What is the root cause of quarrelsomeness? Pride. Proverbs 13:10: “Where there is strife, there is pride, but wisdom is found in those who take advice.” Humble engagement listens in love and assumes the best, honestly seeking to understand the other and humbly learn from the other person. Pride, on the other hand, acts as if I have nothing left to learn, but that others must humble themselves and learn from my superior wisdom.

Orthodoxy and Orthopraxy

We talk a lot about doctrinal heresy—and it is a vital issues that we must address.

Orthodoxy—right belief—is essential.

We seem to talk less about relational heresy.

Orthopraxy—right relationships, right living—is equally essential.

We talk even less about right relationships while talking about right doctrine. Our failure to address this runs counter to God’s all-sufficient Word. The Bible is replete with commands about how we treat one another while we address doctrinal disagreements. The Bible consistently commands us to guard our hearts against relational heresy.

The Greatest Command: Love/Orthopraxy

The Bible consistently emphasizes God’s greatest commandment—love. 

• Matthew 22:35-40: “‘Teacher, which is the greatest commandment in the Law?’ Jesus replied: ‘Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.’This is the first and greatest commandment. And the second is like it: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’ All the Law and the Prophets hang on these two commandments.’”

See the end of this post for a small sampling of all the times the Bible teaches about the greatest commandment—love.[i] You will see that love: is the greatest commandment; is the royal law; is the most important commandment; fulfills the whole law; summarizes the whole law.

Wrong Relationships When Addressing Right Doctrine: The Unity of Truth and Love

God’s Word frequently relates this overarching command to love to the specific context of addressing right doctrine. First, the Bible consistently unites love and truth—for all people—but especially for pastors-teachers, including those who preach, teach, and counsel the Word.

• 1 Timothy 4:16: “Watch your life and doctrine closely. Persevere in them, because if you do, you will save both yourself and your hearers.”

Paul practiced what he preached.

• 2 Timothy 3:10: “You, however, know all about my teaching, my way of life, my purpose, faith, patience, love, endurance.”

The love/truth unity is not only for pastors; it is for all Christians. We could paraphrase 1 Corinthians 13:1-2 like this: “If I strive to win all theological debates, but have not love; I am a noisy gong or clanging cymbal. If I think I can uniquely fathom all systematic theology doctrines, but do not have love; I am nothing.”

• 1 Corinthians 13:1-2: “If I speak in the tongues of men or of angels, but do not have love, I am only a resounding gong or a clanging cymbal. If I have the gift of prophecy and can fathom all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have a faith that can move mountains, but do not have love, I am nothing.”

Likewise, Ephesians 4:15, in the original Greek, is not simply “speaking the truth in love,” but “truthing in love,” or “integrity in love.” Paul links the character of our heart with the content of our theology—they are biblically inseparable.

• Ephesians 4:15: “Instead, speaking the truth in love, we will grow to become in every respect the mature body of him who is the head, that is, Christ.”

We talk in the biblical counseling world about integration or non-integration of biblical truth and extra-biblical information. Well, the Bible commands the integration of truth and love, of character and content.

Wrong Relationships When Addressing Right Doctrine: Relational Heresy

What does God’s all-sufficient Word says about relational heresy? What passages would we look at and what biblical principles could we distill in developing a beginning biblical theology of relational heresy?

First, in the context of addressing false teaching, Paul commands Christian leaders not to be quarrelsome.

• 2 Timothy 2:23-25: “Don’t have anything to do with foolish and stupid arguments, because you know they produce quarrels. And the Lord’s servant must not be quarrelsome but must be kind to everyone, able to teach, not resentful. Opponents must be gently instructed.”

Paul especially highlights the danger of Christian leaders quarrelling about words.

• 2 Timothy 2:14: “Keep reminding God’s people of these things. Warn them before God against quarreling about words; it is of no value, and only ruins those who listen.”

• Titus 3:9-11: “But avoid foolish controversies and genealogies and arguments and quarrels about the law, because these are unprofitable and useless. Warn a divisive person once, and then warn them a second time. After that, have nothing to do with them. You may be sure that such people are warped and sinful; they are self-condemned.”

Paul’s command aligns with Jesus’s confrontation of the Pharisees who strain at a gnat but swallow a camel.

• Matthew 23:23-24: “Woe to you, teachers of the law and Pharisees, you hypocrites! You give a tenth of your spices—mint, dill and cumin. But you have neglected the more important matters of the law—justice, mercy and faithfulness. You should have practiced the latter, without neglecting the former. You blind guides! You strain out a gnat but swallow a camel.”

Christian leaders, including biblical counselors, who engage in godless chatter become increasingly godless.

• 2 Timothy 2:16: “Avoid godless chatter, because those who indulge in it will become more and more ungodly.”

Biblical teachers and biblical counselors who can’t control their tempers and tongue will be judged more strictly.

• James 3:1-2: “Not many of you should become teachers, my fellow believers, because you know that we who teach will be judged more strictly. We all stumble in many ways. Anyone who is never at fault in what they say is perfect, able to keep their whole body in check.”

Biblically, the evidence of biblical wisdom is biblical love. According to James, we can’t claim to be wise biblical counselors if we live foolish lives of divisiveness.

• James 3:13-18: “Who is wise and understanding among you? Let them show it by their good life, by deeds done in the humility that comes from wisdom. But if you harbor bitter envy and selfish ambition in your hearts, do not boast about it or deny the truth. Such ‘wisdom’ does not come down from heaven but is earthly, unspiritual, demonic. For where you have envy and selfish ambition, there you find disorder and every evil practice.”

Read More