A weekly reflection from a memeber of the Hastings clergy Written by Pastor Paris Pasch of The Journey Church in Hastings

Must We All Agree?

In today’s culture, it seems that there is little room for disagreement or differences in opinion. Many people today have little tolerance for those who don’t sign on to their personal perspectives. They name call, teardown the opposition and destroy other people’s character on social media, news platforms and even face to face.

We used to value those who could debate skillfully and those who kept their cool while facing opposition. We even had debate taught in our education system. However debates today are angry battle grounds and not typically very civil. We seem to be observing a culture that demands more tolerance, but is strangely intolerant.

In all my studies of the Bible I see a message that there is a true way to eternal life and it’s not really what I think that matters, only what God says. In fact what I’ve learned in my many years of peering into the pages of the Bible, is that God was the originator of the concept of freewill and free choice. God will not force anyone to think or believe what He has made known. He will not force anyone to believe in Him or go to Heaven. He gives each of us the right and the power to decide for ourselves what we believe.

Now having said this, I’ve also become aware that it apparently does matter what you believe, if what you believe isn’t true. Not all the differing viewpoints of our world can all be true. You can’t believe in heaven and discard the truth of Hell. You can’t believe that you need to earn your way to eternal life and also believe that it is a free gift from God that He made possible. You can’t believe that God created mankind and that mankind was bom of primordial soup. So, disagreeing with people may cause frustration, but disagreement with God has eternal consequences.

James 4:1-3 (NIV). What causes fights and quarrels among you? Don’t they come from your desires that battle within you? 2 You desire but do not have, so you kill. You covet but you cannot get what you want, so you quarrel and fight. You do not have because you do not ask God. 3 When you ask, you do not receive, because you ask with wrong motives, that you may spend what you get on your pleasures.

Please know that I am not trying to convince today’s reader that I am right and they are wrong. I am offering a viewpoint of this life that is outside my control and requires that we must trust a loving creator God who longs to rescue humanity. Some may disagree, but I hope they realize that Almighty God is not who we’ve made Him, but rather who He has said He is. Let’s disagree if need be and yet stay kind and civil, knowing that God gave us a freewill.

Written by Pastor Paris Pasch of The Journey Church in Hastings