Agree to Disagree
After many years of study and prayer, I have left the institutional church for a more spirit-led, non-hierarchical way to be the Body of Christ (His Church). I wanted to share one thing this has taught me?Being outside the walls has led me to study Scripture in a whole new light. I seek the revelation of Christ in me no matter where I am reading scripture, since Christ is the Word. As Carl and I started Philter48 the first thing we tackled was the word “true”. What is true? And what is opinion. I pondered this over and over and here is my two cents. It has been very freeing for me spiritually and I do not feel like I am in legalistic bondage.
I categorized truth into 3 orders of reality. The first order of reality is a truth that all believers in Christ would not argue. They accept this reality to be in unity with one another. It is the same for all followers of Him. There are no arguments, it is absolute truth. Basically, Christ was born of a virgin, died for our sins, and was resurrected to give us eternal life.
Then there is a big step to take. This is a leap into the second order of reality. A person can either believe in Christ as their Lord and Savior or not. Once they believe, scripture then has many gray areas to discuss. The second order of reality is a result of our opinions, and of our thinking. As Christians we can discuss the gray areas in scripture and learn to agree to disagree as long as we are focused on Christ. We should not divide based on a second order reality. This is why I feel there are over 30,000 different denominations out there. One little disagreement of a second order reality and you separate the body. Some examples would be:
Old / Young earth
Sprinkle / Immersion Baptism
Pre-millennial / A-millennial
Church with Clergy to Laity / Non-Hierarchical structure
Instruments / No-instruments
Tithe / No Tithe
And the list can go on and on.
If we as brothers and sisters in Christ would just focus on Him and Him only, and not on OUR opinion of what WE believe scripture to mean, I really think we as followers can change the world. If we go out and act as Christ and love one another, we can be that Holy nation God wants as a bride for His son.
The last is a third order of reality. This is our opinion where scripture does not speak and we need to love another and accept the diversity and culture of one another in love. (With the Holy Spirit guiding us in our decisions when we derive our opinion) But if someone else likes to do something where scripture does not speak, just remember we are not God and we do not know all. So how can we judge and tell them right from wrong?
Agree to disagree and let us grow His Church!
