Christian Pressure: Perhaps the Worst Kind

There’s something incredibly unique about growing up in a Christian environment, whether that be a home where your parents are believers, a church that preaches the Bible, a Christian school. There’s usually a steady dose of God and the Bible, a certain vocabulary that usually includes words like “saved” and “repent” and a certain pressure that can be either intentional or unintentional.

Pressure: the exertion of force upon a surface by an object, fluid, etc., in contact with it. Whoops, wrong kind of pressure. To force (someone) to a particular end; influence. Either way, you get a glimpse of what happens when there’s pressure on someone. It’s an exertion of force. Force is a negative word, unless you’re talking Star Wars of course. You might associate the word “force” with someone making someone else to do something against their will. 

I’ve observed in the Christian world, particularly the evangelical subculture, there’s often a pressure to be a certain way, to use a certain vocabulary. And it’s not necessarily an intentional pressure.

Let’s talk about a couple places where that pressure can be prevalent. By the way, this is from my perspective. I’ve learned recently that I feel lots of pressure in a few of these areas, pressure that’s not necessarily good.

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Social Media

The above video is quite poignant in its humor. I can’t count how many times I’ve seen those kind of posts on Instagram. Several times on my own, I’ve taken a picture of my quiet time layout and said something to the effect of: “I love getting in the Word outside/at Chick-fil-a/in the morning.” Those posts usually get a lot of likes and comments. And don’t get me started on the Bible verses! As the guy in the video says, “Because after all, what’s the point of having devotions if no one knows about it?”

I’m not saying that everybody who posts these kind of Instagrams/tweets/etc. has this approach. But for some, or maybe it’s just me, there’s a pressure to “like” it if 75 of my other friends have or I feel like I need to post something like that as well so 75 of my friends can “like” it too. I mean, if I don’t “like” it, am I denying that it’s truth? There’s almost a contest to be the “most holy” on Facebook. When I was younger and dating, it was making sure that people knew how awesome and godly my girlfriend was. When I got to college, I wanted to make sure I shared the most deep and thought-provoking theological truth so that people would know I was deep and thought-provoking in my theology.

Again, I don’t want to say that everyone who posts stuff like that is just trying to be super holy and get everyone to think of them that way. But there can sometimes be this unspoken pressure to be a certain way on social media so people know that you’re a Christian. Is that really the kind of pressure that we need?

The Most Popular Evangelical Conference/Book/Speaker/Musician/Retreat/Missions Trip/Internship

So what if I’m not a huge John Piper guy? What if I don’t want to watch the free livestream of the CROSS conference? What if I don’t particularly care if Hillsong releases a new CD? Does that make me not a Christian?

I’ve written about hero worship and how I think it’s a little too prevalent in the evangelical subculture, but I think it extends to more than just people. I’m talking about the posts like this on Facebook:

I probably won’t watch any of the livestream. It’s an awesome conference with an awesome message and an awesome goal, but I’m not going to go out of my way to watch it because I genuinely have no desire to. But I bet I’ll see a bunch of my friends tweeting about it and talking about it. And that’s OK! I don’t have a problem with that whatsoever. Do it! But might there be an unwarranted push from a lot of the evangelical world to push things like this into the conversation in an unnecessary way?

What good does watching a livestream under pressure do? What good does reading Jonathan Edwards do if I don’t have an open heart for it? What good does any kind of pressure in this area do? Does it change hearts? Don’t think so.

How You Pray/Study the Bible/”Do Life” with Other Believers

There’s some good to being smart with spending your time. We’re instructed in Scripture to be consuming God’s Word, praying and encouraging other Christians. But how much time you are spent doing those things is a pressure I’ve experienced.

For instance, how much time should we spend in Bible study? 5 minutes? 10 minutes? 30 minutes? An hour? I’ve heard different opinions. How should we study the Bible? Just read it? Use five commentaries? Original languages? I’ve heard different opinions. How long should we pray at a time? 10 minutes? 35 minutes? Three hours, like Martin Luther?

To be honest with you, I wonder: does it really matter? As long as we’re growing in Christ and actively pursuing obedience, I don’t think it does. The last few months, I haven’t used a commentary in my Bible reading. I haven’t cracked open Wayne Grudem’s Systematic Theology. I’ve just read Scripture and taken a couple notes in the margins of my Bible. And I’ve learned and retained a lot.

We should not be pressuring people to do the Christian life a certain way because people are different and, for the most part, the Bible doesn’t spell out how we should do it. We should just do it! Arguing over the specifics is, in the long run, not as helpful as we make it out to be.

Politics

I saw a post on my Twitter feed today about an article asking if President Obama was a Christian and examining evidence for and against the contrary. Does it matter?

Some Christians are all about the politics game nowadays, and if you don’t agree with what they say, well, are you really a Christian? If you’re not passionate about stopping same-sex marriage from becoming legal, do you trust the Bible? If you’re not all about warning the world of the dangers of diminishing religious liberty, are you really aware of current events the way you should be? If you’re not about protecting the Constitution, do you really love America?

I feel like this is more of the older generation than mine that causes this pressure, often exerted on my generation. I’ve experienced this firsthand on a couple occasions, and if I had said what I really thought, I think I might have gotten a couple sideways looks.

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Here’s my answer to the pressure: There is nothing that makes you a Christian except the fact that Jesus was perfectly obedient on your behalf and you believe in and trust Him with your life. That’s it! You could be a Democrat who thinks gay marriage is OK or never read your Bible and still be a Christian! This is true! Because being a Christian is one of those things that you are not what you do, because we will never perfectly do what we are called to do.

There’s only one requirement to not be condemned: “There is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus” (Romans 8:1). So the pressure that is often felt, whether intentional or unintentional, is not warranted.

It’s something that I’ve wrestled with a lot in the last year as I graduated from college and moved back home. Outside of the pressures of being in school, I’ve had opportunities to evaluate why I do what I do. And I’ve learned that I’ve lived under far too much pressure. You can’t really grow under that kind of pressure. There’s freedom in Christ. Live it.

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