There is a lot these days that passes for Christianity that saddens Jesus and angers the Apostles. However, while many would rant and rave and throw out the “heretic” label, I hope to show you a different way.
My name is Joshua Wingerd, and over the course of my five and a half years of theological education (though I’ve been educating myself in theology and Bible study since summer 2010), I have become convinced that the Church is lamentably defined by what Jesus predicted in Matthew 24:12, “Because lawlessness will multiply, the love of many will grow cold.”
Perhaps you’ve been hurt by the Church.
I pray you
find peace
and healing here.
Perhaps you find Christianity to be a sham.
I pray you
are met with patience
and grace here.
Perhaps you’ve never heard of Christianity.
I pray you
come to know
Jesus Christ here.
A bit about me: I’ve been hurt by the Church. I’ve accused Christianity of being a scam. So I know how much it hurts, and I know how tempted you are to flee. I still face the struggle described by the old hymn:
“Prone to wander, Lord, I feel it
prone to leave the God I love.”1
But maybe you’ve tried Christianity for 5 years, 10 years, 20 years. Maybe you’re done. Maybe you’ve decided it’s not for you. Maybe you’re rethinking everything you believe. Maybe you’ve already decided you don’t believe anything.
Or maybe you’ve grown up in Church and you’re looking forward to the day you won’t be forced to go to Church anymore.
I would ask you to reconsider. I would ask you to not try to convince yourself that God isn’t real or isn’t how he’s been presented by Christians for 2,000+ years.
John 15:6 was the verse that changed my trajectory in 2010, and regardless of your thoughts on God’s wrath and the justice of hell, there is a consequence for fleeing from God and isolating yourself from his people:
If anyone does not remain in Me, he is thrown aside like a branch and he withers. They gather them, throw them into the fire, and they are burned.
John 15:6
I’m not saying that it is bad to rethink doctrine. It’s more than fine to do so—Jesus and the Apostles would encourage us to do so. It’s what Jesus himself did (cf. Matthew 9:13), and it’s what ultimately got him nailed to a cross (cf. Mark 3:1-6).
However, in our rethinking of doctrines, we must always have a baseline. We can’t toss out everything; even Jesus didn’t toss out everything. In fact, he came to fulfill the Law (cf. Matthew 5:17-18). His quotation in Matthew 9:13 is from the Old Testament (Hosea 6:6). The reason why our doctrines must be reassessed is because—much like in Jesus’ day—the wrong things can be prioritized to the detriment of weightier matters: “justice, mercy, and faithfulness” (Matthew 23:23).
But if we throw out the Bible, claiming it to be outdated and unhelpful for the twenty-first century, then we will be in big trouble. The Bible is the foundation of Christianity. The Bible witnesses to Jesus Christ. And other Christian writings ever since show the people of God wrestling with both Scripture and themselves to better understand what God desires for them in this life. As such, in order to properly navigate rethinking doctrines, we must listen to the Bible and Tradition (from the Apostolic Fathers to modern commentators – especially heeding those closer in chronology to Christ). The Tradition should be weighed against the Bible, but the Tradition exists to guard us from wandering off into uncharted territory (true heresy).
It’s true that Scripture has been misused over history. The Inquisition. The Crusades. Slavery. The Holocaust. The list could go on. But this is why we must read the Bible carefully, attentive to the threads that connect the various parts. As Saint Augustine of Hippo explained, “Whoever, then, appears in his own opinion to have comprehended the Sacred Scriptures, or even some part of them, yet does not build up with that knowledge the twofold love of God and his neighbor, ‘has not yet known as he ought to know’ (1 Corinthians 8:2).”2
And the sad reality is that Augustine’s understanding of love ultimately resulted in the Inquisition and potentially even the Holocaust, so even words like “love” can be misused.
But that’s why this blog exists. It exists to help us properly define “love.” It exists to help us understand Scripture better. It exists to encourage our growth in both love of God and love of neighbor. It exists to foster unity in Christianity. It exists so that Christians would better represent God to a watching world:
Whoever confesses that Jesus is the Son of God—God remains in him and he in God. And we have come to know and to believe the love that God has for us. God is love, and the one who remains in love remains in God, and God remains in him. In this, love is perfected with us so that we may have confidence in the day of judgment, for we are as He is in this world.
1 John 4:15-17, emphasis added
In other words, “live in Love; find your true reward” (FYTR). Let’s grow in Christian love together.
In this with you.
Thanks for reading.
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live in Love; find your true reward 