I was going to start this blog off with some posts about the core beliefs of Christianity.  Rest assured, those are still to come - but there are a couple of other topics that I believe need to be addressed first.

I’ve noticed an anti-intellectual movement in many Christian circles, and frequently it takes the form of railing against “big, fancy words” under the guise that “it’s not about all that fancy doctrine and theology mumbo-jumbo, it’s all about Jesus”.  It’s easy to be swayed by the apparent simplicity of this argument, because yes - it is all about Jesus.

However, while you’re talking about Jesus, you need to describe what you’re teaching, what you’re doing, and what you believe.  For that, you need both doctrine and theology…there’s just no way around it.  We’ll define both words briefly in this post, starting with theology.

Theology is a word we get from two Greek words, “theos” and “logos”.  “Theos” is the Greek word for God, and “logos” is the Greek word for “word”.  When you combine the two, you get (roughly) “words about God”.  In fact, if we translate John 1:1 just using these couple bits of Greek, we get:

“In the beginning was the Logos, and the Logos was with Theos, and the Logos was Theos.” (John 1:1, ESV with substitutions)

The roots of the word are right there in the beginning of the Gospels.  Moving from our rough definition, “words about God”, we refine it a bit and get the modern definition for theology, “the study of God”.  You’ll see this same word combination elsewhere as well.  For instance, you probably studied biology in high school.  The word “biology” comes from “bios” (the Greek word for life) and “logos”, and it means “the study of life”.  Theology is, in its most basic form, the study of God.  Therefore, if you’re studying God, you’re learning theology.

While you’re studying theology, you’ll also be learning doctrine. The word “doctrine” doesn’t come to us from Greek directly, but it is an English translation of the Greek word “didaskalia”.  This word can also be translated as “teaching” or “learning”,  and it’s the root of the word “indoctrinate” as well.  If you say that a school teacher “indoctrinated the children”, you’re saying that the teacher repeatedly communicated their teachings to the children.  The word “indoctrinate” is usually considered to be negative in our culture, but it doesn’t have to be.

Webster’s dictionary defines the word doctrine as “in a general sense, whatever is taught”.  Doctrine can be true or false, and the Bible encourages us:

“But as for you, teach what accords with sound doctrine” (Titus 2:1, ESV)

Again, there are many purportedly Christian teachers out there that claim that what they’re teaching isn’t about doctrine or theology.  This is appealing to many people, because it makes it sound like the teacher has no underlying motives or agendas.  The thing is, if you say something as simple as “Jesus loves you,” you’re teaching somebody (doctrine) about what God is like (theology).  So why do the teachers make the claim if it’s patently false?

There are of course those who make the claim in ignorance. These people are well-meaning, and what they usually mean is that Christianity doesn’t have to be as complicated as some people make it.  I can sympathize with this point of view, because the core of Christianity is really very simple.

But there are others out there that use this type of statement to defuse objections to something they’re about to say.  After all, the thinking goes, if doctrine isn’t being taught you don’t have to worry about whether or not it “accords with sound doctrine.”

This is in direct opposition to what Paul says to the Galatians:

“But even if we or an angel from heaven should preach to you a gospel contrary to the one we preached to you, let him be accursed. As we have said before, so now I say again: If anyone is preaching to you a gospel contrary to the one you received, let him be accursed.” (Galatians 1:8-9, ESV)

We are to monitor what we’re being taught, compare it with what we’ve learned, and sort out the differences to discover where the truth actually falls.  You can’t do this by uncritically accepting what a teacher says; you have to turn to the Bible and discover what it says for yourself.

There is an absolute truth, and that truth is revealed to us in Scripture. Because of that, doctrine and theology are not the enemies of Christianity; they’re delightful companions on the journey.  Enjoy your journey this week!