Do Better

Oct 31

What The Gospel Says About Cancel Culture

Today, our world lives in a constant state of outrage. Daily headlines swarm around the latest tweet, insensitive remark, or celebrity that’s found themselves in hot water. Angry and offended, those who are triggered demand public apologies, “canceling” anyone who no longer makes their list of morally-unblemished people. Their philosophy is simple: Offend us, and we’ll end you.

Whether or not we’re willing to admit it, the presence of “cancel culture” in our society has made this way of thinking more and more routine. As soon as the story breaks, our generation’s first inclination is to grab a pitchfork. Eager for justice, we flood the comments section or retweet the original remark with brave words like “Do better,” virtue-signaling to our followers how deeply we despise the offense.

Why don’t we just come out and say it? “I am SO much better than this person! I would never do something like that. More people should be like me.”

Maybe you’re not guilty of the sort of mob mentality our culture has perpetuated and are a little burned out by it. After all, what’s the big deal? It was just something they said. Plus, it wasn’t aimed at me. Who cares? Or, maybe you’re pitchfork-in-hand right now over whatever the latest outrage is (I can never keep up). My goal in none of this article is to condemn either way of thinking. Our society has done enough of that already.

But as my friend Matt would say, “Culture isn’t just what we create, it’s what we allow.” He often says this when speaking organizationally, but I believe it applies everywhere.

My only goal is to reveal the place that we, as young followers of Jesus, have allowed cancel culture to take us—a place FAR from the gospel—and suggest how we can create a culture that looks more like it.

But in order to do this, the gospel is where we need to look first.

Jesus and the Pharisees

Jesus spent much of His ministry in the public eye. Even though many followed Him to learn from His teachings, a group of the religious elite followed for different reasons. Matthew 15 tells the story of Jesus confronting a group of Pharisees, eager to trap Him with religious law. But as He does, the disciples begin to worry: “Do you realize you offended the Pharisees by what you just said?”

That’s right. Jesus offended people. That’s pretty far from the fair-skinned, flannel graph, lamb-holding version of Jesus many of us grew up with in Sunday school. This Jesus (the real one) doesn’t seem the least bit concerned about offending a powerful group of religious leaders—the same people who would not only cancel, but later crucify Him. Why?

Jesus didn’t choose His words based on what people wanted to hear—He spoke the kind of truth people needed to hear, no matter the cost. He says to His disciples:

“Every plant not planted by my heavenly Father will be uprooted, so ignore them. They are blind guides leading the blind, and if one blind person guides another, they will both fall into a ditch.” (‭‭Matthew‬ ‭15‬:‭13‬-‭14,‬ ‭NLT‬‬)

Translation: Jesus knew their hearts. He knew their self-righteousness, their hypocrisy. He knew how they used the law to separate people from God, all while disobeying the law themselves.

Jesus sees through the Pharisees’ act of pretending to be holier than everyone else.

He sees through it in us, too.

“But… Some People Deserve to Be Canceled! Right?”

I realize there are some of you who are probably thinking, “Okay, Connor—I get it. But surely there are some people out there who deserved to be canceled. What they said or did was wrong! There’s certain things we need to get offended about!”

Need is a strong word… but I’ll bite. Trust me, there are plenty of things in this world that will most definitely offend us. The list of things that offend me is long: prejudice, racism, sexism, ageism, road rage, swearing, gossip, lying, abuse of power, and adultery. I find ALL of these types of behaviors disgusting—you probably do, too.

But, I must admit, I’m also guilty of all of them, too. That’s right—ALL of them.

As Jesus begins His Sermon on the Mount, He tells His followers not only that those who murder are subject to judgement, but anyone who gets angry with someone is subject to judgement as well (Matthew 5:22). He speaks out against adultery, but goes even further to say that those who look at a woman lustfully have already committed adultery (Matthew 5:28).

I can’t count the number of times I’ve lost my temper with someone, or silently judged someone based on their age, race, or gender. I can’t count how many times I’ve spread rumors, lied to someone’s face, or gossiped. My eyes alone have committed adultery, probably thousands of times—so THAT box is checked.

The fact is, I’m on the exact same level as the world’s worst sinner. Maybe not in ways others have noticed, or even that I’ve noticed, but in my heart.

You know, the heart. That thing Jesus can see.

By suggesting there are people who, based on their offenses, deserve to be publicly criticized, condemned for what they’ve done, and thrown into a lake—we’re not wrong. But we’re merely fooling ourselves by adopting the notion that WE aren’t those people, or don’t deserve the same punishment.

It’s silly for me to believe Jesus carried a heavier cross to redeem someone else’s heart than He did for mine.

Holy Huddle

All of this self-reflection is well and good, but fighting against cancel-culture can be tricky. This most certainly isn’t about normalizing sin for the sake of being non-judgemental—quite the opposite. As Christians, the Bible calls us to both recognize and flee from sin (1 Corinthians 10:13, James 4:7) and even gently address it in others (Galatians 6:1, Matthew 18:15). But if we’re not careful, we’ll confuse righteousness for self-righteousness.

Every so often, I’ll find myself in what I refer to as a “holy huddle.” Basically, it’s a group of Christians who have everything in life all figured out (ironically speaking, of course).

Several years ago, a group of guys and I met for our morning Bible study. We started chatting about a friend we all knew, whose wife recently filed for divorce. He’d been unfaithful, and before we knew it, the conversation exclusively turned to us examining everywhere his marriage had gone wrong. After about fifteen minutes of venting our frustrations, there was a moment of awkward silence.

A few weeks before, our group had studied the story in John 8 of the woman caught in the act of adultery. The Pharisees drag the woman to Jesus and ask if He agrees with the law of Moses, which would essentially give them permission to stone her. But Jesus doesn’t react to the madness—He responds.

“Let any one of you who is without sin be the first to throw a stone at her.”

Our guys hadn’t had much to say about this chapter when we’d discussed it a few weeks prior. But suddenly, it was as if the Holy Spirit had spoken it to all of us individually.

Breaking the silence, one of my friends, JP, spoke up. “Guys, what do ya say we pray?”

And that’s exactly what we did. We bowed our heads and asked God to forgive our friend—and forgive us. Then, one by one, we dropped our stones.

This is where cancel culture has perhaps tricked us the most. Instead of praying for people who’ve missed the mark, we prey on them. After all, it’s easier being part of the crowd. There’s a far lower chance of someone noticing what we’re hiding.

But when one person is brave enough to think like Jesus and speak up, it breaks up a mob pretty quickly. The world needs more of that, not less. I’m grateful to have friends like JP who think more like Jesus than I do.

What We Can Do

The tenants of cancel culture unmistakably work against the message of Jesus, but as followers of Him, I believe we have a special opportunity to change that. What if the next time we saw a headline that made us angry, we dropped to our knees in prayer? What if we flooded the comments section with words like “God isn’t done with them yet” or “If Jesus can forgive me, Jesus can forgive anybody”? Call me crazy, but I think we’d start to see some stones hit the dirt.

Our generation didn’t create the idea of cancel culture—it’s been around since the Pharisees. But Jesus entered into the world and demonstrated that through Him, our failure isn’t final. As Christians, we must strive to do the same for others.

After all, culture isn’t just what you create, it’s what you allow—so let’s allow Jesus into a culture that desperately needs more of Him.