There is no substitute for personal holiness, kindness, and humility. Nothing can be substituted in for it. Nothing adequately takes the place of it. There are many glorious truths in the Christian faith, but there is only one demeanor to adorn them all. The gospel is glorious, but what adorns it? Tender mercies. The covenant is wonderful, but what adorns it? Covenant love and kindness. Family life in the faith is a tremendous blessing, but what does God call us to there? Kindness and respect where it counts, where other people can see it.
As churches grow, as numbers increase, as institutions become more institutional, a plea often goes out for “realism.” Obedience to the Word of God is just not realistic. Or so we say. But how is it not realistic to conform ourselves to ultimate and transcendent reality? Why is it more “realistic” to obey the whims of flickering shadows and wisps of smoke?
Obedience to God’s word is what we do to live out what we say we believe in our confessions and constitutions. To be clothed in tender mercies as we deal with one another—this is how we adorn what we claim to love. To love brothers and sisters from other churches—this is how we communicate the truth of an objective covenant. To maintain a spirit that is easily entreated, as James puts it, this is true wisdom, and only this refutes the folly of the world This is the true apologetic.
How, therefore, are we to see our doctrine? Though the kindness of our lives. Where is our aesthetic to be found? In the kindness of our lives. Where is our ethic to be located?—be ye kind one to another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another. Our kindness is not to be identified with our doctrine, our ethic, our aesthetic—but it is the only jewelry that goes with them. Without covenant kindness, all our “issues” become nothing more than rationalism, moralism, and high-brow snobbery. From all such, may our good God deliver us. So as you come into the presence of God, are you filled with kindness one to another?