Issue 43 Expressions of churchBlog | Holding the flock together
Holding the flock together
Author: Andy PeckPost Date: 16.06.25
Euodia and Syntyche were not of the same mind. We don’t know what their particular disagreement was about but Paul was clearly concerned, pleading with them to sort it out, and asking the ‘true companion’ to help them to do so. (Philippians 4:2-3) If you hold a leadership role in a local church, or any Christian organisation, you are likely to be in the place of the true companion, with responsibility to hold the flock together. How are we to do that?
It’s interesting to me that Paul doesn’t tell Euodia and Syntyche what opinion they should hold. Indeed, just a few verses previously (Philippians 3:15) he wrote, ‘if on some point you think differently, that too God will make clear to you’. Paul seems more concerned about the prayerful and relational process of resolving or living with differences of opinion than he is about settling who is right and who is wrong. In Ephesians he urges believers to ‘make every effort to keep the unity of the Spirit through the bond of peace’, and similarly in Romans writes, ‘make every effort to do what leads to peace and to mutual edification’. (Ephesians 4:3; Romans 14:19) It is a mark of maturity to be able to remain in relationship with people with whom we disagree. It’s not that right and wrong don’t matter – they most certainly do! And Paul devotes a lot of space in his letters to right doctrine and right ethics; what we term orthodoxy and orthopraxy. Yet alongside that he is deeply concerned about what we might call orthokardia – having a right heart. Having a right heart attitude in working through differences is especially important when it comes to what Paul calls ‘disputable matters’ (Romans 14:1).
