#STRask - “Christians Care More About Ideology than People”

Episode Date: October 13, 2025

Questions about how to respond to the critique that Christians care more about ideology than people, and whether we have freedom in America because Christians are more civilized or because the Constitution doesn’t allow Christians to enforce their laws.   Can you respond to the critique that Christians care more about ideology than people? Do you think we enjoy freedom in America because Christians are more civilized or because the Constitution doesn’t allow Christians to enforce laws like in Saudi Arabia?

Welcome to the hashtag SDRask podcast from Stan to Reason. I'm Amy Hall, and I'm here with Greg Kokel. Hello, Greg. Hey, Amy. And we're going to start off today, Greg, with a question from Lucy. Okay. Can you respond to the critique that Christians care more about ideology? than people.

Pardon the little sad chuckle. This is a person who raises this objection that is not paying attention. Now, I'm just saying this kind of a little more forcefully for our purposes here than I would address it with that individual. I'm going to ask the question, the opening Colombo question, essentially what do you mean by that? by, I'm not sure what you're getting at. Tell me more, all right? And the reason I ask that is because, and I don't know who she's engaged with, but the heart of our whole enterprise is to communicate a message of salvation.

Just think of somebody, for example, who's got a podcast about, I don't know, holistic food or something like that, or diet so that you wouldn't get sick or you, this or that. I mean, all kind of these things out there. And when they're offering all these recommendations that will help people live more healthy lives and more satisfying lives, therefore, somebody charges them, oh, you just want to be on YouTube. Only the basis for that kind of claim is what I'm thinking. You just want to be on YouTube.

Well, and by the way, even if that was, was a legitimate charge against that individual, who cares? What does it matter what their motive is? I mean, it matters before God, and that's not so virtuous if all they want to do be on YouTube. But if they're giving good information, that's really helping people, then that changes everything. And in fact, Paul encountered this circumstance. When he encountered this in Philippians, he's in jail, and there are other people broadly in the body of Christ that are making personal, you know, what, benefit, taking personal benefit from that, preaching the gospel out of bad motives, essentially. And he says, what then? Well, whether in pretense

or in truth, regardless of the motives, the gospel gets preached. Okay. So this is an ad homonym. In other it's an attack on the person. And sometimes in this circumstance, and I have done this recently in the last week, in fact, I simply said, so what? So what? Is your concern to sully, or at least point out what you think is the sullied character of the Christian, or is your concern to show that the message with whatever motives it's delivered with, the message itself is false? If you think the message is false, then it doesn't matter what the person's motives are. If you think the message might be true, it doesn't matter what the person's motives are. It's irrelevant. And so for Lucy's sake here, that's the question I would ask. That kind of a so what. Now, I would like to hear

more detail on this because I don't, I think there are circumstances where, people who are involved in apologetics, and we warn folks about this, get some tools that are powerful, even tactical tools, and then are using them with a little bit of a wrong attitude. We want to win. And the dynamic of interactive shows, ideologically interactive shows is who gets to draw first blood? They are gladiator events. And this is not our approach stand to reason at all. And we encourage other people not to think of it that way. By the way, when you think of these events as gladiator events, you are opening yourself up to harm in the discussion. Because if that's your view, what happens when the other side draws first blood

against you? Then you look really bad. If you issue that approach, if you avoid that approach, you see, I'm not going on that. I'm taking a different approach. a much more amicable and ambassadorial approach, you don't leave yourself open in the same way to getting shut down, all right? So, look, I agree sometimes you've got apologetics types that do that, and we weren't against that. Yet with gentleness and reverence, that's what Peter says in First Peter three, when we make a defense.

It's hard for me to imagine that people would draw the conclusion from those who are witnessing to them that they're more interested in theology. And part of the irony is there's a lot of Christians don't have much theology, even though they seem to be faithful witnesses for Christ. They're getting the basics out great, but it isn't like their theology is that deep. Well, they're not even using the word theology here. It's ideology. So I think it goes – it's more disparaging than that, I think. Okay, well, thanks for the clarification on that. Well, it doesn't really change the point significantly, because what is the nature of the ideology? You're in trouble with God, and God is offering a free pardoned. Take it or leave it. Either Jesus pays or you pay, all right? All of us are in the same boat. It's a tough spot to be when you have a good and holy God. Is God good? Yeah, that's the problem. He's not just good. He's morally perfect. Okay, now what? What for us? We have good news. Ewangelian. It's the good news. It's the gospel. All right. And so this is why I want to draw somebody out, and maybe Lucy, you can think about this, drawing the person out to get a real clear characterization. You, because most Christians are not looking for a fight, except for some rare ones, you know, especially if they're more apologetics, they're not looking.

looking for a fight. In fact, they're sitting on the bench because they're afraid of getting in a fight. All right. And many times when they step out ideologically, like we train them to do, they're doing so with fear and trembling. So it isn't like I'm going to, you know, preach my ideology because that's what I'm really committed to. No, they're committed to Jesus and communicating the message of salvation that everyone needs to hear as best they can for the sake of the listener. Yes, ideology is absolutely critical. We're not just giving our experience. We're not just saying, hey, it turns me on, maybe it'll turn you on too. Give it a shot. That's not our message. We're talking about truth, or as Francis Schaefer used to say,

unfortunately, with this qualifier, true, truth, the way the world actually is. True, the way gravity is. That's what we're talking about here. And so, yes, there's an ideological component, but what's so ironic to me is that actually, not just to do it too coquay, like a U-2, but it's just an observation. That's what the other side seems to do, be more interested in, winning with their ideology, okay? And all right, I don't fault them for that. I'm not going to go after them because they're ideological.

I'm going to go back after them for the ideology, which is false and hurting people or is keeping them from the salvation that can only be obtained through Jesus. I think you hit on a really important point just now, Greg. And that is, you said, we're not just doing what we think feels good. Because I suspect after you start asking questions, what do you mean by that? we care about ideology more than people, I think what you might come to is that our culture has completely lost the idea of the need to conform yourself to truth. So especially when it comes to religion, I think more when it comes to religion than other things. The idea is that

everyone has their own ideas and we should all respect that and don't bother anybody about what they believe. And what they're missing is that truth is, central to our message. If Christianity is true, isn't true, then no matter how it makes me feel, it means nothing. I mean, that's what Paul says in 1st Corinthians 15, right? If Jesus wasn't raised from the dead, then none of this is true. None of this is real. Well, he was a little harsher than that. We have all people should be pitied is what he said, but that's the point. And your faith is useless, he says, because it's all dependent on whether or not it's true. And because it's true and because we are required, as human beings, made in the image of God, to conform ourselves to

truth and our ideas to truth, we can't just change our ideas based on how other people feel about them or what if they like them or whatever it is. So I think that's part of what's going on here. We are beholden to truth. We are, truth is good. Truth is beautiful. And we ought to believe it, and that's our motivation. So what's behind that is the complaint that you're not approving of what I'm doing. So therefore, you don't care about me. Well, and this is, this was going to be my next point. I suspect that at least some of this objection that we care more about ideology than people

comes from the culture's idea of what it means to care for people. So if they think caring for people involves other ideas, then they're going to think we care more about our ideology. But we're not willing to bend the truth to make people feel better. But what if Christian ideology is the best way to care for people? So it's not that we're putting our ideology above people. It's that we actually think this is the best way to care for people. And if this is the truth about the best way to live, then this is what? we should be telling people because we actually care about them. We don't just want to make them feel

good. We want to do good for them. And this is what Paul. Paul explains that the law is meant to show us how to care for people. And this comes from Romans 13, 8 through 10. Oh, nothing to anyone except to love one another for he who loves his neighbor has fulfilled the law. And a lot of people think that means, oh, well, then love should supersede the law. So, but that's not what Paul's saying. He's actually saying the law enables us to love, because this is what he says next. For this, you shall not commit adultery. You shall not murder. You shall not steal.

You shall not covet. And if there is any other commandment, it is summed up in this saying, you shall love your neighbor as yourself. Love does no wrong to a neighbor. Therefore, love is the fulfillment of the law. Not that it takes the place of the law, but that the law defines what love is. Excellent. So if our ideology tells us the truth. truth about the best way to live and the truth about sin and the truth about God and the truth about

the gospel, then we ought to care about it as the means of caring for people. And if we ignore any of these things, we're not actually caring for people. We're just giving them some reason to feel good about themselves for a time that's actually going to hurt them. A bromide, you know, just a little like Karl Marx put it, the opiate of the people. the drug you take to make you feel better. That's religion, in his view. So I think people just misunderstand the claim that we're making and why we think the way we do. So hopefully you can help them understand that Christians think that Christianity is actually true and is actually the way to love people. It's like I started out with an analogy of health, you know, physical health, doctors, diet and stuff like.

that. And there are all kinds of things that a doctor is going to tell a person who is not healthy to do. The person does not want to do. Okay. And even my own little workout routine, I do not look forward to it. And I'm not as consistent as I should be. But I have to keep reminding myself, well, this is for my long-term good, for my health and enjoyment of life and my capability of continuing to fulfill my purpose before God in the places that he's given me to serve. And that's not fun. All discipline for the moment.

Now, this different type of discipline, you know, what God disciplines us. It's not joyful, but sorrowful. That's Romans 12. But I'm sorry, Hebrews 12. But the same thing applies. And this is where, and it wasn't so clear to me when we started talking about this, I just want to emphasize it because it's such a critical point of conflict with the culture. And listening to you kind of brought it, you know, into focus for me.

The reason that Christians are not considered to be caring about people is because we are not going to affirm whatever the person wants to do for themselves that they think will make them happy. This is the individualism. Expressive individualism. Expressive individualism. my authentic self is still about whatever I think for myself right now. And if you don't affirm that, for whatever reason, then you're erasing me. That's the term they use. You're erasing me.

And you care more than about your ideological views that end up erasing me than you care about me. But caring is always characterized in terms of affirming what may be terribly damaging to them. And, of course, time will tell. A time does tell. It doesn't show it immediately. But down the line, we see the destruction of these ideas in people's lives. Well, let's go on to a question from Angie. Do you think we enjoy freedom in America because Christians are more civilized or because our Constitution doesn't allow Christians to enforce laws like in Saudi Arabia?

I think this question puts the cartpillar. before the horse. The Constitution itself, which governs our behavior and secures our liberties, is grounded in the Christian worldview. It is grounded in that. It is an expression of that. And one of the things about Western culture in general is the unique emphasis on individual value and individual personal rights, not the collective. Marxism is collective. It's the collectivism. The individual is expendable for the collective.

And, of course, when you have totalitarian governments, they get to decide what the collective looks like. And if you're not in step with that, you're gone. All right. But in the West, characteristically, this is changing a bit. This is part of the concern with many cultural observers, like Douglas Murray, for example, as they look at what's happening in the culture. He's an atheist, you know, but he's, I guess, doesn't he kind of call himself a Christian atheist? Because the things he values are completely consistent with the Christian worldview, which grounds Western civilization, then with the atheism, which doesn't, where atheism reigns, I'm sorry, where communist, where atheism reigns, and especially in communist countries, he realized this is awful what happens to people. And so he's kind of in the midst of a, you know, a conflict, you know, inside himself.

But I'm just making the point. He's a cultural observer. I think Thomas Holland has made the same point, a historian, that this is a cultural thing based on the absorption of Christian values and Christian worldview into Western society, which then resulted in what we call the American experiment expressed in the Constitution. You don't have that in Muslim countries. They're stuck in the 8th and 9th century, you know. Muhammad died 75 years born 632 is when he died. So, you know, they're stuck in the 7th century with all of that. When you think of Sharia law, I don't mean every Muslim, but those who are what might be called fundamentalists,

and I'm not using the term pejoratively. They follow the leader and they follow the book, you know. That's what they mean by fundamentals. They're stuck in the 7th century in all of its ignominious habits. So I think that's at the heart of this. I know you have more to say about it, but that's my first thought. You've already said a lot of what I was going to say, Greg, the idea that our Constitution doesn't allow Christians to enforce laws like in Saudi Arabia.

Well, Christians have never wanted to enforce the laws of Saudi Arabia. This is the difference. The laws themselves are different that we want to enforce. Those just aren't Christian laws. And as you pointed out, when we look at the West, we see what the morality of Christianity has created. And the Constitution, as you noted, came out of biblical legal principles and worldview. And of course, we do want to enforce those laws, but those laws have, those are what have given us our freedoms and our protections. and ensured our rights, our God-given rights. So these are the laws that were created by a Christian worldview. And these are laws that respect the dignity of human beings and principles of justice and have the idea that no one's above the law and insure property rights. And all of these different things, these all came out of the Christian worldview. And I think people forget that and they start to see Christians as separate when that's just, that's not how things developed here.

And I think also maybe some people will start to get concerned because they think, oh, we would want to enforce the Mosaic law and the punishments and the covenant of the Mosaic law. But if you look at Romans 7, it explains how when we died with Christ, we died to the Mosaic covenant, to the Mosaic law. We're raised with Christ. We're in a new covenant. those laws can teach us a lot about what is good and what is right, but the actual exact punishments and not all the laws have to do with an overall universal type thing. So it wouldn't apply to now. Of course, any objective morality that's reflected in those laws, and we learn a lot about

who God is from those laws, that still applies because our whole job now is to become like Christ. And we know who he is by looking at the laws that reflect those, the different aspects of morality, of justice, of all these things that God revealed about himself. But we are not under those laws. So there's no danger that we're going to put those laws into our laws in this nation. And we haven't done it yet. So why would we do it now? That's, I just, I don't know. Well, on this broader issue for Angie and anyone else, I think what will be helpful to them, because this has to do with a political outlook and the political grounding of our country and what follows from that. Just read the declaration, okay?

The declaration is an argument, a carefully reasoned argument to justify the revolution. And at its core, the central feature piece is the part that most people, many people remember. When I was a kid, I had to memorize it, all right, we hold these truths to be self-evident that all men are created equal, that each is endowed by his creator with certain unalienable rights, life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. And happiness, they meant some of the very particular and not just pleasure the way it's read now. And so that piece, and then go to the Constitution and read the. preamble, which I also had to memorize when I was in public school. And in that, it explains we the people of the United States in order to what, now the words, form a perfect union. And then it gives a list of things that it's trying to accomplish. And one of them is provide for

the common welfare, okay? Don't read 21st century concepts into the word welfare for the common good for everybody. Notice that nothing there is itself theological, if you think of it in sectarian theological terms, but it is grounded in a theological notion that's expressed in the declaration about the dignity and value of all human beings under God. You take God out, you take with the consequence of God, the entailment, that if you're not created by God, then you're not equal. You know, there's nothing equal about us at all.

all. Look at any feature. Christianity sees the equality and the scriptures do, and the founders did, in the fact that humans, quah human, in their human nature, their self, their soul. There was something grand that God accomplished, that gave them, that placed them in a circumstance of having rights. And then the Constitution, the preamble explains what the Constitution is meant to accomplish broadly. And you're not going to. going to get any Sharia stuff out of that. You're not going to get, you're not going to get, what's the word now that they're using about, you know, essentially making this a Christian nation in the pejorative sense. Christian nationalism. Yeah, thank you. Christian nationalism and all that.

You're just not going to get that. So you're not going to get that from those founding documents. But those are the things that we always go back to. I do. And the rest of us ought to, to secure what, liberty for ourselves and our posterity. I think it's the last phrase of that. of that preamble. So take a look at those. Well, thank you so much. Angie and Lucy, we appreciate hearing from you. If you have a question, send it to us on X with the hashtag STRask, or you can go to our website at STR.org. All you have to do is look for our hashtag STR Ask page, and you'll find a link there to send us your question. We really do look forward to hearing from you. This is Amy Hall and Greg Coco for Stand to Reason. Thank you.