Why and How to Be Your Brother’s Keeper

All Scripture quotations are taken from the New American Standard Bible 1995 Ed. (NASB95)

We’ve been examining the hallmark example of a congregation that had neglected its accountability and purity to the point of devolving into a mob of mainly proud, fleshly, hypocrites. This was none other than the Corinthian assembly that Paul wrote to in his first letter to them. Sadly, many of the same unconfronted sins are manifest in the majority of so-called “evangelical,” “Bible-teaching,” churches in the West. We’ve largely conformed to the prevailing cultural and societal values for lifestyle choices, manners of speech and dress, and relationship practices. The Corinthians did much the same.

The main problem with them, as we’ve seen, was pride. They believed that the purpose of their living, and of their religious practices, revolved around them. They had corrupted Christianity into a platform for their own selfish ambition. They had forgotten much of who they were in Christ, and therefore what ways of living they were called to. Therefore, they were letting “sin reign in their mortal body,” as they had mostly ceased to pursue the purity to which the Lord called them (Rom. 6).

Along with pride is selfishness, and selfishness is one of the most common, and most promoted, sins in our western assemblies. Christianity is made out to be a hyper-personal, individualized, self-helping religion. The Sunday service is done for you, and you decide what you do while you’re with the “brethren”. However, the teachings of our Lord and apostles make clear that our life in Christ is first about Him, and then about us in Him. That is, our lives are meant to be lived for the benefit of the ones our Savior chose before time to redeem, and then died for in the fullness of time. Not one of lives for himself, and not one of us dies for himself. We are each a part of the one body of our Lord.

We obviously have a great enemy fighting to keep us from purity, joy, and effectiveness in winning souls to salvation. The greatest of these enemies is the sin that dwells within each of our flesh. As members of the body, and soldiers in the army of Christ, we’re called to guard not only ourselves, but also our brethren, against the assaults of our enemies. Although Cain denied the role in his sarcastic question to God, we are indeed our “brother’s keeper.” It’s this keeping, or guarding, that I want to urge upon you, as one of the most neglected, and most important, services that we provide for our brethren in Christ.

You’re First Your Own Guardian

Thankfully, we can know that within each of us in Christ lives the Holy Spirit of God. Apart from our own will or work, “God is at work in you both to will and to work for His good pleasure” (Phil. 2:13). However, we can hamper and squander this work by grieving and quenching the Spirit within us. We must “let the word of Christ dwell” in us richly by daily remembering the gospel of our salvation, and our identity as a believer in Jesus. We are first responsible for the worship and purity of ourselves, before we’re responsible for anyone else. This should go without saying. The Lord warned us that if we have a gigantic fault that we’re ignoring, we have no right to attempt to turn our brother away from his tiny fault. We must first be devoted to our own blamelessness and holiness, before we take steps to watch out for the purity of our brother.

Thankfully, if we want holiness, obedience, and joy in Jesus for ourselves, then this will be just the thing to motivate us to help our brethren grow in the same. But this motivation should come from a few attitudes about our brethren we must possess. We must see them as God’s Word describes them.

Who is Your Brother?

Before attempting to keep our brother accountable, we must judge them as the blessing they are to the Lord and to us. We aren’t tasked with helping our brethren because we’re better than them, or for fun, but for their eternal and spiritual benefit. The more obedient they are, the more joy and fulfillment they’ll have. But if we would have the concern required for treating them as needed, it’s necessary that we hold the right attitude about them.

God’s Child and Friend

The first way we should see our fellow Christians, especially among our local fellowship, is as belonging to the Father. We need to see them exactly the way that God sees us. God has given His only Son on the cross to make them His child, and adopt them into His family. The Father delights in our brother almost as much as He delights in His own Son. In spite of all their faults, He values them for who He’s purposed them to be, not on how they are currently. They are His treasure, His prize, and His joy, in Jesus.

Hence, our brother or sister is also God’s friend. He walks with them just as much as He walks with us. He talks, listens to, and uses them for good, just as much as He does with us. Thus, we need to try to value our brother as much as our heavenly Father does.

A Part of Your Life

The second view of your brother you should have in your disciplining and encouraging relationships is as truly part of you. If another believer is truly a child of God, then he’s only one by virtue of his oneness in Jesus. Since you too are a part of Jesus (and thus of God), then you must see your brother as a part of you. However your brother is feeling or acting affects you, provided this brother has some regular contact with your circle of relationships. We’re all interconnected through our fellowship and influence on each other, so you must regard your brother’s condition as directly affecting your own condition. This is what it means to be “members one of another” (Rom. 12:5).

A Help to Your Spiritual Growth

Finally, any brother or sister with whom you have fellowship is actually a benefit and blessing to you, no matter the appearance of things. We have God’s promise that He’s causing all things to work together for the good of those who love Him, and this is especially true of our relationships with the brethren. The Lord has put your brother in your life as an instrument to push you toward greater faithfulness and Christlikeness. Hence, you have a vested interest in helping your brother press on toward the goal of perfection.

How Do We Watch Over Our Brother?

The essence of our Christian friendships is Christ’s love for us. He’s called us to “love one another, even as I have loved you” (Jn. 13:35). Thus, all we do toward our brother or sister should be motivated by a desire to see them increasingly enjoy the grace and presence of God in them. This means that we need to be devoted to their obedience to God, just as we are.

Obviously, we have many different enemies opposing our faithfulness to the Lord, so we’re also responsible to help our brother in the spiritual warfare we’re engaged in. This requires watchfulness, first over ourselves, and secondly over our brother. But we’ll never be able to have a watch-care for them if we don’t think about them on a regular basis.

Attention and Prayer

The first step to being able to take necessary action to confront our brother in a sin is a regular attention given to their condition. It could be put down as a maxim that the diligence of our prayers is a primary marker of our love and affection for a person. Hence, if we aren’t praying for our brother, why would we be intent on making sure they’re walking in faithfulness to the Lord? We must give ourselves to regular prayer for a brother or sister whom we wish to encourage and guide the most.

This is the basic start of the instruction given in Hebrews 10:24:

“. . . and let us consider how to stimulate one another to love and good deeds . . .”

After considering and praying for our brother, we can then rightly pay enough attention to them that we can guard them from temptation and sin, and help them on toward righteousness.

Be Watchful Over Your Brother

There’s no specific command given to all believers to “watch over one another,” but such a practice is implied by the above verse, as well as Paul’s grand church injunction in Romans 12:10:

“Be devoted to one another in brotherly love; give preference to one another in honor . . .”

If we’re following the royal law taught by the command, “you shall love your neighbor as yourself,” then we’re going to be looking out for our closest brethren. This means we will pay close attention to their spiritual and moral character, and be eager to help them learn to obey the Lord in greater measure. There are several possible habits that we should practice in our discipling relationships towards the end of discerning our brother’s condition, and being able to respond with appropriate speech or action.

Your brother’s most engaging concerns

The first thing we should take interest in is our brother’s most pressing concerns and problems. When we talk to him, we need to be loving enough to ask probing questions about how their lives are going. We should pay great attention to what bothers them, what they’re most eager to talk about, and what they might avoid talking about. As Paul urges in Philippians 2:3-4, our brother’s concerns must be our own, since they are.

The reason why we need our brother to know about the challenges, temptations, and successes we experience is because we can’t always handle them with our own individual understandings and resources. We need the encouragement, different perspective, and prayers of another brother or sister to provide us with help outside of us. Obviously, this comes from the Holy Spirit, but the Spirit uses the instrument of our brethren in our regular exchange of life experiences. We are incomplete on our own, but complete when we have loving brethren concerning themselves with all we experience, especially our problems and failures.

Tests for Discernment of Our Brother’s Problems, Discouragements, and Temptations

Toward the end of watching out for our brother’s spiritual health, there are several specific areas of life that we should pay attention to when we interact with them. I want to put these in the form of questions you can answer as you seek to understand how your brother or sister is coping with their spiritual battle.

How are they fulfilling their callings and stations?

To what degree is your brother devoted to the services and roles the Lord has called him to? Is he being a faithful steward of his resources for serving the brethren and unbelievers?

How do they respond to the Lord’s Supper, praise singing, and the teaching of Scripture?

Is your brother seriously devoted to celebrating and partaking of the body and blood of our Lord through the Supper? Do they diligently attempt to participate in and enjoy the singing of praise songs or hymns with the congregation?

How much do they consider, talk about, or respond to the weekly teaching of Word in the assembly? Do they find nourishment, encouragement, and instruction from your teacher’s biblical teaching?

For what do they ask prayer?

This is a telling indicator of someone’s spiritual health. Are their prayer requests predominantly about physical, natural problems or annoyances, or are they longing for the Lord’s power and help in spiritual things having to do with growing in obedience?

How concerned are they about the salvation of sinners and sharing the gospel?

Another marker of spiritual health is our longing to have our unbelieving neighbors understand and believe the gospel for eternal life. Thus, we should pay attention to how active our brother is in seeking to bear witness to the Lord, and have people come to faith. What are his concerns when he talks about his interactions with unbelievers? And does he ever ask for prayer for the salvation of unbelieving relatives or neighbors?

What is his relationship to the leaders or elders of his church?

Finally, I would pay attention to the respect, affection, and admiration that your brother or sister has for his spiritual leaders in his assembly. Is he or she submissive, respectful, and brotherly toward them? Or can you detect resentment, annoyance, or any hostility toward faithful leaders? Such things are signs that your brother has fallen into some kind of sin.

When and How to Confront Your Brother About Temptation

We’ll end by discussing how we should lovingly confront or warn our brother or sister about temptation or sin. Obviously, this should be the least percentage of our interactions with them. By far, most of our discussions and exchanges with our brethren should be positive, encouraging, comforting, and thankful. However, there usually comes a time when we must offer a word of warning, correction, or rebuke.

One of the most concise instructions for confronting a sinning brother is given by Paul near the end of Galatians. By understanding this verse, we can be equipped to discern the right time and manner to point out a fault we see our brother giving way to. It reads,

“Brethren, even if anyone is caught in any trespass, you who are spiritual, restore such a one in a spirit of gentleness; each one looking to yourself, so that you too will not be tempted.” – Gal. 6:1

Paul’s first point is when a brother is to be confronted. That’s when he, or anyone in Christ, is “caught” in a trespass. Notice that this means we’ve seen that the brother is caught in a “trespass,” or sin. It’s not when we think he’s been caught, but when we see him ensnared there. We’ve gathered conclusive evidence that this brother has let a fleshly lust reign in his mortal body, and he’s been committing a sin.

Secondly, we must be thinking spiritually. That is, we should be motivated, empowered, and taught by the Spirit to seek to help our brother.

And this help should be aimed at restoring our brother to faithfulness and obedience. The word “restore” speaks of repairing or mending a broken bone. Our goal should be the repentance and wholeness of our brother, not his shame, pain, or hurt.

Fourthly, this restoration ought to be done gently, or appropriately. We must use just the right words, demeanor, tone, and actions to bring the restoring truth of the gospel to our brother.

And finally, as we saw before, our confrontation should be done with ample self-examination and guarding. We must recognize that we’re in danger of being tempted with the same sorts of things, and prayerfully guard our hearts against being enticed by our brother’s sin or temptation. Even while we’re mending our brother, we must take heed lest we also fall into the same snare and condemnation.

Hopefully what we’ve covered has given you a general outline of ways in which you can watch out over the souls of your brethren. There are still many details that could be covered, and they’ll have to wait for another time. Until then,

“Be on the alert, stand firm in the faith, act like men, be strong. Let all that you do be done in love.” – 1 Cor. 16:13-14