Introduction

Catholicity refers to unity. In practice, it means to bring Christians together rather than separate them. This is easier said than done. The possibility of catholicity is found in the paradoxical combination of humility and conviction.

The Initiative of Humility

Mk. 9:40, “For the one who is not against us is for us.”

We might call Jesus' words in Mark 9:40 the initiative of humility, which anticipates the problem of pride. For those in the church, there is potential for a narrowness that leads to callowness. It’s the thought that anyone not ministering in my circle must be lacking; anyone not doing sensational ministry must be lacking; anyone not emphasizing what I’m emphasizing must be lacking. There is a temptation to think your cohorts, your ministry, and your emphasis are the greatest (Mk. 9:34).

The disciples struggled with this sort of prideful provincialism. John asked Jesus, “Teacher, we saw someone casting out demons in your name, and we tried to stop him, because he was not following us” (Mk. 9:38). John is asking, “Should we receive this guy who appropriates your name to cast out demons? We told him to stop. He’s not one of us. Did we do well?” John seems proud of the fact that the disciples forbid someone outside their own circle from driving out demons. In response, Jesus says, “Do not stop him.” Jesus then gives three reasons. Reason #1, “For no one who does a mighty work in my name will be able soon afterward to speak evil of me” (vs. 39). Reason #2, “For the one who is not against us is for us.” (vs. 40). Reason #3, “For … whoever gives you a cup of water to drink because you belong to Christ will by no means lose his reward” (vs. 41).

John is concerned about the man who is ministering in Jesus’ name but was not traveling with the disciples (Mk. 9:38). This person has no outward connection to the disciples. They do not labor together. They are not actively involved in each other’s ministry. They don’t travel in the same circles. The ministry of Christ, even at this early stage, spanned beyond the circle of the disciples. It was spreading. There were multiple groups of Jesus-followers operating all throughout the world. They could not all act in coordination with each other. They could not all act in subordination to each other. To Jesus, this is not a problem, but it does create challenges.

It’s not always easy to know who is on our side. Today, there are so many different churches carried off in different directions. Many groups are out in different parts of the harvest without direct connection to each other or even knowledge of each other. There are many different churches out there doing ministry differently from TRC. Their churches look different than ours. Their services look different than ours. Their emphasis looks different than ours. So what do we do about it? Just because they may look different than us, doesn’t mean they aren’t on Christ’s team too. Every church doesn’t need to do everything identically to be on the same team. Jesus says, “For the one who is not against us is for us.”

Notice the tendency of the disciples in Mark 9. The tendency is to see other Christian groups, even the ones doing work such as casting out demons in Jesus’ name, and say, “But he’s not following us. He’s not one of us.” This is why Jesus gives the initiative of humility. The man can work miracles in Jesus’ name. He is not an enemy. This man is associating himself with Jesus by using his name. This puts him on the right side. Such a person cannot, consistently, go on to speak as his enemy (1 Cor. 12:3; 1 Jn. 4:2-3). So there is no justification for Jesus’ disciples to oppose this person. Those who minister in Jesus’ name with sincerity are friends.

But what about those people who use the name of Jesus but reject the Jesus of the Bible? That’s the situation in Acts 19:13-16. The Jewish exorcists started using the name of Jesus in their work. And their practice is condemned. Why? Because they had no actual sympathy, allegiance, or belief in Jesus. They were “ministering” by the rude working of their own fancies. They used the name of Christ like one might use a magic incantation. That is, they used Jesus’ name insincerely.

So, common cause is not about mere appearances. It’s about devotion to Christ. Those who serve the Lord with sincerity, and acknowledge Jesus is Lord (1 Cor. 12:3), and acknowledge Jesus is God (1 Jn. 4:2-3), are serving “in my name,” as Jesus said in Mark 9:39. These are allies. John’s problem—and too often our problem—is that we are looking for whether or not they have membership in our circle. As G.K. Chesterton’s great novel, The Man Who Was Thursday, teaches: Some people who seem to be our enemies turn out to be our allies.

The initiative of humility reminds us that sincere believers in the Lord who make the orthodox confession are to be considered on the same team. Whenever there are genuine signs of faithfulness, we must presume that the gospel is at work in their ministry. It is our duty to love Christians everywhere, even if they don’t agree with us on every point. By humbling finding unity in the fundamental truths we have in common, namely, the ecumenical creeds, we expand the ministry of Christ on earth.

Now for the paradox. Unity on the first things does not minimize the truths that separate us. Rather than creating doctrine an inch thick, catholicity offers a compelling invitation to conviction regarding denominational distinctives.

The Initiative of Conviction

Mt. 12:30, “Whoever is not with me is against me, and whoever does not gather with me scatters.”

Jesus’ words in Matthew 12:30 are what we might call the initiative of conviction, which anticipates the problem of cowardice. For those in the church, there is potential for a timorousness that leads to shallowness. It’s the thought that anyone who does not gather around Christ in faith can still receive Christ’s healing power; anyone who is religious must be with Christ; anyone who dons a surplice or claims to be a Christian must be a sincere worshiper of Christ. There is a temptation to think any cohort, any ministry, and any emphasis with a proof text is automatically Christian.

The ecumenical movement in the twentieth century struggled with this sort of facile fervor. Their great mistake was to draw no lines. It turned out that the people who passed the ordination exam denied the vicarious death of Christ, denied the resurrection of Christ, denied the sinfulness of man, and denied the divine origin of Scripture. Yet they were putatively given the rank of Christ’s minister even as they refused to “gather with” Christ. The great mistake of the ecumenical movement of the past century was when those who believed in the resurrection of Christ thought they could have unity with the apostates who didn’t. They summoned people of all religions to gather around their god, and then had no god for them to gather around. The mistake was to build a tall and toppling city that had the initiative of false humility without the initiative of biblical conviction.

It is the catholicity paradox—the combination of humility and conviction—that makes ecumenicity possible. Deep humility and cast-iron conviction are not opposites, but complements, when done according to the love of Christ. It sounds arrogant and bull-headed to say that Christianity is not only right, but always right, and everything else a lie. But when Paul claims with conviction that the resurrection of Christ is the highest hope of mankind (Acts 23:6; 24:15), it is not a boast. It is an act of love and humility. When Paul points out the error of the Sadducees who deny the resurrection of the dead (Acts 23:7f), it isn’t to score points. It is an act of love. When Jesus tells the disciples that they are given the keys to the Kingdom, so be careful about what is bound and loosed (Mt. 18:18), this is an act of love for those bound in Christ’s name (Mt. 18:20).

If you aren’t with Christ, you are against him. If you are with him you gather and if you are against him you scatter (Mt. 12:30). The scatterers of the failed ecumenism of the twentieth century thought they could redefine Christianity to be, in the words of the Richard Niebuhr, “A God without wrath brought men without sin, into a kingdom without judgment, through the administrations of a Christ without a cross.” They thought of Christian faith as a condiment to flavor their secular sandwich. They thought of faith as mere decorative material for their “progress,” which turned out to be neither humble nor convictional.

In contrast, we must gather with Christ in great conviction on the primary things. The basic Christian dictum is to “confess with your mouth that Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved” (Rom. 10:9). The same species of conviction must exist on the secondary things. Primary doctrines share the bloodlines of secondary doctrines; only the former are closed-handed and the latter are open-handed. Belief in the secondary things must be convictional and without doubts (Rom. 14:22f). Each person “should be fully convinced in their own mind” (Rom. 14:5). And this is the secret sauce that enables humility toward different denominational distinctives. You won’t respect other beliefs until you have some of your own.

Conclusion

The way to avoid the visionary futilities of twentieth century ecumenism is to participate in the church with humility and conviction. Humility is needed in dealing with other Christian groups. This means you treat them as brothers and sisters in Christ because of their sincere faith in the risen Lord. Conviction is needed in dealing with your own beliefs. This means you treat them as doctrines worth believing because they are derived from Scripture. This combination strengthens and steadies the church in the onward march of the Kingdom of God.

Jason Cherry is an elder at Trinity Reformed Church in Huntsville, Alabama, as well as a teacher and lecturer of literature, history, and economics at Providence Classical School in Huntsville. He graduated from Reformed Theological Seminary with an MA in Religion and is the author of the books The Culture of Conversionism and the History of the Altar Call and The Making of Evangelical Spirituality.