Question 24: Did Christ institute a universal law for the church of the New Testament with the wo...

Question 24: Did Christ institute a universal law for the church of the New Testament with the words of Matthew 18:17, or did He not rather speak of it with special regard to the character of the Jews? Did He not, in addition, give His followers a completely different lesson in the following twenty-first and twenty-second verses?

Answer: We have shown above that Christ has given a universal law for His church with the words of Matthew 18:17. They are by no means annulled by the following twenty-first and twenty-second verses, but are rather confirmed by them. This is still more clearly expressed in Luke 17:4, where Christ says: "...if he (your brother) sins against you seven times in the day, and turns to you seven times, and says, ’I repent,’ you must forgive him." Without the admission of the sin, there is no forgiveness of sin, not even by God. Just so must believers be minded that if the sinner admits his sin, he must be forgiven. If he does not acknowledge it, then the ban is rightly to be exercised, as Christ says (Matthew 28[:20]): "...teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you; and lo, I am with you always, to the close of the age."