No denomination has it all. No Christian movement has an exclusive corner on the truth.
No single group can claim to be “it” – to the exclusion of everyone else who has been born into God’s family through faith in Jesus. All of us together make up the Body of Christ, and only together are we complete.
The problem is that we tend to divide over our distinctives, becoming totally closed to anyone who would have anything to teach us in those important – yet touchy! – areas.
Certainly, the foibles, follies, and flaws of the contemporary charismatic Church have helped those of us who call ourselves “Spirit-filled” to open our ears more widely to our non-charismatic brethren.
But could it be that the reverse is also true? Could it be that there is some significant error in the non-charismatic camp as well? Or, to get more specific, could it be that those who most zealously hold to the principle of sola scriptura need to learn about this very principle from those whom they judge to be dangerously subjective and even unbiblical?
Could it be that those who urge us to go back to the Word, who tenaciously profess that the Scriptures alone are the final authority of faith and practice, and who sometimes call their churches “Bible churches,” have unwittingly denied important truths that were central to the authors (and Author!) of that very Bible...?