Being a Christian isn’t about confidently knowing where you’ll be in the future. It’s about following Jesus right now, building the kingdom of heaven here on earth.
This past Sunday, I preached a sermon on Jesus’s famous Parable of the Weeds.
In that sermon, I made the claim that human beings, Christians included, should not spend their time/effort trying to confidently identify people as Christians or not (since only God knows the state of human beings, and only God will do such sorting in the end).
Instead, I suggested that we should spend our time and effort serving our master Jesus Christ, who in the parable is the “master of the house,” whose field we are charged to steward.
After the sermon, someone came up to me, not in a spirit of criticism but rather curiosity. They asked: What about all the language in the NT letters (i.e., those of John, Paul, Peter, Jude, etc.) imploring Christians to be on guard against false teachers in their midst?
This is an excellent question, because as this person noted, the NT devotes an awful lot of space to warning believers against such activity.
To this question then, I would respond as follows: When such letters were written, the “early church” existed in a disparate, scattered, and rather vulnerable state.
They were not united by a shared ecclesial structure or set of beliefs. They did not possess an authorized body of Christian writings (i.e., the NT), not yet. They thus depended on the “live teaching” and ministry of the apostles, their associates, and others.
Since the early church with its practices and doctrines was still very much in the process of development, it was essential that congregations beware of false teaching and only accept what aligned with the apostles’ message.
Still, however, I would argue that they were not required or commanded to confidently label others Christian or not.
In other words, the detection and elimination of false teaching can proceed without pronouncing a verdict about a person’s spiritual state.
Genuine Christians –i.e., the “wheat plants” from last week’s parable– have on many occasions been found guilty of false teaching (whether intentional or not).
Many figures considered saints at one time or another, were later considered heretics in the eyes of the orthodox church (or some, during their lives, were considered “true” by some and “false” by others).
Such persons in their teaching and ministry may have propounded ideas that they thought were correct and beneficial.
They might not have been trying to deceive or corrupt the church at all but were deemed “false” (in some sense) by others in the church body.
This is an instance in which believers should exercise discernment, combatting the influence of harmful theology, without labelling the person as a non-believer.
To be a Christian, as we know, is not to simply hold certain, approved theological beliefs. To be a Christian is to commit your life to Jesus, and to faithfully serve him. That’s it.
The duty of Christians, both then and now, is to exercise discernment in community.
As Jesus says in Matthew 10:16, we are to be “wise as serpents, and innocent as doves.”
Like doves, we are to be gentle, loving, and graceful toward all humans, not knowing whether they are true believers or not.
But like serpents, we are to be discerning, always aware of the insidious nature of sin, resisting false teaching and harmful activity when appropriate.
I believe then, that Jesus’s Parable of the Weeds in Matthew 13 does not contradict the injunctions to beware of false teachers found elsewhere in the NT.
What I will say though is that we as Christians must concern ourselves less with our or others’ eternal state, and more with Christ’s mission here on earth.
In other words, rather than spending our time thinking: “How can I make sure I am saved,” or “How can I make sure he or she is saved,” we should focus on what we can do now, which is: Follow Jesus and help others do the same.
If we observe Jesus’s life and emulate his way of being in the world, we’ll naturally do what the Parable and the NT letters call us to do.
We’ll love all the plants in God’s field, regardless of their spiritual state. And we’ll keep a close watch on our flocks, resisting any teaching misaligned with Jesus Christ.
The church, therefore, can be a community of radical acceptance, love, and inclusion, while also being aware of what harmful, crooked, “false” teaching looks like.
Sometimes we will have to act, resisting falsehood and even removing it.
In such cases though, we’re not pronouncing a judgment about the person’s spiritual state, nor are we “harvesting them,” as only God can.
We’re simply caring for the health of our flock, watching for “wolves” in “wolf-clothing” and in “sheep’s clothing” too.
Some wolves don’t even know they are wolves. They’re not trying to be wolves. They think they are sheep.
At times we need to resist and expel such wolves, so they can repent, come to their senses, and re-join the flock.
To sum up: Being a Christian isn’t about confidently knowing where you’ll be in the future. It’s about following Jesus right now, building the kingdom of heaven here on earth.
Rooting out false teaching and restoring false teachers, are ways we accomplish the above mission.
We’re not labelling or pronouncing judgment on others’ souls. We’re simply stewarding the field God has given us.
As we proceed in following Jesus, let’s think less about “what we get from him” (i.e., eternal bliss) and more about “what he gets from us” (i.e., total commitment to his mission).
In letting go of our quest for certainty about the future (about our salvation and that of others), we’re freed to follow Jesus right now, growing his kingdom of heaven here on earth.
Pastor Jonah