THE BASIS OF ACCEPTANCE

Therefore receive one another, just as Christ also received us, to the glory of God. --- Rom. 15:7

Perhaps I have already said it now and again, or at least implied it, but in this essay I want to say it as unequivocally as possible: we have no right to make anything a condition of accepting a fellow believer except loyalty to Christ. There can be no baptismal test, no doctrinal test, no ecclesiastical test, no educational test, no racial test, no social test. Nothing, except loyalty to Jesus Christ. And this loyalty is to be determined by the persons’s own relationship to Christ, his own abilities and knowledge, his own limitations and opportunities. Not ours.

This Scripture, which is a command by metaphor, should be all the motivation we need: as Christ received us we are to receive one another. In receiving us Jesus went the second mile and then some, for it was by mercy that he saved us. “God demonstrates His own love toward us, in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us” (Rom. 5:8). If the Lord received us with all our warts and hangups, we are to receive each other with all our imperfections.

By “receive” or “accept” I take St. Paul to mean to treat and acknowledge as an equal in Christ. We are to receive a brother because he is a brother and a sister because she is a sister, not because he or she belongs to the right party or has passed some check-list. The condition can be but one thing: belief in and obedience to Jesus Christ according to one’s light.

Several ideas get in our way when we consider this more open position. One is fellowship, which we tend to equate with approval or endorsement, and so we say things like “We can’t fellowship a brother in error.” If that means we can’t endorse what we believe to be wrong, that is right, but we can accept (treat as an equal) one who holds erroneous positions. If not, there would be almost no one to fellowship since we all “fall short of the glory of God.” In the light of Scripture, fellowship simply means sharing the common life, and there can be and is sharp diversity between those who share “life in the Son,” in the earliest church as well as the modern church. There can be even serious clashes without a break of fellowship, as with Peter and Paul. Paul withstood Peter to his face on one occasion, for “he was to be blamed,” and the apostle refers to others who “were not straightforward about the truth of the gospel” (Gal. 2:11-14). But there is no hint that this confrontation compromised the reality of the life they shared in Christ, or their fellowship.

We might try using acceptance more and fellowship less. Rom. 15:7 does not mention fellowshiping one another but receiving one another, and it tells how: the way Christ received you, the way of mercy, love, tenderness.

Membership is another hangup, and this idea does not have deep roots in Scripture, except in terms of our being “members one of another,” which has little or nothing to do with what we call church membership. We think of receiving someone into church membership, or that his or her name is listed in the directory, and he or she is thus publicly accepted as a member of our congregation. This may have its virtue, but we must distinguish between this and the principle of accepting all other believers in Christ as equals. Church rolls and membership lists are our ideas and are not mandated in Scripture.

The idea we often have of Christian is still another roadblock to a more open view. As honorific as the name is, it is barely in the Bible, and in one important sense is not there at all: in the sense of any believer ever calling himself by that name or ever calling any other believer by that name. It is next to certain that it was an appellation bestowed by outsiders, maybe in derision and maybe not. The church’s earliest historian takes note of when and where “the disciples” were first called Christians (Acts 11 :26) and proceeds to call them believers and disciples, never Christians. Even when Agrippa told Paul, “You almost persuade me to become a Christian” (Acts 26:28), the apostle avoids applying the term to himself in response, while another apostle acknowledges that believers should rejoice if they are called upon to “suffer as a Christian” (1 Pet. 4: 16).

I am not of course complaining about the name, though I agree with Alexander Campbell that it may be presumptuous for us to call ourselves such, but to the finality and precision that we inject into the name. I have noticed, for example, that my people will accept others as disciples of Christ when they will not accept them as Christians. We usually draw a finer line on who is a Christian than on who is a disciple. Jesus has only asked that we make disciples of all the nations, not Christians. And I am saying in this essay that we should accept all disciples of Jesus as equals, on the same grounds that Jesus received us.

In the light of Scripture I know little or nothing of “how to become a Christian,” but the Bible makes it abundantly clear how to become a disciple of Christ: believe in him and follow him. We should accept as fellow disciples all who do that. Loyalty to Christ is the standard!

Our doctrines on baptism are the most serious obstacles to this larger view, and I say doctrines because we have no single interpretation. Some insist that baptism must be for the remission of sins, with the disciple having to understand that to be the purpose when baptized, to be valid. Some stress its essentiality, and the candidate must believe it to be absolutely necessary when he is baptized. Others take a more symbolic view of baptism. But we hardly have one position, except that we generally are reluctant to receive other disciples of Christ as equals unless they have been immersed as have we.

In doing this we commit an old fallacy called non sequitur. While we should stand firm to what we believe the Scriptures to teach about baptism, it does not follow that in doing that we have to reject those who do not yet have our understanding. We can bear witness to the truth about baptism in the context of accepting all other believers on the basis of their fidelity to Jesus Christ, according to their understanding. If we make our understanding and practice of baptism a test of acceptance, we then and there alienate ourselves from most of the Christian world and thus neutralize any influence we might have.

I will illustrate what I mean. Now and again I am with a gathering of believers in a common cause, such as a fight against pornography. Since they talk, believe and act like Christians, I do not bother to question them about their baptism. I accept them as equals in Christ (period) and with no strings attached. Since we share the common faith (fellowship), I may and do have opportunity to teach them just as they teach me. While baptism (my understanding and practice) is not a condition for my accepting them, it is a subject we might well discuss within a framework of loving acceptance. It would be the same if they came to our church.

Our church here in Denton does it the right way, as I see it. I’ll put it as one of the elders recently stated it to me: we accept people on the profession of their faith in Christ, which is implied by their presence and interest. We bear testimony to all that we believe to be right and good, including baptism by immersion for the remission of sins. As people come to share this view they will make the proper response. Until they do we go right on accepting them, making no distinctions. While we have a “directory,” we do not make much of it, and it is only for convenience and not a “membership” roll. We somehow know who our “members” are without having a hard and fast rule as to who they are. We immerse people into Christ as they come to see that they should obey this command. While we recognize baptism as a transition point, “the answer of a good conscience toward God” as the Bible puts it, we do not have to await a person’s response to our way of baptizing before we accept them as fellow disciples, or “Christians” if you like.

In reference to baptism as a condition to fellowship, history has bequeathed to us a problem the earliest believers did not have, for in the primitive faith there was no such thing as an unbaptized (unimmersed) disciple of Christ. In fact they were made disciples by being immersed into (not in) the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit (which means to be initiated into a relationship), according to Matt. 28:19. When a disciple met another disciple he would know that he had been baptized.

While it is admittedly not quite that way today due to centuries of disputing about baptism, it seems appropriate that we make the same presumption when we meet another Christian --- assume that he is a baptized believer (most are baptized in some manner) and accept him and treat him as such. If as we share life in Christ it becomes evident that he has not been properly baptized, it is something we can place before him at the proper time. But in learning that he is unbaptized or improperly baptized we should not then and there “un-disciple” him and reject him. We will receive him as a believer and as a disciple, even if an improperly baptized one, for that is what Jesus did with us --- he received us even when we didn’t have everything exactly right.

We are not of course talking about folk who reject baptism as an ordinance of God, for that is not loyalty to Christ, but folk who do not see baptism the way we do. I am persuaded that there is no way for us to take ourselves seriously as a unity movement (do we take it seriously?) if we separate ourselves from other believers over baptism.

What we should emphasize in baptism is not its externals as much as its implication --- the likeness of Christ. In baptism we rise to walk in a new life. Christlikeness is the real bond that attracts us to each other. Should you chance to meet a Greek Orthodox who beautifully exemplifies the likeness of Christ, it should be that - Christlikeness - that draws you to him, and him to you. You accept him and come to love him because you see in him the one you both love. As you “share the life” together it should not bother you too much to learn that he did you one better on immersion (or two better!) in that he was triune baptized. After all, doesn’t it say to baptize into the name of (1) the Father, (2) the Son, (3) and the Holy Spirit!

Should your Greek friend come to your church would you insist that he be baptized again, just once this time, before you would accept him?

It can get complicated and risky if we make anything a test except the one laid down by Jesus, “Come, follow me.” I will walk with all those that heed that call, and will seek to help them to follow him more nearly, know him more clearly, and love him more dearly. --- the Editor

I was once so straight that, like the Indian’s tree, I leaned a little the other way. I was so strict a Separatist that I would neither pray nor sing praises with anyone who was not as perfect as I supposed myself to be. In this most unpopular course I persisted until I discovered the mistake and saw that on the principle embraced in my conduct, there never could be a congregation or church upon the earth. --- Alexander Campbell (Christian Baptist, 1826)