The important thing about accountability is in knowing where it rests.
There is a fundamentally different approach to accountability between the counsel Jesus has given His church body on the subject and the manner in which we see accountability being pursued in practice by the powers of this world.
Authority comes from one of two extremes. In God’s kingdom authority begins with God the Father. God has given Jesus all authority in heaven and earth. Jesus has given authority to His collective church body. In the kingdom of this world authority is taken by individuals through a competitive process leaving someone at the peak of a hierarchical system. In practice, worldly authority is never fully realized and is always in transition as competition rolls on and people succumb to the decay of our sinful organic condition. The unifying influence for worldly authority is injected by the great deceiver, the prince of this world, the enemy of God who desires to sit on the throne of God.
For true believers of Jesus, authority is recognized as coming from God and from Jesus as the only head of His church. Accountability is the duty of man to be faithful to the commandments and testimony of Jesus. If we do not keep the foundation of accountability clear in our minds we will not fulfill our duty to be morally accountable. The only alternative is to conform to the system of worldly authority which does not yield moral results.
It is each member’s duty to seek restoration of other believers to the body of Christ. We are not given the authority or capacity to know anyone else’s heart or to judge anyone’s heart. We are given the ability to discern sin. Our duty is to invite those engaged in sin to repent according to the teaching Jesus provides in Matthew 18. Jesus teaches to approach each other privately first and then publicly if that fails. Here we recognize specific cases of failures to reconcile privately and bring cases before the entire church body of believers. This is the only provision we have been given by Jesus to hold each other accountable.
Matthew 18 is about maintaining the integrity of God’s character in the church restoring relationship with the one who has offended you. If you don’t have Christian love for your fellow believer in your heart then Matthew 18 isn’t for you.
- If your brother or sister sins, go and point out their fault, just between the two of you. If they listen to you, you have won them over. (Matthew 18:15)
- But if they will not listen, take one or two others along, so that every matter may be established by the testimony of two or three witnesses. (Matthew 18:16)
- If they still refuse to listen, tell it to the church; (Matthew 18:17)
- and if they refuse to listen even to the church, treat them as you would a pagan or a tax collector. (Matthew 18:17)
These steps seem straight forward enough. The problem we have as sinful human beings starts with our motive to pursue these steps. We must keep our carnal natures in check as we pursue the steps Jesus has given His church. It is too easy to fear our human nature believing that we are not proceeding with an appropriate motive. This fear too often prevents us from doing as Jesus has commanded. We are never free to fail to follow the commands of Jesus. Jesus wants us to love each other. Jesus wants us to love our enemies. We can’t love those who have offended us by avoiding them. Jesus knows we are sinful and incapable of perfect motives in this process. That is why He adds the step to bring witnesses. Together we can support each other to conduct the process with spiritual integrity.
A common misunderstanding about the last step, “treat them as you would a pagan or a tax collector,” is to think this step is about either party in the dispute. It is not about the heart of the accuser. It is not about the heart of the accused. This step is about the integrity of the church body. This step is about how believers collectively represent the character of God to the world going forward. This step only occurs after all the previous steps have failed and after the entire church body has addressed the matter. The church body uses God’s name in vain when it continues to claim it represents God to the world while willfully failing to uphold His character publicly. This is why leaders are not given the option to avoid confronting sin among believers, why it is a sin to avoid doing what is right. (James 4:17)
Accountability among believers begins with individual members and culminates by adding as many additional members to the struggle as needed. Accountability in the church is never to be given over to leadership of any kind. Leaders have accountability as individuals the same as any other member, but leaders do not possess any amount of authority that justifies or excuses their attempts to act with hierarchical authority.
The reason leaders do in fact attempt to act with hierarchical authority is because it is our sinful human nature to do so. More importantly in the context of Christ’s church body, leaders presume to act with hierarchical authority because the individual members fail in their duties of accountability. This is the key to morally appropriate progress regarding accountability in the church. Members need to step up.
The lesson of the watchman on the wall in Ezekiel is an illustration of our individual accountability and the consequences for failing to stand up and speak out.
The word of the Lord came to me: “Son of man, speak to your people and say to them: ‘When I bring the sword against a land, and the people of the land choose one of their men and make him their watchman, and he sees the sword coming against the land and blows the trumpet to warn the people, then if anyone hears the trumpet but does not heed the warning and the sword comes and takes their life, their blood will be on their own head. Since they heard the sound of the trumpet but did not heed the warning, their blood will be on their own head. If they had heeded the warning, they would have saved themselves. But if the watchman sees the sword coming and does not blow the trumpet to warn the people and the sword comes and takes someone’s life, that person’s life will be taken because of their sin, but I will hold the watchman accountable for their blood.’ Son of man, I have made you a watchman for the people of Israel; so hear the word I speak and give them warning from me. When I say to the wicked, ‘You wicked person, you will surely die,’ and you do not speak out to dissuade them from their ways, that wicked person will die for their sin, and I will hold you accountable for their blood. But if you do warn the wicked person to turn from their ways and they do not do so, they will die for their sin, though you yourself will be saved. (Ezekiel 33:1-9)
Therefore, son of man, say to your people, ‘If someone who is righteous disobeys, that person’s former righteousness will count for nothing. And if someone who is wicked repents, that person’s former wickedness will not bring condemnation. The righteous person who sins will not be allowed to live even though they were formerly righteous.’ (Ezekiel 33:12)
Your salvation depends upon you being personally accountable in the body of Jesus, as does mine.