Warn as a brother

And if anyone does not obey our word in this epistle, note that person and do not keep company with him, that he may be ashamed. Yet do not count him as an enemy, but admonish him as a brother. - 2 Thessalonians 3:14-15

What happens when a brother falls? What happens when he sins and won’t repent and do the right thing. How do we handle it? Do we just let it go? Do we kick him to the kerb and move on? Do we handle it somewhere in between and just kind of ignore it?

First of all, we can’t ignore the sin. That would be the most unloving, ungodly, and unkind thing we could do. To leave a brother stuck in his sin would be to say, ‘I don’t care.’

On the other extreme we could just attack and condemn him for his sin and cast him over. The church can be very good at shooting our own wounded. We don’t count this brother as an enemy. Instead we are to warn him as our brother. The purpose of warning, and indeed of everything regarding discipline, it to restore the erring Christian to fellowship with the rest of the body.

Encourage, build up, warn, and love the brother back into right fellowship with God and the body.