Authenticating Ourselves
People are creatures of culture. When a group’s actions make them distinctive from others we can refer to them as having a separate culture. Among Christians we could identify a number of religious cultures, and these can be seen in the way we go about things differently.
One of the weapons we have stumbled across as believers is how the Scriptures can be used to justify what we do, particularly in comparison to others. We enter a place where God becomes a tribal God, favouring us because of our doctrine, our way of doing things and how we’re not like ‘those people out there’.
Let me give you an example. We spent 15 years in a Christian movement (oh no, you’ll guess it) and found that this attitude was alive and well. There are a number of distinctive aspects of this movement which are described by its members with Biblical terminology. Terms like worship, headship, the presence of God, singing in the Spirit, baptism in the Spirit, speaking in tongues, prophecy, faith and, not to mention (cringe), teaching were all drawn from Scripture and applied either wrongly or with insufficient evidence that the practice so-labeled was in fact what the Bible is talking about.
The effect was that these elements of the culture were given divine sanction, and it was all too present in the thinking of people in the movement that those who did not have or do these things were a notch or two below the bar.
These people aren’t alone. We all need to examine ourselves for this attitude, which could be described as self-justification. Jesus told the Pharisees, “You are those who justify yourselves” (Luke 16:15). We should be looking to nothing other than the justification that Christ gives and to have our confidence among men stand on this alone. We all want to be authentic but let’s remember that the root of the word is author – our assurance is in the author of life.
Postscript: We had similar experiences in another movement which are detailed here: Moving On: The New Teaching on Family.