thoughts on "unchristian" - 2

Hypocritical...

that's how the majority of young people perceive the average Christian on the street. If you're like me, you might get occasionally irritated by the "Christians are hypocrites" jab when folks are talking about why they are not Christians, why they stopped being Christians. Sometimes, I want to say, "If the shoe fits, where it." I mean, how many folks of other faiths, or no faith, actually live out the principles and values they claim to espouse without a good bit of hypocrisy?

On the other hand, responses like this don't help us give a reason for our hope, or to speak wisely with outsiders, as Peter exhorts us to. We do well to investigate the root of this common complaint.

unchristian exposes some of the hypocrisy latent in the wider culture, but Kinnaman reminds us that followers of Jesus are held to a higher standard - not just by God, but by the wider culture. And, "Young outsiders believe that...followers of Christ are playing the very same mind games they are. They perceive us as employing the same tactics as everyone else to preserve an appearance of strength (pp 44-5)."

This is shown true in the research. Kinnaman works with the Barna research group whose intensive investigations have shown that, in America, those who hold beliefs in line with Evangelical or 'born-again' Christianity (ie, a personal commitment to Jesus as Savior) are just as likely (in the past 30 days) to gamble, look at porn online, steal, consult a medium or psychic, physically fight or abuse, get drunk, used narcotics, lie, slander another person, or practice vengeance as 'non-born-agains'. In our culture, those who believe what Christians are supposed to believe live virtually the same lives as their unbelieving neighbors (47)!

There are some minor differences, especially when it comes to public sins, like using profanity in public. And, Christians are a bit more likely to help the poor and homeless. But, all in all, we're not doing so hot in the whole "do not be conformed to the pattern of this world" command Paul articulated to us.

Now, I'm big on grace, and believe that it's silly to pretend we're not sinning if we are. "Christians are not perfect, just forgiven," is a truism we see on bumper stickers. However, these statistics are mind-blowing to me. We fail, we blow-it, we are forgiven. But, we ought to be progressing in godliness, throwing off the sin that so easily entagles us. How is it that our average month consists of all the same garbage as the world?

I hope these statistics will spur us toward some soul searching, and some thinking about what it means to be a follower of Jesus. And, I plan to delve into these questions in my next post. Let me conclude today with the cruel twist Kinnaman exposes on pages 48 and 49:

It's not just our lifestyles that have gotten us in trouble; it's the very way in which we convey the priorities of being a Christian. The most common message people hear from us is that Christianity is a religion of rules and regulations. They think of us as hypocritcal because they are measuring us by our own standards.

The most compelling research we did on this is a recent study in which we asked Christian adults to identify the priorities Christians pursue in terms of their personal faith. We did not prompt any answers; respondents were able to mention anything that came to mind.

What do you imagine was the most common response?

It was lifestyle--being good, doing the right thing, not sinning.

No wonder the world considers us hypocrites: we have convinced them and ourselves that Jesus died on the Cross so that we would sin less, and we don't! I've heard a quote that might be from CS Lewis that goes something like this: Jesus did not come to make bad men good, but to make dead men alive!