From the Olympic games to the U.S. presidential race, and life in between, our world is brimming with controversy and hot opinions. In efforts to maintain honor to Christ’s name, I’ve seen people become hypocritically nasty. I am the kind of person who tries to see the best in people, so I think these people have their heart in the right place, but Satan is doing what Satan does and twists things around for his entertainment and glory. My biggest concern in this atmosphere is that we Christians are being poor witnesses for Christ.
So, how do we become a light for Christ in a world of sin? This is an especially difficult question when that sin is parading as light. I believe there are a few things Christian need to consider and hold closely to our hearts when interacting with non-Christians.
We can’t expect non-Christians to act like Christians.
I think that the most important thing we need to remember when interacting with our secular society is that Christians follow Christ and non-Christians do not. That might seem obvious, but hang with me, here. What does it mean to follow Christ? It means to surrender your life to Christ, to live with a repentant heart, and allow him to fill you with his Spirit. If you’re not doing that, then you are surrendered to your own wants and desires, defensive of your sin, and are filled with self. That seems harsh to say, but that’s the basic difference between a Christian and a non-Christian.
In his first letter to the Corinthians, Paul reprimands the Corinthian Christians for living as they did before they received Christ. Throughout this letter, Paul points out ways in which they are not exhibiting the fruits of being a believer and how they need to change. A big part of what was missing in the Corinthians was their awareness of the work of the Holy Spirit.
Now we have received not the spirit of the world, but the Spirit who is from God, that we might understand the things freely given us by God. And we impart this in words not taught by human wisdom but taught by the Spirit, interpreting spiritual truths to those who are spiritual. The natural person does not accept the things of the Spirit of God, for they are folly to him, and he is not able to understand them because they are spiritually discerned.
1 Corinthians 2:12-14
In this passage, Paul is telling the Corinthians that they need to surrender to the Spirit of God, but they should not expect non-Christians to do the same. Non-Christians do not have the ability to honor Christ in what they do, nor to respect Christianity, because they lack the understanding that can only come from the Holy Spirit.
So, yes, non-Christians are going to do and say things that will be offensive to Christians. They will do and say these things out of their ignorance. I think that a lot of times these uninformed actions aren’t meant to do any harm, they just don’t know better. I’m a believer in extending grace in order to win them over to Christ with our trust and good faith. That’s not to say we should excuse poor behavior, but we should be gentle in how we approach them about what they are doing and saying.
For example, the way many Christians expressed outrage over the 2024 Olympic opening ceremonies was ugly. Rather than trying to understand what the organizers were trying to do, they just slammed them and shamed them for what I believe was pure ignorance. I believe many people lost the opportunity to be a light to Christ and instead made Christianity appear to be a hateful religion rather than a gracious relationship with our Savior.
Rather than shaming the organizers for their actions, I believe Christians should have stopped and done their research to find out why the organizers put together the program that was presented. Then, in a calm and friendly manner expressed the truth. The opportunity to use this situation to share the gospel was lost by many, and I believe many thousands turned further from Christianity, because people sinned in their anger.
We must exhibit the gospel with our actions.
From arguing about the Olympic opening ceremonies, to whether a boxer should be able to compete, to which candidate one should vote for, we need to season our talk with the gospel. In fact, our speech shouldn’t be argumentative, but full of light and truth.
Walk in wisdom toward outsiders, making the best use of the time. Let your speech always be gracious, seasoned with salt, so that you may know how you ought to answer each person.
Colossians 4:5-6
Non-Christians looking on to Christians conversations should notice something different with how we approach these topics. They should see the grace and peace by which we communicate about controversial topics and want what we have. Instead, I see a lot of people proclaiming to be Christians acting just like an Non-Christian in how they speak.
We can tell people about Jesus all we want, but if our actions don’t exhibit Christ’s love and compassion, then are we really even sharing the gospel?
We should live amongst Non-Christians, but act separately from them.
It is my experience, at least amongst my friends and acquaintances, that Christians often find themselves living in a bubble along with other Christians. They have few, if any, people in their life that don’t know Jesus. Or, if they do know non-Christians, they don’t spend time with them. This is the opposite of what Jesus did.
And as Jesus reclined at table in the house, behold, many tax collectors and sinners came and were reclining with Jesus and his disciples. And when the Pharisees saw this, they said to his disciples, “Why does your teacher eat with tax collectors and sinners?” But when he heard it, he said, “Those who are well have no need of a physician, but those who are sick. Go and learn what this means: ‘I desire mercy, and not sacrifice.’ For I came not to call the righteous, but sinners.”
Matthew 9:10-13
Jesus sought out sinners and spent time with them. But be careful how you read this verse! He didn’t excuse their behavior, but rather invested in them to see them repent and turn to God. He saw them as sick and he wanted them to become well. God doesn’t want us to spend time with non-Christians so we can be like them, but that we would be a positive influence on their lives.
Do not be unequally yoked with unbelievers. For what partnership has righteousness with lawlessness? Or what fellowship has light with darkness?
2 Corinthians 6:14
Jesus wants us to show the world the dramatic change God has done in our lives in the way we walk and talk. He wants people to see in us that what we once were and what we are now are different. We don’t go on to live as we did before we met Christ in order to bring others to him. No! He wants our life to be a living testimony of his grace.
Now this I say and testify in the Lord, that you must no longer walk as the Gentiles do, in the futility of their minds. They are darkened in their understanding, alienated from the life of God because of the ignorance that is in them, due to their hardness of heart. They have become callous and have given themselves up to sensuality, greedy to practice every kind of impurity. But that is not the way you learned Christ!—assuming that you have heard about him and were taught in him, as the truth is in Jesus, to put off your old self, which belongs to your former manner of life and is corrupt through deceitful desires, and to be renewed in the spirit of your minds, and to put on the new self, created after the likeness of God in true righteousness and holiness.
Ephesians 4:17-24
We should be kind even when others are being unkind.
Jesus never shamed unbelievers into believing in him. He never attacked their character or their choice to sin, though he did point it out, and quite bluntly in the case of the Pharisees. He always treated people with kindness and compassion, even when pointing out their sin and speaking truth to them. He always did so with love. This is opposite of how I’m seeing a lot of Christians talk about non-Christians and even each other. Just look at how people are approaching this year’s presidential race. I don’t see Christians acting any better than non-Christians. They are making fun of the other party’s candidates and speaking ill of them in a distasteful manner. If you really want people to consider your point of view, why not use love and compassion to show how your candidate is a better choice?
Gotquestions.org has a great article about how Jesus handled non-Christians. It says,
Jesus was kind, even when people didn’t understand Him. The people were perpetually confused about who Jesus was and why He was in their midst. Yet Mark 6:34 records that, when He “saw a large crowd, he had compassion on them, because they were like sheep without a shepherd. So he began teaching them many things.” The arrogant challenged Him; He responded with kindness (Luke 10:25–26). The needy drained Him; He responded with kindness (Luke 8:43–48). Roman soldiers and religious zealots killed Him; He responded with kindness (Luke 23:34).
Jesus was prepared to be misunderstood, so He could have patience and kindness with non-Christians as He explained how to have a relationship with God. We need to remember that as His followers we, too, will be misunderstood. Jesus warned us, “If the world hates you, you know that it has hated Me before it hated you” (John 15:18). Even when hated or misunderstood, we should always respond with kindness.
What it comes down to is a rule of life that even non-Christians often agree everyone should live by. We need to treat everyone like we want to be treated as commanded to us by Jesus in Matthew 22:34-40. Instead of focusing on the wrong other people are doing, we should focus on how Jesus might respond to them.
I’d be remiss to omit a word about the scene in the temple where Jesus flipped tables on the religious people (John 2:14–17; Matthew 21:12–13; Mark 11:15–17; Luke 19:45–46). Especially concerning the Olympic opening ceremonies, I have seen a lot of people say that we need to flip tables over this incident. Not true. There are a few reasons why we shouldn’t be “flipping tables.” For one, Jesus’s anger was purely righteous and we are incapable of being purely righteous. We also have to consider that Jesus took time out of his day to contemplate what was happening at the temple while making a whip. More often than not, we let our anger out immediately when we see a problem. Also, Jesus’s actions were towards religious people, not Gentiles. When I hear people say they are “flipping tables” on a situation, most of the time it’s over something an Non-Christian did, not the religious. There are a lot of good articles on this topic if you search online. If you ever feel like flipping a table, I recommend you “make your whip” by reading up on this topic first.
First and foremost, be a light for Christ
When responding to the hot topics of today, more than anything else, I want you to be burdened for the lost. When you feel yourself becoming angry, stop and pray and get into the Word. Consider the repercussions of people getting turned off from the gospel because of how you are reacting to a situation. Hell is a real place and the reality is that most people will end up there.
“Enter by the narrow gate; for wide is the gate and broad is the way that leads to destruction, and there are many who go in by it. Because narrow is the gate and difficult is the way which leads to life, and there are few who find it.”
Matthew 7:13-14
How you act and what you say can be the difference of someone drawing closer to Christ and being pushed further away. My heart goes out to our presidential candidates who are clearly lost. My heart brakes for the people responsible for the grotesque opening ceremonies. I feel crushed because of the way the Algerian boxer Imane Khelif has been treated regardless of whether or not she should be competing against women. The way people are acting towards these people is appalling and they, as well as people observing the situations, are being turned off from the savior of the world.
I challenge you to consider whether you are being a light for Christ? Are you taking the opportunity of these and other hot topics to stand apart from non-Christians in how you are responding? Do you need to apologize to anyone for how you have reacted? What can you do today to be a light for Christ in this fallen world?
Bethany Marinelli is an author and speaker out of Orlando, Florida. She also supports her husband, Andrew, in his auto repair business and homeschools her son, Arthur.
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