Truth is susceptible to be misinterpreted, and truth is often being misinterpreted and misused. It has been so in the garden of Eden, where Satan questioned the truthfulness of God’s word and then Adame and Eve succumbed to this doubt. In a fallen world, amongst fallen people, there is no such thing as a safe truth. No truth is safe, and this has been well demonstrated in the postmodern world. Actually, the postmodern man even denies the existence of truth. All truth is by definition an individual and fluid perspective. Christians are not unfamiliar with truth being attacked and twisted. The history of Christianity is a history of identifying deviations from truth and fighting against them. Whenever and wherever a truth is stated, anything that deviates from this truth is condemned, by default or by expressive proclamation. Saints in the previous generations had fought the great battles, but the war is unceasing. There is no settlement nor truce, there are only attacks and coming attacks. Orthodoxy is risky because it is under perpetual assault, and because truth is delicate. Going one step left or right, you enter into the territory of falsehood. Falsehood is not far from truth, it is one step away from truth, or sometimes one letter away from truth. Errors are not the opposite of truth; they are distortions of truth. That means you do not have to go to the other end in order to be false, you just need to digress, even a bit, from the truth as God defines.
Another characteristic of truth related is that truth is defined within a system. There is no isolated truth, all truth exists and functions within the system God created and sustains. Isolated truth is unthinkable, just as a truth estranged from God is impossible. One propositional truth is true because it means what the system defines it and it operates as the system defines it. Truth must spring out of the system and guarded by the system. System means multiplicity and multi-dimensionalism; it means depth and complexity; it means totality and integrity. Orthodoxy is risky because to understand and think in the biblical system is difficult, and again, delicate. To be against on error is easy, to be free from all errors is formidable, but that is precisely our duty and calling.
What happens often in church history is that some would prefer a “safe” orthodoxy. They would like to make a water-tight statement on a doctrine so that no way it could be misunderstood. Or, in order to prevent misunderstanding, they articulate one doctrine to the extent that it violates the biblical system. In fighting an error, they unconsciously walk to the other error. In defending a truth, they distort its system. An error is a distorted truth, and they offer a disfigured truth instead.
For example, some Calvinists are so alarmed of the Arminian errors that they almost become fearful about speaking about anything that resembles Arminianism, even most remotely. They argue an immutability of God after Greek philosophy while practically rejecting the biblical evidence of God’s genuine interaction with man (see the debates stirred up by James Dolezal’s All That Is in God; see John Frame’s responses in On Theology Part 2, articles 11-18). God’s interaction with man comes to nothing but a mirage, or an appearance. The conclusion based on this reasoning is horrifying because it is so close to Docetism.
Some have good theology on confessions and probably on paper, but bad theology in function. Concerning man’s responsibility and the gospel calling to all sinners, of course, in the confessions and in theory, all Reformed acknowledge these doctrines. But in practice, some are so timid of speaking these, so afraid of being accused of compromise, and these doctrines hardly function in their life. This is one reason behind their reluctance of proactively reaching to unbelievers, and most growth of Reformed churches comes from birth or from bringing in theologically awakened Christians. On Christian life, some are so fond of speaking man’s sin that they practically deny the regeneration of Spirit. When they speak about the state of Christians, it is as if these Christians have no essential difference with unbelievers. This is a common Protestant problem since we are all sensitive about bringing any “infused” righteousness.
There is almost no exception: we tend to overreact when reacting, we tend to panic before crisis, we tend to retreat in order to fight. We seem to be good at finding the problem, but we seem to stumble in addressing it biblically. Besides the issues mentioned above, on Charismatics, on slavery, on social justice, on women pastors, on politics today. We are pushed by the errors to the other side; we want to keep a far distance from errors that we are also distanced from truth. This may be the most lethal and lasting consequences of errors, not by seducing you knowingly to err, but by forcing you unknowingly to err. Satan actually does not care which error we commit; he is happy as long as we deviate from truth. We are in a dangerous position when we look more towards the enemies than towards God and His truth. It is God who tells us where to stand, not the enemies nor our antagonism to the enemies.
Truth is an island in the ocean of errors. There are limitless ways of falling.
