Proper 18 (23) – Year A
Fifteenth Sunday after pentecost: September 6, 2026
Gospel Lectionary Text
Matthew 18:15-20
18:15 "If another member of the church sins against you, go and point out the fault when the two of you are alone. If the member listens to you, you have regained that one.
18:16 But if you are not listened to, take one or two others along with you, so that every word may be confirmed by the evidence of two or three witnesses.
18:17 If the member refuses to listen to them, tell it to the church; and if the offender refuses to listen even to the church, let such a one be to you as a Gentile and a tax collector.
18:18 Truly I tell you, whatever you bind on earth will be bound in heaven, and whatever you loose on earth will be loosed in heaven.
18:19 Again, truly I tell you, if two of you agree on earth about anything you ask, it will be done for you by my Father in heaven.
18:20 For where two or three are gathered in my name, I am there among them."
Context
Welcome to the Fifteenth Sunday after Pentecost. In this week’s Gospel, Jesus offers what is often treated as a step-by-step guide for church discipline: confront the sinner, bring witnesses, involve the community. It can sound like a handbook for managing bad behavior.
But it’s important to take a step back and look at the context. Just before this passage, Jesus places a servant boy in the middle of the disciples and declares that true greatness looks like paying attention to the one everyone else overlooks. Then he tells a story about leaving ninety-nine sheep to search for the one who has gone astray. In other words, the concern is not how to protect the respectable majority. The concern is how to recover the lost one.
Seen this way, Jesus is not giving us a mechanism for punishment. He is slowing down our rush to judgment.
Notice how every step resists the logic of accusation. Start privately. Avoid humiliation. Resist gossip. Invite others into the conversation, not to build a case, but to test your own assumptions. Move slowly. Give every opportunity for reconciliation. The goal is never exclusion. The goal is always restoration.
This matters because communities, like individuals, are often tempted to solve their problems by finding someone to blame. Jesus knows how quickly a grievance can become a scapegoat. So he creates a process designed to interrupt the cycle before it takes hold.
And where is God in all of this? Jesus says: “Where two or three are gathered in my name, I am there among them.” He promises to be present right in the middle of the difficult work of creating a community that reconciles.
Question
This week, Jesus guides his disciples to prevent the violence that occurs when people rush to judgment. The challenging work of face-to-face relationships slows things down and counters the rush of mob mentality. In an era of impersonal, crowd-driven communication, how does Jesus' wisdom resonate with you?
Reflections
Structured and Tight, but Open
By Esau Oreso |
Both my parents worked away from home all throughout my childhood years. As the eldest child, I was entrusted with the responsibility of looking after my siblings, which included ensuring they were fed.
Binding and Loosening
By Rev. Sarah Wiles |
This passage makes me think about forgiveness, even though the word never appears. Stick with me. Jesus teaches a number of different things about forgiveness through the gospels. First, in the first gospel story in Mark about forgiveness, a paralyzed man is brought to Jesus and before Jesus heals him, he declares that he’s forgiven....
Why so Judgey?
By Lina Thompson |
One of the disciples poses a question that is essentially asking, “How much do we really have to forgive each other?” Jesus’ response, as was his habit, came in the form of a parable.
An Absolutely Reckless Pedagogy!
By Ojii BaBa Madi |
In one of my favorite Ted Talks, Educational Technology Specialist Sugata Mitra discusses his experiments with “Hole in the Wall” computers. These are computer kiosks left in Indian slums, among children with no prior contact with PCs. Mitra found that children, by pooling their knowledge and resources, learned how to operate the computers.
Binding and Loosing
By Scott Dewey |
In this and similar passages, Jesus doesn’t weigh in on whether he falls in the strict or loose camp. As a rabbi he makes a far more profound move.
Praying Eucharistically - Weekly Homily by James Alison:
Girardian Lectionary Weekly Reflection: (opens in new tab)
Understanding the Bible anew through the Mimetic Theory of René Girard.
Poetry
In the poem below, William Stafford invites us to help each other remember that we belong to one another lest the “parade of our mutual life get lost in the dark.” He reminds us to remind one another that when we lose sight of each other’s humanity we end up “following the wrong god home.” He reminds us to remind each other that we are as fragile and vulnerable as a parade of elephants holding each other’s tail. When that connection is broken, “the parade of our mutual life gets lost in the dark.” And so he reminds us to remind each other with clarity that we belong to one another because “the darkness around us is deep.”
A Ritual to Read to Each Other
by William Stafford
If you don't know the kind of person I am
and I don't know the kind of person you are
a pattern that others made may prevail in the world
and following the wrong god home we may miss our star.
For there is many a small betrayal in the mind,
a shrug that lets the fragile sequence break
sending with shouts the horrible errors of childhood
storming out to play through the broken dike.
And as elephants parade holding each elephant's tail,
but if one wanders the circus won't find the park,
I call it cruel and maybe the root of all cruelty
to know what occurs but not recognize the fact.
And so I appeal to a voice, to something shadowy,
a remote important region in all who talk:
though we could fool each other, we should consider—
lest the parade of our mutual life get lost in the dark.
For it is important that awake people be awake,
or a breaking line may discourage them back to sleep;
the signals we give — yes or no, or maybe —
should be clear: the darkness around us is deep.
Prayer
This week, the call to prayer comes from the Street Psalms Prayer of Vocation:
Let us pray.
Prepare the way of the Lord; make his paths straight. Every valley shall be filled and every mountain and hill shall be made low. The crooked shall be made straight and the rough ways made smooth, and all flesh shall see the salvation of God. Come, Holy Spirit. Show us the way of the Lord that we might see your salvation and seek your peace in all things. Quiet our troubled souls and teach us how to pray. Be our guide, our counselor, our advocate, and our defender. Transform our hearts of stone into hearts of flesh.
Amen.
