When Iron Sharpens Iron

April 1, 2011

I have been giving a lot of thought lately to the verse in the book of Proverbs, “Iron sharpens iron, and one man sharpens another.”(27:17) I returned this week from the North Eastern District Pastors Conference for the Christian and Missionary Alliance. The conference was an assembly of most of the Pastors on our district and it got me thinking about this verse.

Now from my experience so far in this denomination I have seen that the Alliance is made up of pastors all of whom share the gospel message of Christ in common but still come from a vast expanse of theological backgrounds. This is exciting to me because it shows how different we all can be, yet we all share in the common call for us to, “Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit”(Matt 28:19)

I see this verse in Proverbs as an essential part to understanding how these different views work together towards a common goal. We as Christians are called to sharpen one another but I don’t think we understand what this means all the time.

My pastor once said to me, “We are called to sharpen one another, but sometimes we forget that when iron sharpens iron there is friction, and that kind of friction makes sparks.” I have not been able to forget that comment because so often I discuss with others a different view point with others instead of making each other sharper we make each other blunt.

I don’t want to be responsible for making my brothers and sisters in Christ blunt because of our disagreements. I want to sharpen them on the truth that we both hold together. We must realize that in our faith and believe systems there are beliefs that are essential and then there are ideas and concepts that are secondary. The essential beliefs are the ones we need to sharpen ourselves with, the secondary beliefs are used only to adorn already magnificent blades.

Sometimes we as Christians want to make every sword in our armory look the same… But if we all carry the same style blade we can only fight in one particular way. But some of us need to be longswords, rapiers, or claymores, while others are meant to be daggers, katanas, or sabers. Each one has its different purpose and use but each one sparks when it is sharpened by the other.

We need to come to the understanding that we are not against each other just because we hold a different view on some aspects of our faith. We simply have a different blade that we are using to fight a common enemy. But the sharpening, with as much friction as it causes, and as many sparks as it makes, brings us further in the advancing of the Kingdom of God.

After all, that is what we collectively pray for as the church: “let your kingdom come, and will be done.” So we too should continually pray that God would help us to sharpen one another so that we can be useful in the advancement of His Kingdom, and to not become dull because of our differences.