Use, Misuse, and Neglect of the Bible Part 2: Sound Doctrine — But Not Too Much

This month we move to the other end of the spectrum for a very different example of the misuse of the Bible. This comes from a Crossway.org article “Unity is Not the Same as Total Agreement” by Conrad Mbewe, who works with a Baptist church in Lusaka, Zambia. This gentleman clearly respects the Bible and appeals to it to make a point. In so doing, he must severely distort the Bible, despite his obvious sincerity. 

Conrad is worried about those who “will work together only with those with whom they agree on every everything — doctrinal and practical.” This, of course, can be a problem. We will not even attempt to try to solve that problem here. Instead, we will examine his approach. It involves appeals to certain sections of the Bible, sections that are often cited in these kinds of discussions. To reach his conclusions, Conrad has to twist passages into hermeneutical pretzels, and these passages are often misused to make these kinds of points. 

The first passage, one often completely misread in this discussion, is Romans 14. Conrad cites excerpts from it and then concludes: 

“The appeal of the apostle was that the Christians in the church in Rome should remain united even if there was a difference in doctrine and practice over these matters. Not all differences are worth dividing over. On some matters, you can agree to disagree.” 

The problem here is that in Romans 14, the matters Paul is talking about are NOT matters of doctrine or prescribed practice at all. To the utter contrary, Paul is talking about how to handle differences over matters that are not prescribed by God. To sum up what Paul says, some Christians think they should celebrate certain “holy days,” and some think they must adhere to certain dietary regulations, but these are matters on which God has not spoken. 

What Paul says is (vs. 14) that “nothing is unclean in itself” (ESV, NASB). In other words, no holy days are special, and no foods are special. God has no requirements about this. If you want to celebrate certain holy days (something most of us do to some extent), you may. If you do not want to celebrate, you need not. If you want to be a vegetarian, you may. If you would rather not, that is your decision. Paul’s point is God has no word on those matters, so individuals may do as they wish. 

The one and only one doctrinal point, or word from God, Paul has on this is that people who differ on these pure matters of opinion should not condemn one another or look down on one another. People who disagree on these things should not rub each other’s noses in it, so to speak. Paul nowhere in Romans (or anywhere else, for that matter) even suggests that any matter in which God has spoken can be ignored or set aside to reach some other goal. 

Conrad calls the things he is concerned about “non-gospel issues.” He is a bit vague in this, never quite defining his term. That is probably because he is confused at this point. He is correct in thinking there can be non-gospel issues. He is correct in thinking Paul is talking about non-gospel issues in Romans 14. He goes very wrong when he assumes anything Paul is talking about in Romans 14 is a doctrinal matter, that is, a matter in which God has spoken. If God has spoken, that is a “gospel issue.” It is only in the areas where God has not spoken that we can find non-gospel matters. 

Conrad’s next appeal is to a part of Philippians 1:27, “I will know that you stand firm in one spirit, contending as one man for the faith of the gospel.”  This, he thinks, reinforces his point that unity in the church can sometimes require we ignore some “doctrinal” issues. Therefore, what Conrad is saying once again is that some doctrinal issues are “non-gospel” issues. However, shortly after this statement, Paul makes a point by appealing to the doctrine of the incarnation. How are we supposed to know if this is a gospel issue or not? Those like Conrad are always sure they can make this distinction, but upon what do they base it? Has God revealed a principle that distinguishes gospel matters from non-gospel matters? If He has not, then that distinction is made based on ideas that Conrad and others have invented—and that is a very shaky basis. 

Baptists are not the only ones to think about things this way. This approach has been used in the restoration movement to deal with certain problems and disputes. Perhaps we should all rethink this matter. What distinction from Scripture can we find between some things God has said that are important (“gospel issues”) and other things God has said are not quite as important (“non-gospel issues”)? Any problem we might think we can solve with this idea pales in comparison to the problems introduced by presuming that some things God says are in the not-so-important category. 

Conrad never gives up on this impossible distinction. He says in reference to Philippians 1 that Paul “wanted to continue hearing of healthy unity among the believers in Philippi, despite the doctrinal winds blowing among them, some of which he would allude to later in his letter.” Here again is the assumption unity somehow trumps the Word of God. When we look later in Paul’s letter, the first appeal he makes for unity is to the doctrine of the incarnation of Christ. 

In Philippians 2:16, Paul urges us to “hold out (or on to) the word of life.” It is impossible to conclude that Paul is here saying some parts of the word of life are important, while others are less so. 

Conrad concludes by appealing to “biblical unity.” He thinks of this as the middle point between doctrine and unity. This is a common move in this kind of discussion. Here we have some very muddled logic. The assumed opposition between doctrine and unity is a classic case of a false choice. These two are not opposed. They are completely compatible. Therefore, finding a “middle point” between them is an attempt to find something in a category that does not exist. 

Conrad urges us to find “the true biblical balance when it comes to unity in the body of Christ.” However, as much as many have tried to use this sort of approach, it ends up being empty. Jude 3 talks about “the faith that was once for all entrusted to the saints.” Was this given in two categories, one important, and one negotiable? Does the “one faith” of Ephesians 4:5 have two sections, one of which is negotiable for the sake of unity? It is beyond unlikely that this is what the Apostle had in mind. 

Perhaps it is time to abandon this paradigm for Christian unity. If we think God is capable of communicating messages in human language to us, we surely must think it is at least possible for us to correctly understand those messages. That means the “unity of faith” (the content of faith), as Paul states this in Ephesians 4:13, is possible. What this further implies is it is not appropriate to see doctrine as something that should be “balanced” with something else. 

We can hope that obviously sincere people like Conrad Mbewe will come to see this. Sound doctrine does not need to be “balanced” with anything else. It just needs to be studied, taught, and embraced. 

* Kent B. True is the alter ego of Harold N. Orndorff, Jr., a retired campus minister who has taught college and seminary courses in the fields of apologetics, philosophy, ethics, and logic. Lately he enjoys studying his grandchildren, who are very interesting one and all.