A Plea for Unity: Confronting Slander and Restoring Honor
I am grieved by the division among believers and by the accusations we spread about one another, including pastors and other ministry leaders. We speak against a fellow believer online or behind their back, then encourage others to distrust them because we disagree with them. Heresy hunting can become a search for reasons to condemn people, until we begin treating members of Christ’s Body as enemies of God. Our words cultivate suspicion and contempt toward people the Lord has commanded us to love.
Paul places his warning against grieving the Holy Spirit alongside his commands concerning our speech. Our words are to give grace to those who hear, and slander and bitterness are to be removed from among us (Ephesians 4:29–32). The Holy Spirit, whose ministry we claim to defend, is the One we grieve when we slander His people. Being right about a doctrinal point does not give us permission to misrepresent the person who is wrong. Fellowship with the Spirit requires us to yield to His correction of our own speech, including words we have justified as a defense of truth.
Whether the dispute concerns spiritual gifts, fivefold ministry, eschatology, or another doctrine, we are responsible for describing what the person actually teaches. When we quote a sentence while withholding the explanation that clarifies its meaning, we can make a pastor appear to teach something they have explicitly denied. Others may then repeat our accusation without ever hearing the teaching for themselves. We have given them a false account of someone’s words and encouraged them to judge that person by it. If we have done this, repentance includes correcting the accusation before the people who heard us make it. We cannot preserve a false account of someone’s teaching because admitting our error would be embarrassing.
When correction is necessary, the person being corrected should be someone whose repentance we desire. Paul instructs Timothy to correct his opponents with gentleness, hoping that God will grant them repentance and bring them to a knowledge of the truth (2 Timothy 2:24–26). We should want a believer to be delivered from error and their hearers established in the truth. If their humiliation has become more desirable to us than their restoration, we need to bring that desire before Jesus and repent.
The injury also concerns the grace God intends to impart through His people. Every believer carries grace, and God longs to give that grace to others. Christ gives ministries to equip the saints and bring His Body into maturity and unity (Ephesians 4:11–16). When we falsely portray a leader as a deceiver, we can persuade others to reject the very person through whom the Holy Spirit intends to strengthen their faith or minister healing. Our accusation can deprive other members of the Body of ministry God intended them to receive.
I have often taught that the fountain of grace flowing through someone’s life to us is turned off through dishonor and turned on through honor. The person still carries grace, but contempt has closed us to receiving it through them. Honor opens our hearts to receive from the Holy Spirit through someone we had dismissed. Through slander, we can spread the very dishonor that closes people to the grace God desires to impart through that person.
My plea is that we would humble ourselves before Jesus and repent of the false accusations and slander we have permitted in His Body. He prayed that we would be one and that the world would know the Father loves us as He loves His Son (John 17:20–23). The believer we have spoken against is someone Jesus loves. Where we have falsely accused them, we need to withdraw the accusation and seek their forgiveness. Our desire to defend the faith must include obedience to the Lord who commands us to love one another.
Our Unity in Christ
Jesus’ prayer reveals how deeply our unity concerns Him. He desires a people whose fellowship bears witness to His union with the Father and to the love through which He was sent. Through His death, He has reconciled people who were previously divided. In Ephesians 2, Paul describes Jews and Gentiles reconciled to God in one Body through the cross, with access to the Father through the same Spirit. Their hostility had to be understood in light of what Christ had accomplished for them. As we consider divisions among believers today, we must begin with that same recognition: the people Christ has received are members of His household, including those outside our theological circle (Ephesians 2:11–22).
Paul therefore calls us to preserve the unity of the Spirit while we grow toward unity in the faith and in our knowledge of the Son of God (Ephesians 4:3, 13). We already belong to one Body, and we still require instruction and maturity. If we withhold love from fellow believers until every interpretation agrees with our own, we withhold the very patience through which growth can occur. Christ gives teachers to establish His people in truth, and He commands the people receiving that instruction to bear with one another in love. Our present disagreements must be addressed as members who are responsible for one another’s growth.
Paul’s prayer in Ephesians 3 takes us further into the spiritual substance of this fellowship. He asks the Father to strengthen believers inwardly through the Holy Spirit so that they may comprehend Christ’s love with all the saints. Knowing the love of Jesus involves the Spirit’s work within us and our fellowship with the people He loves. We can ask Him to deepen our experience of His affection while refusing the contempt that would make another believer’s humiliation enjoyable. As He makes His love known in our hearts, we must surrender the judgments and resentments that resist its expression through us (Ephesians 3:14–19).
Honor and the Grace God Gives Through Others
Our need for one another also arises from the way God distributes grace. Peter describes believers as stewards of God’s varied grace, each serving others with the gift received (1 Peter 4:10–11). The gift has been entrusted to a person for ministry beyond that person. God intends someone else to benefit from what He has given. Paul develops this through the image of the Body: one member cannot dismiss another as unnecessary, and God gives honor within the Body so that its members will resist division and attend to one another (1 Corinthians 12:21–26). Honor recognizes both the person’s value to God and the grace He has entrusted to them for others.
That grace can be expressed through teaching that opens the Scriptures to us, a prophetic word that strengthens our faith, or prayer through which the Holy Spirit ministers healing. These are acts of God’s generosity through His people. Paul wanted to impart a spiritual gift to the believers in Rome so that they would be strengthened, and he immediately acknowledged that their faith would encourage him as well (Romans 1:11–12). Even as an apostle preparing to minister, he expected to receive. Spiritual maturity should deepen our recognition of what God gives through others. A person’s usefulness to us is not exhausted by whether they can affirm what we already believe.
We can confess our dependence on the Holy Spirit while resisting the person through whom He intends to minister. Perhaps we have dismissed someone because of their church background, their manner of speaking, or a disagreement we have allowed to define everything about them. Before they speak, we have already decided that they have nothing to give us. Honor involves surrendering that contempt. We become willing to hear what they actually say, recognize the Spirit’s work, and receive the grace He is giving. This requires humility because God may strengthen us through someone we had considered spiritually beneath us.
The account of Jesus in Nazareth shows how offense can obstruct reception. The people heard His wisdom and knew of mighty works, yet their familiarity with His family became part of their objection to Him. They took offense. Jesus spoke of a prophet lacking honor in his hometown, and Mark connects their response with unbelief. He also records that Jesus laid His hands on a few sick people and healed them (Mark 6:1–6). The account warns us about the spiritual cost of dismissing the One God has sent because He does not fit our expectations. Applied to our own hearts, it gives us reason to bring prejudice and contempt before the Lord rather than treating them as discernment.
Discernment, Heresy, and Disagreement
Receiving from others requires discernment. Paul tells the Thessalonians to remain open to the Spirit, refuse contempt toward prophecy, test what is given, and retain what is good (1 Thessalonians 5:19–22). His instructions require us to recognize and receive God’s work while rejecting what is false. Someone who rejects every prophetic word has not fulfilled the command to hold fast to what is good. Someone who accepts every claim of revelation has not fulfilled the command to test. We honor the Holy Spirit by welcoming His ministry and submitting spiritual claims to the judgment Scripture requires.
This applies to those of us who believe deeply in the gifts and ministries of the Spirit. Calling a statement prophetic does not place it beyond correction. An apostolic title cannot authorize someone to overrule Scripture or demand unquestioning obedience. We should welcome correction that helps us minister faithfully. At the same time, the use of a title or the practice of a spiritual gift does not establish that someone teaches heresy. We must address what they actually believe, claim, and do. A disagreement about whether apostles and prophets continue today cannot be settled by portraying everyone who affirms their continuation as a deceiver.
Heresy is a serious charge because it concerns the faith by which we confess and know the Lord. Within historic Nicene Christianity, the term identifies teaching that contradicts the apostolic faith at its foundation, especially concerning God, Christ, and salvation. The Nicene confession expresses central truths concerning the Father, the deity and incarnation of the Son, His death and resurrection, and the Holy Spirit.¹ Christian traditions draw some further boundaries differently, but the central distinction remains necessary: denying who Jesus is or denying His resurrection is different in kind from disagreeing about the millennium. First John 4 tests spiritual claims by their confession of Jesus Christ, and 1 Corinthians 15 explains why denying the resurrection overturns the Christian hope.
This does not make every other error harmless. Teaching can damage believers, distort their understanding of God, or encourage serious disobedience without requiring us to settle every question through the word heresy. We can explain precisely why a teaching is wrong and what must change. We also need to distinguish a person’s established conviction from a confused explanation, an unfortunate analogy, or a sentence whose meaning becomes clear in context. A charge concerning someone’s faith should describe what they actually hold. It should not depend on treating every implication we draw from their words as something they consciously affirm.
Romans 14 shows believers needing correction in how they treat one another while remaining responsible to the same Lord. Some ate freely; others abstained. Paul held a definite conviction about food, yet he opposed both contempt and condemnation because God had welcomed the believers involved. Their fellowship required them to consider how their conduct affected someone for whom Christ died. Romans 16 also warns against divisive deception contrary to received teaching. Paul could welcome believers through a disagreement and warn against teaching that endangered the Church. We must understand the particular disagreement before deciding which response it requires (Romans 14:1–15:7; 16:17–18).
The early Church provides a helpful example. Eusebius records that Victor, bishop of Rome, attempted to exclude churches in Asia over the timing of the paschal observance associated with Easter. Irenaeus urged him to preserve fellowship with them. Irenaeus himself favored Sunday observance, so his appeal did not require abandoning his conviction. He could defend the faith and still recognize that this disagreement did not justify severing communion with whole churches.² His response challenges the assumption that the seriousness of our convictions must always be demonstrated by separating from those who differ. Sometimes faithfulness requires us to restrain the impulse to exclude.
Acts 18 gives us a more personal picture of correction. Apollos knew the Scriptures and taught accurately concerning Jesus, yet his understanding was incomplete. Priscilla and Aquila took him aside and explained the way of God more accurately. The account then describes believers encouraging his ministry and commending him to others, whom he greatly helped. His need for instruction did not erase the grace already evident in his life. Their response made room for his understanding to grow and for others to receive through him. We should desire that kind of fruit when we encounter a believer who needs correction (Acts 18:24–28).
Slander Against Church Leaders
Paul instructs believers to honor those who labor among them and lead them in the Lord, esteeming them in love because of their work (1 Thessalonians 5:12–13). This honor concerns their service to Christ and His people. When we circulate false accusations about a leader, we can turn others against the ministry through which God has been strengthening and equipping them.
Scripture also requires us to confront the deliberate cultivation of division. The Greek noun behind the word heresy is αἵρεσις (hairesis). Its meaning varies according to the passage. In Acts, it can identify a religious party, such as the Sadducees or Pharisees (Acts 5:17; 15:5). In 1 Corinthians 11:19 and Galatians 5:20, it describes factions or divisions. In 2 Peter 2:1, it refers to destructive heresies associated with false teachers who deny the Master who bought them. These uses show why we must consider the surrounding passage: the word can identify a religious group, condemn factional division, or describe destructive teaching.
In Titus 3:10, Paul uses the related adjective αἱρετικός (hairetikos), describing someone who creates or promotes factions. Having warned against foolish controversies and quarrels about the law, he instructs Titus to have nothing further to do with a person who persists in division after a first and second warning (Titus 3:9–11). Paul is addressing conduct that fractures the fellowship of believers and continues despite correction. His warning gives us reason to consider whether our own response to disagreement is drawing people into resentment and hostility.³
This has a direct application to how we speak about pastors and other believers. If we gather people around resentment toward a ministry, spread distorted accounts of its teaching, and refuse to withdraw accusations shown to be false, we are cultivating division ourselves. Claiming to defend the faith does not exempt us from Paul’s warning. We need to bring that resentment before Jesus and correct what we have said before those who heard it. Fellowship with the Holy Spirit requires us to surrender the contempt that has governed our speech and receive His correction of our treatment of the people He loves.
Much of this division develops away from a public platform. A pastor’s name is mentioned, and someone begins recounting every concern they have heard. The people listening are encouraged to distrust that leader without hearing the teaching in question or the explanation the leader has given. A request for prayer can become an opportunity to circulate the pastor’s failure. We may tell ourselves that the information is true while giving no thought to why we are sharing it with these particular people. Even a true account can be used maliciously when our purpose is to diminish someone or recruit others into our resentment.
The damage can extend through a congregation. People may withdraw from prayer, teaching, or pastoral counsel because we have persuaded them that the person ministering to them cannot be trusted. A leader’s family may bear the distress of accusations that others repeat casually. If our words are false or distorted, that injury cannot be excused by saying we were protecting the Church. We have wounded people within it and obstructed their willingness to receive through someone God has given to serve them.
James brings our speech into the presence of God. The same mouth with which we bless the Father can be used to curse people made in His likeness. He also describes heavenly wisdom as peaceable, gentle, receptive to reason, and full of mercy (James 3:9–18). Those qualities should affect how we handle a disagreement. If no explanation can soften our accusation, no correction can alter our judgment, and no repentance can move us toward forgiveness, we should question what is governing our response. We cannot measure spiritual discernment solely by the number of errors we can identify in someone else.
Honor and Necessary Correction
David’s treatment of Saul deserves our attention here. Saul was pursuing his life, yet David refused the opportunity to kill him. He also restrained the men who wanted to act against Saul, recognizing Saul as the Lord’s anointed. David’s reverence for God governed what he permitted himself and his companions to do. Saul’s wrongdoing did not become permission for David to take vengeance. That restraint has a searching application to our speech: being wronged does not authorize us to injure someone through lies, ridicule, or malicious exaggeration.
David also named Saul’s wrongdoing and maintained distance from him. He did not pretend the threat had disappeared. In 1 Samuel 26, he spoke from a hill with considerable space between them. His example allows us to see reverence, confrontation, and protective distance in the same person. Honor can govern our conduct even when trust has been broken and reconciliation remains incomplete (1 Samuel 24; 26).
The Lord later sent Nathan to confront David himself. Nathan named his sin concerning Uriah and Bathsheba, and David’s anointing did not place him beyond that confrontation (2 Samuel 12:7–13). Similarly, Paul publicly opposed Peter when his withdrawal from Gentile believers drew others into conduct that contradicted the gospel (Galatians 2:11–14). These passages give us no basis for using honor to silence necessary correction. They show that people entrusted with spiritual responsibility remain accountable to God for how they exercise it. A correction can serve the unity of the Church when it confronts conduct that is harming its members.
We must therefore receive those who report harm with the same concern for their dignity that we extend to a leader. Seeking help, reporting misconduct, or explaining a public error is not made sinful merely because someone’s reputation is affected. People who have been harmed should be heard, protected, and given a fair response. Genuine unity cannot require them to conceal wrongdoing. Honor applies throughout the Body, including to members with little influence whose voices may be easier to dismiss. A leader’s spiritual gifts never make those people expendable.
The question of public correction also requires judgment. A public teaching that has misled people may need a public answer so that its hearers can understand the problem. That answer should explain the teaching accurately and show why it conflicts with Scripture. It does not require speculation about hidden motives or contempt for everyone associated with the teacher. We can warn clearly where warning is necessary while remembering that the Lord commands us to love the people involved. Forceful language does not become faithful merely because we can find forceful language in the Bible; our own words must address the actual wrongdoing.
How to Handle a Concern
Suppose you hear a pastor say something that appears to contradict Scripture. Before posting about it or repeating it to a friend, listen to the explanation surrounding the statement. Identify what you believe is wrong and the passage that raises your concern. Bring it before the Lord, asking the Holy Spirit to show you whether resentment or an earlier disagreement is influencing your interpretation. Where possible, ask the pastor directly what they meant.
You might say, “When you spoke about honoring leaders, I understood you to mean that questioning a leader is disobedience to God. Is that what you meant? How should someone bring a concern when they believe an instruction conflicts with Scripture?” This gives the person an opportunity to clarify their teaching while bringing the concern into the open.
If the explanation still conflicts with Scripture, discuss the particular passage and remain willing to receive correction yourself. If you cannot contact the person directly, use the ministry’s stated contact channel or ask a trusted pastor to help you understand the teaching and determine an appropriate next step. An unanswered message does not establish that the person is guilty of what you suspect. It also does not require you to accept teaching you believe contradicts Scripture.
If your concern involves misconduct, bring it to someone responsible for addressing it, such as an elder or the ministry’s oversight. Describe what happened and what needs to be addressed. Where a personal conversation is appropriate but has not resolved the matter, seek help from those able to participate in correction and reconciliation. Gathering frustrated friends to discuss everything wrong with the leader does not accomplish that responsibility.
Confidential counsel and support may be necessary, especially for someone who has been harmed. Asking a trusted person for help is different from spreading an accusation to turn people against someone. Share what is necessary for that person to understand and help. If there is abuse, intimidation, or danger, seek protection and appropriate help; you are not required to confront the person alone or place yourself in danger.
If you discover that you misunderstood the teaching, acknowledge it and correct anything you repeated. If wrongdoing is confirmed, pursue the correction and protection the situation requires. Where a public answer is necessary, address the actual statement or conduct without inventing motives or encouraging contempt. Throughout the process, desire the good of those affected, the repentance of anyone who has sinned, and the restoration of fellowship wherever that becomes possible.
Repentance and Restoration
For those of us who have participated in slander, repentance must become specific. If we posted an accusation that was false, the people who received it need to hear that it was false. Deleting a post may stop its further circulation, but it does not necessarily correct the belief we planted in those who already read it. If we persuaded friends to distrust someone through a distorted account, we should return to those friends and correct what we said. Seeking forgiveness involves acknowledging the harm we caused without making the injured person responsible for our decision to speak.
The same humility is necessary when correction comes to us. If someone shows that we have misrepresented their teaching, we should welcome the opportunity to put it right. Defending an accusation after its basis has been disproved adds another refusal of truth to the original wrong. Our reputation as a discerning person cannot become more important than obedience to Jesus. We belong to Him, and He is worthy of our surrender even when repentance costs us the approval of people who agreed with us.
Where someone has sinned and repented, our response must also be capable of changing. In 2 Corinthians 2, Paul tells the church that a disciplinary response has been sufficient and urges them to forgive, comfort, and reaffirm their love for the person involved. He is concerned that the person could be overwhelmed by excessive sorrow. Correction has a purpose beyond establishing that the Church was right to act. The person must know that forgiveness and love remain available. Restoration to fellowship and restoration to a position of leadership involve different questions, but neither question gives us permission to withhold the love Christ commands (2 Corinthians 2:6–11).
Receiving One Another in the Love of Christ
I long to see believers who can rejoice when the Holy Spirit ministers through someone outside their own circle. I want us to recognize the grace of God with gratitude, to receive what He gives, and to become willing instruments of His grace to others. That includes the humility to receive instruction, the faith to welcome His power, and the affection to desire another believer’s maturity. The Church suffers when we become more practiced at discrediting one another than at strengthening one another in Christ. Jesus has given us to one another as members of His Body, and He intends His life to be expressed through our fellowship.
As we spend time with Him, let us bring before Him the people we have resented, dismissed, or spoken against. We can ask the Holy Spirit to show us where our judgments have become contempt and where fear of error has closed us to His ministry through others. We can ask Him to renew our affection for His people and give us the humility to make things right. His correction is an invitation to surrender the sin that has injured our fellowship and to participate more fully in the love with which He loves His Church.
Prayer
Lord Jesus, forgive us for the accusations and slander we have justified in Your name, including the harm we have done to those who lead Your people. Show us where we have misrepresented someone, and give us courage to correct our words before those who heard them. Holy Spirit, soften the places in our hearts that have become contemptuous. Open us to the grace You desire to impart through Your people. Establish us in the truth, and make us willing to receive correction ourselves. Where others need correction, fill us with a desire for their repentance and restoration. Father, deepen our knowledge of Your love until it governs the way we speak about Your children and the way we receive one another. May our fellowship bear witness to the Son You sent and to the love You have given us in Him. Amen.
Notes
1. Rick Brannan, Historic Creeds and Confessions (Lexham Press, 2001), “Nicene Creed.”
2. Eusebius, Church History 5.24.9–18, trans. Arthur Cushman McGiffert, in Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, second series, vol. 1, ed. Philip Schaff and Henry Wace (Christian Literature Publishing Co., 1890).
3. James A. Swanson, Dictionary of Biblical Languages with Semantic Domains: Greek (New Testament), 2nd ed. (Logos Research Systems, 2001), entries 146, “αἵρεσις,” and 148, “αἱρετικός”; Thomas D. Lea and Hayne P. Griffin Jr., 1, 2 Timothy, Titus, New American Commentary 34 (Broadman & Holman, 1992), commentary on Titus 3:9–11.