02 (The Doctrine of Nonaccumulation) WHAT IS A DOCTRINE?

In 1928, Daniel Kauffman authored a book entitled Doctrines of the Bible. In this volume, he identified and expounded on roughly 62 different Bible “doctrines” such as the Trinity, the Atonement, Baptism, Nonconformity, Nonresistance, and the Second Coming of Christ. Some might question the purpose for such a book. Why can’t we just read the Bible and believe what it says? Why do we have to take broad Biblical truths and distill them into these neat little packages that we call “doctrines”? This question is a valid one. The Christian church certainly has spent an enormous amount of energy through the centuries developing, articulating, and defending a huge variety of doctrines, both true and false. And much of this energy, no doubt, would appear to God as an utter waste of time and resources. On the other hand, to identify a particular set of ideas as a doctrine does provide several important services. First, it provides us with a “line in the sand” that individuals or churches can examine and then ask themselves this question: “Do we or don’t we accept this doctrine as a true Bible doctrine?” The answer to this question, in turn, gives us a concise way to communicate our beliefs to others. (It is far easier to say, for instance, “We believe in the doctrine of the Trinity” than it is to give a detailed explanation of exactly what the doctrine of the Trinity teaches.) If a doctrine has been defined well, the decision to accept or reject it becomes a simple “yes or no” question. The answer should be either yes, we accept it as a true doctrine, or no, we reject it as a false doctrine. There shouldn’t be much room for saying, “Well, I accept part of it,” or “Well, there’s some truth to it, but there needs to be some balance.” These statements may be appropriate when it comes to the practical applications of the doctrine. But they are not valid responses to the question of whether we accept the doctrine itself as a true doctrine. The fact that two different individuals may agree to embrace a particular doctrine as true does not mean that they will practice this doctrine in exactly the same way. Different people often are at different places practically despite their agreement with one another doctrinally. These differences, however, ought never to be used as a basis for accepting or rejecting the doctrine itself. Second, defining a set of beliefs as a doctrine provides a sort of theological guardrail against future apostasy. This does not mean that the provided guardrail cannot be crossed. It simply means that future generations will be slower to drop a doctrine officially accepted by a church body than to discard a set of beliefs that has never been defined in this way. _______________________ The purpose of this book, then, is threefold. First, it aims to define the doctrine of nonaccumulation, and thus draw that “line in the sand” that we as Christians or groups of Christians can examine and then decide: Do we accept this doctrine as a true doctrine? Or do we reject it as a false doctrine? Second, for those of you who until now have not accepted this doctrine as true, I want an opportunity to influence you to do so. At a minimum, I want to ask whether you would be willing to consider the possibility that the doctrine of nonaccumulation might be true, and to give yourself to the study of God’s Word to discover the truth about this question. Third, for those of you who have accepted it as a true doctrine, I want to strengthen you in that belief and perhaps provide you with a few suggestions regarding its practical application. _______________________ “So you’re trying to introduce a new doctrine to us?” I can hear some of you asking. The answer is no. The doctrine of nonaccumulation is not a new doctrine at all, not by any stretch of the imagination. It is a doctrine as old as Christianity itself. However, it is a doctrine that has been lost to most of today’s Christians, including those who would call themselves conservative. In the future, will these Christians continue to let go of Bible doctrines they have previously held? Or will they choose to recover this doctrine that has been lost? My fear is that, in the long run, it must be one or the other.