The perception is that Christians cannot agree on anything. Oh, not that some can't agree. The suggestion is that there are no points at all on which Christianity has not disagreed. Everything has been up for debate, from whether or not Jesus ever actually lived to whether the Bible is authoritative or reliable to ... well, anything you'd like to mention. The conclusion the suggestion draws, obviously, would be "You can't know." That is, everything Christian is in question and should be viewed merely as a matter of opinion rather than actual fact. "So, don't tell us what God says. You can tell us what you think (perhaps), but don't pretend like there are actual facts involved." And the fact is that there is and always has been division in the Body of Christ (1 Cor 1:10).
I hate to be the bearer of bad news, but this idea that Christians agree on nothing is not exactly true. In fact, it is not even nearly true. As a singular example, at no time in all of Church history has any held that homosexual behavior was not a sin. Ever. Until this century. That is, given all the stuff that Christians have disagreed about, one of the clearest things they have not is now in question. Now that is some level of arrogance to conclude, "They've all gotten it wrong for all time, but we have figured it out."
That's just one example. Is there any other agreement? Yes, there is.
First, let's be clear. Not all who call themselves "Christian" are Christian (Matt 7:21-23), so we immediately run into problems when discussing "What do all Christians agree on?" We have to dismiss the non-Christian, you see. So, as a bare structure, it is impossible, for instance, to have a "Christian" who doesn't believe in Christ or who doesn't believe in God. Hey, look! We just found a couple of basics that all Christians agree on.
From the early days of Christendom there have been efforts made to ... well, agree with each other. The Apostles' Creed, the Nicene Creed, and others comprise efforts made to say, "This is the minimum on which we can all agree." So, we have God as Trinity. Jesus's virgin birth, sinless life, death on the cross, and physical resurrection, His eventual return, and His exclusivity -- that He is the only path to salvation. We have the agreement that the Bible's 66 books are God's inspired Word. We have agreement that those who place their trust in Christ will be saved. There is a lot of agreement.
There is much emphasis on the disagreements among believers, suggesting we can't really know what is the "true faith", what is biblically true, what is genuine Christianity. I don't think that's true. It is true that Christians disagree on a large variety of things. Generally they are nuances, shades, minutia. I think that most of the division we see is between Christians and false-believers, self-professed "Christians" who are, as it turns out, not actually known by Christ (Matt 7:21-23). I think if you weed out that group and then look at the disagreements that remain, they will be much smaller, much more nuanced. They will be more "I think that Scripture says this" and "No, I think when it says that it means this." That is a fundamentally different disagreement because it is premised on Scripture as truthful and authoritative. On that we should all agree.
1 comment:
If one looks at the history of Christianity, the list of things agreed on is very consistent, until recently. The question becomes “What changed?”. The answer is that the functional definition of Christian changed in the last 50 years or so. It changed in such a way that it allows anyone with any belief to announce that they are Chirstian. I’d suggest that most of the things that are disagreements have been brought in by exactly these folk.
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