BOLD - Fellowship / Community

How to treat unbelievers

The Christian community is to be a new holy community of God’s people that are family. Our care and sacrificial love towards one another are marks of this new community. In addition to that statement, we are also called to love those outside the community of faith.

There is, however, an order.

We do see an order:

Galatians 6:9–10 NIV

Let us not become weary in doing good, for at the proper time we will reap a harvest if we do not give up. Therefore, as we have opportunity, let us do good to all people, especially to those who belong to the family of believers.

It is true that we can develop an isolationist lifestyle by avoiding those outside the community. It is granted, of course, that because we are in church and have close friends in church that much of our circle is part of the same community of faith. There is nothing wrong with this and should be celebrated, however, we must not isolate ourselves from those outside the faith. We are called to be engaged with them and treat them well.

Old Testament:

Deuteronomy 10:18–19 NIV

He defends the cause of the fatherless and the widow, and loves the foreigner residing among you, giving them food and clothing. And you are to love those who are foreigners, for you yourselves were foreigners in Egypt.

God is commanding His people to do, in the social realm, what He does.

They must be especially sensitive to aliens living among them, particularly since they also had been aliens in Egypt (v. 19).

The word for alien here (gēr) is the same as appears in Lev 19:34: “The alien living with you must be treated as one of your native-born. Love him as yourself.” Exactly the same sentiment (but with “neighbor,” rēʿa) is expressed in Lev 19:18, the verse Jesus quoted when he was quizzed about the greatest of the commandments (Matt 19:19). Jesus attached this to the command to “love the LORD” with all one’s being (cf. Deut 6:5), thus joining love for God with love for others. This is precisely what the present passage is teaching as the enveloping structure makes clear.

New Testament:

Let’s contrast a couple scriptures

1 Corinthians 5:9–13 (NIV)

I wrote to you in my letter not to associate with sexually immoral people—not at all meaning the people of this world who are immoral, or the greedy and swindlers, or idolaters. In that case you would have to leave this world. But now I am writing to you that you must not associate with anyone who claims to be a brother or sister but is sexually immoral or greedy, an idolater or slanderer, a drunkard or swindler. Do not even eat with such people. What business is it of mine to judge those outside the church? Are you not to judge those inside? God will judge those outside. “Expel the wicked person from among you.”

What Paul meant was not that the community was to disassociate itself from all nonbelievers, but that it was to distance itself from flagrant hypocrites, professing believers who were still living as idolatrous and immoral pagans—like the man with his stepmother (5:11).

Refraining from table fellowship with such people is an appropriate form of community discernment, or judgment (5:11–12).The whole unit is a highly rhetorical, but also thoroughly theological, effort to drive home the importance of the principle of communal holiness—separation from evil—and its application to the issue at hand. It was a difficult word then, and it is certainly no easier twenty centuries later.

2 Corinthians 6:14–7:1 (NIV)

Do not be yoked together with unbelievers. For what do righteousness and wickedness have in common? Or what fellowship can light have with darkness? What harmony is there between Christ and Belial? Or what does a believer have in common with an unbeliever? What agreement is there between the temple of God and idols? For we are the temple of the living God. As God has said: “I will live with them and walk among them, and I will be their God, and they will be my people.” Therefore, “Come out from them and be separate, says the Lord. Touch no unclean thing, and I will receive you.” And, “I will be a Father to you, and you will be my sons and daughters, says the Lord Almighty.” Therefore, since we have these promises, dear friends, let us purify ourselves from everything that contaminates body and spirit, perfecting holiness out of reverence for God.

This interpretation sees the passage as a warning against associating with Paul’s opponents, particularly the “false apostles” who will be castigated in chapters 10–13. Though it may seem odd to refer to self-proclaimed ministers as “unbelievers,” Paul’s assessment of the “super-” or “false” apostles is that they proclaim a different Jesus, Spirit, and gospel (11:4) and are ministers of Satan (11:13–15).

Accusing them of unbelief and idolatry (6:16) seems almost tame—but appropriate. A more explicit connection between this passage and the problem of the pseudoapostles appears in the word “Beliar” (6:15), another name for Satan. If this interpretation is correct, then the specific point of the passage is to call the Corinthians to disassociate from the false apostles (6:14a) and thus, more generally, to live in holiness in the fear of God (7:1; cf. 5:11), for ‘holiness’ means separation for God’s purposes.

These admonitions bracket a series of rhetorical questions about the antithesis between the ways of God and the ways of Satan and idolatry (6:14b–16a), followed by a series of Scripture quotes defining the chosen community as God’s people who are called to separate themselves from unclean people (6:16b–18). These quotations, from Leviticus, 2 Samuel, Isaiah, and Ezekiel, focus on the covenant relationship between God and the people of God, and the corollary summons to holiness in that relationship. As the people of the new covenant (1 Cor 11:25; 2 Cor 3:6) and as God’s temple (cf. 1 Cor 3:16), the Corinthian church must practice holiness by reconciling with Paul and by severing all ties with his satanic opponents, the false apostles. Though Paul does not dwell on this here, he will return to it, in full force, in chapters 10–13.

We don’t isolate from them.

Colossians 4:2–6 (NIV)

Devote yourselves to prayer, being watchful and thankful. And pray for us, too, that God may open a door for our message, so that we may proclaim the mystery of Christ, for which I am in chains. Pray that I may proclaim it clearly, as I should. Be wise in the way you act toward outsiders; make the most of every opportunity. Let your conversation be always full of grace, seasoned with salt, so that you may know how to answer everyone.

Making the Most of Every Opportunity

1 Corinthians 9:19–27 (NIV)

Though I am free and belong to no one, I have made myself a slave to everyone, to win as many as possible. To the Jews I became like a Jew, to win the Jews. To those under the law I became like one under the law (though I myself am not under the law), so as to win those under the law. To those not having the law I became like one not having the law (though I am not free from God’s law but am under Christ’s law), so as to win those not having the law. To the weak I became weak, to win the weak. I have become all things to all people so that by all possible means I might save some. I do all this for the sake of the gospel, that I may share in its blessings. Do you not know that in a race all the runners run, but only one gets the prize? Run in such a way as to get the prize. Everyone who competes in the games goes into strict training. They do it to get a crown that will not last, but we do it to get a crown that will last forever. Therefore I do not run like someone running aimlessly; I do not fight like a boxer beating the air. No, I strike a blow to my body and make it my slave so that after I have preached to others, I myself will not be disqualified for the prize.

The main thought is stated 6 times - to win or save “as many as possible”. Freedom from human “strings” or entanglements allows Paul to give the best possible service to the widest range of people.

Of course, Paul is not promoting pure situation ethics. He didn’t say to the thief I became a thief or to the adulterer I became an adulterer.

But regarding the morally gray areas of life and culture, Paul is sensitive to the non-Christian mores of society to not hinder people from accepting the gospel.

Far too often Christians have alienated themselves from the very people they should have been trying to win to Christ because of their own legalistic dogmas in the morally neutral areas of life.

1 Corinthians Bridging Contexts

It is of course far easier and requires far less thought to adopt one of these options consistently—either pure separatism or pure indulgence. But neither of these courses of action is in the gospel’s best interests. Paul’s athletic metaphors of self-discipline make plain that he is calling us to the far more rigorous approach of proceeding on a case-by-case basis with morally neutral matters.

In light of theses verses, what we find is a missing formula for evangelism. The right questions to ask, the right tracts to share, the right approach. Rather, true evangelism is far closer to friendship. We must come alongside them, getting to know them, valuing them as God’s creation in his image… Not just potential objects of conversion.