament letters were written to churches as a whole and not merely to church leaders.

Determining the suitability of elders based on these qualifications [1 Tim 3:1-13; Titus 1:5-9] will require the assessment of members. Paul also said that deacons “must first be tested; and then if there is nothing against them, let them serve as deacons” (1 Tim 3:10 NIV). As with assessing elders, such testing requires input from the congregation, not merely the leadership team.