IN ESSENTIALS UNITY
March 18, 2010 (David Cloud, Fundamental Baptist Information Service, P.O. Box 610368, Port Huron, MI 48061, 866-295-4143, fbns@wayoflife.org; for instructions about subscribing and unsubscribing or changing addresses, see the information paragraph at the end of the article) -
The New Evangelical philosophy is often stated by the dictum, “In essentials unity; in non-essentials liberty; in all things charity,” (commonly attributed to Augustine, but actually first stated by the 17th-century Lutheran Rupertus Meldenius (a.k.a. Peter Meiderlin).
This became the rallying cry of the Moravians, who did many good things but refused to reject the heresy of infant baptism and promoted unity above the absolute truth of God’s Word. The same dictum has been heartily adopted by modern New Evangelicals. They might stand for ten or twenty or thirty “cardinals,” but they refuse to make an issue of the WHOLE counsel of God.
In contrast, Paul exemplified exactly what they neglect to do (Acts 20:27), and in this, he was merely following in His Master’s footsteps. Jesus commanded His disciples to teach converts “to observe ALL things whatsoever I have commanded you” (Mat. 28:20).
Paul instructed Timothy to keep the truth “without spot, unrebukeable, until the appearing of our Lord Jesus Christ” (1 Tim. 6:14). A spot is a small, seemingly insignificant thing.
I challenge anyone to show me where the Scripture encourages the believer to “stand for the cardinal truths and downplay the peripherals.”
Jude instructed every believer to “earnestly contend for the faith once delivered to the saints” (Jude 3). As Jude didn’t delineate what part of the faith is to be defended, the obvious meaning is that whatever aspect of the faith is under attack, God’s people should rally to its defense rather than pretending that it is a “non-essential.”
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