Thursday, January 22, 2015
There are things that matter more than others...
I had quite a bit of good feedback and comments from my blog on things to consider when Christians disagree. The following question really caught my attention.
What about being worried when people who disagree with the official line are publicly condemned to hell?
I do believe churches should have a clear understanding of what their core convictions are. These are those beliefs that are not to be compromised. They need to be clearly communicated. I suppose that is the "official" line. We have them at Southern Hills.
Where I am an elder we welcome people to engage us over our core beliefs. We love having that discussion. But we are clear. If you do not subscribe to our core convictions, you will not be considered part of our fellowship. You are certainly welcome to attend, but you will be allowed to teach or do ministry.
If you disagree with our core convictions, we are probably not the church for you. If you feel the need to try and change our core convictions, you will be asked to leave. We do not tolerate false teachers.
Which is why churches better be sure their core convictions are easily shown in Scripture. If you cannot defend your core convictions, something is wrong. When God uses terms like "first importance", "greatest", "saved," etc., we believe those are terms that reflect beliefs that cannot be compromised.
But we do not condemn people to hell. Not our job. God is the judge. We are willing to stand on our convictions. At the same time, we do not believe that we decide who is saved. Again, God's business. So when we talk about heaven or hell we want to be standing solidly on what God says.
So what if you do not agree with the core convictions of your church?
If I attend a church that has core convictions I cannot support, that is not the church for me. It may be that a church does not teach what I believe to be core. It may be that they bind things as core that I do believe are core in Scripture.
So in practical terms where I worship, we have a small set of core convictions that we all believe and practice. And we have a wide variety of opinions on other things involving church life, worship, and organization that are not core.
So we study lots. We have elders (spiritual shepherds) that decide the practices of our local fellowship. We don't worry about the church down the street. Not our job. And everyone in our flock does not agree on every decision.
But we stick together because we stake our lives on the truth that Jesus died, was buried, and was raised from the dead. We all shared in that gospel by being baptized. We participate together in that gospel by sharing communion meals, reminding us and the world of what we believe about Jesus. And we commit that our highest calling is to love God and to love our neighbor. This unites us above all else.
Our core.
For us, that puts everything else in perspective.
Remove these and we are not being true to what we believe God clearly says matters most. Add a bunch to these and we are making things matter more than God said.
These are a few thoughts sparked by a good question.
So God help us to unite on what you say matters. Help us to not shatter that unity over anything else.
What about being worried when people who disagree with the official line are publicly condemned to hell?
I do believe churches should have a clear understanding of what their core convictions are. These are those beliefs that are not to be compromised. They need to be clearly communicated. I suppose that is the "official" line. We have them at Southern Hills.
Where I am an elder we welcome people to engage us over our core beliefs. We love having that discussion. But we are clear. If you do not subscribe to our core convictions, you will not be considered part of our fellowship. You are certainly welcome to attend, but you will be allowed to teach or do ministry.
If you disagree with our core convictions, we are probably not the church for you. If you feel the need to try and change our core convictions, you will be asked to leave. We do not tolerate false teachers.
Which is why churches better be sure their core convictions are easily shown in Scripture. If you cannot defend your core convictions, something is wrong. When God uses terms like "first importance", "greatest", "saved," etc., we believe those are terms that reflect beliefs that cannot be compromised.
But we do not condemn people to hell. Not our job. God is the judge. We are willing to stand on our convictions. At the same time, we do not believe that we decide who is saved. Again, God's business. So when we talk about heaven or hell we want to be standing solidly on what God says.
So what if you do not agree with the core convictions of your church?
If I attend a church that has core convictions I cannot support, that is not the church for me. It may be that a church does not teach what I believe to be core. It may be that they bind things as core that I do believe are core in Scripture.
So in practical terms where I worship, we have a small set of core convictions that we all believe and practice. And we have a wide variety of opinions on other things involving church life, worship, and organization that are not core.
So we study lots. We have elders (spiritual shepherds) that decide the practices of our local fellowship. We don't worry about the church down the street. Not our job. And everyone in our flock does not agree on every decision.
But we stick together because we stake our lives on the truth that Jesus died, was buried, and was raised from the dead. We all shared in that gospel by being baptized. We participate together in that gospel by sharing communion meals, reminding us and the world of what we believe about Jesus. And we commit that our highest calling is to love God and to love our neighbor. This unites us above all else.
Our core.
For us, that puts everything else in perspective.
Remove these and we are not being true to what we believe God clearly says matters most. Add a bunch to these and we are making things matter more than God said.
These are a few thoughts sparked by a good question.
So God help us to unite on what you say matters. Help us to not shatter that unity over anything else.
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Thanks for responding. It was not a disagreement over the core parts of the faith. That was never an issue. The issue was that those who use IM and/or let women in the pulpit aren't going to hell over it was more than enough to get someone sent to hell. Basically, I had to believe that using IM and/or letting women in the pulpit would get everyone sent to hell who participated, and if I didn't, I would go to hell.
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# posted by 
: 4:15 PM PST
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