|
 A
young preacher is ”confused, disillusioned, frustrated and
discouraged.” He has discovered that older preachers, in whom
he had the utmost confidence, are not worthy of that confidence
— they do not agree upon Bible teaching.
Yeah!!
I also made that discovery, in the mid-thirties. I still recall
the men involved, and my disappointment in them. It is a safe
guess that every conscientious young adult whose eyes are open,
faces that same awakening. Young man, I am not laughing at you;
I am hurting with you. But the picture is not completely dark.
You
could have been so blinded by hero worship that you rationalized
the whole mess, and concluded that truth is relative to the
individual — that there is no standard but man. In despair,
you could have chosen blindly — taking the “leap of faith”
that only pretends to see, and wraps God in hypocritical robes.
You could have been wed to one “party” or “creed” so
that party loyalty took the place of honest intellectual
objectivity. And you could be using this whole matter as your
excuse for “copping
| |
out,” or gratifying selfish “liberation” from
the demands of truth and right.
Failure
to agree is no reflection upon God’s word as source of truth.
There was great disagreement among those who heard Jesus. We “hear”
with our background, our likes and dislikes, our selfish
interests (Matt. 13:9-16). There is little evidence that anyone
is wholly objective; and identical understanding, in all
details, is rare. The young man was naive.
But
“one mind” in striving for the faith of the gospel is
possible, and is necessary (Phil. 1:27-f.). We must have a
common desire to know truth, “having the same love,
being of one accord, of one mind” (2:1-f). In this spirit we
will defer to one another, and help one another to know truth.
And
with this spirit the young man will realize he had placed his
confidence in the wrong direction-- in man rather than in God.
Now he can shed childish dreams, pick up the pieces, and join
with brethren world-wide who study and live honestly before God.
[Previous
Article] [Next
Article]
|
