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“We Need to Talk” 

Matthew 18:15-20 

There are four words in the English language that have the power to ruin an otherwise perfectly good day. Those words are: 

We. Need. To. Talk. 

Nobody hears those words and thinks, “Oh, wonderful! I was hoping we could have a meaningful conversation!” 

No. 

Someone says, “We need to talk,” and immediately your brain begins conducting an investigation.  

What did I do? 

When did I do it? 

Who told them? 

You start mentally reviewing every conversation you have had with this person for the past six months.  

If your boss says “We need to talk,” you wonder if you still have a job. 

If your spouse says, “We need to talk,” you start wondering what you forgot. 

If your doctor says, “We need to talk,” suddenly you would very much prefer that they just send you a message through the patient portal.  

And sometimes the worst version is when someone says, “Do you have a minute to talk?” 

Excuse me? 

You cannot say that to another human being and expect them to just go about their afternoon.  

Because most of us do not particularly enjoy difficult conversations. We avoid them. We postpone them. We rehearse them approximately forty-seven times in our heads.  

Sometimes we have the entire conversation with the other person while we are driving down the road- and conveniently, in our imaginary version of the conversation, we are incredibly articulate and the other person eventually realizes we were right all along.  

Since we’ve gotten so creative at avoiding “we need to talk” conversations, what Jesus says in our Scripture reading for this morning feels rather inconvenient.  

Jesus says, If another member of the church sins against you, go and point out the fault when the two of you are alone. 

When someone upsets you. Go talk to them. Not about them. Not around them. Not to three other people so you can determine whether those three people agree that you are right.  

Go to the person. Have the conversation. And suddenly we discover that Jesus has wandered directly into one of those places where following him becomes remarkably practical. Because Jesus seems to believe that sometimes the most loving thing we can say to another person is “We need to talk.”  

Maybe this sounds simple enough. Someone hurt you. You go talk to them. But Jesus has been around human beings long enough to know that it is rarely that simple. Because when someone hurts us, going directly to that person is often the last thing we want to do.  

Talking to them requires vulnerability. It feels much safer to talk to someone else. Someone who already likes me. Someone who will listen to my version of the story and say, “You are absolutely right. I cannot believe they did that.” Sometimes that feels pretty good. But it rarely repairs anything. It usually just creates a larger circle of people who know about a conflict that the two people actually involved have never discussed.  

Jesus offers another way. Talk to the person. Then If the member listens to you, you have regained that one. That one sentence changes the whole conversation. Because for Jesus, the person matters more than the argument.  

And that is important when we read this passage, because it would be very easy to turn these verses into a procedure.  

Step one: Talk to the person privately.  

Step two: if that doesn’t work, bring one or two others.  

Step three: If that doesn’t work, involve the church. 

We could put the whole thing into a flowchart. And Presbyterians do love a good flowchart.  

Give us a disagreement and enough time, and eventually someone will suggest forming a committee. 

But Jesus is primarily concerned with the kind of community the disciples are building. He just told them about a shepherd who has one hundred sheep. 99 of them are exactly where they are supposed to be. One has wandered away. And the shepherd goes looking for the one. Jesus says that is not the will of his Father in heaven that even one of these little ones should be lost.  

And then, almost immediately, Jesus says: If another member of the church sins against you, go...” 

Go.  

It is the same movement.  

When something has come between you and another person, do not simply write them off. Do not decide that losing one relationship doesn’t matter because you still have 99 others. Go.  

Because that person matters. In the ordinary conflicts that happen whenever human beings try to live together, Jesus asks us not to treat one another as disposable.  

The rest of the passage would not be so necessary if every difficult conversation ended with two people hugging and saying “I’m so glad we talked.”  

We tell someone “we need to talk” because somewhere underneath those uncomfortable words is another message: this relationship matters to me. You matter to me. And whatever has happened between us matters enough that I don’t want to simply walk away. 

Of course, Jesus knows something else about awkward conversations. 

Sometimes they do not work. Sometimes you go. You choose your words carefully. You try to explain what happened and why it hurt. 

And the other person says: 

“No.” 

Or: 

“That isn't what happened.” 

Or: 

“I don't see it that way.” 

Which is why Jesus keeps going. 

“If you are not listened to, take one or two others along with you.” 

And if that still does not work, Jesus says, “Tell it to the church.” 

At first glance, this can sound like Jesus is simply escalating the conflict. If they don't listen to you, bring backup. If that doesn't work, bring even more backup. Eventually, surely, you can assemble enough people to prove that you were right. But that would contradict everything Jesus has just said. 

The goal is still to regain that one. 

The circle gets wider not because the punishment gets bigger, but because sometimes we need help seeing what we cannot see on our own. Maybe I have misunderstood something. Maybe the other person has. Maybe both of us have become so invested in our own version of the story that we need someone else to help us hear each other. 

That is one of the gifts of Christian community at its best. 

We do not simply take sides. 

We help one another tell the truth. 

We remind one another when grace is possible. 

We help each other see what anger, fear, or pride might be keeping us from seeing. 

And then Jesus gets to perhaps the hardest sentence in the passage: 

“If the offender refuses to listen even to the church, let such a one be to you as a Gentile and a tax collector.” 

That sounds harsh. It sounds like Jesus is saying: 

Fine. You tried. Throw them out. 

Except there is a problem with that interpretation. 

We know how Jesus treats Gentiles and tax collectors. Jesus eats with them. Jesus talks with them. Jesus heals them. Jesus calls a tax collector to become one of his disciples.  

Maybe that is the tension Jesus asks the church to hold. 

There are moments when reconciliation is not possible. 

There are moments when accountability requires boundaries. 

There are moments when we have to acknowledge that a relationship cannot continue in the same way it once did. But even then, Christians do not get permission to stop loving. We do not get permission to stop hoping. We do not get permission to decide that another human being is beyond the reach of God's grace. 

And maybe that is why Jesus ends this teaching in such an unexpected place. 

“For where two or three are gathered in my name, I am there among them.” 

We usually hear those words in much nicer circumstances. We hear them when only a few people show up for Bible study. We hear them at prayer meetings. We hear them as reassurance that you don't need a packed sanctuary for Jesus to be present. 

And all of that may be true. 

But that is not the conversation Jesus is having when he says these words. 

Jesus has been talking about conflict. About hurt. About accountability. About people trying to figure out how to remain a community when something has gone wrong between them. That is where Jesus says: “I am there among them.” 

Which means Christ is not only present when the church is singing together beautifully. Christ is not only present when everybody agrees. Christ is not only present when relationships are easy. Christ is present when reconciliation takes time. 

And Christ is even present when faithful people discover that the only loving way forward requires a boundary. 

Maybe that is the promise we need when Jesus tells us to have the conversation. Because “We need to talk” can be frightening words. We do not know how the other person will respond. 

But we do know this: We do not enter that conversation alone. 

“For where two or three are gathered in my name, I am there among them.” 

Even there. Especially there. Christ is among us. 

Thanks be to God.  

In Jesus’ name, Amen.