High School: Everyone is a Theologian

Scripture: Romans 12:2 and Jeremiah 17:9

Last year I had the opportunity to hear Tony Campolo, an old Baptist preacher, teach. During his message, he was sharing the story of a time when he was preaching on loving people the way that Christ loves people. During that time he elaborated on a lot of the issues facing the Church today and he made the comment that Christians should spend more time loving homosexuals than condemning them. After the service, he told us, a man angrily came up to him and said, "Your preaching is heresy!" Dr. Campolo replied, "How is the love of Christ heresy?" Feeling stumped, the man blurted out, "Well, you're no theologian!"

At that point, Dr. Campolo responded, "Sure I am because everyone is a theologian. Everyone has views on God."

I couldn't agree with him more. Theology is the study of God, and everyone has a belief about God. Everyone at one point in time has to face what they truly believe about Him. Some go on to think very deeply about Him, others only just scratch the surface...but, the truth remains that everyone is a theologian of some sort.

Here is the question that I want to focus on before we start our series:

Why study theology? Because you're going to do it anyway.

There are certain points in life that force you to ask the hard questions about God...so studying theology is unavoidable. With that said, Christians have passed on 2000 years of theological understanding to us. Who are we to ignore what they have worked so hard on?

As Christians, we should be compelled to study theology because of our desire to know God more closely. Christian theology takes us beyond just beliefs and ideas about God, and actually helps to grow closer to God Himself. It is not just about KNOWING ABOUT God, but it is more about KNOWING God.

Lastly, we should study theology because we know that transformation only comes through the "renewing of our minds," and that the, "heart is deceptive above all else." We live in an age where people are encourage to follow their hearts. The problem with this is obvious...Jeremiah says that our hearts are deceptive. It is not that we should say, "forget the heart then." No, we just lead our hearts with our heads. For example, a person will not ever FEEL compelled to love an enemy, but, because of our theology we seek to love them.

So, as we begin the study in, "Doctrine," take time to ask yourself some important questions.

"Do I see myself as a theologian?"
"Do I have a passion for studying God? Why or why not?"
"What are some things about God that I would really like to know about?"

Here is a video clip of Tim Keller on the importance of theology:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0xG1XNrDQGM