I've heard people say, "I know people who claim to be Christians but really aren't" or "Aren't you a Christian?"Regarding the latter, this is rhetorically asked because usually the one being asked is doing and/or saying something that the questioner believes a true Christian would not say and/or do. It is my desire to analyze these notions and break them down to notice their problems.
First, I'm going to write assuming the one making the comments is a nonbeliever. Believers do make these comments as well but I think they have more authority and knowledge in order to make these comments. Now, that doesn't mean one should express doubt about one's faith in this manner. It should be done more gently and privately. Plus, believers have God's Word as their authority in order to challenge an deviation from proper Christian conduct. Unbelievers have......well......I don't know what they have.
So when a nonbeliever says, "I know people who claim to be Christian but really aren't," this is quite an audacious statement. It is because no person can ever truly know who is included among God's elect. So the nonbeliever is claiming to know something that only God knows. That's pretty arrogant to me.
Another problem with nonbelievers making this statement is that they usually don't know what it even means to be a Christian. The secular world has this notion that Christians are simply people who go to church and are perfect people. The secular world certainly has other negative thoughts toqards Christians but I won't deal with that here. How does a nonbeliever rightly judge who is a Christian and who isn't? Is the one who sins not a Christian? If so, then nobody is one. Christians sin and so do non-Christians. The secular world usually judges something it has little to no knowledge about and that is precisely the case here.
Lastly, it's interesting how Christians are regarded as morally superior to all other religions. I've never heard anyone condemn a Muslim who was malicious and perverse in his speech. I've never heard anyone object to the conduct of a Pantheist when he decides to be selfish and spend money on luxury items rather than on helping those less fortunate. I have only heard the Christian condemned any time he does/says something that the non-Christian deems "un-Christian like." I already mentioned that the nonbeliever usually doesn't even understand what he's talking about regarding the faith but putting that aside, the nonbeliever judges the Christian faith to be morally superior. One could say that it's only because Christianity has been more dominant in our culture so people think they know more about it than other religions and that may be true. However, I think that even if others knew more about other religions, Christianity would still be regarded as morally superior and that is why others outside of the faith are quick to make a moral judgment upon believers even though they have no ground to make that judgment.
