Recently I was encouraged by another blog post to be more open to the ideas of other believers. The author was "sad" about the predicament as they lamented how another writer's work created dissension among Christians. From the bloggers vantage point, the divisiveness that exists among the community of faith that claim to follow Jesus Christ was unacceptable. As I read the post, there seemed to me to exist a call for a pervasive "Let's all just get along" attitude among believers.
But surely divisiveness can at times serve a useful purpose for the body and for the church. It keeps us sharp...keeps us on track...keeps us moving toward the prize. I have heard the cry for years, but have never liked (nor completely understood) this exhortation to be"unified" among the body as it is held up as a goal of the Christian faith. I do not see it in the Bible and do not understand the promotion of it as something we should seek.
I desire no misunderstanding here. We, of course, should seek to love one another. This is how the world will know we are Jesus' followers (John 13:35). But perhaps there is the rub. Many people (including the author of this post, I suppose) seem to be under the impression that unity and love are synonymous terms. How silly. If this were the case then we must suppose the most loving thing to do would be to seek unity with a teacher who communicates heretical principles as though they are not detrimental to the Truth (which was precisely the ludicrous encouragement in the aforementioned blog post).
But surely this should not be the case. No, the goal of the believer is to be one with the Father as Jesus prayed for in John 17. We value Him above all else...not unity with believing men and women. We are not instructed to entrust ourselves to mankind because (as Jesus taught us) we know what is in man's heart (John 2:24-25). There are those that claim to be Christ-followers but are not, and if they teach things that are heretical I will not have anything to do with them. I will not welcome them into my home. I will not read their books. I will not listen to what they have to say in any way (much less be "unified" with them) as instructed by II John 10-11. For if I am "unified" with them, then I too take part in their wickedness...May it never be!!
On the contrary. I will search the Scriptures to see if whether or not what the communicator is teaching is true, just as the Berean believers of more noble character did (Acts 17:11). The Word of God will be the standard for all teaching from math and science to art and religion, so unity should only be possible with those who hold the Bible as the final authority...and this is born out of a love for all men...it is indeed the only loving thing we can do.