Is The Church Full of Hypocrites?

Last January Dr. Ed Stetzer, Director of Lifeway Research (Lifeway does missiological research on North America), appeared on CNN to discuss the results of his most recent research (A full report of the results of his research appeared in section one of his recent book Lost and Found: The Younger* Unchurched and Churches That Reach Them). Among the findings from interviews with over one thousand people who do not attend church included 77% of unchurched people between the ages of 20- 29 and 83% of unchurched people between the ages of 30-39 who think, “Christianity, today is more about ‘organized religion’ than about loving God and loving people” (p. 58). Another result discussed with Dr. Stetzer during the CNN interview, 46% of unchurched people between the ages of 20- 29 and 44% of unchurched people between the ages of 30-39 said, “Christians get on my nerves” (p. 60). The book’s also shared that 67% of unchurched people between the ages of 20-29 and 75% of unchurched people between the ages of 30-39 think, “The church is full of hypocrites, people who criticize others for doing the same thing they do themselves.”

Responses of this nature are expected from outside of the church, yet they are indicative of a very real negative perception about Christians. The idea that Christians, a group of people whose inclusion in the family of God is based entirely on the merits and achievements of Jesus Christ are largely viewed by those outside the believing community as hypocrites must capture all of our attention. In Galatians chapter two we get a picture of what hypocrisy among Christians looks like when the Apostle Paul admonishes the Apostle Peter after he stopped sharing meals with the Gentile Christians after a group of men from Jerusalem came up to Antioch. In Galatians 2:14 the Apostle Paul vividly describes the hypocritical conduct of the Apostle Peter, Barnabas and the others who followed their example as “not in step with the truth of the gospel.” What drives this perception that Christians are hypocrites? What drives this perception is our failure to live in step with the gospel.

The gospel is far greater than we can imagine

The power of the Gospel transforms lives, relationships, and communities producing lives marked by joy, peace, freedom, and love as a people defined not by such things as race, social class, gender, theological system, personal standards or achievements, but only by receiving God’s grace through trust in the perfect obedience, substitutionary sacrifice, and resurrection of Jesus Christ. The gospel teaches that because of Christ alone we are declared righteous, adopted, accepted, truly free, and heirs no longer to be defined by our sin, weakness, and failures and therefore no longer need to live lives marked by seeking to highlight our real or perceived strengths, gifts, achievements, or accomplishments and can cease from trying to hide the fact that none of us have our lives all together, because God, from whom we can hide nothing truly loves us and has accepted us beyond what we can imagine.

The gospel teaches us we are worse than we think

What so often destroys and devastates our families and communities within the body of Christ are our lives of pretense – pretending that we do not wrestle with a myriad of sins such as attitudes of self-righteousness, a bad temper, anxiousness, lustful glances, seeking to control everyone and everything around us, a critical spirit toward the real or perceived failures of others (all while trying to keep our own failures as far under the radar as possible), and the general belief that we are better than others. You don’t think so – observe the discrepancy between your own reaction and attitude toward the struggles of those around compared to the reaction and attitude you would like others to have toward your own struggles. Have you yourself ever been critical of someone else’s failure to respond toward you graciously?…me too.

The beauty of the gospel is that it not only delivers us from our sin, but also delivers us from our self-salvation projects, our feeble attempts to justify ourselves through performing for and pleasing others, spiritualizing self-centered desires, looking good, and being in control as if our salvation depends upon it. Even worse we seek to make the ones we love perform for us as conditions upon which they will be accepted by us, even though we know God doesn’t respond to us in this fashion. Do you pray Psalm 139:23-24: Search me, O God, and know my heart! Try me and know my thoughts! And see if there be any grievous way in me, and lead me in the way everlasting! Do you invite others into your life and encourage them to speak gospel truths into your life to help you turn from unbelief and trusting “pseudo-Saviors” and point you toward a life marked by repentance and faith. This kind of community is what the home fellowship group ministry exists to provide.

The Holy Spirit works in your weaknesses

Among the many glorious gifts of the gospel is the Holy Spirit Who is more than sufficient to illuminate the myriad of implications in the gospel revealed in the Bible to grant us wisdom, lead, guide, and empower this new life. The Holy Spirit is more than sufficient to change and transform our lives working in us the same power that raised Jesus Christ from the dead (Eph 1:19-20). This power does not work automatically, but only on behalf of us who live by faith. The Spirit-filled life is the life marked by repentance and faith, and He is the one who produces the obedience of faith in our lives. More than that power is made manifest in our weaknesses (2 Cor 12:9; 13:4). We embrace a life of weakness when abandon our own sense of righteousness, strength, power, achievement, and all other expressions of lordship over our own lives. Those whose faith is in reality faith in themselves and their own abilities find little spiritual power for they have traded the power of the Spirit through faith in Jesus alone for faith in their own ability to run their lives. The good news is God delights to use what is weak, insufficient, and inadequate in the eyes of the world to accomplish His glorious plans. Great freedom comes from glorying in our weaknesses, knowing that we do not have the power to affect anything, but God uses and empowers us in our weakness.

Is it either true or fair to say that the church is filled with hypocrites? That depends. If the Church is a body of people whose only avenue for boasting is the gospel of Jesus Christ, then, ‘no,’ absolutely not! On the other hand is the life we most frequently live a reflection of a people resting in and living from the achievements of Jesus Christ, or do we engage life and the live of one another as if our hope is built upon something we have or can do? Do we respond to another in the same way that Christ responds to us and respond to one another’s struggles as those who do not know the same struggles on a very real level? When that is the case, by all means, then the church is filled with hypocrites.

(*the term “unchurched” refers to a person who is both not a Christian and has either never attended a church or grew up with no church background at all, distinguishing this group of people from non-Christians who have a background of having attended church or even attend a church now and have some familiarity with the Bible and the message of Jesus Christ)

-Vince Cuomo

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