Theology is very simply the knowledge or study of God. Anything we say about God is theology. If you say in your heart that there is no God, that is a theological statement, though a blatantly false one. See Psalms 14:1: “The fool hath said in his heart, There is no God. They are corrupt, they have done abominable works, there is none that doeth good.” The true theology belongs to true Christ followers as it is the faithful response to the greatest commandment. It is the application of our mental faculties of learning to the love of God. We want to know Him whom we have loved, and so we study that which has been revealed about Himself. The inspired Word of God is the source of all good theology, and out of it comes a treasure trove of insight. See 2 Timothy 3:16 and 2 Timothy 1:14: If we were to say that God could be called “mother,” that is a theological proposition, but it is a poor one, as it completely ignores all the Biblical evidence. The Bible never refers to God in the feminine form, He is always our Father, and never mother. Likewise, claiming someone bears the mark of Cain today is bad theology because the Bible clearly says that all the descendants of Cain died in the great flood of Genesis 6-7; Noah is a descendant of Seth, as told in Genesis 5.
Theology Defined
Good theology always answers to the authority of the text. Any theology without clear Scriptural references is nothing but the idle thoughts of man.
To say that Christ died to save sinners from the eternal consequences of their sins and reconcile them to God is a sound theological proposition with numerous Scriptural supports scattered throughout the Bible. Now, if we were to study all those verses and then draft a comprehensive statement of what they taught us, we would have a theological doctrine. A doctrine simply means a teaching, in our example, we have a doctrine, or teaching of salvation.
Sometimes, when we read through all that the Bible says on a given topic, we find we need a term to express the truth of Scripture subsequently. See, it takes a while to say God exists eternally as one God in three persons, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. So, we coined the term Trinity to express that Biblical truth. Trinity is a theological term. These terms are manmade, and for some, that seems a problem. However, as long as the term is expressing a Biblical reality, there should be no more issue with using it than with using any other term to express Biblical realities. However, we do need to know our terminology.
Sadly, the terminology is not always explained in the local churches, leaving many of us to teach ourselves. At some point, we all have to teach ourselves, at very least to apply ourselves to learning. That is work, in a world where we already have a lot of work to do. Why put in the effort to learn theology?
Lord's Library participates in affiliate programs. We may make a small commission from products purchased through this resource.
