What is a Healthy Church?
By Mark Dever
Chapter Eleven
Week 7 (May 26th & May 28st). An Important Mark of a Healthy Church: Biblical Church Discipline
1. Is Discipline Loving?
Defining Discipline: Broadly speaking, discipline is everything the church does to help its
members pursue holiness and fight sin (formative discipline). In a narrower sense, discipline is
when we point out fellow church members’ sin and encourage them to repent and pursue
holiness by God’s grace (corrective discipline).
Read Hebrews 12:3-11
Put yourself in the shoes of believers who are being persecuted and harassed for their faith.
Why is it especially comforting to know that you are God’s child, and that these
circumstances, among other purposes, may be His way of disciplining and teaching you?
What does this passage teach us about God’s discipline?
We know from elsewhere in the book of Hebrews that the main form of divine discipline these
believers were experiencing was persecution for their faith.
 What are some other forms of divine discipline that you’ve experienced?
 How can this passage’s teaching help you grow through these trials of faith?
 What fruit of God’s discipline have you seen in your own life?
2. Formative Discipline: Building Up the Church
Read Colossians 3:12-17
What does it mean to “put on” a compassionate heart, or humility, or love?
How does singing psalms, hymns, and spiritual songs help us to grow to maturity in Christ?
What are some concrete ways you can teach, admonish, and encourage others this week?
3. Dealing with Sin, Part 1
Look at Galatians 6:1-5
Practically speaking, what steps are involved in restoring someone who is caught in sin?
What are some burdens other members of your church bear? What are practical ways you
can help to bear them?
What are some obstacles that get in the way of our caring for one another? By God’s grace,
how can you seek to overcome them? Give specific examples.
4. Dealing with Sin, Part 2
Look at Matthew 18:15-20
What would it mean for the person to “listen to you” (v. 15)? How should you treat someone
who repents of their sin when you confront them?
What kind of people do you think you should involve at stage two in the process (v. 16)?
What are some practical steps you can take to help ensure that you and other members of
your church continually repent of sin?
5. Dealing with Sin, Part 3
Read 1 Corinthians 5:1-13
What practical actions can you take to keep sin from spreading through the church (v. 6)?
Why do you think Paul gives opposite instructions regarding how the Corinthians are to treat
an immoral person who does not claim to be a Christian and one who does?
In light of the things we’ve seen in this passage, how would you explain church discipline to
someone who thought that it was mean, exclusive, and unloving?
6. Repentance and Restoration
Read 2 Corinthians 2:5-11. Note: From what we learn in the rest of this letter, it seems that this
incident had to do with someone stirring up opposition to Paul among the Corinthians (not the
man Paul refers to in 1 Corinthians 5). That explains why he graciously downplays the
seriousness of the sin in question.
What does it mean that the church is to reaffirm their love for this man?
What would it practically look like for your church to reaffirm their love for someone who has
been excluded? Give specific examples.
Read 2 Corinthians 7:5-13
Imagine that a person has committed a serious sin and it’s come to light. This sin is so serious
that the church has excluded the person from their membership. It’s now a couple months
later, and the person feels terrible about it all.
How do you think the church could assess whether the person has genuinely repented or is
merely experiencing worldly grief? What are some factors that should go into making this
judgment?