Creeds define doctrines of primary importance. Many churches adopt creeds to encourage unity but still encounter divisions over secondary doctrinal issues. Despite the frequency of conflicts over secondary issues in the local church, pastoral ministry textbooks and training tend to neglect instruction on shepherding a congregation through disagreement on secondary issues. This paper will demonstrate this neglect through a survey of pastoral ministry textbooks. While categorizing doctrines as primary or secondary may be addressed in theology courses, pastoral ministry training must integrate this subject on a practical level. This imperative will be argued through an examination of the Apostle Paul’s letters as well as the contemporary cultural climate of western Christianity.
This thesis argues for modifying the content of pastoral pedagogy and is supported by biblical and cultural arguments. Biblically, about 10% of Romans and First Corinthians deal with handling differences in secondary doctrines. Although Paul was not a local pastor, as the “apostle to the gentiles” he provided instruction to local churches and their leaders. Paul instructs churches to submit secondary doctrines to relational considerations within the local church. While grounded in theology, Paul’s approach focuses on interpersonal practices such as: building up others and not causing them to stumble, not judging, continuing in table fellowship, forgoing one’s personal rights, and prioritizing the spread of the gospel. Carrying out these practices would fall upon local pastors. Their task was not only to lead their church in theologically distinguishing between primary and secondary issues, but they also would implement Paul’s instructions concerning these interpersonal practices. Today we would classify this task as falling within pastoral ministry, and yet Paul’s instructions in this area are often neglected in pastoral ministry training.
Culturally, western protestant Christianity faces unprecedented mobility and connectivity, which constantly unsettle a local church’s approach to secondary issues. Recent surveys have found that most protestant adult churchgoers change churches at least once in their lifetime and almost half of highly religious adults consume religious videos online. Church attenders, therefore, increasingly are exposed to teaching that does not align with their local church’s approach to secondary issues. Every church has their own taxonomy of convictions – spoken or unspoken. Local pastors (especially in free church/non-denominational congregations that have local autonomy) need to continually clarify and navigate their church’s essential and non-essential issues. Over a decade ago, Al Mohler called churches to meet this need by “doing theological triage.” More recently Gavin Ortlund’s “Finding the Right Hills to Die on” offers some practical guidance in this area. These are just two short works that could be integrated into introductory pastoral ministry training. The biblical and cultural data argue that such an integration is imperative.