Why so much negative teaching

We have been accused of always being so negative in our teaching. Why not more lessons on peace, joy, love and other such comforting topics and less on strictly obeying the world of God? There is certainly a need for all those “comforting” topics to proclaimed. Indeed “the peace of God, which passeth all understanding, shall keep your hearts and minds through Christ Jesus” (Phil. 4:7). And, it is true that we can “rejoice in the Lord always: and again I say, Rejoice” (Phil. 4:4). It was the apostle John who is often called “the apostle of love”, but it was Paul who said, “Though I speak with the tongues of men and of angels, and have not charity, I am become as sounding brass, or a tinkling cymbal” (I Cor. 13:1). There is certainly a need and a place for all such teaching. However, is that what is needed most of the time? Paul told the Thessalonian brethren, “But as touching brotherly love ye need not, that I write unto you: for ye yourselves are taught of God to love one another” (I Thess. 4:9). One might say that such teaching is the milk for the babes rather than the meat for the mature. The Hebrew writer said of those to whom he wrote, “For when for the time ye ought to be teachers, ye have need that one teach you again which be the first principles of the oracles of God; and are become such as have need of milk, and not of strong meat” (Heb. 5:12). As the reconstruction of the walls of Jerusalem progressed in the days of Nehemiah, he told them, “…The work is great and large, and we are separated upon the wall, one far from another. In what place therefore ye hear the sound of the trumpet, resort ye thither unto us: our God shall fight for us” (Nehe. 5:19-20). They did not waste time and manpower covering ground that did not need to be covered. This brings us to our first real answer to those who want to be continuously comforted with hope, joy and love stories.

The question is not of what the people want to hear, but what they need to hear. When the apostle Paul went to Athens, he found that “…all the Athenians and strangers which were there spent their time in nothing else, but either to tell or to hear some new thing” (Acts 17:21). Paul told them, “For as I passed by, and beheld your devotions, I found an altar with this inscription, TO THE UNKNOWN GOD. Whom therefore ye ignorantly worship, him declare I unto you” (Acts 17:23). First Corinthians was written to the Church at Corinth by the apostle Paul and in that epistle he condemned many things they were doing. It was in that letter that the “love chapter of the Bible” (I Cor. 13) is found, but he taught them mostly what their shortcomings were. He told them in his next letter the reason for teaching that which he taught. He said “Wherefore we labor, that, whether present or absent, we may be accepted of him. For we must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ; that every one may receive the things done in his body, according to that he hath done, whether it be good or bad. Knowing therefore the terror of the Lord, we persuade men; but we are made manifest unto God; and I trust also are made manifest in your consciences” (II Cor. 5:9-11).

Paul taught what they needed to hear, not what they wanted to hear. That has always been the case of those who were honestly engaged in the work of spreading God’s word. In the long ago, God told Isaiah to, “…go, write it before them in a table, and note it in a book, that it may be for the time to come for ever and ever: That this is a rebellious people, lying children, children that will not hear the law of the Lord: Which say to the seers, See not; and to the prophets, Prophesy not unto us right things, speak unto us smooth things, prophesy deceits:” (Isa. 30:8-10). This sounds very much like the instructions Paul gave Timothy in the closing days of his own life. He commanded him to. “Preach the word; be instant in season, out of season; reprove, rebuke, exhort with all longsuffering and doctrine. For the time will come when they will not endure sound doctrine; but after their own lusts shall they heap to themselves teachers, having itching ears; And they shall turn away their ears from the truth, and shall be turned unto fables. But watch thou in all things, endure afflictions, do the work of an evangelist, make full proof of thy ministry” (II Tim. 4:2-5).

It is noteworthy that the instructions God gave the prophet Jeremiah were, “I have this day set thee over the nations and over the kingdoms, to root out, and to pull down, and to destroy, and to throw down, to build, and to plant” (Jeremiah 1:10). Two thirds negative and one third positive. Paul Timothy to reprove, rebuke and exhort (II Tim. 4:2). Two thirds negative and one third positive. More teaching is needed on that which the people need to learn than on what they already know.