When to Contend for the Faith

We don’t look for a fight. We love peace and joy. But we don’t shrink when the truth is attacked.

In J.R.R. Tolkien’s classic trilogy The Lord of the Rings, an evil and powerful ruler called Sauron intends to take over the world, called Middle Earth. The people of Middle Earth, dwarves, elves, men, hobbits, and tree-like creatures called ents push back against the darkness. Some glory in the fighting. But Tolkien, marked forever by his experience in the first World War, wanted to show a better vision. He shows this vision in the character of Faramir in the second book, The Two Towers. Faramir, unlike his battle-loving brother Boromir, says: "War must be, while we defend our lives against a destroyer who would devour all; but I do not love the bright sword for its sharpness, nor the arrow for its swiftness, nor the warrior for his glory. I love only that which they [the sword, arrow, and warrior] defend.”

Here Faramir (and Tolkien) echoes the vision of St. Augustine in The City of God. Augustine argued that peace was the ultimate aim of a just war. And here, again, Augustine only echoes Solomon the wise. “There is an occasion for everything, and a time for every activity under heaven….a time for war and a time for peace” (Eccl. 3:1, 8).

In other words, at times the battle descends on us, whether we want it to or not. In following Jesus and living within the church, lies can threaten the people of God. Deceivers and deception attack the truth. When that happens, we must fight. We don’t look for a fight. We love peace and joy. But we don’t shrink when the truth is attacked. We love the truth, so we defend the truth.

Jude, the half-brother of Jesus, provides the classic text on struggling for the faith in his one-chapter letter. Though Jude had rejected his brother Jesus as the Messiah during Jesus’s earthly ministry, Jude encountered the resurrected Jesus and bent his knee, confessing Jesus as his Messiah, Savior, and Lord. Jude writes to a church that was struggling and hurting. Some folks had joined arms with the church but then whispered lies in small groups and Sunday schools and prayer meetings. Jude refuses to play nice or to “go-along to get-along.” He calls these ancient Christians to contend for the truth, and current Christians find principles for holy contention here as well.

1. We must fight for the truth when necessary

In his short letter, Jude writes to “dear friends” (Jude 3), but this translation misses the depth of this greeting. They are literally “beloved.” They are beloved by Jude, but more importantly they beloved by God (as scholar Tom Schreiner points out in his commentary). True truth comes from love. We “speak the truth in love” (Eph. 4:15). If you love the fight but not the people connected to the fight, you’re in the wrong spot.

Jude explains that he had intended to write a letter that celebrated the gospel, but problems required his attention: “Although I was eager to write you about the salvation we share, I found it necessary to write, appealing to you to contend for the faith” (Jude 3).

Necessity obliges him, and he now has a more pressing obligation. Like the man who wanted to show his friend his new car, but the car wouldn’t start. An urgent need has pressed into the situation. Paul says something similar: “I am compelled to preach—and woe to me if I do not preach the gospel!” (1 Corinthians 9:16).

Jude tells the Christians that they must take up the calling to fight or contend. Fight. Struggle. Strive. Wrestle. Oppose. Literally, “agonize.”

Now, we must reconcile Jude’s call to contend with the command to live at peace in many other places in Scripture. The Bible repeats itself on this point. We’re called to peace. “If possible, as far as it depends on you, live at peace with everyone” (Romans 12:18).

So, when do we move from peace to protest? When do we move from celebrating to contending?

When we can no longer live at peace, because someone has brought the conflict to us. When conflict is already present or inevitable. We don’t start fights, but when someone picks a fight with the truth, we stand ready.

Jesus said, “A thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy. I have come so that they may have life and have it in abundance” (John 10:10). When the thieves break in and threaten the sheep, we fight back for the truth. We fight against invasion.

As Churchill said in the early days of the second World War:

“Even though large tracts of Europe and many old and famous States have fallen or may fall into the grip of the Gestapo and all the odious apparatus of Nazi rule, we shall not flag or fail. We shall go on to the end, we shall fight in France, we shall fight on the seas and oceans, we shall fight with growing confidence and growing strength in the air, we shall defend our Island, whatever the cost may be, we shall fight on the beaches, we shall fight on the landing grounds, we shall fight in the fields and in the streets, we shall fight in the hills; we shall never surrender.”

(Churchill, Address to House of Commons, June 4, 1940)

We don’t glory in fighting for the faith. We’re not crusaders. But we are defenders. Crusaders create chaos, but Defenders protect the truth.

2. We must defend and teach the essential core of Christian truth

We’re called not to defend the “fatherland” or the “soil” of our earthly life, but the “faith once for all delivered to the saints” (Jude 3). Here’s the where the newfangled Christian Nationalist vision, for example, goes haywire. We’re talking about theological and gospel battle, not political or military belligerence. “The faith once for all delivered” refers to the truth of the Bible in the Old and New Testaments. Paul the apostle talks about this faith in 1 Corinthians 15. The essential doctrines of the truth concern God, Christ, and salvation.

God is one (Dt. 6:4) and God is a Trinity (Mt. 28:19).

Christ is God the Son (John 1:1) and Christ is fully human (1 Tim. 2:5).

Christ died for our sins and rose from the dead (1 Cor. 15:3-8).

We defend the core essentials of Christian truth. In the earliest years of the church, churches had precious few scrolls of the Scripture, but members didn’t. People couldn’t just open their Bible or tap in their app to one of a dozen various translated versions. So to help Christians remember and believe the truth, the churches summarized the Bible’s teaching into a statement or standard or “rule” of faith.

I’m simplifying, but “the rule of faith” was eventually preserved in ancient statements of faith that churches would recite together when they gathered. Those who worshipped in Latin would rehearse their faith by saying together, “I believe.” The Latin word for “I believe” is credo. So these summaries took the name “creeds.”

The most ancient creed is “The Apostles’ Creed,” which summarizes the apostles’ teaching. It was confessed not long after the apostles died and the biblical text was completed. The most universally confessed creed celebrates its 1,700-year anniversary next year. “The Nicene Creed” was first drafted in 325 AD in modern-day Turkey, and it outlines the core beliefs of the truth about God, Christ, the Spirit, and salvation.

And it was a hard-won truth.

In the 300s, many Christians were being lead astray by a teaching pastor in Alexandria, Egypt. His name was Arius, and he was charismatic and popular, making up memorable phrases like, “There was when he was not.” Meaning, “There was a time when Jesus didn’t exist.” In other words, Arius taught that Jesus was not fully God.

Such a lie was deadly and damning, so another local pastor in Alexandria, named Athanasius, pushed back against Arius’s false teaching. Athanasius called the church to believe the biblical truth that Jesus is fully God, God the Son. Athanasius was exiled from his home five times, and at times nearly the entire known world opposed him. In fact, a famous phrase echoes through the history of the church, Athanasius contra mundum. “Athanasius against the world.”

Like Athanasius, we contend for the core essentials of Christian truth, sacrificing life and comfort for eternal reality. But we must ensure we’re fighting the correct battle for the essential truth of our faith.

3. We must keep first things first, second things second, and third things third

So how do we know when we should “go-along to get-along” versus when we should fight with teeth and fingernails for the truth? Numerous theologians have pointed out that some of our beliefs are more central and essential than others. We must discern which beliefs are core and which are less critical. Some have called this discernment process “theological triage.” “Triage” comes from battlefield hospitals, where medics must decide which wounds are most severe and threaten life, versus which need attention but less urgently.

Triage means discerning which theological truths are most central and which have room for disagreement. Those primary doctrines “of first importance” (1 Cor. 15:3) are the doctrines of God, Christ, humanity, and salvation. The secondary issues are those things that define specific tribes or denominations. Infant baptism might be one of these. The third-tier issues are those that we can debate within our own churches, like the specifics of eschatology or “the end times.”

We must carefully discern which beliefs occupy which level of centrality to our faith. First-level issues are life-and-death, with eternity is at stake. Second-level issues are church-life issues, with membership at stake. Third-level issues are important but have room for disagreement even within closely connected communities and local churches.

To put it bluntly:

We die before we deny the first-level issues. If someone were to put a gun to our head and say, “Deny that Jesus is God”—we would take the bullet.

We divide before we deny the second-level issues. For example, if someone were to demand that I baptize their infant child at our church, I would say, “I love you, but we don’t practice infant baptism.” If they believed strongly in this second-tier issue, I would point them to any number of faithful and healthy churches that agree with them on that point.

We debate before we disagree on the third-level issues. We might view the Millennium of Revelation 20 differently, or any number of things. We can discuss and even debate in good-faith, but we don’t let such things test our fellowship.

The social media streets often confuse these things, with folks elevating second-tier and third-tier doctrines to first-tier priority. We must carefully discern the cluster of non-negotiable truths at the core of our faith. We must hold these tightly. We must discern where we have room for disagreement and where we don’t. Confusing these things damages lives and churches—sometimes eternally.

Sometimes contending is necessary, and we defend the truth we love.

But we don’t love the fight for its own sake. We don’t pick fights.

We don’t make third-level things tests of fellowship or second-level things tests of orthodoxy.

We discern when it’s time for war, and when it’s time for peace.