“That You All Agree” (1 Cor.1:10): Discernment, Dialogue & Decision-Making in the Church: Part I
Posted by Radical Resurgence | Posted in Uncategorized | Posted on 29-02-2012
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Decision Making.
One of the most basic elements in the fabric of church life is decision-making. Every church makes decisions (even not making a certain decision in itself still constitutes a “decision”). Churches decide such things as when to meet, who will be received into the church, how to use church funds, who will teach, and how they will be governed. Yet it is precisely in the area of decision-making that most churches are totally untrained and unprepared, The inability to resolve conflict is a central reason why churches are splitting at epidemic levels.
Two key reasons why churches split are (1) the lack of participation by the whole congregation in decision-making, and (2) the refusal of the leadership and/or congregation to confront problems, which then repeat themselves in the future (Wayne Kiser, “Church Splits,” Evangelical Newsletter, 9:6, March 19, 1982).
The most important thing a church must learn in its life as a body is how to work through things together. To put it in the language of 1 Cor.1:10, we must learn “how to agree.”
1 Cor.1:10 — “I appeal to you, brothers, in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, that you all agree with one another so that there may be no divisions among you and that you may be perfectly united in mind and thought.”
The Corinthian believers had a serious problem: they were clustering around personalities, which then caused divisions. To solve this problem, Paul appeals to them “to agree” about the sinfulness of this situation. If they “agreed” the divisions could no longer exist.