At various time different people have said to me, "theology doesn't really matter, all that matters is that you love....God ...Jesus etc." To which my answer is, of course, it's great to hear that, my Mormon friends who say they love Jesus will be delighted.
To which I tend to get a response along the lines of either, "stop it, you know what I mean, I meant be a Christian and love Jesus" or "I meant be a disciple and love Jesus", their frustration grows if I then point out that Mormons and JW's call themselves Christians and disciples as do Roman Catholics and Unitarians.
Those people brave (argumentative?) enough to press on, usually go on to qualify, their meaning of "loving Jesus, Christian, discipleship" even more to help explain what they mean - if I'm in a mood to tease my friends, I continue the process of saying like ...? (People from another faith or religion.), but more often than not, I now draw the conversation to a conclusion by saying something like ...thanks for the clarification...but wasn't what we just did the very theology you said doesn't matter?
We don't need bad theology
I have some sympathy for those folks who think negatively about theology, my earliest memories of anyone talking about theology are of senior figures in the Church saying they didn't believe in this or that aspect of Christianity. Consequently I had no time for theology or theologians, considering them a waste of time or even a threat to my faith, completely missing the point that the Christian writers and speakers that fed my faith were Christians and theologians like CS Lewis and David Watson.
Loving God, mind and all
Many years later I'm now convinced that theologians are a vital part of God's plan for building His Church, drawing us closer into our relationship with Him and a deeper grasp of His plans and ways. A church without theology is in constant danger of drifting away from God's plan and ultimately from God, scripture tells us that the work of Holy Spirit includes his vital role revealed by Jesus in John 16:3 "But when He, the Spirit of truth, comes, He will guide you into all the truth; for He will not speak on His own initiative, but whatever He hears, He will speak; and He will disclose to you what is to come. "All truth", carries with it the implication of all theological truth, all we need to know about God, His plans, His ways.
Theology is what you do
This doesn't mean we all need to become academic theologians, but it does mean that all Christians are theologians, every time we read scripture, teach, preach, witness, prophecy, or worship we are doing theology by default. The choice we have is whether we make the effort to do it wisely and well, or to pretend it doesn't matter and neglect to grow in our understanding of God.
To neglect or to set a better example is the question
Just because some people do theology badly is not a reason to write off theology, I've been in meetings when the worship was lifeless to the point of being dire, yet rarely do I heard anyone saying worship isn't important so let's ignore it, so let's not neglect the privilege of getting to know God, His Word and His ways just because some do it badly. If we are truly to love God as Jesus commands ".....with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength and with all your mind..." (Luke 10:27) then we need to embrace theology as an important facet of knowing and loving God.
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