Our Zeal Tempered With Loving Those We Disagree With

In the Protestant world (or Reformed if you prefer), each viewpoint eventually becomes an issue worth dividing over. Time and time again, churches splinter and people leave churches over the silliest of issues. Each denomination and religious group has a heritage of splintering because each Protestant group divided from another group at their origin. This fragmentation is exacerbated by our desire to be right on the truth and stand up for what we believe in. During the whole process, we have the tendency to demonize the people sharing another viewpoint. Forget sharing the "truth in love;" we share the truth and leave no room for dissenters.

We turn every stance into a reason for separation. Even on the essentials, we need to make sure that they are always expressed in love. Not having a clearly defined statement on what the essentials are, we find ourselves in a world of confusion. What issues are worth standing up for? The trinity, the structure of the church, the role of women, spiritual gifts, the Lord's Supper, loving our neighbor. We are left with every point, including the minutest points that we understand differently from everyone else, becoming an essential because it is essential for us to live out the truth, even to the minutest details, as we understand it.

I was recently stuck with looking in the mirror when I read through Shane Claiborne's Irresistible Revolution. Encountering someone that follows Christ in a way somewhat different from myself, I realized how I must sound to those that follow Christ differently than me. Being so excited and zealous for the way I am called to live out the gospel, I confuse my personal calling for a universal calling. I have the tendency to try and shoehorn everyone into my way of following Christ.

The blessing, and frustration at times, of the Bible is that it is vague on the specifics of how we are to live out the life of Christ here and now. We are given broad principles - love your neighbor, glorify God, make disciples - but we are left without many specifics on the lesser details. I should always view that as a blessing. Being a Christian is not about some legalistic checklist that we can complete and be done with; it is about knowing God and bringing about his will in our specific circumstances. Every person alive has a different situation that they find themselves in, yet there is a best course for that situation. We need to be close enough to God that we can discern his leading and the path we are supposed to go down. Being a Christian is not about knowing a book but about living the life God would have us live here and now. The Book should be a tool to help us do that.

We need to find a way to let our passion be kindled while at the same time always exemplifying love to those we disagree with.

"If I have the gift of prophecy and can fathom all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have a faith that can move mountains, but have not love, I am nothing."

Statements of Belief, Division, and I Am Second

Recently, I ran across the organization I Am Second when looking for a video to share before a sermon I was working on. They made an awesome Tony Dungy video that I was debating on using. I went to see how much it would cost to use, when I found out that I needed to agree with their statement of belief to use it. What turned into a brief attempt at finding an appropriate video clip turned into a diatribe on church unity.

Below is their statement of belief followed by the letter I wrote after facing, "You must accept the statement of faith."

I Am Second's Statement of Belief

THE GOAL OF UNITY. The task of finally finishing the Great Commission is bigger than any one part of the Body of Christ. God wants to use the entire Body of Christ to finish this task. I am Second and its parent organization, e3 Partners Ministry, seek to be an answer to the prayer Christ Himself prayed in John 17:20-21:

I do not pray for these alone, but also for those who will believe in Me through their word: that they all may be one, as You, Father, are in Me, and I in You; that they also may be one in Us, that the world may believe that You sent Me.

UNITY BASED ON TRUTH. I am Second and e3 Partners Ministry seeks to serve as a catalyst for spiritual, Biblical unity in the Body of Christ as we serve various parts of the Body. While we pray and work toward unity, we also are mindful of Paul’s caution in Galatians 1:8, 9:

But even if we, or an angel from heaven, preach any other gospel to you than what we have preached to you, let him be accursed. As we have said before, so now I say again, if anyone preaches any other gospel to you than what you have received, let him be accursed.

STATEMENT OF FAITH. Unity must be based on truth. Cooperation that results in a dilution or compromise of the essential truths of the Bible is ecumenism, not Holy Spirit-breathed Biblical unity. We seek to work with those who believe in the following Statement of Faith:

God. We believe that the Godhead eternally exists in three persons—the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit—and that these three are one God, having precisely the same nature, attributes, and perfections.

Jesus. We believe in the deity of Jesus Christ, His virgin birth, sinless life, miracles, death on the cross to provide for our redemption, bodily resurrection and ascension into heaven, present ministry of intercession for us, and His return to earth in power and glory.

Holy Spirit. We believe in the personality and deity of the Holy Spirit, that He performs the miracle of new birth in an unbeliever and indwells believers, enabling them to live godly lives.

Bible. We believe in the divine verbal inspiration of the Scriptures. The whole Bible, in the original manuscripts, is without error. As the revelation of God, we believe the Bible to be the sole authority and sufficiency with regard to Christian faith and practice.

Man. We believe that man was originally created in the image of God. Adam fell through sin, and as a consequence of his sin, lost his spiritual life. This spiritual death, or total depravity of human nature, has been transmitted to the entire human race of man, the Man Christ Jesus alone being excepted. Thus every person is born into the world with a nature that is essentially and unchangeably sinful apart from divine grace.

Salvation. We believe that, due to universal death through sin, no one can enter the kingdom of God unless born again. Our redemption has been accomplished solely by the blood of our Lord Jesus. We believe that the new birth of the believer comes only through faith in Christ. No other acts, such as confession, baptism, prayer, faithful service, or manifestation of certain spiritual gifts, are to be added to believing as a condition of salvation.

This statement reflects a contemporary summary of the central doctrines in the Bible, which are also presented in the historic creeds of the Christian church.

I understand that membership in the I am Second network is intended solely for churches, ministries, leaders and other individuals who affirm an orthodox understanding of biblical Christianity, including the above affirmations.

I agree with the Statement of Faith written above.

My reply to being asked to agree to the above statement in order to use their materials

Hi,

Thanks for your time. Your organization has a lot of potential. Your purpose is powerful as I also long for unity in the body of Christ.

I wanted to download some of your resources and use them in the church that I serve as pastor at, but I cannot agree with your statement of faith on every issue.

I had three points where I couldn't press "agree" in good conscience.

Let me briefly summarize. I am sure that you have heard these before, but I summarize in the hope that you consider modifying your statement so that I an other followers of Jesus like me can "agree," work with you, and use your materials. Even more important than that, I think these statements will alienate other people who are completely in agreement with what you are doing except in the case of these three statements.

"We believe that the new birth of the believer comes only through faith in Christ"

James 2:24 disagrees sharply with this statement. It states, "You see that a person is justified by works and not by faith alone" (James 2:24 ESV). If you mean by "faith in Christ" the surrender of rule in my life to Jesus, then I agree with that. But faith is a word that implies thoughts, and receiving a new birth is more than just thoughts. It is a realigning of one's life from personal lordship to a position under Jesus as Lord. We are saved through a surrendering of our heart to the Lord, not through faith alone.

"The whole Bible, in the original manuscripts, is without error."

This is a powerful statement, but we have no way to prove it. Unprovable, useless speculation regarding what the original manuscripts were like is not worth dividing over. Can we not agree on a position on the manuscripts as we currently have them rather than speculate on what they were in copies that we no longer have?

Total Depravity and Man

The whole section on "man" relies on the concept of "total depravity." I have been in conversations with brothers who share this thought before, and I doubt anything I say would change your thoughts on this. However, I thought I would lay out an approach that would be more unifying without compromising the Bible.

"We believe that man was originally created in the image of God. The Bible teaches that man, created by God, willfully sinned against God and is consequently lost and without hope apart from the divine grace revealed through Jesus Christ (Acts 4:12; Romans 3:23)."

One other brief thought. This wasn't a deal breaker although it did make me uncomfortable. Your statement describing the godhead as "having precisely the same nature, attributes, and perfections" seems to minimize the concept that the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit are three unique distinctions of the same God, hence the different manifestations and names. Nothing in your statement expressed their uniqueness. I could probably agree with your statement in theory, but " precisely the same" nature and attributes are some really loaded thoughts that would need to be unpacked.

The Tony Dungy video I watched was well made and powerful in its message. You guys did a great job with that. Unfortunately, I am currently unable to use it and share the thought that you have so superbly packaged because I cannot agree with your statement of belief in good conscience. It is your right to put whatever stipulations or costs on your materials. I hope that you would reconsider agreement to above statements as a stipulation.

I share my thoughts, not to stir up trouble, to be divisive, or to attack your organization. I bring them up because I desire to be part of what you are doing but cannot on the terms you have laid out. The "statement of belief" contains some positions that I do not hole, nor do I think they are essential to unity as you aim to be about. If you feel that the points above are worth excluding people who are followers of Jesus over, that is your right as it is your organization.

You say, and rightfully so, that "Unity must be based on truth. Cooperation that results in a dilution or compromise of the essential truths of the Bible is ecumenism, not Holy Spirit-breathed Biblical unity." Unfortunately, you put what I perceive as man-made obstacles in the way of that unity through the points I described above. I am not asking for compromise but for unity on essentials eliminating divisions that are man-made.

Grace and peace,
Regan Clem

I don't think it needs to be said, but please let me know what you think.

Osama Bin Laden, Essentials, and Grace

As Americans, our emotions were all over the place after the announcement of the death of Osama bin Laden. Some danced in the streets celebrating, others mourned the death of one who we logically presume did not know Jesus, others bounced back and forth between those feelings, while others did not know how to feel. It was a crazy, few days in the life of America.

I want to tell everyone who doesn’t feel the way I feel, and understand Scripture the way that I understand it, that they aren’t right with Jesus. I have this terrible, evil instinct inside myself. A place of arrogance, pride, and self-righteousness. A place where I sometimes mistakenly think that God is confined to the nice, little box of my understanding. A place where I do not allow any grace for others but gladly except grace for myself. Maybe you can relate.

Even though I think the proper response is clearly expressed in Scripture, I must be gracious to those who disagree. One of the principles of the Christian Church since its beginning in the 1800s is that we believe that there should only be a minimal set of essentials. And the way one should react to the death of a terrorist like Osama bin Laden does not make that cut. If you want to read our church’s list of beliefs, they can be check out at here.

On the rest, we can disagree. And we will disagree. But we will disagree and still call all those who call Jesus their Lord brothers and sisters. This has historically proven to be a tough place to remain because we, the church, suffer from Essential creep. Another issue becomes important, and people want to make that an essential. Then another. Then another. And soon we have a whole handbook, often times unwritten and unknowable even to the individual, that holds all of the legalistic thoughts – a handbook that tells us what to think on a multitude of issues and who to consider not a Christian.

What if we have it all wrong? What if Jesus came to earth to free us from that sort of legalism? He could have given us a legalistic handbook if he wanted to. Instead he taught us that the most important things to do are to love God and to love one another. Simple. Pure. Two noble tasks that we struggle to aspire to. Instead of struggling and relying on grace, we make little legalistic rules that we can meet so that we can feel good about ourselves. Instead of comparing ourselves to Jesus and his perfection, we begin to compare ourselves to the prostitute or the drug addict and brag about how moral we are. We puff ourselves up rather than humble ourselves at the beauty of Jesus dying for us.

I don’t know everything, but I do know that I killed Osama bin Laden in my heart a long time ago. For that I need God’s grace. May I have the strength to show that grace to others.

Heresy, Rob Bell, Love Wins, Universalism, and the Christian Church

The problem in the "Rob Bell is now a heretic (although we already called him one when Velvet Elvis: Repainting the Christian Faith was released)" is the confusion over the issues.  There are two significant issues at play, but people are dealing with them as if they are one.

The first issue is whether Bell a universalist.  A universalist is a person who believes that all people are saved in the end.  In the Christian perspective, this can take the approach that the blood of Jesus is for all humanity, whether they accept it or not.  Bell clearly answers, "No."  He is not a universalist.

But here is what Bell appears to be teaching.

He is a person that will accept a universalist as a brother or sister in Christ.

So the second issue is whether a universalist can be right with God.  Can a person be off on this issue and still have a relationship with Jesus?  In the interview, Bell was clear.  Our choices in this life are extremely relevant when we die, but he claims there is room in the Christian tradition for universalists.  He is not a universalist but will not condemn those who are.

For some reason, people can't separate the first issue from the second.  If Bell is going to be condemned for anything, it would be for accepting universalists as brothers and sisters in Jesus.  Maybe the issues shouldn't be separated because they might be equal "heresies."  Let's look at it.

It is similar to the baptism issue in Church of Christ/Christian Church circles.  For some it is an issue of division.  For most, it is not.  I fall into the it is not an issue of division camp.  I accept people as brothers and sisters in Jesus if they show fruit yet have not been baptized.  This does not stop me from teaching believer's baptism and its importance to all people who claim to be followers of Jesus.  Bell seems to be taking a similar approach with universalism. 

The pickle Bell finds himself in is that the anti-Bellers want him to defend being a universalist when he is isn't one. Due to this unfair situation, his answers appear weak because he is not defending what they have already concluded that he believes, universalism.  What he defended through the interview was that people can be universalists and still be Christians. Again, I will have to wait for my copy of the book that is scheduled to arrive today.  I am just going off of the interviews and publisher's hype. But I bet Love Wins: A Book About Heaven, Hell, and the Fate of Every Person Who Ever Lived won't even touch on Universalism. That subject was what the neo-reformed started attacking Bell on and Bashir went with it, but I wouldn't be surprised if the book doesn't even go there.

At the core, Bell is fighting for a principle that we, as Christian Church/Church of Christers, hold dear although we have a historical tendency to ignore. There is only a minimal set of essentials. It's not just our tradition.  The phrase "In essentials, unity.  In opinions, liberty.  In all things, love" goes back throughout church history and is not exclusive to our movement, but for a systematic theologian, that idea can be frustrating.  For them, all parts of a system of theology are important.  A systematic theologian develops a grand, comprehensive belief system that reaches the point where all teachings must be adhered to on all points in order for it to make sense.  It is like a house of cards.  You cannot just take one card out and have the house; it all crumbles because they were all constructed together depending on one another.  That is the way doctrine works in systematic theology.  It all builds together and the more irrelevant teachings must be adhered to because a few relevant teachings along with many more irrelevant teachings have been built on top of them.  Biblical theology takes a different approach.  It just takes the Bible at face value and refuses to construct a house of cards.  If one thought needs to be removed after further study, it is willingly removed because we don't have a whole system built using that belief.  Each belief must stand on its own in Scripture. 

The real Bell/Love Wins/Universalism debate should be on whether rejecting universalism is essential? Universalism goes against a few Scriptures. But I think most of us have changed views that we have held because we have been corrected by Scripture. I'm sure it will happen again some day for you and me. If we have to have perfect theology to be saved, then all of us are screwed.  Where is grace in that view?  Bell is not asking if universalism is right; he's asking whether it is an essential.  I think that is a good question.

I accept people as brothers and sisters who clearly go against some Scriptures I hold dear.  One of our core convictions at Riverside Christian Church is, "We believe in a minimal set of essentials in order to foster unity and freedom in Jesus."  There are a few issues there is absolutely no budging on.  Those are the essentials.  But the rest can be disagreed on for the sake of unity.  This is a thought that we have to always keep in check because we have this tendency to broaden the important issues until we have developed a scatterbrained systematic theology where everything is important.  From our beliefs at Riverside, we have two that stand against universalism.  "Forgiveness of sins and the promise of a meaningful and eternal life are available as a free gift of grace to those who believe in Jesus as Savior and Lord" (John 3:16).  "Jesus Christ is the one and only Son of God, who showed us how to live life to the fullest, died for our sins, and arose from the dead" (1 Corinthians 15: 1-8; John 3:16; John 10:10).  Those are essentials that we won't budge on.  But that does not mean that one cannot be a universalist and be saved.  A universalist, despite believing otherwise, can only be saved through surrendering their heart to Jesus.  Many universalists have done that, but they can do that and still be wrong on universalism.

It would be teaching false teaching to teach that everyone would go to heaven.  But that is not what Bell is teaching.  He appears to be teaching that people who believe everyone goes to heaven can be accepted as a brother or sister if they are in a relationship with Jesus.   

Churches have a tendency to make too many issues essential and that continues to divide us.  Bell seems to be fighting that.  To that, I say, "Keep up the good fight."   

(For further study on universalism, verses universalists use are Isaiah 45:15-25, Jonah 2, Matthew 12:40, Acts 3:19-26, Romans 5:12-21, 8:18-22, 10:8-18, 14:11, Ephesians 4:8-10, Philippian 2:10-11, I Peter 3:19, 4:6.  Verses against universalism are Isaiah 55:6-7, Matthew 11:28-30, Luke 18:18-30, 19:1-10, John 3:16-18, 6:37, 7:37, Acts 2:37-39, 3:19, 5:31, 17:30, Romans 2:4, 10:9-10, 2 Corinthians 5:19-20, 7:10, Ephesians 2:8-9, Hebrews 7:25, James 2:17, Revelation 3:19)

For the post that led up to this one: Rob Bell Dodged Only One Question.

Further Conversation Over My Post on Essentials

The first collection of replies:  The Facebook Conversation Over My Post on Essentials

The original post:  A Proposed Minimal Set of Essentials

Grady replied:

The people in the book of Acts that reieved the Holy Spirit pre baptism, what was the context of those incidents? Jesus breathed the Holy Spirit on his disciples He sent out, was this before their baptism? Absolutly the Holy Spirit is the seal, and the judgement is not a judgement of comdenation (to hell), the judgement is the one that we make a decision aas to if a person has obeyed and become. The scripture is very clear on this. When people hear us say you have not become a Christian yet, they are very quick to assume we are making a judgement of comdemnation against them, and use it because of what the common thinking is concerning judgement (don't judge lest you be judged). Sp to our marching order's...if we are to make disciples (and we are) then what do we teach as to how that happen's...the truth of the matter, no matter what others may teach. We are to teach those who would to believe in the gosple, belive Jesus as God's Son, that He died for the sins of the world, and that when this is accepted, we teach that they need to turn from their sin, confess Christ and then to be baptized (first fruits!). Then when they have obeyed we teach them of the promises of the Spirit, and then comes the how to walk.

In the initial post you asked about "In essentials, unity. In opinions, liberty. In all things, love." And said you had never heard anyone give explanation of this. That is what I was addressing.

You may have forgot what Paul said to always interact with one another in a spirit of humility, gentleness, patience, and love. Without that, our message is lost, this is true, he also said to preach the truth.

You can feel free to teach something different as to the essentials of the truth, but I will not. I teach the scripture, not my opinion. It is our JOB to teach them first to become before we teach them how to be, once we have done this then to be is the true course. If wew don't teach them the path of conversion, it is not I who will do any judgement of condemnation (thankfully not my job to do so).

Hey got to run to my people, God bless your day, may He convince you of His truth in all things. Love you! 

 Regan replied:

Ultimately, we just disagree about how one can receive the Holy Spirit through our understandings of the teaching of Scripture, especially the book of Acts. I feel that the Holy Spirit only comes at baptism crowd has "contextualized" away every difficult passage that disagrees with them. Maybe you also do that. Maybe that is the right approach. I am not comfortable with that approach. Those exceptions are there to show us that there are exceptions. Until either I state that baptism is the only place you can get the Holy Spirit or you acknowledge that those exceptions were given to show that there can still be exceptions, we will just be running around in circles if we continue. That is the crux of our disagreement.

We also disagree on separating what we teach from what are the essentials. I will teach that a person should be baptized after giving their life over to Jesus. Baptism is the normative place for people to receive the Holy Spirit, but that does not mean that I will exclude people who show fruit and acknowledge Jesus as Lord from fellowship. Our movement started with open fellowship and open communion. On the frontier, circuit riders could only make it once a month or once a quarter. People were not allowed to take of the Lord's Supper until the circuit rider came into town. What happened was people started gathering for communion without the clergy. They started baptizing people without the clergy. But they joined together as people who wanted to study the word and living under Jesus' lordship.

Over time, we, who started as a unity through Scripture movement, just became as divisive as the denominations we were trying to bring together. Instead of ending sectarianism, we just added another sect to the fray. Over 150 years later, the denominations have stopped being divisive, non-denominational (locally led) churches are flourishing, and nearly everyone is baptized as adult believers except for in a few mainline denominations. We are fighting battles that were fought for us over 150 years ago. We're like Civil War reenactors remembering the battle, but instead of it just being a hobby, it's really damaging to the Kingdom of God.

The men who started the Restoration Movement, from which the modern Church of Christ/Christian Church come, both took this stance.

Alexander Campbell said:
Should I find one [baptized as an infant] more intelligent in the Christian Scriptures, more spiritually-minded and more devoted to the Lord than…one immersed on a profession of the ancient faith, I could not hesitate a moment in giving the preference of my heart to him that loveth most. Did I act otherwise, I would be a pure sectarian, a Pharisee among Christians.

Barton Stone said:
None of us are disposed to make our notions of baptism, however well founded, a bar of christian fellowship. We acknowledge all to be brethren, who believe and obey the Saviour, and, who walking in the Spirit, bear his holy image; yet, in the meekness of Christ, we labor to convince such of their duty in submitting to every ordinance of the Lord.

My list of essentials came from the same vein that the Church of Chirst/Christian Church was founded on. We teach baptism, yet we do not make it a test of fellowship. Who am I to say that a person who is not baptized but is more faithful and fruitful is saved? God knows their heart. Paul wrote, "A man is not a Jew if he is only one outwardly, nor is circumcision merely outward and physical. No, a man is a Jew if he is one inwardly; and circumcision is circumcision of the heart, by the Spirit, not by the written code. Such a man's praise is not from men, but from God." I will teach them the Scriptural teachings on baptism, but God knows their heart and their lives show evidence of the Spirit.

I believe I teach Scripture. You can call it my opinion; it is. So is what you teach. Each one of us teach our opinion of what Scripture teaches. Some day we will know fully as is taught in 1 Corinthians 13:12. Until then, everyone filters Scripture, hopefully in tune with the Spirit, through their own brains, experiences, etc. So we always teach what we believe is the truth, but we must always do it as Paul taught, with humility, gentleness, patience, and love.

Do you really believe that every person not immersed as an adult believer does not have the Holy Spirit? How do you reconcile those verses that I mentioned on how Jesus and Paul taught us how to know who are Jesus' followers?

Regan replied to Dan's previous reply: 

It is a biblical explanation of why we can work with people who are not from our particular background on furthering God's work and accept them as brothers and sisters in Jesus where they are, but in a way it also deals with who is saved and who is not. But it does not deal with what I would teach to someone who wants to be saved. I have no qualms saying that the ministers I consider my friends from other denominations are my brothers in Jesus. They don't have to be brothers in Jesus to be my friends, but I see the love of Christ in their lives, the fruit of the Spirit growing in them, and they share my proclamation that Jesus is Lord. It does not mean that we just leave things rest and don't dialogue with one another on our differences. It's just that I think that dialogue should happen in the context of accepting one another as a brother and sister in Christ. I think they have as much to teach me as I do them, as long as we keep the Bible as the center of those discussions.

As for the rest of what you wrote, I agree wholeheartedly. "The church is probably in the state it is in because we love judging outsiders and refuse to collectively judge those inside the church. We have completely backwards maybe because we have not challenged each other's motives." I agree that we have the whole judging people backward. Those outside of Jesus, I do not judge. Those inside, I judge, but in a gentle, patient, and loving way to help them be who God wants them to be. They should do the same to me. Together, we spur one another on to reach the prize.

 Laura's response:

Yeesh, I tried to read all those, but I'm getting sleepy. I'll leave the scholarly talks to you guys...I just felt from the heart that forcing a list isn't what's needed. God could have made the Bible much clearer, shorter, more compact. He... could have used lists and numbers or used only a few writers to keep us from "discussing" what THAT writer intended. He didn't. It requires us to rely heavily on the Holy Spirit to interpret it and over time and seasons and experiences, we see things we'd never seen before. Is this because we were just wrong before and now we are right, or because God gives us these things in His time? I just don't think a list is necessary. I think we can deal with things as they come and have the answer at that time. If I come upon someone and I want to decide if they are a brother or not, I can look at a list. That sounds convenient. But I could also decide in that moment what the Holy Spirit is trying to tell me-through the Bible, through other believers, through experience, and always with love. Or decide over a period of time, etc...

I'm not automatically against lists or creeds or church goals, etc... but sometimes I wonder why we need to put things in OUR (by "our" I mean mine and whoever agrees with me) own words apart from scripture. Call me floppy, but I don't have hard and fast rules about certain things (or most things, for that matter), and I don't think you're wrong for wanting to clarify, for the sake of unity, the essentials. But I don't know that it's best either. I've used catch phrases of the church and have found them helpful to me and to others, but I don't think they were necessary.

 Regan's reply to Laura:

My list was a list of Scriptures and not my opinions. But I understand your hesitancy because it was my opinion that chose which Scriptures to include. How does one decide what Scriptures would be used as a test of fellowship? Do we use all... of Scripture, and they have to agree with us on everything? Do we use more than what I used or less? You would say that it is up to the Holy Spirit. That's what I think I was saying in a more structured way. If they have the Spirit, I can discern that, and they claim Jesus is Lord and follow the greatest commandment, then they are brothers and sisters. The problem is that those who refuse to have a list like this often are the most divisive and sectarian. I'm not saying you are, but I have experienced that. They typically have lists, that if written out would be longer than any denominational handbook.

Would you accept someone as a brother who said that Jesus is not Lord, showed absolutely no fruit of the Spirit in their life, did not strive to live a life of loving God and loving God or loving their neighbor? I am pretty sure I wouldn't. Even in the moment. But the list was focused more on us being able to have fellowship with people in the community who might not go to a church with the same name on the sign as our church or all of the same beliefs as our church.

The four Scriptures I chose were selected to help my local church pull back from all of the divisiveness and sectarianism that our movement in this geographic area struggles with, focus on the essentials, and move forward to minister to our community from there.

Also, in the local context, we are involved in starting a community youth center with other churches. A few struggle with whether that should be done because they were once taught that people in those other churches are not Christians. We make this judgment call whether we want to or not. I laid this out to show what the essentials are and how we are to evaluate whether a person is a Christian or not. I could ignore there frustrations and just say that I think they are a Christian and that should be good enough, but it's my job to teach. So these essentials were more of an explanation of why we can be involved with other churches in a youth center. Not a list to exclude people. I don't think this list would exclude anyone who wanted to be considered a Christian. It's a minimal list of essentials. It's frustrating to some because it includes too many people, not enough essentials. The discussion centers around whether it should be broader, not narrower.

And I understand where they are coming from; we should just teach the Bible. But unfortunately, the issue of who to accept as a brother or sister is an issue that our church was struggling with. So I attempted to teach on that through Scripture. It was a list because I tried to deal with the passages that talked about who to accept and what are the greatest teachings. I could have called it something other than a list, but it was a list nonetheless, whether I called it by another name or not.

How would you teach someone who was saying people are not Christians that those people are in fact Christians? Or how would you teach someone who thought certain people were Christians who you thought were not? Unfortunately, just leaving it alone would not have helped the church move forward, so that really wasn't an option.

The Facebook Conversation Over My Post on Essentials

Facebook seems to be the breeding ground for comments rather than the blog, so I thought I would copy and paste the comments on here for posterity's sake.

The original post:  A Proposed Minimal Set of Essentials

Grady posted:

‎? should not the death, burial, and resurection be a part of those essential beliefs? How about forgiveness of sin, the how that happens as proclaimed from the scriptures? How about living a life after Christs example? Should not these all be a part of the "essentials"? Just questions not debate, have the answers they are in the scripture, just trying to decern your thinking on these matters.

By the way, I continue to pray for you and your family, be blessed in this day, love you!

 Regan replied:

I like to focus more on what it means to be a Christian rather than how we get there. The church is littered with debate and division over the latter. We get hung up on it and miss the former.

And when teaching what it means to be a follower totally surrendered to Christ, the basics of conversion are covered. They just don't remain the focus. I know people who are just baptized and never become disciples; same with people who say the sinner's prayer. But if you love God, love your neighbors, love one another, show the fruit of the Spirit (which would imply you have the Spirit, the seal of Salvation), and declare that Jesus is Lord, then you are Jesus'. It's about the maximum Christian life of total surrender rather than the minimal ritual life of baptism and church.

And this list is more of a "who can we accepts as brothers and sisters in Christ." What are the "essentials" to accept someone as a brother or sister? The "essentials" we will allow ourselves to be unified in. The Spirit of God is the sign of a follower. And that Spirit doesn't just come at baptism, or I would have had that in my essentials.  How People Received the Holy Spirit in the Book of Acts?

I did not address doctrinal essentials in this post, but I will. Although, we still need a minimal list. That Jesus rose from the dead and was God in the flesh would be on that list. 

 Dan wrote:

When you say "what it means to be a Christian" are you only talking about the actions of the Christian? Are you including the why some one does these things?

One clarification: you say "Jesus said that He did not come to judge (John 12:47).  If Jesus did not come to judge and condemn in regards to eternal life, then we to avoid our natural tendency to judge others in that light." While I agree with judging eternal salvation of some is dangerous, aren't there are some the church is supposed to judge? Also, in using this verse, does that mean we need to save since in that same verse he says he came to save the world? What about the next verse(s) where he does point to the Judge (presumable himself as seen in these places: http://bit.ly/d8tB81)?

 Laura wrote:

I'm not reading all this, but I propose not making a list of essentials.

Regan replied:

@Laura - That way we can have it change and be whatever we want depending on the mood we are in? Because whether we have thought it out enough to write it out, we do have a list.

@Dan - Besides me missing the word "need", here is responses.

Oh, yes in regards to judging. We are supposed to judge people to teach them, to help them out of sin, etc. But judging about eternal salvation is not something we can do because we do not know their heart. And as for saving, we do play a role in passing Jesus' salvation to the world. Through us being Jesus, we can show people Jesus and be part of the process of salvation. Although, we do not save by ourselves, we play a role in the salvation of the world. 

I am not including the why. We, in the position of accepting someone as a brother or sister, cannot know someone's motives.

Obviously, we are incapable of being a judge when it comes to eternal salvation at this point, whether or not Jesus does that judging. Although, I think he was clear that is not the reason he came. He came to save. And when we deal with the world that does not know Jesus, we are not judge. We are to be used in sharing Jesus' love which will hopefully lead to their salvation.

Unless, of course, we narrow salvation down to a prayer or baptism. If we do that, we can judge. But I think salvation is much more that that. 

I tried to deal with all of your questions. If I missed one, feel free to ask again. I'm not trying to avoid any.

Grady replied:

How can you focus on what it means to be a Christian before you get there, it is ok for those of us who have become a christian according to the scripture , but leaves those who haven't hanging out to dry trying all on there own with out the spirit of God providing for the walk of a Christian. Hey the whole book of Acts addresses this, why would you "like to focus on something other then what the scripture focus's on???? It is the Church's responsibility to focus on the "HOW", it is our marching orders. We are going to not have unity with the world, and if some one wants to come and accept the grace God has given then they would be free to do so and become united with the church. And when that happens they recieve all the bennifits associated with being in Christ or apart of the ones called out. What does it take by the way to BECOME a CHRISTIAN?

 Regan replied:

@Grady - I actually shared a link with you of a Bible study of the book of Acts that showed people receiving the Holy Spirit at different points. People did receive the Holy Spirit outside of baptism. And the Holy Spirit is the seal of s...alvation. If God gave us examples in Acts of people receiving the seal of salvation outside of baptism, who am I to say that it could not happen again?

Does that mean that we no longer teach baptism? Of course not. But it does show that we cannot be as legalistic as we would like on the subject of baptism. The Holy Spirit is the seal of salvation. Jesus and Paul did not tell us to check to see if people were baptized to know that they are Jesus' followers. They told us to examine their fruit and to see if they claim that Jesus is Lord.

Our marching orders are to make disciples, to baptize them, and to teach them follow Jesus' commandments. I don't think we disagree on that. The issue I was addressing here was not about our mission. It's about our judgmental attitude about other people's salvation; it's about how we discern who to accept as brothers and sisters in Christ. Our judgmental attitude has made many of the churches in this area ineffective at going about that mission. We often behave in such a way that nobody is tranformed by Jesus' love lived out in our lives. We have forgotten the major, love, and focused on the minor, baptism. In the end, we have created a lot of fruitless baptized people who think they are saved because they participated in the "salvation" ritual.

We have forgotten Paul's teaching to always interact with one another in a spirit of humility, gentleness, patience, and love. Without that, our message is lost.

What I will teach is a different topic than what are the essentials to accept someone as a brother or sister. I realize that everything that I believe Scripture teaches is not an essential. My understanding of all of Scripture is not completely accurate, although I currently believe it to be. I will teach Scripture unabashedly but in a spirit of humility, understanding that my interpretation could be wrong.

When it comes to who I will accept as a brother or sister in Jesus, I will stick to the passages I cited in my post on how Paul and Jesus taught we could tell if someone is a follower of Jesus.

This post was not a conversion message focused on how to be a Christian. If it was, I would first encourage people to surrender their heart to Jesus and become His disciple. Then, the next step is repentance and baptism, followed by living a life of total surrender to Jesus and His will. All of it is meaningless if their heart is not given to God.

Will I judge people to hell for not following the path of conversion I understand Scripture to teach? Jesus' taught that we will know His followers by their fruit. Paul's taught that they will claim Jesus is Lord. God will judge people's hearts. I will accept people based on Jesus' and Paul's criteria. And I will teach my understanding of Scripture to the best of my ability. In the end, God will be the judge; for now, I will teach the conversion message of Scripture and accept people as brothers and sisters based on the criteria of Paul and Jesus.

Dan replied:

I hope I wasn't coming across divisive. I just wanted to see how you clarified some things that I didn't think you meant. The big point is how we reach across walls of denomination right and not quite who is saved or not right?

But one thing... I would caution is one of the roles/fruits of the Holy Spirit is to Glorify the Son and the Father as the reason for we do what we do. Because of our identity, we do what we do. We don't do X to become Y. We are Y so we do X.

If we do not attribute glory to him as the why behind the what we could be practicing a form a works righteousness that is no difference than the elevation of baptism seen in Christian Church circles and may not have the Gospel. WE should call each other to examine ourselves to see if we are in the faith if we see this going on no matter what (which is something we take for granted). Obeying out of Love and obeying out of fear of Going to Hell are two very different why but can produce very similar whats to an untrained eye. Jesus treated those people differently than the "pagan sinner" who may not have known better. The church is probably in the state it is in because we love judging outsiders and refuse to collectively judge those inside the church. We have completely backwards maybe because we have not challenged each other's motives. Is that enough to disfollowship with someone? Not at first but over time maybe not.

But at the same time we are slaves to Christ and one another so that means we don't give up on people but bear together a fuller understanding of the Gospel.

 More of the conversation can be found here.

A Proposed Minimal Set of Essentials - A Discussion on Essentials (Part Three)

In the previous two posts, we have talked about essentials and division in the church.  In this post, I would like to propose four passages of Scripture that should be the cornerstone of what we believe is essential:  Love God, love our neighbors, love one another, accept people as brothers and sisters in Christ who show fruit and claim that Jesus is Lord.  That’s it.  Once we start broadening beyond that, we start alienating people and continually add to our essentials creating a list that will keep growing and never stop.

But when the Pharisees heard that he had silenced the Sadducees, they gathered together.  And one of them, a lawyer, asked him a question to test him.  “Teacher, which is the great commandment in the Law?”  And he said to him, “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.  This is the great and first commandment.  And a second is like it: You shall love your neighbor as yourself. 40  On these two commandments depend all the Law and the Prophets.”  [Matt 22:34-40 (ESV)].

A new commandment I give to you, that you love one another: just as I have loved you, you also are to love one another. By this all people will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another.  [John 13:34-35 (ESV)].

Beware of false prophets, who come to you in sheep’s clothing but inwardly are ravenous wolves. You will recognize them by their fruits. Are grapes gathered from thornbushes, or figs from thistles? So, every healthy tree bears good fruit, but the diseased tree bears bad fruit. A healthy tree cannot bear bad fruit, nor can a diseased tree bear good fruit. Every tree that does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire. Thus you will recognize them by their fruits. [Matt 7:15-20 (ESV)].

Now concerning spiritual gifts, brothers, I do not want you to be uninformed. You know that when you were pagans you were led astray to mute idols, however you were led. Therefore I want you to understand that no one speaking in the Spirit of God ever says “Jesus is accursed!” and no one can say “Jesus is Lord” except in the Holy Spirit. [1 Cor 12:1-3 (ESV)].

So where does teaching come in?  When we say that we will accept people who show the fruit of the Spirit, what do we do with right doctrine?  When it comes to what Scripture teaches, we keep teaching what we believe is right, but if you are like me, you need to be humble in doing it.  Over the years, things that I once thought were solid as a rock have shifted and thinks I thought did not matter, have gained in importance.  Humility is the key when it comes to being a teacher.

Jesus said that He did not come to judge (John 12:47).  If Jesus did not come to judge and condemn in regards to eternal life, then we to avoid our natural tendency to judge others in that light.  Let us be studious of the Scriptures, sensitive to the Spirit, and full of love.

We don’t even have to agree with others on everything that we think are clear teachings of Scripture.  Riverside Christian Church has a list of core convictions.  One is that “We believe in a minimal set of essentials in order to foster unity and freedom in Christ.”  If we make every teaching that we believe Scripture teaches an essential, then we will soon be dividing amongst ourselves because there are not two of us that probably agree on everything.  Somewhere we must draw a line, and the best way to do that is with a minimal set of essentials.

More Tomorrow.

For further reading:
Being a Church Involved in the Community - A Discussion on Essentials (Part One)

Christ is not Divided - A Discussion on Essentials (Part Two)

Christ is not Divided - A Discussion on Essentials (Part Two)

We know God’s people, not by them agreeing with us hook, line and sinker on every issue we believe.

One thing I love about the Church of Christ/Christian Churches is our heritage.  Early on, one of the driving statements of our movement was the traditional church statement, “In essentials, unity.  In opinions, liberty.  In all things, love.”  We were the first non-denominational movement in the world, and now non-denominational churches are the fastest growing churches in the land.  The problem is that we have strayed from being non-denominational into being a denomination.  Some people in the Church of Christ will not even accept the non-denominational churches as being on the right track because they are not non-denominational the way we are.

Some of us have become more sectarian than the sectarianism of the denominations our movement was founded to free the church from.  We claim to have no book but the Bible as our guideline for fellowship and the faith, but we all too often place our interpretations of pet Scriptures or even beliefs that are not even expressed in Scripture as issues of fellowship.  In denominational churches, they typically have handbooks that describe what the church believes, what it requires to be a leader in the church, and how people in the church should live.  We have no handbook outside of Scripture, but all too often, we have erred in making unwritten, ever-changing handbooks, a handbook just as legalistic as those in the denominations, except we are not transparent about them and people do not know what is expected of them.

Our conviction at our church is to no longer be that way.  We want to be non-denominational, not anti-denominational.  There is a big difference.  Anti-denominational people think that people in denominations cannot be right with God because they are in a denomination.  Non-denominational means that we choose to be locally led, but we don’t hate denominations.  Through non-denominational lenses we do not see the man-made lines we have created.  Non-denominational people do not get hung up with denominational names and view each person as an individual, right with God based upon their own faithfulness to Him and not on their church affiliation. Condemning people in other churches and dividing over the names we use to call ourselves is so contrary to Scripture.

Paul actually had to deal with this in the Corinthian church.

I appeal to you, brothers, by the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, that all of you agree, and that there be no divisions among you, but that you be united in the same mind and the same judgment. For it has been reported to me by Chloe’s people that there is quarreling among you, my brothers. What I mean is that each one of you says, “I follow Paul,” or “I follow Apollos,” or “I follow Cephas,” or “I follow Christ.”  Is Christ divided?   [1 Cor 1:10-13 (ESV)].

Let’s put it in modern words.

For it has been reported to me by people on Facebook that there is quarreling among you, my brothers. What I mean is that each one of you says, “I follow Luther,” or “I follow Wesley,” or “I follow Calvin,” or “I follow Christ.” Is Christ divided?  [not 1 Cor 1:10-13 (ESV)].

I wish I was as faithful at following Jesus as Luther or as Wesley.  They were great Christians, faithful to the point of selflessness.  I understand why people thought they were on the right track on how to follow Jesus and desired to follow Jesus the way Luther or Wesley did.  And if we are honest with ourselves and study the history of the Restoration Movement, we follow Jesus in the same vein as Alexander Campbell followed Jesus, although we might not have ever read him, really don't even know about him, nor do we call ourselves Campbellites.  We should not be arrogant or look down on others who follow Jesus differently because they come from a different heritage; we come from a heritage that has taught us how to study Scriptures and follow Jesus the way we do.. 

Paul concluded his section on division in the early chapter in Corinthian by stating:

So let no one boast in men. For all things are yours, whether Paul or Apollos or Cephas or the world or life or death or the present or the future—all are yours, and you are Christ’s, and Christ is God’s.  [1 Cor 3:21-23 (ESV)].

All are Christ’s.  Even those who follow him like Paul, Apollos, Cephas, Luther, Calvin, or Wesley – Christ is not divided.  We need to stop quarreling among ourselves and with our brothers and sisters in Christ in other churches because bickering destroys our witness to the world.,  We need to have the heart of Jesus and figure out how we can serve one another.  In order to do this, we need to clearly understand the essentials that we are willing to divide over.

More tomorrow.

For further reading:
A Discussion on Essentials (Part One)

Being a Church Involved in the Community - A Discussion on Essentials (Part One)

The churches in Antwerp are working together on the Antwerp Community Youth Center, and things just keep moving along.  God keeps blessing it.  The donations keep coming in, we've been given a great location with great rent, and we were recently given a free pool table.  I’m excited about what can be done in this community by the churches working together for a common cause. 

For the longest time, the church I minister at was not involved in the community – our ministers would not be on the ministerial association, we would not participate with the other churches in the community Thanksgiving or Easter services, let alone bigger things like the school supply project, the kid’s clothes closet, or the youth center, but now we are involved with the our brothers and sisters in other churches, trying to follow Jesus as best as we possibly can.  We are only seeing the tip of the iceberg when we allow God to work among us.  God has more in store for us if we remain faithful to Him, surrender our lives, learn to hear His voice and listen to his leading, and live to bring Him glory.  Through it all we can live the best life possible and encounter God in ways we haven’t even imagined.

Like many churches, our church once had this misguided thought that we were the only ones right with God because our beliefs, all of them, were essential.  When we started changing, people left this church over our refusal to condemn the unbaptized, the name on the building, our modern worship style, where in the building we gathered, that we will not condemn casual drinking, my title as pastor, that we accept people in the other churches in the community as brothers and sisters, and other issues that I probably don’t even know about.  We once fostered an environment where maintaining the rituals of church attendance, being baptized, and participating in the Lord’s Supper on a weekly basis were what made a person right with God.  This was done to the exclusion of more significant matters.  I am so glad those days are behind us.  Let us be careful to never stumble back.

There is a disease that causes churches to lose focus on the major things and become obsessed with the minors.  This disease can permeate a church and cause us to isolate ourselves from other believers because of differences in beliefs and actions?  Obviously, we believe what we believe is right or we would not believe it.  Every other church believes what they believe is right or they would not believe it.  Both of us can not be right, but, more than likely, neither of us are right on all things.  The dilemma we face is to discern at what point should we accept another as a brother or sister.  What are the essentials to being a Christian?

More tomorrow.

Sunday Evening Service - What is essential?

When I was called to stay here at Antwerp, given the blessing of the leadership, and was making my rounds meeting with people in the church to talk with them about me being the minister at this church, I met with one individual. This individual presumed I was meeting with them to ask them to support the campus ministry I thought I was going to just a few weeks before. (Isn't it crazy how trying to follow God makes us appear wishy-washy at times?) [sorry for the somewhat bad grammar but I prefer to keep this gender neutral].

Anyway, when I sat down and began talking with this individual about staying in Antwerp to be the minister, they shared that they would not have been able to support me being a campus minister. This person's reason? Because I was not a supporter of the Sunday evening gathering. I did not attend it regularly, and I was on record as saying that it was no longer useful at meeting any pertinent goal.

So here I was, possibly going to minister to the most unreached segment of American culture, the college student, and this person would not have been willing to support that ministry because I did not participate regularly in the Sunday evening gathering.

What's important? Ministering to the most unreached people group in America or attendance at the Sunday evening gathering? There would be good reasons to not support me as a missionary to college students. One could think that I would not be capable of ministering to them. One could think that too much of the money would go to overhead in the organization I was going with. They could desire to send their money to another missionary. Or they could say that they just did not have the extra money to support a missionary at this time. There are legitimate reasons beyond those.

But I would say that one's view of the Sunday evening gathering should play no part in whether we support a missionary or not. I do not know the view on the Sunday evening gathering of any of the missionaries that we support. If we make our criteria go so far down the list of what a person believes as to include their view on Sunday evening gatherings as an essential, then I think we have made a list that is much too lengthy. What would not be an essential with such a lengthy list?

I could not verify it, but the following seems to be the only reason that I could find on the origins of the modern Sunday evening service. Sunday evening church was started in the late 1800s, early 1900s, because people wanted to sit under artificial light. It was a new novelty, and people were willing to come and listen to a Gospel message because of it. I would say, go ahead and start a Sunday evening service if it would provide a gate for people to hear the message of Jesus. Whatever we can do that is not compromising the Gospel and will allow us to share the message of Christ, we should do that. We are already doing those types of things all of the time; the question we need to ask is whether they are effective. If not, we need to discard them quickly.

Sunday evening service did not originally pop up, as many state, to give farmers who had to work in the morning an opportunity to go to church. Although that could have been the reason used in some communities to maintain the ritual. We no longer believe attendance in mass is necessary for one's salvation. If someone has to miss the morning service because of work, health, or some other means, it does not mean they cannot get plugged into a small group or a ministry. They can still be part of the fellowship in practices that actually provide fellowship.

Once a practice that is not an essential loses its effectiveness at drawing new people in, we should focus on the tried and true things, like bringing the Gospel to them through loving actions. Maybe inviting friends over to our house and sharing an evening of fun. Maybe going out and helping someone with the extra two hours we have saved. Maybe spend time playing games with one's family. Maybe spending that time in prayer. There are certain things that never lose effectiveness, and these should be the things we are primarily focused on.

Frank Viola quotes J.C. Ryle in the beginning of his book Pagan Christianity?: Exploring the Roots of Our Church Practices:

Experience supplies painful proof that traditions once called into being are first called useful, then they become necessary. At last they are too often made idols, and all must bow down to them or be punished.