“Matthew 18 and Adultery” is part of a 3 part subseries in the larger video series Set-apart Communities. In this series we have been talking about what set-apart communities are, why they are so important, and why Yahweh expects us all to participate in set-apart community to help build His Son’s Kingdom. What we are really talking with set-apart community is having people organized in the right relationship so as to build a governmental structure, society, or (in this case), Yeshua’s Kingdom.

However, anytime you get people organized in the right relationship you will also end up with some people who are in a wrong relationship. Either they are not hearing in the Spirit, or they are quenching the Spirit, or they are not paying attention to those who do hear in the Spirit, who are trying to help lead them.

And this is why the Matthew 18 process is so important. In “Matthew 18 and Adultery” we want to talk about how the Matthew 18 process works when there are cases of adultery.

Proper Hebrew relationships

To start this series on “Matthew 18 and Adultery”, we would like to first explain what proper Hebrew society and proper Hebrew marriages should look like. We want to teach people to identify proper relationships and then we can teach them to identify what goes wrong within relationships in the concept of Hebrew society.

As we have said in earlier sections, the nuclear family is considered the basic building block of society, or at least of secular society. In the dispersion we might say that the basic building block of Yeshua’s Kingdom is the set-apart community (or a spiritual family).

Set-apart communities

When we return to the land, we are going to have physcial communities made up of nuclear families in which all are going to be in the faith. In the meantime, in the dispersion, that is not the case. Many of us are isolated, our families are not in the faith, and some of our families are even very hostile to the faith. Sometimes you have one spouse that is devout while the other spouse is either not as devout or does not believe at all. So, in the meantime, we need to do the best that we can.

But we are going to try to talk about what community should look like and once we understand what spiritual community should look like, then we can understand how to help each other get there over time.

Democracy

When we come back to the land of Israel, there are going to be a lot of changes in lifestyle for those who have been raised in the democratic west. Because Scripture never advocates democracy for any reason. Sometimes people believe that Acts chapter 15 or Acts 21 were democratic processes. But democracy is not advocated in Scripture. Effectively, democracy is when people do what seems good and right in their own eyes, which is more of a mob rule. It does not work in Yahweh’s Kingdom.

Scripture advocates anointed servant leadership, which is what we see in both the Tanakh (The Old Covenant) and in the Brit Chadasha (The Renewed Covenant). In this system, we have those who are strong in the Spirit serving those who are less strong in the Spirit, and those who are less strong in the Spirit voluntarily follow the lead of those who are serving them. This is the opposite of Babylonian culture where the strong exploit the weak.

In order to follow this model, those of us who do hear in the Spirit and do receive direction from Yahweh have to be disposed to serve others, and those who are not as strong in that need to know to take direction, leadership, and guidance from those who are attempting to serve Yahweh’s people in the correct direction.

Spirit-led patriarchy

The other thing is that in Yahweh’s system there is what we might call Spirit-led patriarchy. A lot of people are concerned about patriarchy. Many people misunderstand what patriarchy is, and as a result, have misapplied it. There has been a lot of abuse of the patriarchal system in the past, so some people are very hesitant with regard to it. But that is the model that Scripture speaks of.

We will talk about about what patriarchy is and what it is not, because this is going to form the basis for our society. We will talk about why it is necessary to have anointed servants (who hear and obey Yahweh’s voice) leading the nation and the body of Yeshua, and why the fraternal, patriarchal framework is important for family structure. We will explain what true, Scriptural patriarchy looks like, and how this system provides unity, order, and the correct type of relationships.

Matthew 18 and Adultery

Something important to understand is that if people are not able to hear in the Spirit, then they need to take direction from those who do hear in the Spirit. There is no other way that set-apart community can work, or for Yeshuah’s kingdom to work. And so when we establish our own miniature set-apart communities in anticipation of the day when we come back to live together in the land, our set-apart communities need to be Spirit-led.

Those who are strong in the Spirit need to serve those who are weak in the Spirit, and those who are weak in the Spirit need to listen and take the questions to Yahweh in the Spirit. That way the Spirit is the one leading and not men or women doing the leading. That is extremely critical, there is no way around that. And if people do not agree to that then, as sad as it is to say, they do not have a place in Yahweh’s spiritual set-apart communities, or even in the Kingdom for that matter.

In order for set-apart communities to work, we must all be willing to submit to the Spirit, and to receive correction from anointed leadership when necessary. So that the entire body can walk unified in the Spirit, in one doctrine, and in obedience to Elohim. This requires leadership who are listening and obeying Yahweh’s voice and who are willing to love their neighbor enough to reprove them in their sins. And for the people to be willing to accept that reproof, in order to grow into faithful servants unto Elohim.

Reproving your neighbor

We will talk about how Yahweh defines love, and why spiritual leaders are required to reprove their neighbors (their spiritual flock) of sin. In “Matthew 18 and Adultery part 1” we will specifically talk about how the Matthew 18 process plays out in situtations where leadership is aware of sin within the community. Then, in Matthew 18 and Adultery parts 2 and 3, we will see how the Matthew 18 process is used under the Levical order (inside the land of Israel) vs how it is used under the Melchizedekian order (outside the land of Israel).

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We thank  Yahweh Elohim for your love for His kingdom.