We live in a time in American Christianity where there are Christian books, music, DVDs, Bible studies, you name it. They are independent, not answering to any church. Many of these are not necessarily doctrinally correct. Using Romans 14 and Matthew 18:1-2, people say we have no right to judge other ministries. A back lash has ensued and ministries committed to discernment have arisen. They seek to expose false doctrine. Many targets for discernment are the word of faith movement, emergent church, seeker sensitive and mega-churches. Several ministries like Jan Merkell's "Understanding the Times" and Todd Freole's "Wretched Radio" seem to major in discernment ministries.
Discernment is designed to call attention to teaching that is not line with orthodox Christianity. The problem is, many times it becomes personal. What appears to be a blatant act of blasphemy may just be a misunderstanding. What began as a well-meaning call to doctrinal purity may turn into character assassinations.
There is a difference between intended heresies and misunderstandings. No Christian has doctrine totally right. We all have our pet issues that, if insulted, we take personay. We must make sure our motives are right. We must correct error in love, not hate. At times Jan Merkell and Todd Freole come off as hateful. Exposing false doctrine should be done out of love for the truth, not to destroy. Too many times, mountains have been made out of molehills.
How do you deal with false doctrine without being hateful? Matthew 18 says that if you are offended with a fellow believer, you go to that person and discuss it with them in private. If he fails to listen to you,. you go back with one or two witnesses. If he still won't listen, then you take it to the church. If he won't listen to the church then he is to be considered an infidel. Because of geographical differences and corporations make it difficult to do this. But that does not give us licence to attack others on a radio program. To many times discernment is an excuse to attack. Some ministries exist with the express purpose of exposing false doctrine. We must not become MacArthyists looking for heretics under every bush.
I write this because I am very disturbed by this trend of discernment to become hateful. We do need to stand for truth, but it must be in a godly way. The Roman orator Cicero said that in time of war the law falls silent. Although Christianity is under attack from all sides, the Bible must not fall silent but influence all we do.
Being an agnostic, I had not heard of the 'discernment movement' before reading this essay. This is exactly what I was talking about when I was asking you what your opinion was in writing a blog. As I understand it, you believe that the discernment movement has a place in returning the church to the ideology, but it should not be a movement based in hate and anger. Not that my opinion on your blog matters, but I think this entry shows much improvement over previous things I have read on your blog. Good work.
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