“I Don’t Need Doctrine!”
The word
doctrine sounds like the word doctrinaire and that sounds
pushy, impolite, narrow minded even. And if we take into
account the unsavory fact that followers of Jesus have
fought viciously and even killed over doctrine and have
been doctrinaire in their attitudes, well, no wonder some
run from any discussion of doctrine like jack-rabbits. “I
don’t need doctrine! I have Jesus!” is the cry of the
anti-doctrine folks. And I do understand their reticence.
Having been bludgeoned with “doctrine” by Christians who
said they loved me, I really have no desire to experience
that again.
But we cannot avoid something of grave importance
here. Everyone
has doctrine. Everyone formulates doctrines.
You
cannot escape it and nor should we. Doctrine matters,
because doctrine is understanding what we believe about
something particular, like God, or His Son, or the Holy
Spirit, or salvation, or the value of unborn children, or
human beings, etc. When I say, “I believe in Jesus Christ
as my Lord and Savior,” I am making a doctrinal/belief
statement about Him. I am saying, for example, that Jesus
is the Messiah that God sent to save His people. Jesus is
the ruler of life, and in order to be ruler of life then He
must have special characteristics, and we spell those out.
We declare that Jesus is both fully human and fully God. We
read the Scriptures and see who Jesus is and then we
proclaim that truth about Him. In doing so we have
formulated a doctrine of the Son of God—a “bundle” of
truths about Him based on Scripture. The truth is no one
“just has Jesus” without doctrine.
Likewise, we study the Word of God and come to believe
certain things about the nature of human beings; we are in
this way formulating a Doctrine of Man. We say, for
instance, that humans are dead in their trespasses and sins
(Ephesians 2:1). We say that without a savior man will
remain dead in his sins and experience the wrath of God as
his just reward (Romans 3:23 and Romans 6:23). We say that
humans must believe in Jesus Christ as their Lord and
Savior by faith and then follow Him in His new way of life
and truth and love (Romans 10:9). We are “doing” doctrine.
Look at how important doctrine is:
Matthew
16:13 Now when Jesus came into the district of Caesarea
Philippi, he asked his disciples, “Who do people say that
the Son of Man is?” 14 And they said, “Some say John the
Baptist, others say Elijah, and others Jeremiah or one of
the prophets.” 15 He said to them, “But who do you say that
I am?” 16 Simon Peter replied, “You are the Christ, the Son
of the living God.” 17 And Jesus answered him, “Blessed are
you, Simon Bar-Jonah! For flesh and blood has not revealed
this to you, but my Father who is in heaven.
Peter has to
declare who Jesus is (as do we all!). And what he believes
about Jesus is vitally important. This is why doctrine
matters, why theology matters, because we must bring all of
ourselves to our lives with Christ. We receive faith and
then we live exploring and seeking to understand the God
who has saved us. If we miss the mark on who Jesus is, we
miss salvation, His divine grace and blessings for us. If
we misunderstand who man is in relation to God, then we
miss our need for repentance and new life. To simply state
“I don’t need doctrine! I have Jesus!” is to retreat into a
kind of obscurantism, a non-thinking, shallow faith that
refuses to engage with God in a substantial way. We do not
have to be professional theologians or experts in all of
the technical matters of philosophy and theology but we
have a command from God to love Him with our minds as well
as our hearts and strength (Deuteronomy 6:5, Matthew
22:37).
We are not talking about a sterile intellectualism that
argues such nonsense as how many angels can dance on the
head of a pin. Nor do we run around examining others for
“correct” doctrine. We are advocating here a deep, rich,
faith that attempts to understand the God who creates and
saves and is right at this moment preparing a place for us
(John 14), that brings the mind and heart together to bear
on our living faith. This requires an engagement of the
mind with His Word, a willingness to wrangle with the deep
concepts of who Jesus is (and the Father and the Holy
Spirit) and what He came to do and what He is doing right
now. When we discuss what the nature of the church, for
example, we are formulating a Doctrine of the Church. And
we should!
We will not “arrive” in this life, and all of our doctrines
are subject to the authority of God’s Word, but we have a
unique privilege of bringing our hearts and minds to engage
with the great and living God, who He is and how He loves
His people!
Know what you believe and why. Let your faith seek to
understand. Pray for wisdom and God will give it to you. He
promised that in James 1:5, If any of
you lacks wisdom, let him ask God, who gives generously to
all without reproach, and it will be given him.
Yours in
Christ,
D. Wayne Bogue