Dr. James Anderson explores what Scripture teaches about spiritual growth and human failure.
The following is a transcript of the video above.
If Christianity is so good, why are Christians so bad?
Sometimes, I get asked the question, “If Christianity is so good, then why are Christians so bad?” And it’s a great question. A number of years ago, there was a British TV show with the title “Men Behaving Badly”. And I sometimes wonder how long it will be before some enterprising producer, a TV show producer, comes up with a show called Christians Behaving Badly, a reality TV show. And I think there’ll be no shortage of material for such a show. But this actually presents a serious objection to the Christian faith because if Christianity is true, so the argument goes, then we would expect Christians to be better people, to be more moral people than non-Christians. And yet, that doesn’t seem to be what we see in the world. Jesus himself said this is how all men will know that you are my disciples because you love one another. And so when Christians behave badly, it seems to cast doubt on the very words of Christ himself.
Well, there are several things that we might say in response to this objection. The first is to say that the Bible recognizes that there will be many people who profess to be Christians, who claim to be followers of Christ, but who aren’t truly converted. These are false professors, and eventually, their false profession will be shown by their deeds. Jesus says that there will be many on the day of judgment who say, Lord, Lord. But they turn out not to be followers of Christ. And again, Christ says that the tree will be known by its fruits. And so, if we don’t see fruit in the lives of professing Christians, then that casts doubt on their claim to be a follower of Christ. The second point is that often, the objection is judging Christians by non-Christian moral standards. Above all, Christianity isn’t for good people. Christianity is for bad people. Jesus said, it’s not the healthy you need a physician; it’s the sick. And he had come not to save the righteous, but to save sinners.For example, it is sometimes said, Well, Christians are very intolerant, intolerant of LGBTQ people, but really they’re just assuming a certain sort of set of moral values and criticizing Christians because they don’t go along with these non-Christian moral values. And then the third thing that we might point out is that Christianity doesn’t actually predict that Christians, on the whole, will be more moral people than non-Christians. Rather, what Christianity says is that any Christian should be a better person than they would have been had they not been converted to Christ. And so what we’re really looking for is moral improvement in an individual’s life. Are they growing? Are they becoming a better person, a better follower of Christ, and they’re becoming more like Christ? Over time, that’s the true fruit that we should be looking for in the lives of Christian believers. But here’s the thing that we need to recognize. Above all, Christianity isn’t for good people. Christianity is for bad people. Jesus said, it’s not the healthy. You need a physician; it’s sick. And he had come not to save the righteous, but to save sinners. And that’s really what makes Christianity so good because it offers hope and transformation for bad people like you and me.
