There has been a popular saying in Free Methodist Circles over the last several years when it came to the life of the church, "The main thing is to keep the main thing the main thing".
I have lately been reminded of the fact that secondary issues, if allowed, will divert your attention from what is really important!
One thing that I learned from my Theology professor, Dr. Gary Habermas, was the difference between 1st Order theological issues and 2nd order Theological issues.
First order or First importance issues are the non-negotiables of the faith. These are often referred to as the Fundamentals. If you have ever attended a fundamental church you would readily recognize this term. It is basically referring to the 5 non-negotiables:
1. The literal inerrancy of the autographs of scripture. (The word autographs means the original writings of the authors of scripture, so manuscript copies and translations are not included in what is inerrant according to the fundamentals.)
2. The virgin birth and deity of Christ.
3. The substitutionary view of the atonement.
4. The bodily resurrection of Christ.
5. The imminent return of Christ.
Or some variation of these.
Second order theological issues would be things that we could disagree on and still consider that person to be a believer. Here is an example:
Special Creation is a first order theological position. The time and length of creation is a second order issue. In other words, all Christians believe that God created the universe, how he did that is a different issue all together. If you believe in The Big Bang, The Gap Theory, or a Literal 7 Day creation as I do, you can still be a Christian.
Now I know that some of you at this point are feeling sleepy, and I am sorry to get all theological on you, but this is very important for us to understand in order to maintain unity in the body.
The point is that on the negotiables it is ok to have differing opinions and to still love and fellowship together.
Here are some examples of negotiable:
1. The Tribulation
2. Women in Ministry
3. Worship styles
4. The duration of Hell
5. Sign Gifts (Healing, Tongues, Apostle, Miracles & Interpretation of Tongues)
And there are many more… all of which can be violently divisive if we allow, more than one church, more than one person, more than one denomination has been wounded and divided by choosing to focus on secondary issues.
I believe that this is one of the MOST EFFECTIVE strategies of the devil!
I want to admonish you… “Keep the main thing the main thing.”
Jesus told us what the main thing was just before He ascended. Remember, He said to go and make disciples!
As a church plant we cannot afford to have our time and energy diverted from this important work! We must all be diligent to keep the mission that Christ charged us with on the forefront of our mind and actions.
Southside, what are you doing this summer to use your gifts and serve God in making disciples?
Keep your eyes on Jesus and your focus on building His kingdom and all the secondary issues will fall into line.
Pastor Willy
Here is a link to where you can find out more about what Free Methodist's believe: www.freemethodistchurch.org
Interesting post, although I would quibble with you a bit. Some of the main things you listed (inerrancy, substitutionary atonement, imminent return) are things that broader orthodoxy has not agreed upon, but instead has encompassed a broader range of "acceptable views". Further, although there is no dispute that Jesus told us to make disciples, I think Jesus was more direct about the main thing. When asked directly what the most important commandment was he responded "The first in importance is, ‘Listen, Israel: The Lord your God is one; so love the Lord God with all your passion and prayer and intelligence and energy.’ And here is the second: ‘Love others as well as you love yourself.’ There is no other commandment that ranks with these.” (Mark 12:28-31).
ReplyDeleteYour main point is well taken, we must keep our focus on Jesus, our head and teacher, and we must love other people.
I like the idea that we focus on what's primary, and let the secondary fall into line without dividing us. I agree with Nate that there is variance about "what's primary". Rather than look at specifics, my question is very broad. On a "meta" level, it's this: What is the process by which we decide what is primary and what is secondary (or tertiary? OK, I just wanted to show off and type "tertiary"...) We can't just say "what's in the Bible is primary". There's a lot in there. There must be an interpretive process by which we boil down the totality of scripture into the core, or the "fundamentals". You (or someone) did that above by boiling it down to 5 points. So what are the ground rules? What guiding principles inform the process? And who gets to decide? And why? These are not rhetorical questions; I am genuinely curious about how people navigate these questions. But I'm also not willing to blindly accept any list of core non-negotiables without transparency into the process that created them. So, thoughts?
ReplyDeleteJeff, I think that is a great question. What you are getting at is illustrated in this whole conversation we are having, what is maybe most important to me might not even make the top ten list to someone else. The illustration at the top of the page shows where those priorities come from. 1st order - gospel issues have to be the non-negotiable core issues to our faith. In other words, what must I do to be saved. That, I think we would all agree is THE most important question to answer, after that, everything else can be open to debate. I made the mistake a couple of years ago of coming down on my dad pretty hard about listening to this kind of weird preacher who was teaching the gap theory as fact... after a while a realized, hey, even if he buys into that, it's not going to keep him out of heaven, so, grace. We all learn as we go.
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