Why Doctrine Matters

Newsletter article for September 2002

© 2002 by Rev. Paul A. Wolff

“Be careful to obey all these regulations I am giving you, so that it may always go well with you and your children after you, because you will be doing what is good and right in the eyes of the Lord your God.” Deuteronomy 12:28

God is not a fundamentalist. There are not a set of fundamental teachings which God values over any other. God’s teachings are ALL important, and God required the Israelites of the Old Testament to obey all of His laws, even the ceremonial laws. For the selfish person who thinks that he is the center of the universe, this may sound harsh and uncompromising, but God had a good reason for His uncompromising stance. As He said above, if we keep God’s regulations as He wants us to then things will always go well with us and with our children. God’s purpose in giving us His Word is so that things will always go well with us. God isn’t being mean or nasty (He isn’t capable of being mean), instead God tells us this for our benefit because He loves us.

God knows what is best for us. He created us, after all, and God wants what is best for us. God knows that if we follow His plan, as He created us to do, then things will work according to His plan and we will be happy. God also is the only one who can save us when we sin against His commands, and that is also why He wants us to love and worship Him above all else.

“I am astonished that you are so quickly deserting the one who called you by the grace of Christ and are turning to a different gospel — which is really no gospel at all. Evidently some people are throwing you into confusion and are trying to pervert the gospel of Christ. But even if we or an angel from heaven should preach a gospel other than the one we preached to you, let him be eternally condemned! As we have already said, so now I say again: If anybody is preaching to you a gospel other than what you accepted, let him be eternally condemned!” Galatians 1:6-9

These are some very strong words from St. Paul. Here he proclaims eternal damnation to anyone to teaches a gospel other than what he preached to the church in Galatia. This would again seem the height of arrogance, except that what Paul taught the Galatians was the Word of God. Paul wasn’t teaching something that he invented, or some new educational theory. He was preaching the Gospel of Christ as Jesus had told him to preach. The false teachers in Galatia were perverting the Gospel and were evidently leading people away from Jesus. That is why Paul declared that anyone who preaches a different Gospel would be damned, because there is no salvation except that which comes from Jesus.

“Dear friends, do not believe every spirit, but test the spirits to see whether they are from God, because many false prophets have gone out into the world. This is how you can recognize the Spirit of God: Every spirit that acknowledges that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh is from God, but every spirit that does not acknowledge Jesus is not from God. This is the spirit of the antichrist, which you have heard is coming and even now is already in the world.” 1 John 4:1-3

Not every teaching that claims to be from God actually does come from God. This is why John gives this warning, but he also tells us how to test the doctrine to know that it has come from God. Those who speak God’s word truthfully must acknowledge Jesus as Lord and God. Similarly, no messenger from God would deny God’s Word either, even in the smallest degree.

“For the time will come when men will not put up with sound doctrine. Instead, to suit their own desires, they will gather around them a great number of teachers to say what their itching ears want to hear. They will turn their ears away from the truth and turn aside to myths.” 1 Timothy 4:3-4

These verses do much to describe the situation in our world today. Even in the Christian Church, there are a seeming multitude of denominations and each one teaches something different. This certainly cannot please Christ because each different denomination gives credibility to some false teaching which can lead people away from the truth, and lead them to put their faith in something which cannot save them. Only Jesus can save us from our sins.

“Jesus said, ‘If you hold to my teaching, you are really my disciples. Then you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free.’" John
8:31-32