Why Do People Not Like Us?

Check out this survey—the horizontal bars measure the percentage of people with a positive view of churches, Jesus, evangelicals, and other artifacts of modern Christianity in America.

 

The 3 demographic groups are “Christians”, “Other Faiths”, and “No Faith”. The green top bar in each category is the total. 

How does that strike you?

As an Enneagram 5, of course I wanted more info, raw data, sampling details, and more investigation. But my visceral, non-surprised reaction was, “Totally makes sense.”

I’m someone who made a cognizant decision in my twenties to follow Jesus during the throes of the Jesus/charismatic movement that swept across the U.S. in the 1970s. Seen the Jesus Revolution movie?—that’s the picture. Jesus radically changed my life and I still love and follow him today.

Anyway, the survey raises the obvious question: why do people not like us?

In my early evangelical days, I probably would have chalked it up to some mild form of persecution. After all, didn’t Jesus himself say, “You will be hated by everyone because of me”?

Problem with that is: apparently most people like Jesus. At least from a P.R. perspective.

In my younger years, I have to admit there was nothing appealing to me about Christianity, at least how I understood it. As a counter-culture bar musician who protested the Vietnam war, allied with the civil rights movement, and deeply disliked Nixon, I couldn’t understand why church people seemed to be the first ones to rally for war, segregate their churches, slap “America: Love It or Leave It” stickers on their cars, and play bad music. And what was their problem with long hair...like mine? Church people seemed mean, judgmental, weirdly patriotic, and racist to me.

And then I began to bump into people who looked like me but claimed their lives were changed by following Jesus. I was stunned. So when I read the New Testament for the first time, I was shocked by the Jesus I encountered there. Plus, it seemed like he didn’t like religious people either. Or at least the ones who made it harder for people like me—a full-time, professional screw-up—to join their club.

But if he was the president of it, then I wanted in.

So here’s my simplistic solution for this PR problem. And leaders, this falls on us:

Let’s listen more than we talk.

And when we talk, let’s talk about Jesus.

Let’s tell stories about him.

Even better, let’s behave like him.

Let’s choose serving over power.

Let’s pray for someone before judging.

Let’s pick the seat in the last row.

Let’s love the marginalized and those on the edges.

Yeah, that love-thing.

Let’s lean into that. 

Dave Workman | The Elemental Group

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