When believers disagree and argue over issues about the way things are done in our churches, we can get caught up in looking at these practices from the wrong perspective. Sadly, somehow our personal points of view usually become based on what we want to see happen, which may or may not be what our Lord wants.
We can come up with practical or spiritual justifications for what we want or why we want it that way, but many times our ideas of correctness correspond with our own personal desires, and we become emotionally bound to our own concept of what we think is "right."
These battles can be around how to express our faith, whether in an older traditional way, or a way that fits with the younger people or new believers who are more connected to the current culture.
They can be about who is going to lead the church. A particular leader may represent the ways things have always been done (and considered unchangeable). Others may feel that things should be done in a different way, even if some of the more traditional ways still hold true.
Many times when either way wins, God's fullest will and greatest desire may be compromised.
The New Testament wonderfully gives great wisdom on resolving these matters. Jesus Himself commended a greater unified wisdom of both the Old and New Testaments.
Jesus foresaw that this wise combination would be personified by learned scribes who received further living revelation. Newer revelations would not contradict, but instead progressively build on the original understandings they had prior to the coming of Jesus and the fullness of the Holy Spirit!
Jesus told the apostles and us of His greater way in Matthew 13:52:
Therefore every teacher and interpreter of the Sacred Writings who has been instructed about and trained for the kingdom of heaven and has become a disciple is like a householder who brings forth out of his storehouse treasure that is new and [treasure that is] old [the fresh as well as the familiar].
Wise people do not focus on the ancient traditions alone, nor on any new revelations exclusively. These faithful servants have learned by God's gracious training and many years of dying to self daily (or more often as needed) to see and value both.
They value the strong and stable taproot of our faith as well as the new growth and beautiful fruit of living in the eternal now. Both are part of a true heart possessing on and into those things yet to come, both in this life and into the forever beyond. This eternal perspective is always present oriented in the newness of life, yet infused with a love and respect for those who have gone before us.
They, who have lived in their generations as faithful witness to the Light they had, knew the deep truth we always need to recall: All who overcame do so because the Blood of our Lamb of God, and the word of our testimony (prophetically enlightened by the Holy Spirit, really as another testimony of Jesus).
By God's grace, these elements of true faith will lead us to love not our earthly human life existences, even to the point of being willing to persevere to the point of death for Jesus' sake!
Having this eternal viewpoint is a work of the Holy Spirit within us, which leads us evermore toward and into His glorious heights. It also enables us to be used in our time here on the earth, both as individuals and corporately as the Body of Christ, His church, fulfilling our destinies given by Paul in Ephesians 3:21:
To Him (our Heavenly Father) be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus throughout ALL generations forever and ever.
Amen (so be it).
Neil Uniacke
Executive Director
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