June 20, 2012
Scratching the Itch
As I read and listen to campaign ads I’m struck by how many politicians
run their race on what they are going to do, rather than on what they have
done. It’s amazing that we voters often buy the rhetoric and cast our vote for
a future promise, rather than a past track record. Unfortunately the church is
not immune to such tactics. “For the time
will come when men will not put up with sound doctrine. Instead, to suit their
own desires, they will gather around them a great number of teachers to say
what their itching ears want to hear. They will turn their ears
away from the truth and turn aside to myths.” (2 Timothy 4:3-4 NIV)
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2 comments:
Gail;
-----Baptists, Pentecostals, Lutherans, Seventh Day Adventists, the whole lot of our denominations all share in common the fact that the total of their distinguishing characteristics lie beyond what is written. “I have applied all this to myself and Apollos for your benefit, brethren, that you may learn by us not to go beyond what is written, that none of you may be puffed up in favor of one against another.” (I Cor 4:6) If all the churches were more about the wonders of what the Lord has done for us instead of all the great things they are doing for the Lord there would not be the jealousies which require distinguishing characteristics; we would not all sound like a bunch of politicians running puffed up against each other. “Knowledge puffs up, but love builds up. If any one imagines that he knows something, he does not yet know as he ought to know. But if one loves God, one is known by Him.” (I Cor 8:1b-3) I don’t mean to imply none of us are known by God. All our denominations are made of people who love God. It is just that they are also made of man, imperfect, frail, and erring a bit in everything we try to do.
-----Every person’s knowledge is vastly incomplete and a little fuzzy around the edges. So it becomes easy human nature to think that what we think differently from what others think must be what makes us right and them wrong. Sometimes it does. But sometimes it makes us wrong and them right. For in the condition where everyone is short of knowing in full and certainly foggy in what they think they know, then what is actually real is going to inevitably be a little different from what anyone thinks. And what is real is the AM part of the I AM. So let it be. If the churches would spend more time thanking God for the grace He shows towards our sorry conditions of being short on knowledge therefore tainted in conclusion, we would all be more unified in Christ. Then the imposters teaching only for itchy ears would stand out more sharply from the rest of us being just kind of wrong in our surmising.
-----Alas, meeting around anything less than what we figure we should be doing for the Lord just doesn’t quite fill the competitive belly. Thankfully, what He does for us saves the empty belly. And the imposters will be what they are, whoever they are; God knows; that's good enough.
Love you all,
Steve Corey
Steve,
Thanks for the Scripture application of denominations not going beyond what is written. “I have applied all this to myself and Apollos for your benefit, brethren, that you may learn by us not to go beyond what is written, that none of you may be puffed up in favor of one against another.” (I Cor 4:6) I have always thought about individuals, not denominations. Wow. It will be so much easier to say you have gone “beyond what is written”, than it is to convince them they are in error. I appreciate the insight!
Gail
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