We can all likely cite examples of churches gone wrong. False teachers, horrible leadership, absolute heresy taught as truth, on and on. There are entire websites dedicated to ferreting out the errors in modern Christianity. But ... it's God's church, the Body of Christ. Did this kind of thing catch Him off guard? Was He unable or unwilling to fix it?
The truth is, most of the New Testament was written to correct error in the Church. As early as the beginning, error was sneaking in. As early as the Book of Acts, the Apostles were fighting heresy. Jesus warned, "Beware of the false prophets, who come to you in sheep's clothing, but inwardly are ravenous wolves" (Matt 7:15). Yes, the concept of "a wolf in sheep's clothing" comes from the lips of Jesus Himself as a warning against false teachers in the flock. Paul warned the Ephesians that "after my departure savage wolves will come in among you, not sparing the flock" (Acts 20:29). John wrote about "antichrists" who "went out from us" (1 John 2:19). So, no, it wasn't a surprise to God. Apparently, we're supposed to expect it and deal with it.
Scripture does not record a single incident where an heretic was executed (except, perhaps, by God). There isn't even a record of an excommunication. But Scripture has a lot of tough talk and sharp confrontations between believers and false teaching. And I wonder ... are we ... too soft? In church history, heretics have been known to be executed, and I'd suggest that's not the right approach. But Jesus told the church at Thyatira they needed to repent from tolerating a false prophetess in their church (Rev 2:20). We're talking here about self-professed believers teaching false doctrine, and you and I have been told we shouldn't question their salvation, shouldn't be unkind, shouldn't be confrontational. Is that biblical? Jesus was confrontational (e.g., Matt 23:13-36). Paul was confrontational (e.g., 1 Cor 5:1-5; Gal 2:11-14). It appears to me that confrontation of false teaching, especially of those who consider themselves religious, is a serious responsibility of God's people. I'm not sure we're doing anyone any favors by being nice to false teachers among us.
8 comments:
I can think of one excommunication in the Bible, though it wasn't meant to be permanent or a rejection of the possibility of repentance, but was meant for the purpose of repentance. I agree that execution is a step too far, but I've been reading some of the old theologians of late, and whenever they were writing against the teachings of a specific person, they were never polite about it. They used invectives that to my modern "kind" mind quails at. But it makes me wonder if we should have a similar attitude against heresy. Have we been to polite, leading to a weakening of the Church? I recently heard a group of pastors responding to the question, "What is the greatest threat to the church today?" To a man, they pointed to two things, church leadership and biblical illiteracy. If we are not on our guard by consuming Scripture, we're going to be lead astray by every changing wind of doctrine. I think I may have heard a similar warning somewhere...
To my mind, “contending for the faith” (Jude 1:3) is a crucial element of sharing the Gospel, so that the full and complete truth “which was once for all delivered to the saints” will be spread, rather than Satan’s distortions and substitutes, which cannot save the lost. Promoting false teachings produces false converts, so one’s message must be God’s, not our own, and false teachers must be opposed with vigilance. To this end, I agree that our best model for addressing error in the church is the examples of Jesus and the disciples (rather than incidents in church history, where “mistakes were made”). As I understand it, one guiding Bible passage for the nonemployment of violence to spread the Gospel is Eph. 6:10-20, with its reminders that “we do not wrestle against flesh and blood….” (Eph. 6:12) and that the “armor of God” includes the “sword of the Spirit” (among other things), rather than a literal sword. (And there is the obvious fact that men are flawed and will err, so capital judgment/punishment over spiritual matters is God’s prerogative alone.)
I also contend that the presence of prevalent error in the church--clearly foretold by Jesus Himself and addressed in every book of the New Testament except Philemon--was (and is) evidently solidly within God’s will; clearly, despite Satan’s best efforts and fervent desire to thwart the Lord’s plans, this situation is serving God’s purposes and has been (and will be) used to bring Him glory.
I clearly agree, as some might say is obvious by now. There's a church in downtown Charleston (there's a ton of churches in the Holy City) which I believe is a UCC church (though maybe not) and it has a large banner hanging from the fence around it's property expressing the notion that Christ welcomes everyone (or something like that). But that's not Biblical given Christ speaking of the narrow path.
I concur that being mindful of one of the purposes of “church discipline” and the opposition to heresy “among us”--i.e. to promote repentance and restoration to right thinking, if possible--is important. Regarding that strong vocal pushback against heresy you mentioned, the best example that comes to my mind is Paul’s statements in Gal. 1:8-9: “If we…or any others…preach any other gospel…let him be accursed”--so significant that he says it twice.
David and Lorna, Jesus told the parable of the weeds where an enemy plants tares in the landowner's wheat field (Matt 13:24-30). In His story, Jesus said to leave the tares lest you uproot the wheat (Matt 13:29). Jesus said it was the responsibility of the Son of Man and His angels to root them out (Matt 13:38-43). Paul identified the gross sin in Corinth, but he left it in Christ's hands to remedy (1 Cor 5:4-5). Even so, we must be aware and active in dealing with such things in our midst (1 Cor 5:6-7), but leaving the judgment to Christ. We have to be diligent to confront it but not to take excessive measures to remedy it.
True, Paul didn't tell the Corinthians to change the incestuous man's heart, but he did tell them to banish him from the community, so that Christ could work in his heart to repentance. It seems to me there are actions the church must take when there are those among us trying to teach another gospel or leading others to sin. We have taken on a live and let live mentality in the church. Do we try to ferret out the false believers? Certainly not! But that doesn't mean we allow the blatant, unrepentant sins continue, or what else was Jesus talking about in Matthew? When we see people teaching another gospel, we don't sit aside and let Jesus sort it out, do we? We shouldn't go in witch hunts trying to find the tares, but when they clearly show themselves to be tares, we should expunge them, lest they become a corrupting yeast.
In our comments, I see mention of three different categories of those serving to create the error in the church about which you posted: (1) false converts mingled within the assemblies, (2) professing believers living in gross sin, and (3) false teachers. I also see that biblically inspired responses to each would be different, ranging from taking no action, to exercising local church discipline, to formal disfellowshipping and “calling out” (but not execution, as you noted).
Coincidently, I happen to be going through my home library books and am currently reviewing my books about cults. I am noticing how many of the modern-day cult founders had been brought up in orthodox Christian denominations. Then they challenged one Christian tenet and then another, and it all snowballed into something quite different…and dangerous.
I think we're agreeing, David. I'm saying we don't do nothing, but we don't get the final judgment. Paul said to not even eat with a believer in known sin (1 Cor 5:11). We need to respond and we need to respond 1) in love with the aim to restore and 2) with certainty, not wavering. I'm pretty sure burning them at the stake, though, is right out.
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