Philip Yancey's Understanding of Grace is Not Amazing

Well, I had a topic for a new post ready to go, had it half-written in my mind already, and then this interview with Philip Yancey showed on my Facebook timeline.  I feel the need to respond to Yancey’s statements.

Yancey’s basic premise is this - People loved Jesus and hate Christians. We need to change what we’re saying and doing so people will like us the same way they liked Jesus.

Sadly, Yancey is either willfully or ignorantly misrepresenting the Biblical and historical record of Jesus’ life and the attitude the world has displayed towards Christians since.  

Those people who loved Jesus so much?  Eventually they yelled, “Crucify him!” and spit in his face as he was being beaten, forced to wear a crown of thorns, forced to carry his own cross, and then crucified - one the most shameful and excruciatingly painful forms of execution this sin-cursed world has ever come up with.  In fact, the word excruciating originates from crucifixion.  

Jesus’ followers?  Stephen was stoned (Acts 7) and James was killed with the sword (Acts 12).  Throughout the book of Acts the first Christians were beaten, imprisoned, and chased out town after town under the threat of death.  History says that all of Jesus’ disciples were martyred with exception of John, who died in exile after surviving being burned in oil.  Nero used Christians as human torches to light his garden.  Other early Christians were fed to lions as a spectator sport.  When Roman Catholicism, and its perversions of the gospel, became the dominant force in Europe those who dared to preach the true gospel were put to death by the Roman Catholic Church.  

This is the history of Jesus and his followers.

Before I go any farther I need to say, yes, absolutely, there are professing Christians who make a mockery of the gospel preaching a hate-filled message of moralism, and some mis-guided Christians who think that enforcing Christian morality on unbelievers is what God desires.  I believe those people actually represent a very small percentage of American Christianity, but receive a disproportionate percentage of attention. That said, let’s examine some of Yancey’s quotes.

When you interview non-Christians and just ask them, “Tell me about Christians,” they use words like judgmental, self-righteous, hypocritical and then a lot of ‘anti’ words: “They’re anti-science, they’re anti-gay, they’re anti-abortion, they’re probably anti-sex.”

Do you know why unbelievers feel this way about Christians?  Because they hate the truth.  They worship the gods of science, sexual liberation, and freedom - and when we tell them what the true God says they hate it and hate us.  What does God’s word say about humanity apart from Christ, those who know the truth but deny it? The Apostle Paul tells us in Romans 1:18-32. I’ve included verses 28-32 below.

And since they did not see fit to acknowledge God, God gave them up to a debased mind to do what ought not to be done. They were filled with all manner of unrighteousness, evil, covetousness, malice. They are full of envy, murder, strife, deceit, maliciousness. They are gossips, slanderers, haters of God, insolent, haughty, boastful, inventors of evil, disobedient to parents, foolish, faithless, heartless, ruthless. Though they know God’s righteous decree that those who practice such things deserve to die, they not only do them but give approval to those who practice them. 

These are the people Yancey is worried about not liking Christians.  Why?

Yancey also identifies three types of Christians he thinks unrepentant sinners like: activists, artists, and pilgrims.  What follows will be his quotes and my responses.

Activists, those are the people who reach out with acts of mercy. It touches people’s hearts. And then they’re open to the message. I can travel to places and I can see the long-term effect of Christians who never talk about their faith, yet they’re reaching out with acts of mercy. They’re affecting people’s hearts, and eventually those people want to know, “Why are you doing this?”

So basically, Yancey wants Christians who show love but don’t speak love.  He wants Christians who will give a hungry man a piece of bread and send him on his way without warning him that he will one day stand before a righteous and holy God who harbors righteous wrath towards all sinners.  He wants us to send that man on his way with a full stomach and no knowledge of the fact that repentance of forgiveness of sins through faith in Jesus Christ is the only way to be spared of the wrath to come.  The world loved Jesus when he had dinner with tax collectors and prostitutes.  The world crucified Jesus when he claimed to be God and called them to repent of their sins.  They will love us as long we keep our mouths shut and serve the poor, needy, and oppressed as well.  The minute we open our mouths and proclaim the gospel of Jesus Christ, they will turn on us just as they turned on Jesus.  

Artists are also effective. Art sneaks in at a subconscious level. The Church historically was the great patron of the arts, and now, some churches are, some churches aren’t. Artists are hard to control, and yet, they are effective in communicating the Gospel to a society that is resistant to it.

I find this the least objectionable of the three, but the statement is still problematic.  For one, the gospel cannot be communicated without words.  It simply can’t.  Paul said in Romans 10:17, “So faith comes from hearing, and hearing through the word of Christ.”  We can hint at the gospel with non-verbal art, but we cannot call people to repentance and trust in Christ without, you know, calling them to repent and trust in Christ.  And when it comes to verbal art, no artist who explicitly communicates the gospel - telling people that they’ve sinned against a righteous and holy God and must humble themselves, repent, and trust in Christ for the forgiveness of their sins - is going be accepted in the mainstream of society.  

I love Lecrae’s music and I don’t have a problem with him making art that doesn’t contain an explicit gospel proclamation in every song.  No Christian would be angry at a businessman for not preaching Christ in every business meeting or a teacher for not preaching the gospel in every class.  And while it’s possible that someone will become interested in Christianity through Lecrae’s music, they cannot become a Christian without hearing and responding to a clear proclamation of the gospel.  The same is true for any form of Christian art.  

And the last phrase I use is pilgrims. We can say, “Look, we’re just traveling along the same road you do, but we know something about the destination, and this is how it has helped our lives,” instead of, “We’re on the inside, you’re on the outside. You’re no good. You’re going to hell.”

If you look at Jesus’ stories, He talks about lost people, lost coins, lost sheep, the lost son. I’ve started looking at people as lost. There are many people who are just wandering around, not knowing why they’re here, how to live, what decisions they should make. And as pilgrims on the same road, we can say, “Here are some clues we’ve learned that may help.”

These two paragraphs are extremely troubling.  These statements cause me to question whether Philip Yancey knows the gospel at all.  Christians are not on the same road as unbelievers.  Jesus himself said this!  “Enter by the narrow gate. For the gate is wide and the way is easy that leads to destruction, and those who enter by it are many. For the gate is narrow and the way is hard that leads to life, and those who find it are few” (Matthew 7:13-14). 

From Genesis to Revelation the Bible is full of insider and outsider language.  The Bible repeatedly and explicitly says that apart from Christ people are no good.  Paul in Romans 3:9-18, quoting from Psalms 14 and 53:

 What then? Are we Jews any better off? No, not at all. For we have already charged that all, both Jews and Greeks, are under sin, as it is written: 

“None is righteous, no, not one; 

  no one understands; 

no one seeks for God. 

All have turned aside; together they have become worthless; 

no one does good, 

not even one.” 

“Their throat is an open grave; 

they use their tongues to deceive.” 

“The venom of asps is under their lips.” 

  “Their mouth is full of curses and bitterness.” 

  “Their feet are swift to shed blood; 

  in their paths are ruin and misery, 

  and the way of peace they have not known.” 

  “There is no fear of God before their eyes.” 

Isaiah 53:6a - “All we like sheep have gone astray; we have turned - every one - to his own way.”

Mr. Yancey seems to not understand much of what the Bible says at all.  It appears that, like so many, he has selectively picked a few stories about Jesus that he likes and ignored everything that doesn’t fit with who he wants God to be.  

The message of the Bible is not that people are good, having only made a few mistakes along the way.  The message of the Bible is that because of the sin nature we were all born with we hate God with all our being.  We despise our Creator and wish him dead.  When he came to earth and dwelt among us we did kill him.

But it was in the act of sacrifice that the true love of God was displayed.  God’s holy wrath, perfect justice, and amazing grace all on display on a bloody cross, and three days later and empty tomb.  The second part of Isaiah 53:6 is this, “And the Lord has laid on him the iniquity of us all.” Someone had to die.  The penalty for sins had to be paid.  Rather than leaving us in our sins, helpless and hopeless, God sent his Son Jesus to die in our place.  He bore the wrath of God towards sinners, allowing God to show mercy while remaining just.  Anyone who repents of their and believes the good news of Jesus will be saved.

But people cannot come to Christ in faith if we don’t first tell them who they are apart from Christ.  As much as we would like to, there’s no way to make that less offensive.  

It would be a failure of love to tell someone that they’re a sinner and not give them the hope of the gospel.  It is equally a failure of love to tell someone that God loves them without telling the the truth about their own sinfulness.  As loving as Philip Yancey sounds when he speaks, he is actually demonstrating hatred towards his neighbors in refusing to tell them the truth about their standing before God.