Some misled believers sincerely believe it doesn't matter what you believe as long as you are sincere. This is fallacious and what you believe is the most important thing about you. Ideas have consequences and you cannot engage in heresy without it having the side effect of wrong behavior or mislead and misguided action. Doctrine is not simply your philosophy but means "teaching" in plain English. "All Scripture is profitable for doctrine..." (cf. 2 Tim. 3:16).
We think in terms of vocabulary and the bigger our vocabulary, the more profound or engaged our thinking can attain to. Doctrine is akin to the vocabulary of the Bible and one must master the basics of the milk of the Word to move on to the meat or solid food of the Bible. You are unskilled in the Word of Righteousness if you don't know the ABCs of doctrine. We think in terms of doctrine and applied doctrine as our vocabulary and shouldn't base our learning upon experience, such as mystics do. Doctrine is rudimentary and we cannot avoid or escape it without committing spiritual suicide.
Teachers are to "teach what is appropriate to sound doctrine" (cf. Titus 2:1) and to pay attention to their doctrine, and "rebuke them sharply that they may be sound in the faith." (cf. Titus 2:13). Learning doctrine requires a disciplined mind, but when you enroll in the school of Christ it comes with the territory. Now it is important to have the right doctrine or orthodoxy, but orthopraxy (right ethics) is also vital. Just because our doctrine is impeccably correct doesn't mean everything is copacetic. It is more paramount that our hearts be right with the Lord than our minds fixated on the right beliefs. But both are important to a healthy Christian walk. R. C. Sproul says: "You can have sound doctrine without a sound life, but no sound life without sound doctrine."
No matter how much faith we have and no matter how sincere we are, if our doctrine is heretical we are not saved. Sincerity is important but it is not everything--you can be sincerely wrong and lost. Mature believers are defined in Ephesians 4:14 as those who are not "tossed about by every wind of doctrine." This stability only comes with a basic foundation that cannot be shaken and getting a frame of reference so that the believer knows what he believes and even what beliefs are negotiable, and which ones are not. (Augustine's dictum says, "In essentials, unity; in nonessentials, liberty; in all things, charity.") We must know when it is appropriate to be dogmatic and stand up for the faith, contend, and when to cut some slack! "For the time will come when men will not endure sound doctrine." (cf. 2 Tim. 4:3).
Yes, there is false doctrine in the church; however, we are to be ever vigilant and to answer it with sound doctrine, not avoid it entirely. To avoid doctrine because of false doctrine is only spiritual suicide and abandoning the search for the truth, whereas godliness is through the Word of Truth and we feed on doctrine resident in the soul. In the final analysis, you are rewarded according to your good deeds, but you are saved according to what your beliefs--these two are correlated, and can be distinguished, but not separated or divorced. Soli Deo Gloria!
We think in terms of vocabulary and the bigger our vocabulary, the more profound or engaged our thinking can attain to. Doctrine is akin to the vocabulary of the Bible and one must master the basics of the milk of the Word to move on to the meat or solid food of the Bible. You are unskilled in the Word of Righteousness if you don't know the ABCs of doctrine. We think in terms of doctrine and applied doctrine as our vocabulary and shouldn't base our learning upon experience, such as mystics do. Doctrine is rudimentary and we cannot avoid or escape it without committing spiritual suicide.
Teachers are to "teach what is appropriate to sound doctrine" (cf. Titus 2:1) and to pay attention to their doctrine, and "rebuke them sharply that they may be sound in the faith." (cf. Titus 2:13). Learning doctrine requires a disciplined mind, but when you enroll in the school of Christ it comes with the territory. Now it is important to have the right doctrine or orthodoxy, but orthopraxy (right ethics) is also vital. Just because our doctrine is impeccably correct doesn't mean everything is copacetic. It is more paramount that our hearts be right with the Lord than our minds fixated on the right beliefs. But both are important to a healthy Christian walk. R. C. Sproul says: "You can have sound doctrine without a sound life, but no sound life without sound doctrine."
No matter how much faith we have and no matter how sincere we are, if our doctrine is heretical we are not saved. Sincerity is important but it is not everything--you can be sincerely wrong and lost. Mature believers are defined in Ephesians 4:14 as those who are not "tossed about by every wind of doctrine." This stability only comes with a basic foundation that cannot be shaken and getting a frame of reference so that the believer knows what he believes and even what beliefs are negotiable, and which ones are not. (Augustine's dictum says, "In essentials, unity; in nonessentials, liberty; in all things, charity.") We must know when it is appropriate to be dogmatic and stand up for the faith, contend, and when to cut some slack! "For the time will come when men will not endure sound doctrine." (cf. 2 Tim. 4:3).
Yes, there is false doctrine in the church; however, we are to be ever vigilant and to answer it with sound doctrine, not avoid it entirely. To avoid doctrine because of false doctrine is only spiritual suicide and abandoning the search for the truth, whereas godliness is through the Word of Truth and we feed on doctrine resident in the soul. In the final analysis, you are rewarded according to your good deeds, but you are saved according to what your beliefs--these two are correlated, and can be distinguished, but not separated or divorced. Soli Deo Gloria!
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