The Wednesday after the Fourth Sunday after Trinity Sunday
Posted on July 1, 2026 by under
Scripture: St. Matthew 18:15-20 (NKJV)
18:15 “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.”
Devotion
Often, when someone sins against us, we quietly forgive him and overlook his faults. And ideally he does the same for us. It sometimes happens, however, that our brother sins so grievously that it threatens to harm his salvation or the unity of the Church. In these situations, the answer is not to immediately launch into judgment. Jesus instead outlines a specific procedure which is aimed at helping our sinning brother avoid condemnation.
It is assumed that we have first followed this instruction of Jesus from Sunday’s Gospel reading, “Remove the plank from your own eye, and then you will see clearly to remove the speck that is in your brother’s eye” (Luke 6:42). After repenting of our own sin, then it is appropriate to have a private conversation with our sinning brother. If he persists, then we are to bring in others, not to gossip or hurt his reputation, but to impress upon him the seriousness of the problem. Only if all of this fails does the Church judge the unrepentant sinner, and even then, only in the hope that this will spur him to repent and escape judgment. As St. Paul writes, “deliver such a one to Satan for the destruction of the flesh, that his spirit may be saved in the day of the Lord Jesus” (1 Cor. 5:5).
Collect: Grant, O Lord, we beseech Thee, that the course of this world may be so peaceably ordered by Thy governance, that Thy Church may joyfully serve Thee in all godly quietness; through Jesus Christ, Thy Son, our Lord, Who liveth and reigneth with Thee and the Holy Ghost, ever One God, world without end. Amen.
Scripture taken from the New King James Version®. Copyright © 1982 by Thomas Nelson. Used by permission. All rights reserved.
