This little story might help to explain the great differences in the religious world. People are using different ``thermometers.'' Divine authority is the real issue at the base of all religious differences. The solution to the problem of religious division if we want to please God is to go to His Word for the only standard of authority. The Bible is the only true and reliable ``thermometer'' for us to use. Where there is no scripture there is no divine authority. Trusting in human wisdom is always wrong. We are told to walk by faith, not by what just seems to be best in our own eyes (1 Cor. 1:18-ff; 2 Cor. 5:7). Many false ``thermometers'' are used by many in the religious world. Let us consider some of these.
EMOTIONALISM
Some people try to determine truth by the way they feel about it. A kind attitude or sympathy toward certain things causes some to just ignore what God's Word might say about it. One woman said, ``I wouldn't give my feelings for all of the Bibles in the world.'' We need to be mindful of the fact that our feelings depend on what we believe. Saul of Tarsus is a perfect example. He hunted, persecuted and imprisoned Christians. He did it with a clean conscience and actually felt good about it (Acts 26:9), but he was wrong in doing it. FAITH comes by our hearing the Word of God (Rom. 10:17). Emotionalism is a false standard. The Bible says, ``He that trusteth in his own heart is a fool'' (Proverbs 28:26).
TESTIMONY OF GREAT MEN
When I asked one man for authority for one thing that he was engaged in, he named three preachers that believed in doing it. My first thought was, ``So what?'' Our faith must not stand in man's wisdom but in the power of God (1 Cor. 2:5). The authority of God makes a practice right or wrong and not how many great men have believed in that practice. One might find one thousand great men that believe a certain doctrine, but that does not make it truth. The Bible is what makes a thing truth.
Several use the creedbooks and writings of men as their spiritual ``thermometers.'' Conferences are held and these man-made creeds can be changed at a majority vote. They write what their group is to believe and/or practice. By what authority can they do that? NONE! Writers of the Bible were empowered with the Spirit of God and knew the will of God. Modern men coming up with these modern doctrines have no power.
FAMILY TRAINING
Most people are what they are, religiously and politically, because that is what their parents were. Very few have ever stopped to consider that their ancestors could have been wrong. One woman on the call-in radio program said, ``My daddy was a member of the same church that I am. He died a member of that church, and what was good enough for him is good enough for me.'' There is too much hand-me-down religion today. It is the wrong ``thermometer'' to rely upon tradition and family training. After practicing something for five or six years, many people think that is the way it has always been done. This is why the use of mechanical instruments of music in worship, sprinkling infants, calling the preacher titles like Reverend, etc., are used in many churches. Tradition is used instead of book, chapter, and verse.
THE ``DO GOOD'' POLICY
Some people seek to justify their unscriptural practices by saying, ``Look at all of the good that it does.'' Their feelings are that if it does good it must be right. This theory is that the end justifies the means. There are many things that are within themselves good, but that should not be practiced by the church. God's work must be done so as to please Him or good is not done. The only way we can know that it pleases Him is to have authority from His Word to do it. His Word is the standard of authority that furnishes us unto every good work (2 Tim. 3:16-17). Promising a child a candy bar if he will come to Bible class, providing a soft-ball league, or a Sunday-night pizza party cannot be brushed off with a ``look at all of the good that it does.'' There must be book, chapter, and verse or else one is using the wrong ``thermometer.''
ONLY ONE ``THERMOMETER''
Friends, let us be content to do God's will because God wants it that way. His Word is the only standard that can be appealed to for our decisions. It is a genuine ``thermometer'' for all of us. Paul said it is ``profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness: That the man of God may be perfect, thoroughly furnished unto all good works'' (2 Tim. 3:16-17).