Winsome Conviction

Disagreeing Without Dividing the Church

Tim Muehlhoff, Richard Langer

• Publisher: IVP
• Year: 2020
• ISBN:
  9780830848003
• Topic: Theologie & Religion
• Subtopic: Christliche Kirche

Christianity Today Book of the Year award of MeritWe generally assume that those sitting around us in church share our beliefs. But when our personal convictions are contested by fellow Christians, everything changes. We feel attacked from behind. When other Christians doubt or deny our convictions, we don't experience it as a mere difference of opinion, but as a violation of an unspoken agreement.Tim Muehlhoff and Rick Langer offer a guide to help Christians navigate disagreements with one another. In today's polarized context, Christians often have committed, biblical rationales for very different positions. How do we discern between core biblical convictions and secondary issues? How do we cultivate better understanding and compassion for those we disagree with? Muehlhoff and Langer provide lessons from conflict theory and church history on how to avoid the dangers of groupthink and how to negotiate differing biblical convictions to avoid church splits and repair interpersonal ruptures.Christian unity is possible. Discover how we can navigate differences by speaking in both truth and love.

SECTION II

COMMUNICATING CONVICTIONS

4

DOES DIVISION HAVE TO BE DIVISIVE?

To this point, we have been answering two questions: How should we cultivate personal convictions, and how should we live together when they differ? The key to answering both of these questions is understanding that we use the word convictions to cover a spectrum ranging from confessional beliefs that define the faith to guidelines for conduct that help us express the faith in tangible deeds. We should expect agreement at the level of confessional beliefs, but we should not expect universal agreement when it comes to guidelines for conduct. Indeed, Romans 14 assumes that believers will express their commitment to Christ by following various guidelines for conduct and that we should respect each other’s freedom to do this. This does not mean that we lack convictions or simply respond to differing convictions by saying, “Whatever.” Rather, we have deep convictions that are thoughtfully developed and prayerfully refined. Other members of the body of Christ do not need to agree with our personal convictions, but they should respect them even as we respect theirs.

So far, so good.

However, a looming question remains unaddressed. Our discussion of Romans 14 associated personal convictions with “disputable matters” but acknowledged that some things are not disputable matters. Some things are absolutes that all Christians should agree upon. What happens when we disagree about absolutes? Is division permissible? And what about dividing fellowship when one group thinks an issue is an absolute and another group does not? And even with disputable matters, are these disputes ever of such a nature that we could or should divide fellowship?

These are difficult questions. This chapter will argue that there are times when it is permissible and prudent for Christians to divide fellowship, not only in disagreements about absolutes but also in the case of certain disputable matters. In most cases Christian unity demands that we live together with our differing convictions, but there are times when the best way to preserve Christian unity is by parting ways.

UNITY AND DIVISION

Division because of false teaching. To begin with the most obvious cases, consider false teachers who deny the confessional beliefs that define Christianity. Should we disfellowship a false teacher or divide a church in which some members are committed to following a false teacher?

In the New Testament the answer appears to be “Yes!” Truth is important. Merely believing a proposition does not guarantee the proposition is true. Our reasoning is often flawed and always imperfect, and it is easy for us to have false beliefs. Perhaps even more significant is that the truth of our beliefs matter. Truth leads to life; falsehood leads to death. Jesus is the way and the truth and the life while Satan is the father of lies, and following his lies leads us on the path of destruction.

These simple facts go a long way to explaining the harsh words one finds in the New Testament for false teaching. False teachers are not just a cognitive problem because they spread false beliefs, they are a peril to our very souls. False teaching confounds our minds with error even as it corrupts our souls with polluted desires and misplaced affections. For this reason, the New Testament saves some of its strongest language for condemning false teachers. Jesus likens false teachers to ravenous wolves dressed up like innocent sheep and cautions his followers to beware (Mt 7:15). He warns that the end times will be marked by an increase in false teaching and strongly warns against being deceived and led astray (Mt 24:11, 24). Paul offers similar condemnations, identifying false teachers by name (1 Tim 1:20; 2 Tim 4:14) and calling them out for punishment. In 2 Peter 2, Peter offers lengthy, specific, and emphatic condemnations of false teaching. He notes that false prophets expound false doctrinal beliefs, even denying Jesus himself (v. 1) but they also follow their own sensuality or greed and thereby bring shame upon the “way of truth” (v. 2). Later in the chapter, they are said to indulge in the lust of defiling passions and despise authority (v. 10). Their passions lead them both into sexual immorality and into greed and gain from wrongdoing (vv. 14-15). False teachers promise freedom but offer only bondage and destruction (v. 19). John also condemns false teachers in strong language. He sees false teaching manifest by moral failure—people who profess to know Christ but fail to keep his commandments (1 Jn 2:4-6). He is also concerned with doctrinal failure—people denying the humanity of Christ (1 Jn 4:2; 2 Jn 7) and the deity of Christ (1 Jn 2:22-23). Finally, he shares Peter’s concern of a false teacher rejecting authority (3 Jn 9).

The particular doctrinal errors of false teachers in the New Testament vary, but they are always profound and fundamental. Some false teachers deny the resurrection, and some deny the incarnation. The denial of these historical aspects of the faith lead to corresponding denials of either the deity or the humanity of Christ. Some false teachers argue that sins of the body don’t matter, while other false teachers are greedy for financial gain. In certain cases, a specific heretical belief is not noted but a general tendency to stir up controversy and dissension is (Titus 3:9-11). In general, false teachers reject other authorities and operate as authorities unto themselves.

The gravity of these errors is such that separation or limitation of fellowship is either mandated, implied, or permitted in the hope that even worse final judgment might be averted. False teachers are to be warned once or twice and then we are to have nothing more to do with them (Titus 3:9-11). Paul wants them handed over to Satan that they may learn not to blaspheme (1 Tim 1:20). He refers to other false teachers as dogs and evildoers (Phil 3:2) and as people whose god is their bellies, who glory in their shame (Phil 3:19). These are people who are to be marked and avoided, even as those who follow Paul’s teaching are to be noted and followed as good examples (Phil 3:17). Peter states that the gloom of utter darkness has been reserved for them (2 Pet 2:17) and strongly cautions his hearers to avoid these teachers (2 Pet 2:19-21; 3:17). John identifies these teachers for his readers so that they will not extend hospitality to them (2 Jn 10-11).

In summary, the New Testament makes clear that: (1) there are false teachers who try to make their way into faithful Christian fellowships, (2) false teaching corrupts both mind and body and leads to conduct that brings shame upon the church, and (3) the church should distance herself from these teachers either by avoiding them if they are outside the church or by removing them from fellowship if they are within the church. Clearly in these cases, there is a place for division. Indeed, false teaching is divisive, and for that reason the New Testament calls for a quick and clean separation. The goal is not to maintain relations with the false teacher but rather to create a clear enough divide that the shameful behavior or blasphemous claims of these false teachers cannot possibly be attributed to the faithful bride of Christ. The hope is that false teachers and their followers will be separated from the body of Christ and experience a profound loss that in turn produces repentance and opens the door for restoration.

The New Testament teaching on false prophets may seem severe and outdated in our contemporary world. I know I (Rick) thought this way—until I didn’t.

My wake-up call came in my early twenties. Upon graduation from college I joined a yearlong overseas mission project which involved intensive door-to-door evangelism and a variety of other outreaches. It was spiritually challenging, something like a Christian boot camp. Several months into our time, a speaker from the United States came to lead a spiritual renewal retreat. He was an unusually charismatic speaker. He was confrontational, challenging, and motivational. We were encouraged to go deeper and be more radical in our faith. He would quote lengthy portions of the Bible from memory and draw fascinating and important insights from them. He was always making us see things that we had never seen before. He would usually refuse to give the actual biblical reference—challenging us to read the Bible and find it on our own.

Sometimes his theology seemed startling to me—but so much of what he said was intended to awaken us from our spiritual slumber that I figured my theology could use a little startling. He didn’t deny the deity of Christ or use Scripture other than the Bible. One thing I remember in particular was a comment he made about sin. He said sin wasn’t about the body; it was about the spirit. It doesn’t matter what you do with your body, he said; the body is just physical matter. What really counts is your spirit, because sin is always and only a spiritual issue.

His impact on our project was transformative in every way. Most all of us felt awakened in some sense. All of us felt challenged. Upon completing our overseas stay, many of the participants in our mission project came back to the United States, and some found their way to the church where this charismatic preacher served as pastor. It made sense—where else could they find teaching and insights like what he offered? Other Bible teachers seemed mundane by comparison.

Then one day I got a phone call. This preacher had sexually violated almost two dozen of the women involved in our project—some during the original visit and others in the three years since we had come back. I was stunned; everyone was stunned. I remember gathering together with these friends, hearing tearful and tragic stories. I remember praying for healing, praying for hope, and hoping against hope that other friends who were still involved in the group would be persuaded to get out.

These events left a lifelong impression on me. I have never since doubted the importance of doctrinal truth. I have never since thought that false prophets are only in the past. I have thought back to his teaching that sharply divided the spiritual and the material world and made sin a matter of the spirit only. In many ways, this modern-day preacher was simply repackaging a particular version of the ancient heresy of Gnosticism. As the Zondervan Encyclopedia of the Bible describes it, “Some Gnostic leaders are high-minded ascetics, and others are licentious charlatans. Nevertheless, they all offer knowledge—and in a form or degree not to be found outside their own teaching.”1 My friends and I had encountered a licentious charlatan who eagerly offered knowledge in a form and degree not found outside his own teaching. The destruction he left in his wake still appalls me decades later.

And there are many other false teachings today. There are groups like the Jehovah’s Witnesses and the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints that deny the deity of Christ—a modern revival of the Arian heresy (lest one think that only Gnostics have made a comeback). Various groups deny the Trinity. Some leaders in several Christian denominations deny the reality of the resurrection. The many versions of what is called the prosperity gospel range from poor exegesis to full-blown heresy. Heresies were destructive in New Testament times, and they are still destructive today. For as much as this book is a plea for respectful understanding of those with differing convictions, it is not a plea for denying the possibility of real and intractable conflicts that are born of a fundamental opposition to the essential truths of the Christian faith. We still need to test every teaching and choose to hold fast only to that which is good.

It is clear the Bible teaches that there are departures from sound belief and practice that justify division. Sometimes division is simply separating a particular false teacher from the rest of the church. Sometimes a church as a whole may embrace a false teaching and needs to be separated from a denomination. Sometimes groups of churches have intractable disagreements about doctrinal issues and new denominations form as a result. Hopefully, these all concern issues where at least one group (if not both) believe that a confessional belief or moral mandate of the Christian faith was at stake. But are there other times when we can divide for lesser issues? We believe the answer is yes.

Separation for missional differences. The most notable example of a separation that does not appear to have anything to do with false doctrine is the argument between Paul and Barnabas described in Acts ...