What’s the importance of doctrine? Is it just “head knowledge” that can be set into opposition with the “state of the heart”? If your doctrine is off, does that mean you are not really a Christian? If not, what difference does it make? Pastor Matt Richard gives an answer by quoting Robert Kolb, who offers an interesting analogy.
From Robert Kolb, The Christian Faith: A Lutheran Exposition (St. Louis, MO: Concordia Publishing House, 1993), 13-14.
Some people define biblical teaching as a series of topics. Like pearls on a string, these topics are all roughly of equal importance for them. If we conceive of doctrine in this way, we could say that losing any one pearl has about the same effect on the whole of biblical teaching as losing any other pearl. Some people could say that you dare not lose any pearl if you are to be dressed for the host of the heavenly banquet. Others could say that as long as you have a pearl or two left on the string, you are ready to be received at his table.
Others conceive of biblical teaching as a wheel, with a hub and spokes and rim. They suggest that wheels cannot exist without hub and rim and some spokes, but other spokes may be broken without immobilizing the wheel.
Neither of these metaphors adequately describes the nature of biblical teaching. It is better to compare the doctrine of the Scripture to a human body. The body of doctrine cannot exist if Christ the head is decapitated. It dies without the heart of our understanding of how we become right with God pumping away—although the heart, the doctrine of justification, may be partially diseased and still pump, it is true. This was evident in the medieval church, where preachers put a high but false premium on good works and still pointed people to Christ’s saving blood. We see this in contemporary Christians who empathize the contribution of our own personal decision in coming to Christ and still try to cultivate trust in his grace.
If an arm, the doctrine of Baptism, for example, is severed, the body may be able to survive. But it may hemorrhage and die. If the leg of the doctrine of the church become paralyzed, the body may survive, but it will be crippled at best, and it may fall down in a heap and crack the head, too.
So the question, “How much doctrine must be pure if one is to remain a Christian?” is simply a wrong kind of question. The whole of our conveying of biblical teaching needs to be accurate and on target—both because believers need to know what God wants us to know and because God’s Word is true. Nonetheless, sinful doctrinal error does not always break our relationship with the Lord even though it makes it more tenuous.[1]
Quoted by Pastor Matt Richard, Steadfast Lutherans » Why Heart Disease And Traumatic Head Injuries Should Be Avoided. (See too Rev. Richard’s discussion of this quotation.)
HT: Larry Hughes
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