Doctrine and the church

From Setting Our Affections Upon Glory by D. M. Lloyd-Jones:

Doctrine comes before fellowship, and unless our fellowship is based upon doctrine, it is not Christian fellowship ...

The church in her great periods has always seen the absolute necessity of defining what she believes in order that wrong teaching might be corrected and driven out. That is why teaching or doctrine must always come before fellowship. There is nothing more dangerous to the true life of the church than reversing this order and putting fellowship before doctrine (55-58)