Every church, at some point, meets a Diotrephes. He may be a pastor out of his proper character, a deacon out of his proper place, or simply a member who has decided the church exists to serve his preferences. Whatever his title, his pattern is always the same: he loves to be first, and that love expresses itself in slander, exclusion, and control. The Apostle John named him, confronted him, and left us a warning that still cuts to the quick two thousand years later.
The Meeting That Never Happened
The church had voted. The minutes were signed. A visiting preacher was coming for a week of meetings, a man of sound doctrine and evident godliness. Most of the congregation was eager. But one member wasn’t. He didn’t stand up and object. He didn’t call a business meeting. He simply started making phone calls. Quietly, methodically, he began poisoning the well. A word here, a doubt planted there, a question raised about the preacher’s associations. By the time the week arrived, the atmosphere had curdled. Attendance was thin. The meetings limped along. And the man who had worked so quietly against them never once had to answer for what he had done.
You may have seen something like this. You may have lived it. What you witnessed has a name, and it is older than you think.
“I wrote something to the church, but Diotrephes, who loves to be first among them, does not welcome what we say. For this reason, if I come, I will bring to remembrance his deeds which he does, unjustly disparaging us with wicked words. And not satisfied with this, he himself does not welcome the brothers either, and he forbids those who want to do so and puts them out of the church. Beloved, do not imitate what is evil, but what is good. The one who does good is of God; the one who does evil has not seen God.”
3 John 9–11 (LSB)
The Pattern of Diotrephes
John had written to the church, but Diotrephes refused to receive what the apostle said. In our day, the spirit of Diotrephes does the same, giving lip service to church authority so long as the church agrees with him, and operating entirely outside that authority the moment it does not.
His charges were not merely disagreements. They were wicked words, false accusations designed to discredit. A church votes to call a pastor, and the Diotrephes works to discourage, undermine, and slander until he gets the outcome he wanted. Rule by the minority, enforced by the tongue.
He refused hospitality to traveling brothers and put out of the church those who showed it anyway. The bully’s final move is always exclusion, cutting off, silencing, or driving out anyone who refuses to submit to his control.
“A pastor needs two voices, one for gathering the sheep and the other for driving away wolves and thieves. The Scripture supplies him with the means for doing both.” — John Calvin
John was not afraid to name names. He promised a confrontation. The enemies of Christ and his church need to be faced, not out of bitterness, but out of faithfulness to the flock.
Known by Their Fruit
Jesus warned us plainly: “You will know them by their fruits” (Matthew 7:16). The fruit of a Diotrephes is not difficult to identify. Paul described it in Galatians 5 with uncomfortable precision: enmities, strife, jealousy, outbursts of anger, disputes, dissensions, factions (v. 20). These are the works of the flesh, and they leave a trail. The man or woman operating in the spirit of Diotrephes may claim to love the church, but the fruit does not lie.
We are permitted to be fruit inspectors. What we are inspecting is not personality, or style, or the fact that someone disagrees, but whether a person is walking in the Spirit or giving themselves over to the works of the flesh.
What the Spirit Produces Instead
Paul does not leave us only with the works of the flesh. He continues:
“But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control. Against such things there is no law. Now those who belong to Christ Jesus crucified the flesh with its passions and desires. If we live by the Spirit, let us also walk in step with the Spirit.”
Galatians 5:22–25 (LSB)
This is the contrast John sets before us in verse 11: “Beloved, do not imitate what is evil, but what is good. The one who does good is of God; the one who does evil has not seen God.”
The answer to a Diotrephes in your midst is not simply to out-maneuver him or build a stronger coalition. Start with the gospel. Christ came not to be served but to serve. He who had every right to be first took the form of a servant, humbled himself, and went to a cross. The spirit of Diotrephes, this grasping for preeminence and hunger to be first, is the very thing Christ put to death on the Cross. For those who are in him, the Spirit is at work producing the opposite: love that prefers others, patience that does not need to win, gentleness that disarms rather than destroys.
The call of verse 11 is not merely moral instruction. It is grounded in what God has done. We imitate good because we have been made good, not by our own effort, but by grace, through the Spirit of the living God who indwells every true believer.
A Charge to Walk Out the Door With
If you have been a Diotrephes, if you recognize in yourself this pattern of quietly working against men your church has called, of planting doubts, of using influence to get your way when the vote went the other direction, repent. Not in general terms, but specifically. Go to the person you have slandered and make it right. Go to your pastor and confess what you have done. Walk in the light.
If you have been on the receiving end, if you are the pastor who has been undermined, the member who has been pushed out, take heart. John did not leave Gaius without hope. He named the problem, promised accountability, and pointed to the goodness of God. The church of Jesus Christ does not ultimately belong to the man who loves to be first. It belongs to the one who is first, the Lord Jesus Christ, who is building his church, and against whom the gates of hell will not prevail.
And if you are simply a member of a church, watch. Pray. Extend hospitality. Walk by the Spirit. And do not imitate what is evil, but what is good.