“Authentic Faith: Letting God Shine Through Our Unity”

Corey Fields preaching

June 24, 2007

[…] = various readings from doctrinal statements; text not included.

Galatians 3:26-29; Ephesians 4:2-6

            If someone were to ask you, “What do you drive?” and you responded, “A car,” that doesn’t really tell you a lot.  Or if someone were to ask you, “What are you chewing on?” and you responded, “Food,” that doesn’t really tell a lot.  Now imagine that someone asks you, “What is your religion?” and you answer, “Christian.”  These days, the answer of “Christian” tells people next to nothing.  It tells people about as much as saying “I drive a car” or “I’m eating food.”  Just think about how many “versions” of Christianity are out there today.  Denominations, cultures, etc.

            Let’s take a quick look.  Let’s start with Jesus.  If you were to ask the different Christian denominations “Who is Jesus?” here are some things you might read. […].  So far, we’re all helping make it clear as mud.  What about the Holy Spirit?  […].   Then of course you get into discussions of the Trinity, none of which I will read because they are all completely unintelligible.  One thing that doesn’t help is that we’re not all reading from the exact same Bible.  The Protestant Bible has 66 books, Catholic Bibles have 73 books as well as longer versions of Esther and Daniel.  Orthodox Bibles have 78 books depending on whether you include 4 Maccabees in the appendix and the book of 3 Esdras that is found in Slavonic Bibles of the Russian Orthodox Church.  Then of course you have the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints who read from the Protestant Bible in the King James Version, but also from “The Book of Mormon,” “Doctrines & Covenants,” and “The Pearl of Great Price.”  Jehovah’s Witnesses read from an altered version of the Protestant Bible.  And the funny thing is that you can talk to Protestants who think it’s so awful that Catholics and Orthodox have additional books in their Bibles, when in fact you have to remember that there are many Protestant groups who have taken it upon themselves to delete 37 books from our canon to print Bibles that only have the New Testament, Psalms, and Proverbs.  (But that’s just a side note).  

Continuing on…the Catholic church uses many creeds and confessions but focus primarily on the Nicene Creed.  The Lutheran Church uses the Apostles' Creed, Nicene Creed, Athanasian Creed, Augsburg Confession, and the Formula of Concord.  Baptists do not use creeds…in theory.  Baptists, Methodists and others claim to draw their doctrine from scripture alone; other denominations point to “apostolic tradition” and “historic confessions of the church” in addition to scripture, and the Catholic Church has an entire catechism.  Several churches have priests, bishops, and some form of hierarchical leadership.  The Catholic Church believes in the apostolic succession of the papacy (in normal language, that means that the apostle Peter was the first “pope” and there has been a direct family line since then).  The Baptist church believes in the priesthood of all believers.  Many churches have sacraments, a few others have ordinances.  Views on the Eucharist range from transubstantiation – Christ is somehow present in the elements and it can only be properly handled by a priest – all the way down to it being merely a symbol that anyone can lead or participate in.  All churches practice some form of Baptism but it carries a completely different meaning depending on which church you’re in, and it’s done in different ways and at different points in a person’s life.  Some churches, in worship, use a standard, organized script, and other churches have completely free and flexible worship services where the leaders just do what they feel the Spirit leading them to do.  You also have to think internationally.  For example, on the eastern coast of South Africa there is a people-group known as Zulu Christians. [brief description].

We could go on and on.  I’ve only scratched the surface of denominational differences within Christianity.  And if your head isn’t already spinning, think now about the differences that exist just within the Baptist denomination.  This church supports the ordination of women; First Southern Baptist Church at 17^th & Gage does not.  Some Baptist churches have charismatic worship, others are very subdued.  Baptist churches also differ in things like the role and authority of the pastor, the inerrancy of scripture, philosophy of missionary work, the nature and permissibility of homosexual orientation, and the practice of speaking in tongues.  I could go on and on.  Is it any wonder that unbelievers aren’t interested?

And you know what’s so great?  You may be very surprised by this….but…we all think we’re right.

One of the books I read for my Old Testament classes in seminary started with a definition of theology in the introduction of the book.  It was a book written by William Holliday, and here’s what he says about theology:  “Studying theology is learning how to say the least wrong thing about God.  All God-language is wrong to some degree.  The trick is to reduce the wrongness to a minimum.”  We have to decide if we really, truly believe verses like Isaiah 55:8-9. “For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways," declares the LORD. "As the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways and my thoughts than your thoughts.”

  If we really believe that’s true, if we really believe that God is far above our understanding and intelligence, then it would seem that that would call for a little humility in our theology.  I think we need to think about it this way.  When it comes to theology…when it comes to God…no one is right.  We can’t be “right” when it comes to God, we can only hope to be “less wrong.”

It’s hard to imagine how much could be resolved or at least laid aside among Christians if we just realized that we can believe we’re right without telling everyone else they’re wrong.  We can believe we’re right, and yet still assert that God is the final authority and we ultimately don’t know.  It’s OK to believe we’re right.  Actually, it’s normal that we believe we’re right.  There’s a school of thought out there (you hear this a lot from young people in college) that it’s closed-minded to have convictions.  The thinking goes that it’s not good to have strong convictions, and that everyone should be completely open-minded and receptive to everything.  There is a distorted version of postmodern thought out there that confuses open-mindedness with empty-mindedness.  We’re supposed to be open-minded, but that doesn’t mean we don’t have convictions, so let’s set that aside right away.  Everyone has beliefs and convictions.  It’s a conviction to say that you shouldn’t have convictions.  But we can believe we’re right…we can believe we’re less wrong…without telling others that they are wrong.  We can believe we’re right while still asserting that God gets the final word, and that His understanding is far above mine.  It’s normal and healthy to believe we’re right.  It’s un-Christ-like to tell other people they’re wrong.

As a Baptist, I believe I’m less wrong about baptism. As a Baptist, I believe that baptism should take place only when someone is old enough to make their own personal decision to follow Jesus Christ.  But that doesn’t mean I go around criticizing or debunking other beliefs about baptism.  I ultimately leave it up to God.  As a Baptist, I believe I’m less wrong about the priesthood.  As a Baptist, I believe that every single believer is called to be a minister and a priest in this world.  But that doesn’t mean that I go around criticizing or debunking other beliefs about the priesthood.  I ultimately leave it up to God.  As a Baptist, I believe I’m right that each individual church should be autonomous and free, but I don’t go around criticizing churches that have a hierarchy, because the Church belongs to God, not me.  As a Christian, I believe that salvation comes only through Christ.  I preach Christ and Him crucified.  I quote John 14:6:  “Jesus said, ‘I am the way, the truth, and the life.  No one comes to the Father except through me.’”  I believe I’m right.  But I don’t go around claiming to know who’s in and who’s out…who goes to heaven, and who goes to hell.  And the minute I start to do that, I prove that I really don’t believe John 14:6, because Jesus said that HE is the way the truth and the life…HE is the final authority, HE is the final decider.  Not me.  Not the church.  Not Muslims, not Hindus, not Buddhists, not Jews, not Christians…JESUS is the way the truth and the life…HE is the final authority, HE decides.  That’s what John 14:6 says.

Before Jesus was ever crucified, He said a prayer for all of us.  His prayer is recorded in John 17:20- 23.  “My prayer is not for them alone. I pray also for those who will believe in me through their message, that all of them may be one, Father, just as you are in me and I am in you. May they also be in us so that the world may believe that you have sent me. I have given them the glory that you gave me, that they may be one as we are one: I in them and you in me.  May they be brought to complete unity to let the world know that you sent me and have loved them even as you have loved me.”

When will his prayer be answered?  Folks, I hate to disappoint, but we will never see the day that all Christians are unified by doctrine…by what we believe about certain things, whether big or small.  But, that’s actually OK, because in my reading of Jesus in the gospels, that’s not how he wanted or expected us to be unified anyway.  Jesus stated clearly how we are to be unified in a story that’s recorded in Matthew 22:34-40.  Hearing that Jesus had silenced the Sadducees, the Pharisees got together. One of them, an expert in the law, tested him with this question: "Teacher, which is the greatest commandment in the Law?" Jesus replied: " 'Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.' This is the first and greatest commandment. And the second is like it: 'Love your neighbor as yourself.' All the Law and the Prophets hang on these two commandments."

  You see, the 1^st century Jewish people were a lot like us in one sense.  There were lots of doctrines, lots of teachings, lots of beliefs.  And the leaders who came to Jesus wanted him to make a doctrinal declaration.  They wanted Jesus to pick loyalties.  They wanted to corner Jesus into one of the existing camps – “denominations.”  But he wouldn’t let them.  Jesus said, you are to be united in love.  When in doubt, love.  Love God, love people.

[Read from original scripture passages again].  God shines through when we are unified.  One drop of water by itself just falls to the ground and is dried up.  But when many drops of water come together, you get a beautiful river; every drop of water, making one thing, rushing to the same place.  One color by itself isn’t very impressive, but when they all come together, we might call it a painting or a rainbow.  One tree by itself isn’t very impressive, but put them all together and we might call it a forest.  One Christian can’t do very much, but put us all together, and you might just call it the very presence of God.

I don’t get the last word this morning.  I’m going to let scripture have the last word.  [1 Corinthians 13].