Articles
What We Don't Need
We humans are very needy creatures. We don’t like to admit this, but it is true nonetheless. It is true physically; we need oxygen on a moment-by-moment basis, and any short interruption of this supply can prove fatal. We need a regular supply of nutritious food, but on a short term basis we need potable water even more. We need many other things to promote physical life that God has built into the earthly ecosystem. And the unbelieving world lives in fear that this fragility will be overwhelmed by an asteroid impact, the buildup of carbon dioxide and other pollutants, extreme famine – even a possible alien invasion. We’re so insecure about life on earth that we’re spending billions of dollars to explore living on Mars.
But we’re psychologically needy as well. We need to love and be loved, cared for, supported and affirmed. We need purpose, value and to be significant and helpful to others. We need to be both challenged and at peace; to be forgiven and to forgive; we need both work and rest – all of these in proper proportion.
The good news is that God has supplied all of our true needs. As our Creator He understands best our physical, psychological and spiritual makeup, and He has provided legitimate outlets and resources for what makes us truly fulfilled and whole as we navigate life and all of its challenges.
Because “all things are yours” (1 Cor 3:21), and because God “has blessed us with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places in Christ” (Eph 1:3ff), there consequently are things we don’t need which other men might say we do. What are some of those things?
We don’t need animal sacrifices. Kevin Pulliam made this observation in his Lord’s supper talk last Sunday. For the majority of human history, which preceded the coming of Christ, men were directed to offer animals to God as sacrifices for their sins. We see the offering of sacrifices in the very first family (Cain and Abel); after the flood Noah builds an altar and offers animals thereon (Gn 8:20-21); Abraham builds altars to God wherever he goes (Gn 12:7-8; 13:18). The book of Job begins with this great patriarch offering sacrifices for the sins of his family (1:5). No doubt the slaughter of animals was a bloody, smelly, repulsive affair yet animal sacrifices were built into the fabric of ancient times.
But not anymore. The book of Hebrews emphasizes repeatedly the once-and-forever nature of the sacrifice of Jesus on behalf of sinners (cf. 1:3; 7:27; 9:12, 26, 28; 10:10, 12, 14). So, while we have been liberated from this grisly ritual we are called on to appreciate something higher and treasure it as the centerpiece of our relationship with God: Jesus allowed Himself to be horribly brutalized for my sake. What each of us do with that information sets the entire tone of our devotion to Him.
We don’t need an elite class of clergy. One of the greatest fallacies of the broader Christian world is that the Bible is not understandable to the “lay” believer. That is, the nuance and deeper meaning of Scripture is reserved for academics, and church governance is best executed by “ordained” officials. This is the result of two forces: 1) an abdication of personal responsibility by the Christian, who is all too willing to let someone else think for him, and 2) the clerical desire to seize and hold ecclesiastical power.
Yet, is it not true that Jesus spent the lion’s share of His time on earth with the “average” person? His teaching was aimed at the common man “who heard Him gladly” (Mk 12:37). It was the scribes, Pharisees and Sadducees – the religious leadership class – that couldn’t or wouldn’t understand the meaning and implication of His words. There is an obvious lesson here. God’s will is directed toward the believer, not the scholar. While there is nothing wrong with studying God’s word in greater detail, let the scholar not “think of himself more highly than he ought to think” (Rom 12:3). His greater knowledge only holds him to greater accountability, not higher honor.
We don’t need an emotional “experience” for validation of faith. Due to erroneous teaching about the Holy Spirit, many think that higher spiritual insight or maturity is fostered by an emotional experience of some sort. It is not enough to hear the gospel truth, obey its conditions including repentance, confession of Jesus as the Son of God and our Savior followed by immersed for the remission of sins (Ac 2:38; Rom 6:1-7; 1 Cor 12:13; Gal 3:26-27; Col 2:11-13; Mk 16:16; etc.). They need something “more.”
The Bible gives specific instructions about what is to be believed and what actions are to be taken in order for our sins to be forgiven and a relationship with God reestablished through Christ and His sacrifice. Emotions are not precluded from this process, but it isn’t fundamentally an emotional “experience.” It is not something that happens to you as much as it is something you do followed by the emotional effects of having obeyed God. But there is no subsequent “better felt than told” confirmation of one’s acceptance by God. Such is not a Biblical idea; rather, it arises from false doctrine which hyper-focuses on the Holy Spirit and emotionalism.
We don’t need a denominational superstructure to support and govern the local church. The word “denomination” in the religious sense has simply come to mean “group”; i.e., the Baptist denomination is the Baptist organization comprised of individual Baptist churches; the Methodist denomination is comprised of Methodist churches; etc. It is simply taken for granted that “Christianity” is an overarching term which covers all sorts of similar religious groups allied with Christ to one degree or another. But this whole system of disparate religious bodies is missing from the New Testament. It is an invention of man, a product of human self-will, a faulty compromise based on the failure of men to agree on what Scripture actually teaches. It is the failed attempt to turn division into a virtue.
This is why we explain to querists that the Centreville church is not merely a cog in the network of “the Church of Christ in America.” When we say we are “non-denominational” we mean that each local assembly is disconnected from all others financially and administratively. While we tend to know one another and support each other’s efforts as Christians did in the early church, we do not merge regionally or nationally or cede control to some overseeing body. While this may not seem like a big deal to the average Joe, it is a vital aspect to the Lord’s blueprint for His church. Religious bureaucracy will always mirror the other dysfunctional, counterproductive human bureaucracies that frustrate us all.
