Short Answer
“Treat them like a Gentile or tax collector” means recognizing them as outside the fellowship of the church due to unrepentant sin. It involves withdrawing close Christian fellowship while still calling them to repentance. The goal is not rejection, but restoration.
The Overview
In Matthew 18:17, Jesus gives instructions about church discipline, saying that someone who refuses to repent should be treated “like a Gentile or a tax collector.” In the first-century Jewish context, this meant treating someone as outside the covenant community. Gentiles were seen as outsiders, and tax collectors were viewed as compromised and unfaithful.
Applied to the church, this does not mean hatred or complete isolation, but a change in relationship. The person is no longer treated as a fellow believer in good standing. Instead of normal fellowship—such as shared meals, close friendship, and participation in church life—the relationship shifts to one focused on calling them to repentance.
This teaching is reinforced in other parts of Scripture, such as 1 Corinthians 5, where believers are instructed not to associate closely with someone who claims to follow Christ but lives in open, unrepentant sin. The issue is not sin itself—since all people struggle—but a refusal to acknowledge and turn away from it.
Importantly, this standard applies specifically within the church. Christians still interact with non-believers in everyday life, but the church is called to maintain its integrity by addressing open rebellion among its members. The purpose of this discipline is ultimately loving—to bring the person to repentance and restoration, not to condemn them permanently.
Key Takeaways
- It Means Treating Them as Outside the Church
Not as an active member in good standing. - Fellowship Changes, Not Compassion
The relationship shifts from companionship to calling for repentance. - Applies to Unrepentant Sin
The issue is refusal to change, not struggling with sin. - Church Integrity Matters
Discipline protects the spiritual health of the community. - The Goal Is Restoration
The aim is to bring the person back, not push them away permanently.
Read Full Raw Transcript
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You’re on the air with Mike Fabaris. How can I help? >> Yes. Uh I’ve got a question uh on church discipline and and understanding a particular scripture. It’s Matthew 18:17 uh where Jesus says, you know, to look at them like a gentile or a pagan. Can you expound more about what that really means? Well, if you’re talking to a largely Jewish crowd in the first century when these words were first pinned, and Matthew, of course, is the most Jewish of the gospels to say, “Treat him as a
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gentile or a tax collector.” They saw the tax collector as as a turncoat, right? You’re collecting taxes for Rome. and a gentile certainly if you’re conditioned in your conscience as a new Jewish convert that became a a word particularly in the book of of Matthew to describe a non-Christian but how a Jew would treat a gentile is I’m not going to have food with you I’m not going to eat with you which is precisely what Paul says in the passage I quoted earlier in 1 Corinthians 5 [snorts] uh
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to a previous caller about the fact that if it’s someone in the church who refuses to repent of a clear sinful behavior then you should not have anything to do with them. Don’t even eat with such a one. So, I think if you read this text in context, knowing what Matthew’s Jewishness is all about and how it’s just flavored this whole gospel, it’s basically getting to the details of I’m not going to sit and watch from our perspective at least sit and watch a TV show with you. I’m not
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going to hang out with you. Uh I I’m I’m going to every time I see you call you to repentance. That’s what I’m going to do. Just like a good Jew should say to a Gentile, you should repent and become a proelite of Judaism. Well, now we’re saying as a Christian, he uses the word church here for the first time. As a Christian, uh Jesus says you you treat them like a non-Christian, which is you need to repent. And a tax collector, you’re a turncoat. You you you you need to stop doing this. So, you can’t leave
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the planet. You’re going to have to work next to or buy food next to someone who’s all kinds of things and maybe openly so with their t-shirt or their blue hair or whatever they’re doing to say they’re in rebellion against God. I’m not not all blue hairs are but many of them. The point is though uh you you you shouldn’t put up with that in church. At church your pastors and leaders should say you’re not welcome here. And if you’re not welcome here, you can’t come and worship with us. And
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our individual people in our church, our members of our church, the parts of our church, our participants in our church should not be having social engagements with you. The only engagement we should have is calling you in love, calling you to repentance. Tell me about the situation you’re facing. How is it being interpreted in your church right now? >> Well, it’s not my church. It’s a a friend of mine who we got in a discussion, you know, about church discipline and and uh and it and it
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really came to the subject of homosexuality and he was kind of taking the stance of Andy Stanley. >> Okay. Well, >> and I disagreed with it. >> Well, you should disagree with it. >> I felt I felt like I agree with what you had to say. Um uh or I do agree with what you had to say. I just thought, well, before I step off in the deep end, I better check myself and find out if is there another way of interpreting that phrase. >> No, >> that scripture. >> There’s not. And I think 1 Corinthians 5
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gives you the same same the same exact concept with a lot more English words, right? A lot more Greek words. >> I wrote to you in my letter not to associate with the sexually immoral. I didn’t mean all the sexually immoral of the world. You may sit at the office next to a homosexual who’s an open homosexual. Okay? I mean, you’re going to work. You got to work in the world. But he’s saying, I’m talking about those within the church, those who bear the name of a brother. He’s guilty of sexual
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immorality, which of course homosexuality is. Don’t even eat with such a one. Stanley’s out there on a campaign to tell everybody, you know, we got to be nice. We got to be Listen, loving people is not equated with being nice, right? Nice means, yeah, we got to be uh respectful of people, but we don’t be we’re not respectful of someone who claims the name of Christ, right, who wants to be a part of our church and yet he’s openly rebelling against what God has said. And in this text, right, we
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got the sexually immoral immoral, which is always the top of the list, and then there’s all kind you’re a swindler, right? If a guy is doing business in your church and he’s ripping people off and he’s known for that, and you know that he’s doing that, right? Done. You you either need to repent and clean up your business ethics because you claim to be a brother or we’re not going to have you in our church and we’re not even going to have a meal with you. We’re going to tell you every time we
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see you, you got to repent. And that’s what we ought to be doing to someone who names the name of Christ, no matter what the sexual argument is. >> His argument is uh well then we shouldn’t let any sinners come to church. >> Right? But here’s the thing. the guy at your church that is cheating on his wife or or the gal in your church, you know, who is lying about her taxes, right? If you call them out, they would be embarrassed and they’d be ashamed. And I hope that they would repent when
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confronted. The reality is that people are openly because the culture is openly applauding immorality. They’re out there living bold and proud, right? That’s even the that becomes their moniker, right? Pride. Pride month. Think about that. We’re not ashamed of what we’re doing and you should support us. Well, we can’t in the church of Christ. We can’t. We have to tell you that it’s wrong. Can we Can we sympathize with temptation? Of course, we can. Can we sympathize with being weak? Yes, we can.
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But we we’ve got to call you to repentance. That’s the thing. You call someone out in your church for adultery, right? They’re that’s a whole different response than calling someone out who’s been inculturated to be proud of their homosexuality, they’re not going to respond the same way, right? And and Stanley wants somehow to make an equivalence there. There is no equivalence there. One is openly rebelling, the other one is shameful, [snorts] right, about their sin. Not
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proud of it. [music] That’s the difference. All right. Thanks for the call.
