This article from Kevin DeYoung is superb. Here’ s an excerpt:
The Lord has been gracious over many years to preserve the unity at our church. So I’m not writing about the members of University Reformed Church. But I’ve seen and heard enough—from other church leaders and from church visitors who end up not staying with us—to know that some conservative Christians can make things that are secondary (or tertiary or whatever words come next for four and five) into things that are primary.
There are Christians who want homeschooling to be the top agenda for the church. Others insist that every church leader must embrace private Christian schools. I’ve met Christians whose number one passion seems to be age-integration in church ministries. Others are adamant that kids should be in all church services and aren’t allowed to draw pictures or look at books. For others, paedocommunion is a must. For some the issue is the Ten Commandments every Sunday or the presence of two services (morning and evening good; two in the morning bad). I’ve heard of other Christians getting up in arms about Christmas trees, the use or non-use of wine during communion, and whether infants should wear white garments or black when they are baptized. And too many have taken the regulative principle, which as a general principle is helpful and scriptural, and made the detailed application of this principle the end all and be all of church life.
Please hear me out. I like Christians who know what they believe and why they believe it (I’ve never been criticized for having too few convictions and opinions). So, I’m not saying the items above are unimportant issues (okay, a couple might be). The problem is not that we care about all sorts of issues or that we want to think carefully about every aspect of church ministry. The problem is we haven’t always thought carefully about how we express and hold to our careful thoughts.
Click here to read the rest.
Christians may disagree on many issues. Oftentimes, they do. However, we cannot disagree on the primary issues: the gospel of grace and the person and work of Jesus Christ our Lord.
What do you think? What secondary issues do you think we can “get of whack” on?