Christ-Centred Christianity
– A Theology of Love
At the
heart of Christianity is of course the person of Christ, His life, His teachings
and His sacrificial suffering and death on a cross, His resurrection after
three days and His ascension to heaven.
While this looks simple and straight forward it is not necessarily
so.
Today you will find many people in
the world who claim to know Christ, who claim to hear His voice and speak or
act on His behalf and yet they all contradict one-another. Even among those who
seem genuine in their desire to follow Christ one can find numerous
contradictions in their understanding of Christ, of his teachings and with regard to other spiritual matters. We, therefore, need to make a continuous effort to have the mind of Christ, that is a Christ-centered mindset informed by His person and teachings.
This is what Jesus himself talks about in Matthew 28:18-20. After stating that He has all authority in heaven and on earth (and therefore is both Lord and Law-giver greater than Moses whom the Jews at the time were familiar with), He stresses that following Him is a matter of being taught to obey all He commanded. Note that He says "teach them to obey all I have commanded you". This is the key for a balanced theology. Whatever Christ commanded and emphasized in His teaching we should prioritize on, whatever He did not emphasize we should not either. He is both Lord, God and Law giver and He knows best. Theology should therefore be Christo-centric and not be based on historical or contemporary developments, ecclesiastical traditions or the so-called 'great' theologians of the past and/or present.
The Biblical Christ
We believe
that Christ can only be fully understood on the basis of His own
self-understanding and how His closest disciples understood Him. While we accept that the whole Christian
Bible reflects God’s self-disclosure to humankind, we agree with the writer to
the Hebrews that while God spoke in the past through prophets, He now speaks to
us in Christ. Christ is the full reflection, the full self-disclosure of God
and His enormous love for humankind and in fact all of creation (Heb. 1:1-4).
The Teachings of Christ and the Canon of
Scripture
We affirm
and appreciate that the whole canon of Holy Scripture reflects God’s ongoing
and progressive self-disclosure to humankind.
We also accept that this revelation was gradual, progressive and partial
until the full revelation of God in Christ.
We acknowledge also that Gods progressive revelation was not always
fully understood by Gods people throughout biblical history. It is only in Christ, in His person, His
lifestyle, His words, His actions that we see the Father in all His love and
Glory. Therefore we always interpret
Scripture from the perspective of the full revelation of God in Christ and
disregard anything which happened in biblical history which is in contrast with
the teachings and example set by Christ.
We appreciate that at the time with their limited knowledge the people
of God tried to live as well as possible in obedience to him but now the
fullness has come that which reflects partial understanding is no longer
relevant. For example the killing of
one’s enemies which was so common in the pre-Christian era has been firmly supplanted
by Christ’s insistence that we now should love our enemies. We find this
teaching in the Sermon on the Mount which also provides many similar examples
(Mt. 5:1-7:29). Jesus does not reject the Law of Moses with all its regulations
but in Matthew 22:36-40 points at the heart of the law and the prophetic
tradition of the Old Testament, its core philosophy: We ought to live a life of
love for God (Dt. 6:5; 10:12; 11:13), which is demonstrated in our relations
with other human beings by loving our neighbour as we love ourselves (Lev.
19:18).
The Law of Christ
The law of
Christ as summarized in Matthew 22:36-40 is both old and new at the same time. It is firmly rooted in the Law of Moses and
yet Jesus provides a very important new insight. The command to Love for God
and the command to love our neighbour as ourselves are not to be understood as
two separate commands, they are equal, and as such they are closely
linked. It is not enough to love God (or
claim to do so), Jesus stresses that the love for our neighbour is equal to the
command to love God. This law of Christ,
if properly understood, deals a death-blow to outward and self-centred religiosity. We may give people the impression that we
love God by being involved in all kinds of outward religious activity, but Jesus
points at the Good Samaritan and says ‘this is what it is all about’. The very first New Testament church under the
leadership of James understood that the religion God seeks is a matter of
looking after orphans and widows in their distress as this shows we are truly
breaking free from the selfish pollution of the world (James 1:27). In his parable about the sheep and the goats
in Matthew 25 Jesus also illustrates this when He says that whatever we do to
the most marginalised of all people, like the hungry or the prisoners, we do it
to Him. Love for God is shown in love
for our neighbour. If we claim to love
God and we do not show love for our neighbour the love of God cannot remain in
us and our faith, our religion is actually labelled as demonic in quality, it
is spiritually dead rather than life-giving (James 2:14-26).
Love and law
The apostle
Paul affirms that love for God entails living a life of love for our neighbour in
his treatise on the Gospel in his letter to the Romans when he states that love
is the fulfilment of the Law (Rom. 13:8-10).
In philosophical and judicial terms we can state that love for God and
our fellow human beings are the universal values or principles which we apply in
a particular manner in our specific context in time and space. Moses did this for example by insisting that
when you build a house, you ought to build a battlement or fence on the roof
(Dt. 22:8). Now this was a very sensible particular application of the
universal principle of acting out of love for one’s neighbour at a time that
people would socialise on the flat roofs and a misstep could have dire
consequences. Today however we are
likely to find ourselves in a context where we build houses in such way that we
cannot sit and socialise on the roof and so the particular law may be
irrelevant. However, the underlying
principle of the law is as relevant today as it was in the days of Moses,
namely love for one’s neighbour means that we make provisions for his or her
protection against harm. Modern
applications of this principle may be the wearing of a seatbelt in a car,
proper safe building regulations and so on.
Today in the context of a globalised world we may for example demand
international laws which provide safeguards against exploitation of the poor
and vulnerable by unscrupulous multi-nationals or measures to prevent corrupt
elites to siphon their countries wealth.
The Law of Christ
The law of
Christ, that is live a life of love for God by living a life of love for our
fellow humans, does not provide us a list of do’s and don’ts but requires us to
think through in every situation, what is the most loving thing I can do in
this situation towards God and my neighbour. This is what true spirituality is
all about. The evidence of the Spirit of God in our lives is demonstrated by
neighbourly love. This love is visible
in how we relate to other people, both believers and unbelievers, positively,
joyfully, peace-loving, pursuing the common good in faithfulness, gentleness
and self-control (Gal. 5:22-23).
Love and Denominationalism
The Catholic Church is the
invisible family of believers which consists of all true followers of Christ.
It is a church without human-made structures and yet can be found within every
Christian denomination. It is a church which
has only one representative here on earth, namely the Holy Spirit who indwells
every true believer. He is the one who
makes us part of Gods church, the body Christ, through spiritual re-birth and
by making us understand and apply in lifestyle, word and deed the truth of
Christ and His teachings as revealed in Holy Scripture. He helps us become more and more like Christ
in every area of life and every part of our existence. In this way each one of
us becomes a better witness for Christ in lifestyle, actions and speech. Christian denominations in contrast are
visible man-made institutions which came into being in a specific historical
and cultural context as Christians at that time felt it was the best way to
worship, fellowship and study the word of God.
We believe belonging to a specific Christian denomination is optional
and a matter of personal preference and not forbidden by scripture but also not
mandated by scripture. However, it would
be sinful if any denomination would understand itself as the only or best
representation of the body of Christ on earth, this would reflect a lack of
humility and sensitivity towards our fellow believers in other churches and as
such violate the core of Christ’s teaching: Love your neighbour as yourself!
Love in the Christian Congregation
While we
affirm that the Church as the body of Christ is invisible we equally affirm
that it becomes partially visible when Christians congregate and fellowship in
the name of Christ. The definition of a
Christian congregation in the teachings of Christ is very simple: Where two or
three are gathered in my name, I am in the midst of them (Mt 18:20). This of course does not mean that when we are
alone Christ is not with us: He promises that he will never leave us or forsake
us and be with us until the end. What it refers to is that in our interaction
as believers as we seek to serve, equip and assist one-another in becoming
better followers of Christ, Christ becomes visible in this. It is therefore crucial that we deliberately,
intentionally and actively seek to fellowship in some form with other
believers. God has given each one of us
different talents, resources, abilities, knowledge, both intellectual and
experiential , wisdom and other gifts of grace which we can and must employ in
Love to equip, help, assist and encourage one-another.
The apostle
Paul explains this in his treatise on the multi-cultural and multi-gifted
church in Ephesians when He stresses that it is in relationship with all the
saints that we can grasp the enormity of Christ’s love for us and experience
God’s fullness (Eph. 3:14-20). He then proceeds in the next chapter how out of
this relationship of love the various ministries and gifts Christ gave to us
can work together to help us grow in spiritual maturity as we communicate in
actions, attitude and words the truth of Christ in love. Out of the same love for God and one-another
comes forth a different lifestyle, a lifestyle that avoids harming one another
in word, deed or attitude. Instead we will be full with the Spirit of love. He
then concludes his treatise with stressing that if we stand firm in Christ, in
His strength, that is the strength of both his power and love, then together
we are able to withstand any attack of the enemy. Together we stand strong for
where two or three are gathered Christ is in our midst.
The law of Christ and Spiritual gifts
In his
discussion on spiritual gifts it is not without reason that Paul when
confronted with the Corinthian eagerness for excelling in spiritual gifts
devoted a whole chapter on godly love (1 Cor. 13) right in between the two
chapters on spiritual gifts. It is only when spiritual gifts are rooted,
embedded and employed in love for God and our neighbour that they will be truly
spiritual gifts. If these gifts are pursued outside the context of love for our
neighbour then they constitute nothing
more than an empty noise, an irrelevant and ungodly distraction from what is
truly spiritual (1 Cor. 13:1-2). This
does not only apply to spiritual gifts but also to testimonies, spiritual
experiences, religious activities, pamphlets, books and whatever other expression
of faith. All these are an irrelevant
distraction if they are not rooted, embedded and employed in love for God and
our neighbour.
It is from
the perspective of the law of Christ that Paul addresses the issue of spiritual
gifts. Love must be the motivation and
mutual edification in love must be the goal.
Consequently, it is important that we understand Paul’s emphasis on
speaking sensible words which benefit the community rather than speaking in
tongues in this perspective.
Paul is not
at all against speaking in tongues as he makes quite clear (1 Cor. 14:5) but
since the goal of meeting together is building one-another up in love speaking
in tongues is of less importance in the congregation of believers (1 Cor.
14:6). Speaking in tongues, that is
speaking a language only God can understand, is good if it is truly an
expression of our love for God, it will be a language of love and worship
between us and Him (1 Cor. 14:2).
However, from the perspective of the law of Christ it is better to excel
in prophecy, that is speaking words that people can understand (1 Cor.
14:18-19).
Practically
this means that everyone can speak in tongues. Everyone can learn to step out
courageously and express him or herself in a series of unintelligible sounds
and silences. The meaning of this language is given by what is in our
hearts. God sees our heart and if we
love and worship him and want to express it in tongues He understands and appreciates
it and will bless us. In a real sense
speaking in tongues does build us up as believers. There may be times that we cannot find the
words to express our joy, love and gratitude to God and then tongues are a
proper way of expressing this as God will understands our hearts. But as Paul rightly points out, in meeting
with other believers it is better that we express ourselves in 5 intelligible
words for the benefit of both god and our fellow believers than in a 1000
unintelligible words, unless we can translate it in which case it becomes
intelligible. Normally, however, tongues
are to be spoken at home and not so much in the congregation of believers
unless there is translations and even then not more than three should be
speaking in tongues otherwise our meetings would become rather unintelligible
(1 Cor. 14:27-28). It is nevertheless
much more important for the benefit of both our fellow believers and outsiders
that we all strife to prophecy (1 Cor. 14:39).
Gifts and Ministries
God has
given some people the gift to be prophets in the church and in society, but as
Paul states: We can all prophesy (1 Cor. 14:31.
This statement goes back to prophets who dreamed of the day that Gods
people would be a nation of prophets.
Through the coming of the Holy Spirit at Pentecost this became reality,
all could prophesy, men and women (Acts 2:18).
We therefore all have the ability to serve another through prophecy,
that is why Paul says chase after love and in so doing strife to excel in
spiritual gifts, particularly prophecy (1 Cor. 14:1). Prophecy in this sense is speaking the truth
of Christ into someone else’s life for mutual edification. It is not a magical affair or playing the
divine oracle, it is a logical outflow from Christ living in us as what comes
out of the mouth reflects what is in the heart (Mt. 15:18). Just as in the Old
Testament the prophets were firmly rooted in the teachings of the Law of Moses
and demonstrated to the people of God how the Law ought to be applied in
different contexts, we can all speak into each-others lives from the
perspective of the law of Christ, helping one-another to apply it well. Of course, just as in the Old Testament there
may be the occasional predictive element or a supernatural discernment of a
personal or societal situation, but the main emphasis in Scripture has always
been on forth-telling and not foretelling.
It is in this vein that even the writer of Revelations says: The
testimony of Christ is the spirit of prophecy.
This is crucial for the understanding of New Testament prophecy for it is
not so much a magical endeavour as that it is a matter of pointing people at
Christ and His teaching.
The New
Testament prophet is someone who in lifestyle, word and deed is a living
testimony of the teachings and the character of Christ. This is part of the work of the Holy Spirit
in us, he makes us witnesses in lifestyle, deeds and words in whatever context
He places us (Acts 1:8). Having said all
this, there will always be some among us who are more effective prophets, good
examples for us to follow and who have the ability to understand, apply and
boldly communicate God’s word very effectively in new situations giving
guidance, correction and edification. Those we can identify as having a
prophetic ministry or having been given as a prophet to God’s church. However
their special ability does not take away our own responsibility for being
prophets just as someone having the special ability of being an evangelist does
not take away our responsibility to be evangelists in our own right.
We do not
believe special meetings focused predominantly of healing or on evangelism or
on prophecy are the best way the gifts of the spirit should operate. Although not intentionally, such meetings
tend to focus people’s minds on one or more ‘spiritual specialists’ rather than on Christ and can foster ‘hero
worship’, lack of transparency and accountability and promote dependency. We also need to be aware that modern society
is characterised by the kind of individualism which dislikes being accountable
to authority as well as consumerism with its emphasis on instant gratification,
instant products and instant solutions.
However, learning and teaching one-another to obey the teachings of
Christ (Mt. 28:19-20) is a long term project which needs to take place within a
safe spiritual family environment.
Learning to follow Christ and teaching others to do so can only take
place in the context of close spiritual family relationships characterised by
love, care and trust. This is what a
Christian congregation should be like.
Godly family relationships are not built overnight but take time and
effort. It may be less glamorous and
exciting on the surface but it is infinitely more rewarding. Unfortunately many ministries tend to
distract God’s people from doing this very thing.
God may use
some in the church effectively in prayers for healing or deliverance but this
does not mean we should not pray for such things ourselves. Again others may have the gift of teaching
but this does not mean we should not teach ourselves, one-another or our
children the teachings of Christ, we are all called to go into the whole world,
making disciples of all nations and teaching them to obey all that Christ has
commanded us. So what we are saying in essence
is that special gifts and ministries that we may discern in the church simply
reflect the fact that some of us excel in certain areas and as such are a
blessing to all, in this way we are special gifts of love, charismata, from God
to His church. Nevertheless all of us
still have the responsibility to strife for the same spiritual gifts for the
mutual edification of all so that together we may grow in knowledge of Christ,
in love and in spiritual maturity.
Worship
Worship is
a way of honouring God. The kind of
worship God seeks is a matter of us living a godly lifestyle and having the
mind of Christ (Romans 12:1-2). Having the mind of Christ is having a mindset
informed by the person and teachings of Christ which in turn determines our behaviour. These are the kind of worshippers God is
looking for, those who worship in Spirit and truth. The Spirit of Christ characterised
by love (Gal. 5:22-23) and the truth of His person and teachings. As people who are full of the Spirit of
Christ we may express this when we meet together by singing psalms, hymns, and
spiritual songs, as we praise the Lord with all our hearts (Eph. 5:18-19).
Leadership in the congregation
Just as in
any family also in the family of Christ we need parental leadership. This is the task of parents in Christ. With
parents in Christ we mean those who have learned to walk in humility at the
hand of Jesus and have learned to live a life of truth and love in accordance
with the law of Christ. Their lives are
characterised by the fruit of the spirit (Gal. 5:22-26): God's Spirit makes us
loving, happy, peaceful, patient, kind, good, faithful, gentle, and
self-controlled. Such people have
clearly killed their selfish feelings and desires. They are not conceited or try make others
jealous by claiming to be better than they are or behaving self-righteously. Such people are even very loving and gentle
when someone makes a serious mistake or got trapped in sin because they know
what it means to be tempted and they offer a helping hand rather than
condemnation. Such people can
accommodate different opinions and even differences in doctrine as long as
these do not clearly militate against the person and teachings of Christ. They
have enough faith in the Spirit of Truth that they do not feel the need to
coerce others to conform to their ideas or opinions, but leave it in His
hands. Such a person does not need the
support or approval of others for his personal sense of identity and self-worth
but finds this in his or her loving relationship with Christ. These are the
signs of a spiritually mature person. Knowledge, education, experience,
popularity, personal charisma, loyalty to a certain doctrine or to human
leaders, spiritual gifts, talents and abilities are not signs of spiritual
maturity.
Leadership
in the congregation of believers is therefore first and foremost a matter of
spiritual maturity and other believers in Christ will be able to recognise this
in the lifestyle, deeds and speech of the person. Such a person can be asked to take upon him
or herself the spiritual responsibility of nurturing other believers in a
specific congregation. At that moment
he/she becomes an elder of the church.
Some congregations limit the positional leadership in a congregation as
elder to men only while others allow women too. Other congregations also
recognise that women can be just as mature and exemplary in the faith as men
but prefer to use the word deaconess (servant) to describe her position. It is our opinion that titles do not really
matter, what matters is spiritual maturity and taking the responsibility of
teaching and helping others to be better followers of Christ. It is therefore up to the congregations to
find out what kind of titles they want to employ or what form of leadership
works best for them. We believe plural
leadership in the church is the most preferable way and is mostly reflected in
the New Testament but some congregations may prefer to employ one resident
pastor-teacher, others may opt for other forms of organization. As long as the
goal of nurturing believers to follow Christ by teaching and example is met,
there is freedom in the way congregations like to organise ourselves.
Christian
leadership is first and foremost setting an example in faith, humility,
servant-hood and love and not a matter of position or control. Unfortunately in some congregations some are
clearly parents in Christ and are recognised as such by the congregation but
not by less spiritual leaders who have managed to get in a position of
power. Such parents may be content to
serve Christ in an informal elder’s role by teaching and encouraging less
mature believers how to follow Christ in every aspect of life. Only when they are prevented from doing so it
is better for them to move to another congregation.
Order and discipline
Order and discipline in the congregation is the responsibility of the
elders, or spiritual parents in the congregation. First and foremost they need to create and
maintain a safe spiritual environment where believers can interact and relate
to one-another without fear of rejection or condemnation. Also they need to create and maintain an
environment where when we come together everyone has a chance to share,
participate, and have his or her input (1 Cor. 14:26). The list provided by Paul in his letter to
the Corinthians is not exhaustive and is simply an illustration of how we can
contribute to mutual edification in the learning environment of the
congregational meetings. The one may
share a vision, the other may explain a portion of scripture, another person
may propose a song or teach a new song, another may share a poem, a testimony
or anything else which may edify the rest of the congregation. Some people, especially those with a prophetic
or teaching ministry may tend to dominate meetings unwillingly hence Paul
instructions that of the prophets only two or three should speak during a
meeting. This should not be taken as law but as a guideline for maintain order
on the one hand and also to facilitate an environment where other voices can be
heard to and not just the dominant few.
Nevertheless in the meetings of the congregation or in day to day life
we may find that a brother or sister makes a mistake or has fallen into sin.
Jesus gives us some guidelines how the Law of Love can be applied in such a
situation in Matthew 18:15-35. If we see
that someone has sinned against us, either against us individually or in
general, love demands that we correct the person gently, lovingly, in a spirit
of forgiveness, patience and understanding, helping the other to carry his or
her burden and overcome his or her weakness (Gal. 6:1-2). If the person repents and sincerely tries to
better his or her life, the matter is resolved and we have the obligation before
God to protect that person’s reputation by not breaking confidence and talking
to others about it. This again is in
line with living in accordance with the Law of Christ.
If a person is unable to see his or her wrong due to ignorance, bad
habits, stubbornness, folly or due to pain, confusion or a problematic
background, we should ask another godly person to come with us and talk to the
one who is unrepentant. Again we have to
approach the person gently, lovingly, in a spirit of forgiveness, patience and
understanding and with a willingness to help them share and overcome their
burden. If the person listens and
repents the matter is resolved and both of us have the obligation before God to
protect that person’s reputation by not breaking confidence and talking to
others about it.
However, there may be some cases where someone refuses to listen
repeatedly. In such a case we must tell
the believers in our congregation although this is not a law and we may try one
or more in-between steps such as involving all the elders and/or deacons or involve
someone who has much experience with people trapped in such a sin. However, if everything fails to help a person
come to his or her senses we may have to inform the whole congregation. Again this must be done in a spirit of caring
love and concern and should be a last resort as it affects a person’s
reputation and can have a big emotional impact.
We must first exhaust all more discrete possibilities.
Many of us have witnessed how informally or formally people have been
publicly exposed to shame and humiliation in the name of church discipline
while more discrete methods would have sufficed. Usually such things are done out of legalism
or a desire to show power and control rather than gentle caring love. Others have been humiliated, tried, condemned
and punished in the public arena through gossip and slander, often thinly
disguised with a semblance of concern but real concern, sadness, compassion and
practical caring love is absent. Such
things cause enormous pain and hurt among gods people. Among God’s beloved, saved by grace and His
compassion and love, things should not be so.
However, there are some cases where we have to inform the whole
congregation. However, the aim should not be to condemn the person involved but
the aim should be restoration. The
congregation should be encouraged to encourage the person to change his or her
ways. This should be done in love, out of genuine compassion and care and not
out of a desire to meddle and certainly not in a spirit of settling scores,
vengeance, anger or condemnation. We
must always keep in mind that one day we ourselves may one day fall in a trap
set by Satan. Therefore we must plead
earnestly with the person in all humility and love to change his or her ways
and be willing to take the time to help them in any way we can. The affected person needs to be convinced by
our actions and speech that there is a loving community ready to help him or
her through his or her problems.
In some very extreme circumstances even the congregation fails to convince
a person to change his or her ways. This
is a very sad scenario but it does occur. We may think of the person who
continued to live in adultery with his father’s wife in the congregation in
Corinth (1 Cor. 5:1-12). In such a case love demands that we tell the person he
or she is no longer welcome in the church until he or she is ready to change
his or her ways. We expel the person
from the family of God under Christ’s command into the world under Satan’s command. This is something not do be decided lightly
but if we do so we must keep the aim in mind.
The aim is not to meet our punishment, the aim should be that the
person’s spiritual life should be saved, even if being expelled from the
community of believers means physical hardship.
If a person repents we should welcome him or her back in the community
with joy and without any judgement, self-righteous attitude or
condemnation. We should then not spare
any effort to make it clear that they are totally forgiven and surround them
with comfort and love (2 Cor. 2:5-11).
In this manner we fulfil the law of Christ and can rejoice together with
God and the angels in heaven that someone who was lost has been found again.
Dealing with ‘difficult’ people
We need to
treat all people as precious and valuable people loved by God and who have been
entrusted by God to us, some for a short time and others maybe for the rest of
our lives. This obligation does not change when the people in our lives do
something wrong, or we think they have done something wrong. Unfortunately
within our families, churches and interaction with people our sinful human
nature tends to make us assume that someone is guilty until proven
innocent. As a result of this when we deal
with rumours, gossip, pre-conceived ideas, accusations and allegations made
against our fellow believers, we often take the side of The Accuser, rather
than the side of the Righteous Judge who looks at what is in the heart. We must recognise in humility that our
ability to properly and rightly interpret situations and people’s actions is very
limited. After all what do we really
know about a person’s background, inner struggles, traumatic life experiences,
his or her fears or shattered hopes/dreams.
We must therefore be very hesitant in jumping to negative conclusions,
especially when we do not understand someone’s actions or when we are in
disagreement. To proudly assume that we understand the situation usually makes
us worsen the situation. Such a simplistic approach fails to do justice to the
person and shows a lack of appreciation for the complexity of human beings and
human relations. We are never to take an
exalted position from where we judge and approach others. Even in addressing in what we perceive as
wrong, sinful or misguided we must follow scripture and in humility consider the
other as better than ourselves (Phil. 2:3) and look beyond our own interests
and consider the interest of the other (Phil. 2:4). We must also avoid any form of legalism which
judges harshly on the basis of written or unwritten rules and regulations. In
contrast, love is patient, it is kind, it approaches people with trust rather
than with suspicion, it is not easily angered or irritates and consciously
chooses to take the route of a positive, forgiving and constructive approach (1
Cor. 13:4-7). Unfortunately, as
Christians we often fail to follow the law of Christ when confronted with sin, emotional
turmoil, accusations, misunderstandings, traumatic experiences and so on. The sad saying that the Christian community
is the only army that further hurts its wounded unfortunately does have a lot
of truth in it. In the way we who claim
to follow Christ’s example deal with those who have fallen into sin or who have
made an error, we often show less justice than an earthly court. Although we identify with Christ’s army of truth
and love, we often demonstrate less brotherly love, forgiveness and care than
comrades do in an earthly army. Partly
this may be due to our mistaken view that the wounded are those who we believe have
been sinned against or who we believe have been mistreated. However, Biblically
speaking, those who have sinned or fallen into error are actually wounded even
more. Satan has managed to penetrate their armour, infiltrate their thoughts,
tripped them and cast them down. We should not be the first ones to stone the
alleged perpetrators or wrong doers, we should be in the forefront of showing
love, care, concern and bring healing and restoration. Too often we abandon the fallen, trample on
the wounded, withdraw our support and assistance and leave them to rot on the
battlefield at the mercy of evil spiritual vultures. This is not in accordance
with the love of Christ, it is hypocrisy and a terrible shame which has deeply
hurt the body of Christ. The apostle
Paul reminds us in Galatians 6 that if someone is trapped by sin, those who are
spiritual (that is full of the fruit of the spirit: love in its proper form –
Gal. 5:22-23) should restore the offender gently in the full knowledge that we ourselves
may be tempted to sin one day also (Gal. 6:1).
In this manner we must carry each other’s burdens and so doing fulfil
Christ’s law of love (Gal. 6:2).
However,
just as money should not become an idol in our lives, so people should not
become idols in our lives. While it is
good to seek to please people and maintain good relationships with everyone, it
is always more important to first please God.
Practically this means that we must never obey people more than God. We can
also never allow any people to persistently abuse or exploit us as God does not
want his beloved children to be treated as such. We are a temple of God’s
spirit and we have a responsibility to protect His property and make sure it is
treated well. This includes our minds and bodies. If we allow people or
man-made systems and structures to abuse or exploit us to the point that we
suffer mentally or psychologically or it negatively affects our bodies then we
must stand up for our rights. In the
same way if we see other human beings abused and exploited we should stand up
for their rights as well. However, while
standing up for our rights and/or those of others we must do so in a manner
that does not violate the Law of Christ.
We must point out the truth in love and call people to repent, to change
their wrong ways. If this fails we may have to break our relationship with
those who abuse us and move to a place or situation which is better for us. In the same way we ourselves must be careful
not to support or assist any oppressive system which makes other people suffer.
Obedience to God is more important than obedience to humankind. Many evils in the world have been made
possible by those who simply did their duties without ever reflecting on the
fact that by doing their duty in accordance with the letter of the law they
were actually perpetuating evil.
Doctrinal differences
Wherever there are two or more people gathered in a place there will be
differences of opinion, including differences of opinion about how a Bible text
should be interpreted or applied. There
is nothing wrong with this; in fact, it can be a greatly enriching experience
because if something is viewed from several angles one actually gets a better
picture. The guiding principle in any
difference of opinion must be the Law of Christ, whether it is about baptism,
Israel, end-times, mystical experiences, spiritual warfare, miracles, books or
treatise written by other Christians, sermons, teachings or anything else. Searching for truth and trying to come to a
common understanding is a healthy process and is part of being a good disciple
of Christ, but it should happen in a spirit of love, humility, gentleness and
mutual respect (Ph. 2:1—3). Arguing,
backbiting, emotional outbursts, losing one’s temper, personal attacks,
insults, word twisting, lying, deceit, forming camps, jealousy, insults and
anything else that may harm our brother or sister in Christ is contrary to the
Law of Christ and therefore unspiritual.
We may never in pursuit of a lesser truth violate the central truth of
the Law of Christ! We must be united in
the centrality of Christ, the Law of Christ and his explicit teachings as well
as His atoning death on the cross, his resurrection and ascension. In all other
matters we must allow for diversity.
Paul in his instructions to the Philippians allowed for this when he
stated ‘And if any of you think differently, God will make it clear to you’,
(Phil. 3:15). Even though Paul was sure
of the truth of what he was writing, he still allowed for differences of
opinion and trusted God to make things clear to them as time went on. We must learn to trust God and be patient for
Him to work in people’s hearts and minds.
We must allow people time to learn and grow without condemnation.
Consider the whole controversy in 1 Corinthians 8 about food sacrificed to
idols. Paul makes it very clear that the spiritually strong ought to be patient
and forbearing with those who still struggle in certain areas and we must avoid
hurting their feelings (1 Cor. 8:7-13). This argument is based on the Law of
Christ! Paul does the same in Romans 14:1-12 when he tells us not to criticize and
look down upon those who think differently from us or who are still weak in some
areas. In fact he then tells us to be
very considerate in the presence of the weak and not do anything that disturbs
them because that would be violating Christ’s rule of love (Rom. 14:13-23). This means that we will not serve pork when
interacting with a seventh-day Adventist or drink wine in the presence of a
Southern Baptist or ridicule infant baptism when being with Reformed friends or
make fun of Israel-pilgrimages in the presence of dispensationalists. Doing such things violates the Law of Christ. We may differ in opinion, we may write and
talk about these differences, but it should be done respectfully and lovingly.
(To be continued .... any questions, comments and contributions can be send to Dr. Erwin van der Meer: africaoutreach@gmail.com)
