Sock Puppet of Meiderlin

In it he captured Paul's distinction in a phrase that has since become justly memorable: “in essentials unity, in non-essentials liberty, and in all things charity.”

Click to expand...

Colossians 3:10 And have put on the new man, which is renewed in knowledge after the image of him that created him:

Colossians 3:11 Where there is neither Greek nor Jew, circumcision nor uncircumcision, Barbarian, Scythian, bond nor free: but Christ is all, and in all.

Colossians 3:12 Put on therefore, as the elect of God, holy and beloved, bowels of mercies, kindness, humbleness of mind, meekness, longsuffering;

Colossians 3:13 Forbearing one another, and forgiving one another, if any man have a quarrel against any: even as Christ forgave you, so also do ye.

Colossians 3:14 And above all these things put on charity, which is the bond of perfectness.

Click to expand...

In the New Testament we see Paul struggling for both purity and unity in the churches he founded. He deplored doctrinal deviations in the churches at Galatia, Colossae, and Thessalonica. He warned Timothy of people at Ephesus who propagated “false doctrines” (1 Timothy 1:3). He also urged peace and unity for those who were unacceptably divisive and separatistic, especially those at Corinth (1 Corinthians 1:10–17) and Philippi (Philippians 4:2). His most extended treatment of these matters comes in Romans 14:1–15:13 where he discusses the meat-eaters (food) and sabbath-keepers (holy days). There he makes a subtle but important distinction that can help us.

Paul urges Christians to honor their theological and ethical convictions, but with three caveats: remember that we will give account of ourselves to God (14:12), that we should always accept one another and aim for peace, love and mutual edification (15:7,14:19), and that we should not judge one another in what he calls “disputable matters” (14:1). A “disputable matter” is something neither right or wrong in itself, like whether to eat certain foods or observe certain holy days. We can contrast them to what Paul called “matters of first importance” in 1 Corinthians 15:3, that Christ died for our sins, was buried, raised from the dead, and appeared to numerous people.

Click to expand...

In the 17th century the Lutheran pastor and theologian Peter Meiderlin had grown tired of the rancor and division caused by doctrinal disputes in the wake of the Protestant Reformation. In the early 1620s he wrote a book under the pen name of Rupert Meldenius, all but forgotten until it was republished in 1850 by Friedrich Luecke, entitled A Prayerful Admonition for Peace to the Theologians of the Augsburg Confession. In it he captured Paul's distinction in a phrase that has since become justly memorable: “in essentials unity, in non-essentials liberty, and in all things charity.” German theologians refer to this as the Friedensspruch or “Peace Saying.” Meiderlin's dictum (sometimes wrongly attributed to Augustine) reached the English-speaking world through the Puritan Richard Baxter (1615–1691), who uses it in his book The Saint's Everlasting Rest (1650). Baxter adopted it as his personal motto and urged that Christians must “tolerate tolerable differences.” (See Hans Rollmann, “In Essentials Unity.”)

What would Peter Meiderlin say upon reading David Barrett's research about 20,000 neo-apostolic movements?! First, I think he would praise God and marvel at the power of the Gospel to attract peoples from the ends of the earth. I think he would honor the freedom of the individual Christian to follow conscience and conviction, and do his best to love, understand and engage them. Finally, I am guessing he would pray that they affirm the essentials of the historic Christian faith and urge believers to unite themselves with all those who did likewise.

And what would Meiderlin or Baxter say to me, right here, today?! I think they would urge me to boldly affirm the whole Gospel for the whole world, nothing more and nothing less. Then, they would tell me to “accept one another, just as Christ has accepted you” (Romans 15:7).

Click to expand...