AP Why can’t all Christians just bury their differences and get along? Isn’t that what Christ wants?Â
Ed The apostle Paul said, ‘Is Christ divided?’(1 Corinthians 1:13). The answer should be no! The community of believers should be characterised by harmony: ‘Behold, how good and pleasant it is when brothers dwell in unity’ (Psalm 133:1).
However, we are sinful people (Romans 3:23), and so problems arise. They did in the First Century, within a few years of the church’s birth, so we shouldn’t be surprised if they happen now. In the New Testament letters we have a sadly long list of cases where faithful believers were told not to share fellowship with other believers who taught or practised wrong things. For example those who were persistently immoral (1 Corinthians 5:11, Ephesians 5:7-8); those who were idle and busybodies (2 Thessalonians 3:10-15); anyone who ‘teaches a different doctrine and does not agree with the sound words of our Lord Jesus Christ and the teaching that accords with godliness’ (1 Timothy 6:3–5); those who betrayed their faith (1 Timothy 1:19–20); those who did not abide in the teaching of Christ (2 John :9–11). The apostle John in his letters warns about those who ‘went out from us, but they were not of us’, who taught wrong things about God and Christ and whom he calls ‘antichrist’ (1 John 2:18-23, 4:1-3 and 2 John :7).
John wrote, ‘That which we have seen and heard we proclaim also to you, so that you too may have fellowship with us; and indeed our fellowship is with the Father and with his Son Jesus Christ’ (1 John 1:3). A Christian believer’s fellowship starts with God and Christ. It follows that fellowship with other believers must be on the basis of a shared faith.