The book, unchristian by David Kinnaman and Gabe Lyons attempts to give insight into the tarnished image of Christianity in America today.
unchristian is a product of the research of the Barna Group to help explain Christianity’s inability to connect with those in the 16 to 41 year old age group. This group is called “the outsiders”.
I can’t argue with the idea that “Christianity has an image problem” or that many people perceive Christianity in a negative light. One of the challenges we face is that our culture is being shaped by this generation’s view of Christianity.
“The Big Three”
- There are some things about Christianity that the subjects of the survey liked.
- Christianity teaches the same basic idea as other religions (80 percent believe this), but this is not true.
- Christianity has “good values and principles”
- Christianity is friendly
- But
- Only a minority believes Christianity to be “genuine and real, as something that makes sense, and as relevant to their life.”
Here are the negative perceptions:
- Old-fashioned
- Too involved in politics
- Out of touch with reality
- Insensitive to others
- Boring
- Not accepting other faiths
- Confusing
Sounds like high schoolers describing their parents.
Now for the “Big Three:
“In our national surveys we found the three most common perceptions of present day Christianity are antihomosexual (an image held by 91 percent of young outsiders), judgmental (87 percent), and hypocritical (85 percent).” unchristian pg. 27
So, what do we do with this information? Let’s just concentrate on the “Big Three”. Actually I believe that the three perceptions are really related. We will call it, the Big One. There is tremendous push in our culture to make homosexuality not just accepted, but normal and maybe even “the norm”. (For more information see the article “Homosexuality and the Reevaluation of Christianity” on our website.) I believe those in the survey would see judgmental and anti-homosexual as the same thing. In the context of this survey group, hypocrisy could describe someone who is judgmental about someone else’s sexual orientation.
Is it righteous to understand that a person living in a homosexual relationship is living outside of God’s created order? God made male and female. The context for sexual relationships is described in Genesis 2.
22 The LORD God fashioned into a woman the rib which He had taken from the man, and brought her to the man. 23 The man said,
“This is now bone of my bones,
And flesh of my flesh;
She shall be called Woman,
Because she was taken out of Man.”
24 For this reason a man shall leave his father and his mother, and be joined to his wife; and they shall become one flesh.
What stance are Christians to take other than that sexual immorality (a rejection of God’s created order) is sinful? When Christians live godly lives, they become offensive to the ungodly. There is not much we can do with that other than to continue to live in contrast to the world.
The truth of the matter is that Christianity has always had an image problem because Jesus had an image problem. The Jews saw him as a troublemaker. He made claims that challenged their understanding of God, especially the idea of God as Father, Son, and Spirit. They claimed that He worked by the power of Satan. When He claimed to be the God of the Old Testament, “I AM”, it was more than they could bear. He told the truth about their hypocrisy and they had Him crucified. John the Baptist was beheaded because he spoke of the immorality of Herod. Steven was stoned to death because he named the Jews as those who had betrayed and murdered “the Righteous One.” The disciples of Jesus were imprisoned, beaten, and killed because they dared to tell the truth about God and His expectation for His people.
Why should we expect to live free from the consequence of looking like Jesus? He actually told us to expect those consequences!
–Chris Schaefer
