Bad actors have abused their power, distorted the gospel, and alienated people throughout history while claiming to speak for God and the church.
Some believe that these shady personalities are harming Christianity and hastening what seems to be its inevitable collapse in America. Should Christians tremble in light of this and search desperately for better public relations specialists to help market Christianity?
In a recent piece, New York Times writer Jessica Grose quoted Phil Zuckerman, a professor at Pitzer College who researches atheism and secularity, who said, “Christianity’s got a branding problem.” Grose, who admitted that she “never really thought of religions as brands” before her current reporting series dug into the reasons why some no longer wish to be associated with Christianity,
7,500 people responded to the survey, and hundreds of them cited the “political drift of their churches” as the main cause of their disassociation. According to Grose’s findings, the advent of Donald Trump and the white evangelical church’s support for this conservative demigod are partially to blame for the growth of an anti-Christian attitude.
This idea appears to be supported by trends like the increase in “nones, a catchall word for agnostics, atheists, and nonreligious people. The nones have increased from 2 percent of the population in the 1950s to somewhere between 20 and 30 percent of the population now, according to Gallup’s tracking of the drop in religious zeal.
Does this mean Christianity will fade away in the absence of better branding and PR?
To answer this question, let us recall the words of a first-century rabbi, Gameliel, a respected expert in religious law (See Acts 5:34–39). In his message to the Jewish Sanhedrin, Gamaliel referenced a man named Theudas who once pretended to be someone great. Though Theudas managed to amass a loyal following of 400, after he was killed, his followers scattered, and his movement died out with him.
Gamaliel told Christianity’s skeptics that if the movement had no divine origin, it would soon be overthrown. “But if it is from God,” added Gamaliel, “you will not be able to overthrow them.”
The point is that Christianity, the world’s largest and most widespread religion, which has been around since the 1st century, has stood the test of time. It has survived the crucifixion of Jesus, the persecution of His followers, the sinful actions of leaders, political propaganda, and numerous cultural shifts.
Worrying about the future of Christianity is unnecessary, despite the fact that human nature leads us to perceive spiritual topics from a natural perspective and makes us worry about them. Scripture does instruct us as Christ’s representatives to strive to uphold the principles of the faith, but if we fail to do so, Christianity will not be endangered.
Human shortcomings and unfaithfulness pose no threat to the existence of the God who created the heavens and the earth, overcame death, and continues to rule over everything. What if some were disloyal? Romans 3:3 Will God’s faithfulness be rendered invalid by their infidelity?
What if some people don’t reflect God well? Will that make God’s perfection invalid?
Not at all.