Life and the Form of Doctrine

Life and the Form of Doctrine

“It is impossible to fashion the bride into a visible church so that people can say, ‘Look, here it is.’ This is what Johan O. Smith wrote in an article entitled, “Christ’s Church and the Lord’s People” in the 1921 October issue of Skjulte Skatter. There he pleads with us to follow the Lamb wherever He goes, live in personal obedience, and lead a hidden life of sacrifice.

We understand quite well that this is how it is and must be, seeing that the church of Christ, the body of Christ on earth, is the bride who is being formed to be “a helper compa­rable to Him.” We understand that it concerns a hidden life with Christ in God. This is a life, and nothing but life! This is the church which you can­not point out directly and say, “Look, here it is!” Br. Smith writes further, “The form of doctrines can give us valuable guidelines, but the value of the life that fills the form is something else entirely.”

By reading something like this, shouldn’t we then be powerfully en­couraged unto love and good works? Shouldn’t our hearts burn within us as it did in the two disciples who were on the way to Emmaus and who experienced that Jesus opened up the Scriptures to them? Shouldn’t we be awakened to live this hidden life that is lived in the church that you cannot directly point out?

In order to live this church life, we have the form of doctrine in the church as a guideline. At innumer­able meetings, at conferences, and through the writings and messages of God-fearing brothers, we have been given a form of doctrine which we obey from the heart; we have seen Jesus Christ portrayed before our eyes as crucified, as Paul writes to the Galatians. However, the Galatians were unsteady, and Paul feared that they, even though they had begun in the Spirit, now wanted to be made perfect by the flesh. Gal. 3:1-3. He even says, “Have you suffered so many things in vain—if indeed it was in vain?” V. 4. The form of doctrine is good and necessary; yet it is the life in the form that is important. “Have you suffered so many things in vain,” Paul writes to the Galatians. May it not be said about us: so many meetings, so many conferences, so many years of apostolic labor, and then . . . in vain! The form of doctrine was not filled with life! Most of it remained a form. Life did not fill the form. Neverthe­less, the apostle adds in his writing, “If indeed it was in vain.” He did not state it as a fact, but he did point it out as a possibility. We read it as a sincere exhortation and a wake-up call.

For example, let us think of the doctrines we have in Romans, Chap­ter 7. We are so used to repeating verse 18, acknowledging that in us, that is, in our flesh, nothing good dwells. We are also well acquainted with the law in verse 21 that when we want to do the good, evil is pres­ent with us. If this is not just to be a doctrine, but is to have consequences for our life by truly believing what we have acknowledged and obeying what we believe, how awake should we not be! We know that something of this “nothing good,” something of this that “is present with us,” can easily influence us. It must be sur­rendered into death; this death must work in us so that Jesus’ life is mani­fested in our body. 2 Cor. 4:10.

Here we have opportunities to live a life of personal obedience and a hidden life of sacrifice that Br. Smith writes about.