I get this question all the time and have answered it often, but I will do so on my blog again for others who still haven’t found the answer elsewhere on the website. I got this email a few days ago:
I have a question for you. Do you still believe in Church leadership and Church discipline? How are those things to operate? Does a loving Father still chastise? Just some questions I have had for a while, I really like what you teach and was wanting your advice on these things. Thank you so much!
My response: I absolutely do, as the early church experienced them, but not how we’ve encased them in our institutional, shame-based caricatures of the church organizations today. Leadership is about equipping and facilitating, not managing and manipulating. And discipline is about loving people into wholeness not shaming them in their sin. We have twisted these things until they no longer reflect the intent of our older brother, Jesus!
