If Christianity is True, Why is the Church Full of Hypocrites?

If you polled a large group of people to give a reason for why they don’t go to church, one of the most common answers would be because the church is full of hypocrites. They see professing Christians claiming one thing with their words but living in a way that seems to contradict their profession. The common picture painted is someone who quickly points their finger in judgement but is blind to their own faults. Anyone who has grown up in the church, or spent any amount of time with professing Christians, cannot deny there are grounds for this criticism. The physical church is full of hypocrites, but it is also full of genuine believers who are not yet perfect. A hypocrite is someone who claims to be something he is not. When the world sees a professing Christian unwilling to admit to his sin or inconsistencies of character, they are right to view this as hypocrisy. But there is a critical difference between someone who claims to hold certain convictions yet never applies them and someone who knows their sinful heart and claims it as the very reason they need a Savior. The true Church consists of sinners who recognize their need of forgiveness. A Christian cannot be a true Christian if he does not claim to be a sinner first.

However, if Christianity is true, then the lives of believers will show consistent, moral change. This is a standard the world has a right to hold Christians to. What the world cannot demand is perfection. The Bible teaches the doctrine of depravity. This is the truth that people are all sinners. And even after they believe in Jesus, and their sins are forgiven, they will still have remaining sin in their life. Because of these remaining pockets of sin, in a very real sense, there will still be a level of hypocrisy in every person’s life. The fight against hypocrisy and the obstacle it provides to unbelievers, is not new. Jesus despised hypocrisy. He was bold and blunt in calling it out. In Matthew 23, he compares the pharisees to ‘white-washed tombs.’ Though they had a perfectly white, unblemished exterior, they only contained dead bones and dirt on the inside. Yes, the church can be full of such people but just because someone lives in contradiction to a truth they profess, that does not invalidate or diminish the reality of that truth. When someone says Jesus is my savior, and he takes away my sins, the truthfulness of that message is not altered if they do not live in alignment with that message. Because of this, a skeptic or unbeliever needs to investigate or look at the claims on their own to see whether or not there is any truth in them. The fact that there are hypocrites in and of itself does not mean that Christianity is not true. More importantly, the truth of Christianity does not stand on the testimony of any mere man. Rather, it stands on the testimony of Jesus Christ alone. Josh McDowell writes, “Christianity does not stand or fall on the way Christians have acted throughout history or are acting today. Christianity stands or falls on the person of Jesus, and Jesus was not a hypocrite. He lived consistently with what He taught, and at the end of His life He challenged those who had lived with Him night and day, for over three years, to point out any hypocrisy in Him. His disciples were silent because there was none. Since Christianity depends on Jesus, it is incorrect to try to invalidate the Christian faith by pointing to horrible things done in the name of Christianity.” For Christians, this obstacle so many have placed in front of skeptics ought to motivate us to take our sin and testimony seriously. If the gospel is true, as we claim, then there should be real, visible transformation in our lives. The gospel should take our words and thoughts and actions captive and create a change undeniable to those around. The impact of the gospel in our lives should have real effect. If our lives have been transformed by the gospel then, rather than being a hindrance, our testimony should be seen as an evidence in favor of the truth of Christianity.