Crumbs from the Table
We had such a powerful time this past Wednesday looking at Acts 11-12. One of the crumbs that fell from our table was our looking at the difference between how man looks at things and how God looks at things. When Peter was sent to the gentile Cornelius, whose entire family was saved and filled with the Holy Spirit, some of the Jews complained to Peter because he moved outside of their religious Jewish laws and customs. How dare Peter go into the house of a gentile. But God had other plans and God put His stamp of approval on Cornelius and his house.
How often do we get upset when some seem to operate outside of our “religious requirements” without seeing the real purpose in what God is doing. The Jews finally saw that salvation in Christ and the infilling of Holy Spirit are actually the fulfillment of the purpose of all of their rituals and laws.
So we began to look at what are the essentials of the faith and the non-essentials. Of course the essentials include there is only one God and there is only one way to Him and that way is through Jesus Christ. With the essentials, there must by unity and these are non-negotiable.
Then there are the non-essentials, such as do we dip or sprinkle, do women wear pants or dresses, do we sing out of hymnals or choruses, do we only use the KJV or are other translations allowed, etc. These do not determine our salvation and we must give people the freedom to operate within non-essentials without guilt and condemnation. I remember Pastor Robbins telling me once his denominational church split because men wanted to wear their wedding rings.
However, these non-essentials cannot violate God’s word, such as we see in some of our cultural compromises like gender confusion, marriage exclusions, immorality, etc. We looked at Eph 5 which tells us clearly what the essentials are in the way we walk and live our lives.
Augustine said, “With Essentials there is unity; with non-essentials there is liberty; and with all things there is charity.” We all have our preferences which are non-essentials, but we do not want to “throw out the baby with the bathwater.” We do not want our non-essentials to cause strife or disunity. We must remember and exercise that in all things, there must be love.
So, as we walk together as a church, we each have our preferences in some things. These can never cause strife or division, or we have mishandled our freedom in Christ. Stay in love with Jesus and these things will not seem to be so important.
Blessings,
Pastor Donna Wise