Following theological trends is the kind of faith Paul warns us to avoid so we don’t experience spiritual sea sickness.
If you haven’t noticed, theology moves in trends like everything else in the world. Like the latest fashion or social media trends, different theological positions and groups come in and out of style. For a few years a certain theological tradition will grow in popularity, and people will flock to the church doors where it is taught. You’ll see blog posts and Instagram posts capturing people as they worship in the latest trendy way. Certain phrases get coined, and everyone starts using them. But suddenly, one day you’ll find that people are warning against that very tradition they once loved and aligned themselves with. It’s now dangerous and foolish to say you belong to a church with those kinds of Christians. It can make us feel dizzy trying to figure out what we’re supposed to believe.
Thus, in Ephesians, Paul warns us against spiritual sea sickness:
He [Jesus] gave the apostles, the prophets, the evangelists, the shepherds and teachers, to equip the saints for the work of ministry, for building up the body of Christ, until we all attain to the unity of the faith and of the knowledge of the Son of God, to mature manhood, to the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ, so that we may no longer be children, tossed to and fro by the waves and carried about by every wind of doctrine, by human cunning, by craftiness in deceitful schemes. Rather, speaking the truth in love, we are to grow up in every way into him who is the head, into Christ, from whom the whole body, joined and held together by every joint with which it is equipped, when each part is working properly, makes the body grow so that it builds itself up in love. (Eph. 4:11–16; emphasis added)
Paul wants us to be wary of following theological trends. He calls us to ground ourselves in a solid, local church where we are taught right and true theology. He calls us to cling to Christ and so grow up in theological maturity. This doesn’t mean we never shift our beliefs.
The kind of change in doctrinal beliefs that’s led by God through sanctification is usually slow and not necessarily tied to what’s trendy.
Here are a few simple steps you can take today to ground yourself in the essentials of the Christian faith.
Brothers and sisters, may we strive to not be thrown about by every wind of doctrine. Instead, let’s study God’s Word and know it. Put yourself under the right preaching of the Word. Ground yourself in historic Christian doctrine and the true gospel before trying on the next theological trend. Know what God says about himself, salvation, and life rather than what the latest influencer thinks. Know God through his Word, not through viral social media posts.
How do we do this? Here are a few simple steps you can take today to ground yourself in the essentials of the Christian faith before jumping on the next theological trend:
- Find a local church that preaches God’s Word and commit to it. Choosing a local church isn’t like finding a hairdresser. You can jump from hairdresser to hairdresser each time you need your haircut, but you shouldn’t find a new church every time yours gets a little boring. Before choosing a church, check out its doctrinal statements, meet with the pastors to ask questions, and attend the church services to learn more about what the church believes and what the leadership is like. Don’t chose a church based on whatever is trendy. Find one that holds to historic Christianity.
- Read Scripture more often than social media and popular books. The Bible is the only book without any errors and is breathed from God himself, and it is this book that needs to be our foundation before we can take in and rightly discern other content. It can feel hard to find time to read the Bible, but perhaps if we considered our screen time (whether on our phones, tablets, computers, or TVs) we would find that we have anywhere from at least ten to thirty minutes that could be devoted to Scripture.
- Get discipled. Learn under believers who are older, wiser, and more mature than you, and bring your questions and struggles to them.
Each of these steps will help guard you from the shifting sands of the culture and ground yourself in the truth. You’ll learn how to discern right from almost right, as Spurgeon so famously quipped, and your roots will grow ever deeper into the truths of God.