Say What?

I'm doing study in 1 John. As I was doing so I was reminded again of how important it is to try to get some sense of the background of what's happening in the community to whom the author is writing. In doing that study I came across this quote in the Word Biblical Commentary: "The writer of 1 John was thus addressing a community, made up of a number of house-churches in and around Ephesus (see on 2 and 3 John), which was split in three ways. It consisted of the following: (a) Johannine Christians who were committed to the apostolic gospel of Jesus as they had received it; (b) heretically inclined members from a Jewish background; (c) heterodox followers from a Hellenistic (and/or pagan) background. The problems relating to the two “heretical” groups, (b) and (c), were primarily theological and (by extension) ethical..."  (emphasis added).  It's this last part that drew my attention.  Our theology impacts our ethics.  It is, of course, a truth that rings throughout the Scriptures.  Paul's writings for instance typically start out with theology and that leads us into how we are to live.  But in our culture we seem to diss theology as basically unimportant, boring, or something for intellectuals (and therefore a bad thing), believing we can act in certain ways without the foundation of theology to hold up those ways.  

It's a good reminder that our theology or lack of it really does impact the way we do life.