In the article, "What Causes Division?" we examined some of the reasons which contribute toward fracturing Christian unity. Now our attention is turned toward steps in restoring the unity God desires.
The unity of believers is important. Paul pleaded with the divided Corinthian Christians to become united in mind. I Corinthians 1:10 He also wrote that their division indicated worldliness, not spiritual maturity. I Corinthians 3:1-4 So how can the unity which Jesus prayed for and which Paul encouraged be attained in our fractured world of Christendom? When faced with the problem of religious division, Paul’s prescription for achieving the unity God desires boiled down to three principles:
1) Do not become enamored with or exalt the human teacher. Instead, the focus should remain on Christ, God and His word (1 Corinthians 3:4-7, 11, 18-21; 4: 5-6),2) Realize that God will hold you accountable to His standard, this means that God will judge the quality of your message (1 Corinthians 3:10-17) and
3) You have been warned to not exceed what has been written in scripture (1 Corinthians 4:5-6).
In building up toward this solution, Paul reminded the Corinthian church that the person who teaches is not the critical element, rather it is God who causes the growth to occur. 1 Corinthians 3:5-9
Furthermore, Paul reminded his readers that God would judge the quality of each teacher’s message. I Corinthians 3:10-17 In fact, if anyone’s message was of such a poor quality that it would destroy the Christian hearer, God would destroy that teacher. I Corinthians 3:17 Through this means, Paul shifted the Corinthian congregation’s focus away from what elevating leading personalities and what might have been distinctive teaching emphases and returned their focus to Christ and God’s Word. 1 Corinthians 3:4-4:6 God is concerned about the faithfulness and the quality of the message which is presented.
Paul then reminded everyone - both teacher and listener, that it was required of those who act as stewards of God’s message to be found faithful. 1 Corinthians 4:2 So, who decides whether a steward is faithful or not? The teacher’s conscience? One’s own conviction? Scholars? The listener? My long list of what's right? My short list of what is right? In essence Paul says, “God will judge. So you just worry about yourself and make sure that you do not go beyond what has been written.” 1 Corinthians 4:3-6
The bottom line is that the teacher should strive to build with those materials that God will judge to be gold, as opposed to what God would consider being worthless straw or worse yet something destructive. With such a multitude of perspectives, what parameters could possibly guide God’s steward in knowing how God will determine faithfulness? Paul simply wrote, “Do not exceed what has been written.” This suggests that the goal of one's perspective should be to discover and to value the message God intended to communicate to the original readers/ audience as opposed to valuing "what this intuitively means to me" or "what this text can be made to teach."
Paul's argumentation suggests that at least part of the solution for religious division is for people to practice not going beyond what has been written and to realize that God is the Judge. These principles tend to strike at the heart of the problem: dominant personalities who seek a following after them.
As long as people value unchartered ground or something new instead of the old paths*, diverse human agendas will appear that will create further division. But in the end, God will be the Judge - even of our well-intentioned agendas. We may not be completely able to avoid human agendas, but we can at least minimize their impact if we remember that God will hold us accountable for the quality of the message we present and that we have been warned to not exceed what has been written.
Does Paul’s prescription in 1 Corinthians answer all of the questions raised today? Even if some will haggle over what the text was meant to convey, Paul' prescription has offered us a basic paradigm and an attitude which can take us a long way in achieving the unity God desires.
* By "old paths" I am refering to "God's way." I am not suggesting maintaining human cultural traditions which may have been passed down through many generations.
Other articles which may be of interest:
The Unity Principle Observations on Philippians
Unity: What Causes Division? Role of agendas in interpretation
Barry Newton, Revised version Copyright © 2000