The Don Lemon Defense: You Can’t Prosecute a Man for Following Matthew 18
A constitutional argument hiding in plain sight
Every now and then, American politics produces a moment so strange, so layered, so unintentionally profound that it forces you to stop and ask:
Did anyone involved actually read the Bible or the Constitution?
The Minneapolis church confrontation — the one where congregants confronted a pastor who also works as an ICE officer, and Don Lemon ended up in handcuffs — is one of those moments.
Because here’s the thing nobody seems to be saying out loud:
Matthew 18 isn’t a suggestion. It’s a command.
Jesus didn’t say, “If your brother trespasses against you, maybe send him a text.”
He didn’t say, “File a complaint with HR.”
He didn’t say, “Tweet about it and hope for the best.”
He said:
1. Go to him privately.
2. If that fails, bring witnesses.
3. If that fails, bring it before the church.
That’s not politics.
That’s not protest.
That’s religious procedure.More importntly it is the Word of the lmighty God
And if a Christian church claims to be governed by Scripture — as every Christian church does — then Matthew 18 is part of its governing law. To deny that is to deny the Bible itself, and no church wants to stand at that microphone.
So when people walked into that Minneapolis church to confront a pastor about alleged wrongdoing, they weren’t staging a riot.
They weren’t storming anything.
They were following the exact dispute‑resolution process Jesus laid out.
Which brings us to the constitutional part.
The First Amendment Doesn’t Stop at the Church Door
The Free Exercise Clause protects:
- belief
- expression
- and religiously motivated conduct
If Matthew 18 requires a confrontation inside the church, then the act of confronting the pastor is protected religious conduct.
You don’t have to agree with the theology.
You don’t have to like Don Lemon.
You don’t have to approve of the optics.
But you cannot — under any reading of the First Amendment — criminalize a biblical mandate simply because it’s inconvenient.
Otherwise, the government isn’t just regulating behavior.
It’s regulating religion.
And that’s where the legal argument becomes devastatingly simple:
You cannot prosecute someone for obeying Scripture.
Not in America.
Not under the Constitution.
Not under any doctrine of neutral law.
The State’s Problem: They’re Entangling Themselves in Church Discipline
Courts have repeatedly held that the government cannot interfere with:
- internal church disputes
- internal church discipline
- internal church governance
If congregants believe they are carrying out Matthew 18, then the state has no authority to step in unless there is violence or imminent harm.
A peaceful confrontation is not a crime.
It is a religious act.
And if the state arrests someone for performing a religious act, the state is:
- inhibiting religion
- entangling itself in doctrine
- and effectively declaring Matthew 18 illegal
That’s not just bad law.
That’s theological malpractice.
The Optics: Trying to Stop Matthew 18 Is a Losing Battle
Imagine the headline:
“State Prosecutors Argue That Following the Bible Is Disorderly Conduct.”
No judge wants to sign that order.
No prosecutor wants to argue that brief.
No church wants to testify that Scripture doesn’t apply inside its own sanctuary.
And no Christian wants to be told that the government can override Jesus.
The Heart of the Argument
You don’t have to be a lawyer to see it.
You just have to be someone who believes two things:
- The Bible is true.
- The Constitution is the law of the land.
If both are true, then the state cannot punish someone for obeying Matthew 18.
Not Don Lemon.
Not anyone.
Because when the government tries to criminalize a biblical command, it puts itself on the wrong side of:
- God Almighty
- the First Amendment
- and the very idea of religious liberty
And that’s a place no government should ever want to stand.
Generally speaking, if we removed men from ALL positions of power and decision making and got rid of religion, 90 percent of the planet’s problems would just disappear.
This is a specious argument from the outset.
First, did Don Lemon - or any of the protestors - approach the pastor in private, first, to hear his reasoning for what he was doing that was so objectionable? Had they done so, they would have quickly realized that this pastor was not an ICE agent - and so even insofar as being an officer of the law is itself an inherent evil, they would have been confronting the wrong person.
Second, did Don Lemon - or any of the protestors - request to meet with him with two or three other brothers and sisters in order to talk through the concerns they had about simply being involved in a government office? Was there any evidence that the pastor on the board had been directly involved in anything that was illegal or morally objectionable in an agency that has existed and operated legally and without broad objection right through the Bush, Obama, and Biden administrations?
Third, Matthew 18 is not about simply bursting into a congregation of which you have no part and then shutting it down. If that were so, we would relaunch the religious wars between Protestants and Catholics, where the objections go much deeper than incidental social issues to ones of eternal, salvational significance. The bringing before the congregation is done by the congregation in a way done "decently and in order" for the sake of "restoring such a one in a spirit of gentleness"; it is not done for the sake of the public even; it is done by the church for the sake of the church.
There is no evidence that the elder in that church had acted in a way that was more out of line than any other officer of the law operating in the normal course of his or her duties. He just happens to serve in a department that you find objectionable, and that is not the same as being caught in an act of sin. Even Christ had no objections to the Roman soldiers who followed him continuing to be Roman soldiers; John the Baptist admonition's only that they not individually use their position to oppress others.
This is not a matter of courts regulating religious speech; it is a matter of courts guaranteeing the continued worship of God in a free manner, perfectly in accord with the teaching of Romans 13: 1-7