Your Congregation Is A Spirit Filled Living Organism

# 41 Today's Prime Time Devo comes from: 1Ti 1:20 - “of whom are Hymenaeus and Alexander, whom I delivered to Satan that they may learn not to blaspheme. (1 Tim 1:20) Hymenaeus and Alexander have been excommunicated from the local congregation because of their superfluous teachings and their denial of the doctrine of the bodily resurrection. These blasphemous teachings shipwrecked their faith and had the potential to shipwreck the faith of others, and therefore, since they refused to recant their teachings they needed to be cast out of the church, lest their sin infect the rest of the Body. This excommunication process or church discipline is a tool that the Lord has given to His church for the purpose of keeping false teaching and sin from gaining root in the local body of Christ. “Do you not know that a little leaven leavens the whole lump?” ( 1 Cor 5:6) Jesus explained how it works in Mt 18:15-20, "Moreover if your brother sins against you, go and tell him his fault between you and him alone. If he hears you, you have gained your brother. 16 "But if he will not hear, take with you one or two more, that 'by the mouth of two or three witnesses every word may be established.' 17 "And if he refuses to hear them, tell it to the church. But if he refuses even to hear the church, let him be to you like a heathen and a tax collector. 18 "Assuredly, I say to you, whatever you bind on earth will be bound in heaven, and whatever you loose on earth will be loosed in heaven. 19 "Again I say to you that if two of you agree on earth concerning anything that they ask, it will be done for them by My Father in heaven. 20 "For where two or three are gathered together in My name, I am there in the midst of them." Sometimes I think we forget that the local congregation (2 or 3 gathered in the name of Jesus) is a Holy Spirit filled entity just as much as the individual believer is a Holy Spirit filled entity! As such, sin and false ideas about God and salvation must be dealt with at both levels. (It's called repentance) Paul was speaking to the church as a whole at Corinth when the Holy Spirit inspired him to write in 1Co 3:16,17 , “ Do you not know that you are the temple of God and that the Spirit of God dwells in you? 17 If anyone defiles the temple of God, God will destroy him. For the temple of God is holy, which temple you are.” The church is to take this charge seriously. Don't allow the leaven of sin and false teaching to besmirch the temple of God! If anyone damages the church with false teaching and sin, God will destroy him. Therefore to cast out is to really do them a favor, hoping and praying that this action will cause them to come to their senses and repent.