
The first principle of theology is
That means we’re fully aware
The problem? A lot of Christians have utterly skipped that first theology lesson. Or weren’t paying attention, ’cause they were too busy staring at the syllabus. Or promptly forgot all about it, ’cause all their new knowledge puffed ’em up. However it happened.
Hence they imagine theology’s first principle is, “I was wrong—but now I’m not. Jesus fixed me.” When he gave us new life, supposedly he gave us a new nature—his nature—so now we have the mind of Christ.
As Calvinist cartoonist Adam Ford depicts it. They don’t always foam at the mouth though. Adam 4d
I run into Christians with this mindset all the time. They’d be the folks who email me to explain, patiently or not, why I’m completely wrong. Or who show up on discussion boards to loudly, angrily correct everybody who varies ever so slightly with their infallible doctrines. Back when they were pagan, they’d get this way about plenty of other subjects, like politics and Star Wars. Now they do it with doctrine.
There’s a term
The cage-stager is as eager to defend their theological territory as a junkyard dog. They’ll fight anyone. Even friends: You might believe precisely the same as they, but if (God forbid) you misstate the slightest idea, the cage-stager will tear your throat out. Best to lock ’em in a cage till they calm the heck down. Hence “cage stage”: Lots of knowledge, very little love.
Calvinists may have coined the term, and may be notorious for the behavior. But lemme tell ya, by no means do they have a monopoly on it. I’ve met cage-stage Fundamentalists, Catholics, people in my own denomination, people in heretic denominations. I’ve encountered cage-stage Jews and Muslims too. The phenomenon’s all over Christendom.
It’s a pitfall many Christians (myself included) fall right into during our early days of following Jesus. The devil’d love every Christian to fall into it, ’cause it nullifies much of the work we do
Doctrines over fruit.
The reason I’m entirely sure the cage-stager doesn’t already possess the mind of Christ? They lack the character.
Jesus is patient. Kind. Generous. Gracious. Loving. Joyful. Peaceful. And all the other
Like I said, the bad attitudes nullify our kingdom work. That’s not just a casual observation of mine; the apostles said so too.
1 Corinthians 13.2 KWL - When I have a prophecy—“I knew the whole mystery! I know everything!”—
- when I have all the faith necessary to move mountains:
- When I have no love, I’m nobody.
God is love, and anybody who lacks love, lacks God.
They’ll interpret the love and patience they receive back
They’ll justify themselves by pointing to what the rest of us Christians are doing. ’Cause a lot of Christianity does consist of reminding and exhorting our fellow Christians to follow Jesus—or follow us as we follow Christ,
But they forget this effort doesn’t consist of flawless Christians helping flawed Christians: We’re all flawed. We’re all wrong. We’re all pointing to Jesus, directing one another to Jesus: He’s right, and we’re not. I don’t have him 100 percent figured out. Neither do you. Neither does anyone. And even if I did have him wholly figured out (probably especially if I did), it gives me no right whatsoever to act like a dick towards anyone who disagrees with me.
Does God win us over that way? He knows all; if anyone’s justified in getting frustrated and ragey over people’s misbeliefs, it’d be God. But God uses kindness to draw us to him.
But the cage-stage Christian hasn’t thought out any of these things. To them, the only true fruit of the Spirit is
Like the verse up top states: No love, no achieving anything for God’s kingdom. If anything, the cage-stager drives people away from the kingdom. Plenty of ex-Christians have horror stories of a cage-stage Christian who tore ’em a knew bunghole over an honest mistake. So they concluded, “I don’t need this,” and promptly found
Battling our own cage-stage tendencies.
A friend of mine was a little surprised when I reminded him the first principle of theology is “I am wrong.” He confessed, “I’ve never heard that before.”
“You had to have,” I told him. “We had the same theology professor!”
Well, it was an 8 a.m. class. But that first lesson made an impact on me, anyway. Our professor emphasized the fact that, during the course of the course, he was inevitably gonna teach error. Totally didn’t mean to. But the reality is, none of us know where our errors are till the Holy Spirit points ’em out to us. Till then, we’re gonna be wrong. And we should never be so arrogant as to presume we’re not, and never are. We’re fallible humans. Being wrong is a given.
He also assigned us a book I’ve found mighty useful, and recommended to loads of Christians: Lutheran theologian Helmut Thielicke’s
Humility, folks! Never practice theology without it.
Of course, college students never read their textbooks unless they’re gonna be on a test somewhere. Short book or not, a lot of my classmates skipped Thielicke’s book, and even those of us who read it got pretty darn cage-stagish. Debates happened everywhere. In the cafeteria, in the coffeehouses, on the school’s online bulletin boards, in the library where other students were trying to study, in the dormitories late at night. Thankfully most of us were Christian enough to not take these debates to heart, nor resort to personal attacks, nor walk away with hurt feelings and grudges. But those risks were always around. And sometimes they did happen. Because an immature Christian isn’t gonna give a rip about hurt feelings: If you get in a fight, you fight to win. Right?
Just as Thielicke warned, some of us went to our home churches and shocked people with our newly-acquired knowledge without
See, as you study theology, you’re gonna discover there are a lot of things
And by patiently accepting the reality that Christians won’t care that it doesn’t fit the bible. Because they want it to be true so badly, they’ll bend, fold, spindle, and mutilate the bible to make it fit. They want it to be true so badly, they think
Yep, there’s nothing like being a voice crying in the wilderness, to teach us humility. That is, if we bother to pay attention and learn this lesson.

