They will be unloving and unforgiving; they will slander others and have no self-control. They will be cruel and hate what is good. They will betray their friends, be reckless, be puffed up with pride, and love pleasure rather than God. They will act religious, but they will reject the power that could make them godly. Stay away from people like that! (2 Timothy 3:3-5)There is a blindness in some people that is set into them so strongly they cannot see any other points of view but their own. Sometimes it is just their own wishes made holy by theological association. Sometimes it is misapplication of scripture. Sometimes it is their own past ruling their present.
Whatever the reason, it will tear them up. It is not from God.
And it will not only tear them up, it will also tear up their families and their friends. People like this are so intent on their point that they slander, they will be cruel (most of the time to their own families in that they remove their families from fellowship with others). They are puffed up with pride in that they feel that their own opinion is so good and so holy that they will tear up a church to preserve it.
The Bible always speaks against division in the church. The book of Proverbs has a number of comments about people who cause division. And neither Jesus nor the apostles ever commended anyone for tearing up a church for any reason whatever.
Whether it be alcohol use or worship styles or the way we dress or any other reason, when we turn from the gospel of unity, we are wrong.
The Lord gives freedom and allows us to worship him as best we can. He never allows anyone in the church, no matter how well-meaning, to determine who we do so.
In fact, over and over, he condemns those who do.
And it hurts when it happens. When people sit at your table and eat your food and accept your hospitality and you find that it was simply because they were trying their best to convert you to their way of thinking.
The church is greater than people’s individual thoughts.
And there is nothing that the Lord made – nothing – that is wrong in and of itself. No food is sinful, no drink is sinful, no medication is sinful, no bodily function is sinful – unless it is used wrongly.
But it is foolish to consider that God would make something and then laugh at us and condemn us when we used it.
It is foolish to bind our own thoughts on others and try to tear the church up with it.
And it hurts.
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