I have a Baptist friend who runs a group on Facebook. Within a few days, two separate posts caused different people to post almost the exact same response:
Both of them said things to the effect of "doctrine can cause division" or "when we die, we'll find out we were all wrong about doctrine". Both encouraged people to not get hung up on issues of doctrine, and instead, to only worry about "the doctrine of Jesus Christ".
Now, I'm sure that sounds all profound and stuff, but what does that even mean? I understand what they're getting at, but if you try to get down to specifics, no one can give a coherent answer. Everyone who has an opinion on doctrine believes that theirs is the One True doctrine. What is the doctrine of Jesus Christ? The fact that no two Christians can give the same answer should set up a red flag, right there.
The closest thing I could think of would be something like a "love God and love each other" sort of thing, but every time I see an author try to boil it down to something so simple, they're always branded as heretics with "false doctrines".
Also, important to note: neither of the two posters show any signs of shutting up about their individual doctrines, so, it seems the platitude isn't particularly effective.
Both of them said things to the effect of "doctrine can cause division" or "when we die, we'll find out we were all wrong about doctrine". Both encouraged people to not get hung up on issues of doctrine, and instead, to only worry about "the doctrine of Jesus Christ".
Now, I'm sure that sounds all profound and stuff, but what does that even mean? I understand what they're getting at, but if you try to get down to specifics, no one can give a coherent answer. Everyone who has an opinion on doctrine believes that theirs is the One True doctrine. What is the doctrine of Jesus Christ? The fact that no two Christians can give the same answer should set up a red flag, right there.
The closest thing I could think of would be something like a "love God and love each other" sort of thing, but every time I see an author try to boil it down to something so simple, they're always branded as heretics with "false doctrines".
Also, important to note: neither of the two posters show any signs of shutting up about their individual doctrines, so, it seems the platitude isn't particularly effective.
